First Salon

Sunday we presented a salon at Oak's house in the Mission. "We" being ICT, Independent Craft Teachers, a small group of seasoned Reclaiming priestesses who also happen to be Feri, although it's the Reclaiming part we're concerned with in these salons. Well, not the last one, which I was unable to attend.

We had a goodly group of 17 people total, including Oak, Anne, Thorn, Medusa, Fern and me. I was especially pleased that my pals Urania and Denise could make it. Most of the others I hadn't met before, as it seems they're more recently part of the larger community and since I've not been teaching for several years, I've only had rare occasions to meet newer folks.

We started with a round of who we were vis-a-vis Reclaiming. We spanned from a few months to nearly 30 years (me).

People said they had a great time and really enjoyed the conversation. The organizers in particular were pleased with how it unfolded.

One of my favorite things to do is talk with Pagans about Paganism and Pagandom. I seem to have a huge appetite for that kind of discussion. I feel strongly that it's up to us as Pagans, as an NRM (new religious movement), to define ourselves. If we don't do it, then journalists and reporters and sociologists will. So when I can get such an opportunity, I jump for it. That's one of the reasons I just love the annual CCPS and PantheaCon and Pagan festivals.

Maybe I'm getting jaded, but it seems to me that we Pagans keep having the same conversations over and over and over again. Or maybe it's just that I have so many of them that they seem to be the same. I was jotting notes on topics people mentioned during the first round that I had something to say about. Of course, this was a salon, not a lecture by Macha, so I behaved myself and didn't hog all the discussion time. But I sure wanted to. I was bursting with things to say, opinions, reflections, anecdotes, bits of lore, word meanings and connotations.

Guess I should jump on this and ride it.

Fern and Oak offer their happy experiences.

By way of notes, I took this photo of the whiteboard with ideas, words, connections.

Interfaith Retreat Day

On Monday Patrick and I attended a day-long retreat sponsored on a quarterly basis by the Marin Interfaith Council and held at beautiful Santa Sabina Center here in San Rafael.

There were two teachers. One was Rabbi Lavey Derby from Congregation Kol Shofar in Tiburon a sixth-generation direct descendent of noted Chassidic Rabbi Levi Yitzhak of Berditche. The other was the Rev. Carol Saysette, a graduate of PSR and retired UCC minister who presently teaches at Lloyd Center of San Francisco Theological Seminary in San Anselmo, about four miles from here.

Lavey began "We are all in Egypt," which I take to mean that we are looking to be somewhere else, we are in the dark, we don't feel at home, we are seekers. He spoke of the Hebrew word shalom, which he says means "coming to a place of wholeness, a place of redemption, an end to suffering, a life of heart." I had thought it meant simply "peace," like salem and salaam; I guess the meanings are concordant. He mentioned that the Yiddish word, now common in American English, kvetch (one of my favorites) literally means to "squeeze through."

When Carol spoke, she added that Gethsemane, the garden where Jesus went to pray before his last Passover meal, means "wine press," or a place where one is squeezed, put under pressure, forced to confront whatever matters are at hand.

After the first hour of teaching, we were to keep silent. I think the importance of allowing a time of solemn silence, a time for unhurried reflection, is much neglected in our society, and I was glad to get it. This was not meditiation in the Zen sense of emptying one's mind; you could think about things. You just couldn't engage in communication with others. It was great for me! I know it was hard for Patrick because he's so engaging -- and I'm no shrink when it comes to talking myself -- but I know he also found value in the exercise.

We were free to wander the courtyard and gardens and the walking paths beyond. The day was mild and sunny and welcoming. We maintained silence until after lunch. Dining in silence Santa Sabina's old refectory evoked a sense of what the life of a contemplative is like every day.

After lunch, when the floor was opened for discussion, we found that, regardless of religion, we were inclined to reach deep beneath our differences.

We considered Destiny and Choice. Carol asked if there was ever a wrong choice. A Christian woman offered that when she was graduated from high school, just at the end of the Great Depression and the beginning of World War II, she took a job with the military in a section that was making chemical weaponry. She was making $30 a week while her contemporaries just out of high school were lucky to be making $3 a week. As she became more familiar with the work she was helping to do, she felt bad. She quit and instead enlisted in the military herself to help fight Fascism. She felt she'd made a wrong choice in accepting the job making chemical weaponry.

I said that I didn't think there was necessarily such a thing as a 'wrong' choice, but there are choices which are unconstructive or self-destructive. To which Carol added that the Jesuits ask, when confronting choice, "is it life-enhancing?" I like that.

Lavey referred to a Chassidic rabbi who likened life (as in incarnation) to a fragmenting or to shards of broken glass that we spend our lives reassembling. That when we are born, that divinity within us is shattered and it is up to us to recover it. (I hope I'm doing his talk justice in paraphrasing it from this distance in time.)

Patrick offered that we are somewhat like a jigsaw puzzle found in a thrift store, one where the box top is missing yet we have all the pieces. Then our process of reassembling the pieces into a complete picture is more difficult because we have no finished image to guide us.

Sherna, a Baha'i member, explained that in her religion they view life as a weaving, where the warp is destiny and the threads, colors and textures we select to weave the woof are choice. Such a wonderful metaphor! How would our human brains ever be able to understand complex matters without metaphor?

This is the second MIC retreat I've attended, the last being a couple years ago. I enjoy them and intend to do others.

More on Cherry Hill Seminary at PantheaCon '07

Student William Blumberg coordinated an academic panel for CHS at the most recent PantheaCon. William, a philosopher, is also coordinator of one of the largest Pagan Meetups in the world in Orange County, California. Sam Webster gave the paper; Carol Cunningham offered a response paper. Sam's paper is here.

More on My Poppy Tatts

One tidbit about PantheaCon you probably won't see on any other blog is that they had a tattoo contest. I entered five of mine -- to enter, they take a photo and you fill out a form saying when you got it, who did it, and why, or its meaning to you. My new California poppies by Heath Preheim at Spider Murphy's in San Rafael, won "best floral." The amazing joi wolfwomyn won for "greenest"; she has bright green leaves tattooed like a mustache on her upper lip and as a soul patch beneath her lower lip.

Red Dawn Rising from Southern California had California poppies tattooed on her shoulders around the same time as I did my arms. We compared thoughts and tatts at PantheaCon.

And on the subject of tattoos, my all-time favorite tattoo artists, Vyvyn Lazonga, was interviewed this week on SF Gate by David Ian Miller, the same religion reporter who interviewed me at Samhain '05.

Internationally Published!

Huzzah! Today I learned from my friend Lugh in São Paulo, that my book, Witchcraft and the Web, has now been published in Brazil, with the exotic Portuguese title of Bruxaria na Internet. Under his his mundane name, Claudiney Prieto, Lugh is Brazil's best-selling author of books on the Craft, and it is thanks to his efforts that this came about.

Although this book was first published in 2001 by ECW Press in Canada, I have heard frequent complaints about how difficult it's been to find in this country. I don't know why, exactly, because reviews have been consistently good. Here's another.

Should you wish to purchase it online, I know that Magus Books in Paganistan (Minneapolis/St. Paul) can sell you a copy.* I had originally had a link arrangement with Powells.com in Portland, Oregon, because I am committed to supporting independent booksellers and publishers whenever possible, but for some reason they don't carry it any more; perhaps it didn't sell enough for them to feel they should keep in in stock. In any case, readers in Australia and New Zealand can buy it at Wakefield Press (though they have the title slightly off). Here's what it looks like:

I wrote the foreword to one of Claudiney's recent books, Coven: Criando e Organizando Seu Próprio Grupo. Portuguese readers might want to check this out. Otherwise, the same topic is addressed in English in Judy Harrow's excellent Wicca Covens.

I got a kick out of how they introduced me in Brazil: "a senhora NightMare, sacerdotista da Covenant of the Goddess." At the time I was National First officer of CoG so I'm guessing that sacerdotista means "priestess" or "high priestess," which sounds sexier that the more clinical National First Officer.

Anyway, while I'm in the midst of family crises on both ends of the lifespan (96-year-old senile mother and 30-year-old daughter going through challenging times), it's great to learn this news.

Also loved my time at PantheaCon last weekend, with my cellphone turned off. More details about that on the blogs of my friends Anne Hill, Erynn, Kevin, Oak, Panthera, Thorn and Victoria, and perhaps here when I can extract myself from family crises. :sigh:


* If it's not there right away, it will be soon.

Green Egg Is Back!

Good news! Ariel Montserrat, with Oberon's blessings and the assistance of Jeanne Koelle and Ian LurkingBear, is reviving The Green Egg as an online zine. After years (since 1968) of being the best and most comprehensive of Pagan medium for writing by and about Pagans and Paganism, GE has been dormant since 2001. The website, which is anticipated to launch this coming weekend, is www.greeneggzine.com.

Maybe this news is all over the Web by now for all I know. I've been preoccupied with a family crisis. Ariel informed me by personal post and solicitation this morning.

I'm eager to see what they do with it. I'm most curious to see if they revive the GE Forum, which was the place where Pagans could discuss ideas with each other pre-WWW. I'm sure the internet has changed that form of dialogue. We shall see. I'm optimistic.

Huzzah for Ariel!

Calling Lady Justice

Here are some facts about First Lt. Ehren Watada's court-martial, featuring a Reclaiming friend.

Lady Justice by Joshua Reynolds, 1779

On another matter, this request concerning a child custody hearing in Texas and involving alleged religious discrimination towards a Witch came in my email. I know nothing about this matter other than what's on the website, which isn't much, really, but in any case, I think the situation calls for the presence of Lady Justice.

Peter Max, 1995

Oh, Bridey, Come, Come, Come!

I'm always glad when the Feast of Brigit rolls around, never less than this year, when I'm dealing with some serious healing issues in my family. Deirdre is melting in Brigit's forge, being hammered on Her anvil, shaped into something new and glorious. I am calling for Brigit's healing balm, carrying Her waters to those who have need of their healing. But basically I don't feel very creative. So in answer to the request for Brigit poetry, I offer this piece created by Diane Darling and me for a goddess masks ritual I created at New College of California back in 2000. The accompanying photo shows Lauren Raine's gorgeous mask of Brigit, worn by Diane, and photographed by Tom Lux.

I am Brigid, Lady of the Celts,
Creatrix of the Island of Ireland,
Midwife to new life in Spring.

You may know I am here
when the snowdrop flowers
When the lambing begins,
and the calving and foaling,
When the babes conceived on Beltane are born.

I am Lady of the flame,
Mistress of changes,
without and within.
I shape the bright metals:
gold and silver, spirit.

I shape the bright hearts of the lover,
the poet,
the smith.
Feel My hand on yours as you craft your lives,
Shape your loves,
build your great works,
grow into your true self.

I am Lady of the Well,
the deep well
That reaches into the darkness
and rises to the light,
The spills the waters of wisdom
for all who care to drink.

I am the great fount of Inspiration
for poet and bard.
The harp sings in My voice,
and the pipes and drums
My song is sung in all the lands,
by bird and bard and babe.

You may come to Me for healing,
be it of beast or human;
For beginning new life,
for insight, for love,
Or just to shelter within My cloak
from life’s tempests and sorrows.

Call Me by My many names:
I am with you,
children of the children of the children of
The Lost Isles,
the Western Shores,
children of Turtle Island.
I have not forgotten you,
far flung though you may be.

Remember Me also, My beloved ones,
when the poet sings,
When the cow rises from the calving
and the fever leaves the brow.

Tonight I'm going to renew my connection with Brigit in community. I will thank Her for all She's given me, renew my pledge to Her, and relight a candle with Her flame. Here are the words with which I'll seal the spell.

What we have received tonight has been held in our keeping.
What passes now flows out of our hands and into the Earth,
Trusting in time and right season,
Let us go on.

The House of Rumour

This is a piece I like to put out there now and then. I don't have anything particular on my mind at the moment, no rumors floating around my life, just revisiting something I really like.

The House of Rumour

from Ovid’s Metamorphoses

In the centre of the world, situated between earth and sky and sea, at the point where the three realms of the universe meet, is a place from which everything the world over can be seen, however far away, and to its listening ears come every sound. There Rumour lives, in a home she has chosen for herself on a hilltop. Night and day the house lies open, for she has given it a thousand apertures and countless entrances, with never a door to barricade her thresholds. The whole structure is of echoing brass, and is full of noises, repeating words and giving back the sounds it hears. There is no quiet within, no silence in any part, and yet there is no loud din, but only murmured whisperings, like the sound of the sea’s waves, heard at a distance, or the last rumbles of thunder when Jupiter has crashed dark clouds together. A whole host inhabits these halls: they come and go, a shadowy throng, and a thousand rumours, false mixed with true, stray this way and that, while confused words flit about. Some of them pour their stories into idle ears, other carry off elsewhere the tales they have been told, the story grows, and each new teller adds something to what he has heard. Here live Credulity, a hot-headed Error, groundless Joy and craven Fears, Sedition newly-born, and Whispers whose origin no one knows. Rumour herself sees everything that goes on in heaven, in earth, and on the sea, and seeks information the world over.

Brigit Approaches

I look forward to our annual celebration of the Feast of the Goddess Brigit. This year especially, since I'm dealing with a loved one much in need of healing.

In honor of Brigit in her role as fire in the poet's brain, goddess of inspiration, I invite all to join in the Second Annual Brigid in Cyberspace Poetry Reading anytime on February 2, 2007 on your blog.

This is a spell begun by Reya and being continued by Oak, so "link to whoever you hear about this from and a mighty web of poetry will be spun."

Our New Kitties

Oona, fka Bubbles


Fernando is the one in front.

On January 13th, I sent this news to a few friends:

Here are Fernando and Bubbles. (Bubbles is undergoing a name change, top contenders being Oona, Mercedes and Isabel.) Marmalade and white Fernando is from an all-male litter called the F Troupe. Bubbles, a medium-haired calico, is from an all-female litter born of a petite mama. One litter was imported to the Bay Area from Manteca and the other from Merced (hence the possible name Mercedes), Valley communities where low-cost spaying and neutering is not available so more kittens need adoptive homes. Fernando is 10 weeks old, Bubbles 8, both are neutered.

They were adopted from The Milo Foundation in Berkeley. Even though they’re from different litters, they adapted to each other instantly, playing, sleeping and grooming together. Mr. Fernando is a regular purring machine, and is a tremendous leaper. Bubbles is full of curiousity, so tiny she can lie on my arm.

Both slept with us last night, in a little pile. They’re great fun. We’re really enjoying them and looking forward to having them in our family for many years to come.

That was nearly two weeks ago. Tonight they are tearing all over the house. They are at least twice the size they were when they arrived here. Two weeks ago they could curl together on my lap; now they've grown so that one or the other of them tends to slide off. Fernando is bigger and purrs more readily and louder, but spunky Oona (aka Oona Banoona) holds her own with him.

I took this photo last week. You can't photograph them in action because they bounce off the walls. They move like lightning.


Oona and Fernando, age 9 and 11 weeks, respectively.

A Woman's Choice

Or who owns our bodies?

Apparently Tuesday, the 34th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, was Blog for Choice Day. I didn't hear about it till Wednesday and was sick all day, so today I'm bringing up the rear.

My reproductive history was affected by big changes in the law.

At the time of my first pregnancy, safe legal abortion was illegal in California, which was where I lived at the time. I could take a chance, assuming I had enough money and good connections, and go underground or to Mexico if I chose to terminate pregnancy. I was in my late teens and had no marketable skills. I was not self-supporting. I was a student at San Jose State. I was unmarried. There was tremendous shame associated out-of-wedlock births, for both mother and child. Few women, even with good skills, could earn a living wage. There was no social support for single women, and no mandated child support from the father.

The only viable choice I could see was surrending my child for adoption, so that's what I did. It was the most painful choice I've ever had to make. The pain of that loss remains forever. It has receded in the intervening years, but it doesn't take much to restimulate it. And even adoption laws have been drastically liberalized since those days.

In 1964 I began taking birth control pills, Enovid E to be precise, which was later proven to have its own set of problems. (See Malcolm Gladwell's essay about Enovid E in The New Yorker.) The doctor who prescribed them for me was prochoice, and he ended up prescribing them for my two under-21 flatmates as well, but mainly birth control pills were only available to married women.

My second pregnancy occurred when I had an IUD in place and was in a committed relationship with the man who eventually became my husband. He had two children already and we were not prepared to become parents at that time. This was around 1969, when one could obtain a safe, legal abortion in a hospital if one could prove that it would be a danger to the life of the mother to continue the pregnancy. With counseling and sound advice from our local Planned Parenthood, I was referred to two psychiatrists who were supportive a woman's right to choose. They had to interview me -- at some expense, I might add -- and state that my life was endangered by bringing my pregnancy to term. Both were male. So I needed two male authority figures and a male M.D. to affirm my decision.

The standard method in those days was dilation and curettage (D&C). This requires shaving the pubic hair. At the hospital I had a hostile nurse who scraped my skin with some vigor, I must say. I had been shaved for delivery of my first child, but this was wicked. I swear she used a rusty razor. Regardless of shaving, a D&C is invasive and carries some danger.

The third time I became pregnant, my late husband Rod and I had our beautiful and much-loved Deirdre Blessing. She was born at home in our North Beach flat with the help of midwives Nan Bowe, RN, CNM, and Vani Garabedian, Lay Midwife, coaching by Rod and photography by the late Richard Smith.

During the time surrounding my divorce I again became pregnant. I was not in a position to take responsibility for another child at that time, nor did the father wish to have it. I had an abortion at Kaiser. By this time, the procedure was placing some kind of seaweed in the cervix to dilate it before vacuum aspiration. The most difficult part was enduring the pokes and jabs from nurses and doctors trying to find a vein for the saline solution or sedative or whatever it was they were giving me intravenously. My veins are not close to the surface of my skin; I always have this trouble when donating blood or getting lab work done. I recovered much more quickly from the VA than from the D&C.

My fifth pregnancy, with the same man (a seven-year monogamous relationship) as with the fourth, was terminated by VA at the Oakland Feminist Women's Health Center (unfortunately now defunct). One of the founders was the late poet June Jordan. It was she who greeted me when I came in for my abortion. There, they assigned me a companion who stayed with me throughout the procedure, offered care and comfort. Ironically, the doctor who performed the abortion was Dr. Gore.

Who cares about my personal reproductive history? Probably no one but my loved ones. I offer it here to show how profound the changes have been since I came of reproductive age and now that I am past that age.

I'm glad we now have personal choice in making such a difficult decision. My daughter and her contemporaries take it for granted. The great news is that Deirdre is now training to be a midwife with Elizabeth Davis at Hearts & Hands.

Marin Remembers MLK

The Marin Interfaith Council and the Marin Interfaith Youth Outreach presented an event in honor of Dr. King called Jubilee: Civil Rights & Marin County 50 Years Ago at Congregation Rodef Sholom tonight. I went alone. Some of the speakers were people I'm acquainted with, mostly through the MIC.

Rabbi Stacy Friedman, the senior rabbi of the host site, spoke of the meaning of the 50th anniversary, or jubilee. The jubilee is a year of restoration and celebration, called in Hebrew yobel, or "ram's-horn trumpet" with which the jubilee year was proclaimed. Besides celebrating 50 years of civil rights activism in Marin, the event also celebrated the jubilees of none Marin religious congregations.

Noah Griffin recapped significant events in the struggle for civil rights, citing legal rulings, Rosa Parks' bus ride, and his own few meetings with prominent civil rights leaders. He just rolled off all these facts; probably is asked to to it a lot.

Sister Chandru Desai of the Brahma Kumaris Meditation Center (soon to open a meditation center in Novato), in her very gentle way, lead us in chanting "Om Shanti Peace."

Interspersed between the speakers was some lively gospel singing. Fortunately, for me at least, most of the gospel singing was of well-known freedom songs rather than Christian hymns. Many, if not most, of the 500 people in attendance, sang and clapped and stood up and rocked. I'm always happy to join in good-time song.

The highlight of the evening was a screening of "Civil Rights & Marin County: 50 Years Ago," a film by Scarlet Shepard. Most of the interviewees were in attendance. Among those interviewed were American-born Nisei who'd been rounded up and interned during World War II -- a shameful chapter in U.S. history. Others were African-Americans whose families had come to Marin during WW II to work for Bechtel building Liberty Ships at Marinship in Sausalito. One of the women spoke of growing up in Marin City, how most of the housing for the workers had been temporary and Marin City itself had been integrated. The housing complex at Marin City was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.

A white woman who was graduated from Tam High in 1950, spoke of the covert racial discrimnation she witnessed in earlier years, and noted landscape architect Lawrence Halprin and his dancer wife Anna spoke of their thwarted efforts to buy real estate in Kent Woodlands because they were Jews and how Roger Kent stepped in and made it happen.

I found the interview footage fascinating, yet I think the film needs to be expanded to contextualize the interviews and some polish. I'm viewing it as a work in progress.

One of the speakers preached, and as preaching goes she was good, but I don't want to be preached to no matter how skilled the preacher. I feel that preaching is inappropriate in interfaith contexts, even ones that celebrate the life of another African-American preacher.

I must admit that when one man sang a song he'd written about 'the Lord,' I just had to walk out for a while. He was a fine singer with a good strong voice, but the song made me so uncomfortable. Daresay it offended me. I know it was meaningful to him. But was it appropriate to all present? I don't think so. Not to me anyway. I returned after he finished.

What should a nice Pagan woman do in such a situation? I felt the only option I had to address my own discomfort was to absent myself for the duration. I did mention to the Director of MIC, who was one of the main organizers, how I'd been put off by such overt religiosity of a particular stripe. Maybe I'm just not cut out for this kind of work. I don't seek it out. It comes to me -- not this particular event, but in general I participate in interfaith activities because someone asks me to. I pass such opportunities to others when I can, and generally I feel I do a credible job, but still -- I'm never sure I'm the best person to be doing it.

We share many values -- peace activism, concern for the poor and homeless, opposition to capital punishment, green concerns -- and when we work together on those problems, I'm just fine. But still I find that the majority Abrahamics tend to slip into their assumption that all the world's population is monotheistic. It bugs me. I feel I should try to bring it up in as constructive a way as I can. How do others deal with it?

News with a Witchy Flavor

A couple of interesting news stories came to my attention this morning.

Two days ago Starhawk had put out a call for someone to lead a spiral dance at a rally to save some Valley Oaks (quercus lobata) on the UC Berkeley campus, and to support the urban tree-sitters there. I didn't volunteer because I was unsure of the specifics of the protest and how I might feel about it (both the validity of it and the methods) and I had a scheduling conflict. I certainly love the trees. I know they grow slowly and become very large. In addition, I love leading spiral dances, or just dancing them. They're seductive and intoxicating. They make you feel really good. Today this story, with plenty of photos, appeared in the Sunday SF Chronicle. Not surprisingly, the reporter, or the editor, played up the "California woo-woo" angle. This part in particular gave me a chuckle:

They chanted "Om," someone began drumming and then it began: an ancient pagan ritual known as the spiral dance.

Singing their song and forming one long line, they walked around and around in circles within circles, forming a spiral. A man told them it was key to look each other in the eyes during the spiral dance. "It's pretty amazing," he said.

"An ancient pagan ritual known as the spiral dance." I love it!

The second story, in the same edition but also sent by a Pagan friend who was among the 1200 who participated, is about a large-scale plea for impeachment. While not quite as audacious as the Baring Witness shoots I've taken part in, the scale is immense. What a job it must have been to get all those people settled in the right places. And then having to shoot the photo from a helicopter!

Madame Speaker -- Huzzah!

I've been happily absorbed in all the media coverage of Nancy Pelosi's ascension ot Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. I caught a smattering of it on the tube as I was leaving for work Wednesday, then read the text of her speech online and found some video on my iBook at work, then spent too much time in my local Peet's Coffee reading the many articles about her, her career and family in the SF Chronicle. I got teary listening to her eloquent acceptance speech. I wave my pointy black hat in celebration.

At the tea given for Nancy the day before her swearing in, she specifically pointed out the influece of one of her mentors, the late Congresswoman Sala Burton of San Francisco (wife of Rep. Phillip Burton, he who brought the splendid GGNRA to the Bay Area) and the late Gov. Ann Richards of Texas. (Ann once said of our current President, "Poor George, he can't help it...He was born with a silver foot in his mouth.") I got misty watching her bring all the House women up on stage with her (including our own Lynn Woolsey), plus Senators Barbara Mikulski and Dianne Feinstein. I've watched all of their careers for so many years, with admiration.

When Congresswoman Geraldine Ferraro was chosen at Walter Mondale's Vice Presidential running mate in 1984, I cried. I found Second Wave Feminism in the '60s, and the idea of a woman actually running for a national office of that magnitude struck many of us as a great accomplishment that women of my generation could barely have imagined possible.

But even before that, in 1972, I campaigned for the first African-American woman to serve in the U.S. Congress, the late Shirley Chisholm of Brooklyn, in her bid for the presidency in the primaries. Congresswoman Chisholm gave this speech in support of the Equal Rights Amendment in 1970, and in spite of our now having many, but not enough, women in the Senate, the House, governors' mansions, state legislatures, city halls and school boards, we still have not managed to pass an amendment to the Constitution guaranteeing our equal rights as women.

I'm encouraged by Nancy Pelosi's accomplishment, her sense of optimism, and her energetic beginning. Recent conversations with younger women, my daughter and stepdaughter among them, and with friends of my vintage about their daughters' attitudes, lift my spirits and warm my heart. I'm on board with Third Wave Feminism. Let's keep the dialogue going. Let's keep up the pressure for our rights. Let's change culture.

Thank you, Madame Speaker, for your work, and for the role model you offer our daughters and granddaughters.

Lilith Is Gone

Corby and I decided it was time to give our kitty Lilith the peace of passing. She'd lost her eye some time ago, and it only got worse, just a dead eye in her head. The vet could do nothing about it. She'd basically been well except for drinking a lot of water because her kidneys weren't working well.

When our friend Raven Moonshadow was ill and dying, he wanted his two cats, Lilith Nightmare (perhaps named for me?) and Shadowfax, to remain together. We adopted them and brought them to live with us and our grey-and-white longhair tuxedo cat, Buster. Raven, who had AIDS-related dementia by that time, had told us that Lilith was 10 and Shadow was 5; that was in 1996. We only know that they were adults when they came to us and both had 10 good years with us. Both were black, Lilith shorthaired and round; we called her our Sicilian cat for her robust swarthiness. Shadow was more elfin, fine-boned, fluffy and longhaired.

Lilith was always the more social of the two. She got out of the carrier first. She greeted people and explored fearlessly. She took longish, for a cat, neighborhood walks with us. She even followed us one night when we were walking to downtown San Rafael. That means she had to cross Second and Third Streets, both main arteries to and from Highway 101. She loved laps but never wanted to be picked up and carried. She protested when we insisted on carrying her across those two streets; we did it anyway. The walk was maybe a mile and a half, quite a hike for a little cat.


Another time she was sleeping in the sunlight on the roof of the cab of Corby's yellow truck when he ran an errand to the local 7-11. He didn't know she was there and just drove off. People were waving at him and pointing to the roof as he drove but he didn't realize that they were trying to tell him there was a cat on the [hot tin] roof. When he pulled into a parking space in front of the store, this terrified kitty came sliding down the windshield onto the hood. It's a wonder she didn't fall off on the bumpy ride. There was nothing for her claws to grip. Corby put her in the cab and brought her home with his purchases.

We live in a condo complex on Picnic Hill. Lilith spent most of her days wandering around, sleeping in the sunlight on the steep driveway, wandering in the gardens, snoozing amidst the flowers, greeting one and all with her little barely-audible croak and wreathing their legs in hopes of some petting. For some of the younger residents, Lilith was their first encounter with a feline. Lilith made friends with everyone.

She quit eating about two weeks ago and just stayed indoors sleeping, mostly on the couch. She sought affection most of that time and purred when she got it. She loved her lap time. She'd go out on the deck from about five minutes at a time. Neighbors noticed her absence out front; they missed her welcomes and inquired about her well-being.

Sometimes it's difficult to judge when a living being has ceased living and moved on to simply existing in a miserable and often painful state. I've never believed there's any value in unnecessary suffering. I've had to make the decision to euthanize my share of animal friends. I'm glad to say that every one of them lived a long, good life in our family. They'd just reached the point where their bodies had worn out. We took Lilith to the Marin Humane Society where we'd taken her sister Shadow this past June. Lilith went easy, very easy.

Remembering the Homeless

Tonight, in a constant mist of rain, I participated in the 19th Annual Memorial Service for Homeless People Who Have Died in San Francisco This Year, an interfaith service sponsored by the Coalition on Homelessness and San Francisco Network Ministries.

I had no idea what to expect. I knew that the woman who organizes it, the Rev. Glenda Hope, is well regarded and considered quite a dynamo. She wanted to assure that this event was an inclusive as possible. One of her colleagues contacted me through a circuitous route, and lo! there I was. I'd have preferred to find a San Francisco Pagan, but didn't know of any who might be good at it and willing to do it on December 21. The actual moment of Solstice being late Thursday afternoon, the longest night was December 20th this year, Wednesday, so many Pagans had already celebrated.

Religions represented were Islam, Roman Catholic, the SF Zen Center, a Protestant (Presbyterian, I think), Judaism, someone from a group connected with Tom Waddell, perhaps the Gay Olympics, and Pagan. There was a news truck from KTVU there and someone else who was videotaping the ceremony. The Muslim man spoke quietly and didn't seem to know how to use a mike. The Zen folks -- there were several -- spoke and then chanted words that they'd handed out ahead of time. They chanted in a monotone.

Between speakers someone read names of people who'd died in the streets in 2006. After each name was read, one of the Zen folks struck a bowl. Glenda had gotten the names from the SF Coroner's Office. I loved the reading of the names. Everyone loves the reading of names. People of many religions know in their hearts and bodies that speaking aloud the names of the departed reaches us in a different way than just reading them. That's one of the things about Spiral Dance Samhain rituals in recent years that most disappoints me. People complain that the list is too long, the reading takes too long, it's boring. Well, I think it's only boring to those who aren't listening. I know that for those who've lost someone that year hearing that person called to dance with us is an important part of their mourning.

I read a prayer by Starhawk from our book, adapted for this situation.

"For One Who Has Died Violently or in Great Distress"

Mother of healing,
Help us to believe in the
Place where wounds can heal.

Mother of weaving,
Show us that what has been torn
Can there be mended.

This worst has happened.
How can we believe again
In hope, love, kindness?

Boatman, Ferryman,
They have had rough crossings.
Carry them gently.

Comfort them, Mother,
In your warm arms of
Night; rock them to sleep.

And by our rage,
Mother of Justice,
May justice be done.

I followed with a simple four-line chant by Anne Hill and Starhawk, a C&W-sounding lament called "When We Are Gone." I explained that because we never knew when we'd encounter death, it was good to have something to meet death with, anyone's death, and that this simple chant was good for that. Before we began, I suggested that people might want to take the hand to the person next to them, if they felt comfortable doing so. I asked them to look around at the faces of those around them. I suggested that if that didn't feel right, they might want to close their eyes and see the faces of those they'd lost. I asked those who liked to sing to add harmonies when they wanted, and said we'd break into a four-part round -- we stood in a rather clumpy circle, about three or four deep -- when we got going and everyone knew it well enough.

I taught the chant by speaking the words once. Then I sang one line at a time and asked those assembled to repeat it; then I did the whole chant again two lines at a time, with repeat. Then I sang all four lines and asked them to join it.

Well, I'm telling you, getting them to sing, even such a simple little chant, was like the proverbial pulling of teeth! The Zen folks, bless them, did sing. I looked all around the circle several times as we sang, seeking connection with my eyes to others. I'd guess that maybe 20% of those there actually sang. Needless to say, we never broke into a round. I brought it to a gentle end by drawing out the last word.

The ceremony didn't last long but it was satisfying. It was over in time for me to get to Berkeley to celebrate the Solstice with Coven Trismegiston.

Spiral Dance

The promised -- and anticipated (by some) -- critique of the 2006 Spiral Dance, in terms of its technical deficiencies, appears below on December 5, the day I started to write it. Other SD reviews here and here.

Bewildering Invitation

Like most folks around this time of year, I receive my share of invitations to holiday parties, celetrations, and religious observances. One that I received this season especially caught my attention. Under a subsection of the e-mailed invitation is a topic called "What else should you remember?" It addresses two subjects:

Be sure you have showered before hand, trimmed your nails, freshened your breath, washed your hands and the like before coming. That's not only polite, but it's also important for ritual purity.

Please come sober and OFF drugs. Alcohol (such as mulled wine) will be served to non-minors who want it, but it's important for ritual to be powerful to start out in a normal, grounded state of mind. Otherwise, you're just partying all the time, rather than starting out grounded and ending grounded. Ritual is about improving mundane life rather than being an escape from it.

Well, I can see the drug and alcohol policy, particularly since such a celebration might be confused with a party where such things may be indulged. But the first one????? One wonders what types of folks the hostess usually invites to her events. Perhaps I'm overly bourgeois, but maintaining good personal hygeine is high on my list of priorities. I find this cautionary in an invitation extended to (presumably) adult Pagans to a private gathering appalling. Am I naïve?

Review of New Mel Gibson Movie

Friend and colleague Traci Ardren, an anthropologist, has written this review of Mel Gibson's new movie, Apocalypto, about the Maya for Archaeology magazine. On November 16, 2006, Traci was featured on Good Morning America in a report about newly designated Wonders of the World, talking about Chichén Itzá. What a gal!