I did get around to carvin' mah punkin this morning. It's supposed to be Ryuk from DeathNote, but I realized it also looks like the Cramps mascot (he's under a cut because I can't seem to resize the image):

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Most people who know me know I’m a Pagan – I’m pretty much out of the broom closet as far as that goes. I’ve noticed from some of the forums that I’ve visited online that one of the problems with Paganism is that, except for books, no one really talks about what it is that they do. Some people may want to stay in the broom closet out of fear of repercussions from relatives, friends, neighbors, employers, etc. Others just don’t talk about their religion or spirituality – it’s too personal to share. There are even some who like to feel superior because they’ve got a ‘secret’, or access to secret knowledge. Generally, I don’t talk about what it is that I do because I am constantly struggling with my personal faith. There’s also a lot of what I’ve done and experienced that places me in the ‘whack-job’ category that I disdain. For some reason, though, I want to share what I do on Samhain.

Samhain is considered by many to be the Pagan New Year. (In some places, though, April 1st held that honor, hence April Fool’s Day – when the calendars changed the foolish folk in rural areas still celebrated New Years on April 1st while everyone else had switched to January 1st). There’s a lot of controversy over how important Samhain was to the Celts, and honestly I consider the ‘New Year’ to occur on January 1st. It seems more right to me because I’ve lived by that calendar all my life – and my birthday is on the last day of the year. Seasonally and agriculturally, Samhain marked the end of the harvest season. The grains and fruits and lasting roots were prepared for storage. Herds were culled down to the breeding stock most likely to survive til the following spring & meat was salted and placed into storage for the long winter. Firewood was gathered, the winter woolens were brought out of storage and the earth prepared to lay fallow until planting time rolled around again. It was a time when the dark nights lengthened and an atmosphere of uncertainty and anxiety fell on those living in temperate climates where winters were hard and cold. With the last of the wheat sheaves reaped the God would die, returning to the womb of the Mother to wait for rebirth at the Winter Solstice.

All my life I have had a unique kinship to the Horned Lord, Lord of the Hunt, the darkened face of the Solar God, and once the Summer Solstice is upon us in June, I tend to slide a little deeper into depression, because I sense His death is near. Even though I enjoy all the modern conveniences and the lack of a bitter winter by grace of a hot desert sun, I still worry about the arrival of Spring. I’ve also had a long relationship with the Greek God Hades and His consort, Persephone. Hades is the Lord of the Underworld, and Persephone became the Lady at His side. When I lose hope with the death of the Sun, Persephone reassures me that Her winter confinement in the root cellars of the earth will end and She will return to the surface bearing flowers and new green shoots. To honor the bargain between Hades and Persephone that was sealed with pomegranate seeds, I placed a taboo on myself that I will only eat pomegranates from the Autumn Equinox til November 2nd – it’s a hardship because pomegranates are my favorite fruit & they start getting into the stores around the first of September. Hades and Persephone receive the first best pomegranate I find.

For a week or two before and each Sabbat, I was taught that the Veil separating the world of the living from the world of the dead grows thin, and it is especially thin during Samhain. Maybe the passage of the God tears a hole in the Veil and the Goddess has to mend it? At any rate, around this time of year I tend to notice more otherworldly activity in and around the house. I believe in ghosts, I believe I’ve seen, heard and communicated with ghosts since I was a child, and even though I usually don’t acknowledge their presence because of the aforementioned ‘whack-job factor’, it gets harder to ignore them. Divination is supposed to be easier this time of year, and I used to do my yearly forecast Tarot readings every year, at least until I realized that my future is bleakly predictable. I don’t really do much by way of rituals or anything anymore – when I was a Wiccan, I would do a full-blown ceremony every year, but I put all that aside. Now I host a dumb supper.

Every Samhain, I try to cook dinner. I cook all the food without salt, because I learned from Vodou that salt is like spiritual Agent Orange. I usually try to make some kind of beans or rice – the dead love beans and rice. I set up a table and light a candle to serve as a beacon. I don’t know if my parents have reincarnated yet, and I never felt close to any of my many deceased relatives, but I still a cigarette and serve black coffee because that’s what my mother & dad & most other relatives favored. I also set up a shot of liquor, sometimes rum, sometimes tequila, sometimes whiskey – it’s not so much the type of liquor that matters so much as it’s for the Guedde – the family of death Gods in Vodou. This year I’ll also serve up an apple to the Shinigami (Japanese death Gods) – now that I’ve learned about them I can’t leave them out of the festivities. I set aside a little of all I cook for myself & Rob, and I make sure when I serve the beloved dead that I taste it to show them it’s not poisoned. I place the table near the front door & open the door wide, and I invite the dead into our home to eat supper with us. After we’re done eating and what feels like an appropriate amount of time has passed, I thank the dead for coming to dinner, tell them whosoever wishes to stay may stay but they are not bound and I close the door. I leave the candle burning for however long it takes it to go out – usually it’s a 7-day candle.

When I lived in Memphis, I had the pleasure of going around with a teacher of mine & her family & friends who practiced Vodou, and she would go into cemeteries and clean neglected graves on the weekend before or after Samhain. We’d scrub headstones and markers, patch sod, replace vases and candleholders and leave home-made wreaths of fall foliage and dried berries. We’d also hold a prayer circle and wish the dead well. If Rob & I had stayed in New Orleans, that would have been the plan that year, too. Here in Vegas, it just doesn’t seem right – I’ve never encountered a cemetery here that felt like it would appreciate the attention. I miss that aspect of service. For me, Samhain is kind of like the universal reset button. The earth gets to relax and kick back until it’s time to start growing stuff again. I can feel the world just going, “Ahhhhh”. It feels deep, warm and sacred, and no matter how much I’m struggling with my own spirituality, it helps renew my focus on the important things. Plus, there’s the added benefit of how much fun it is to celebrate in the secular world.

Thank you, Lisa! I loves me some Dias de los Muertos on my profile :D

Here we are, at the end of the year, the Lord of the Hunt has been run to the ground, back to waiting arms of the Mother; a short nap, a brief rest is all that is required. I wish Him well on His journey and long for His return at Yule, for He is the Light of the world.

On another note, a quote:
Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind.
- Dr. Seuss

Never apologize for being sick, unless you are a whiny man with a cold. Never apologize for 'me time'. Never apologize for times when life has chased you ragged and you need to retreat down the rabbit hole.

Happy Samhain, All Hallow's, Hallow's Eve, Hallowe'en... Gods bless us, every one.

It's coming to an end, the old year. I can feel the cycle winding down, the Earth growing quiet & still.

Read 'Black Light' by Elizabeth Hand last night. Its the counterpart to her 'Waking the Moon'. 'Black Light' is about Dionysus. I was thinking to myself last night, after drinking a glass of blackberry wine & giving a pomegranate to my Goddesses, given the choice, I would free the God. I would be of the Malandanti. Of course, it's not like my serpent priestess isn't a consort of Dionysus. If I had lived in ancient Greece, I would have been a maenad - I would have eaten the pomegranate, drank the poppy wine, and torn a man to pieces with my teeth and nails during the grape harvest festival.

... if you go back far enough and long enough, you will see only two faces staring back at you from the darkness: the hunter and the mother.

I think I figured something out about the rise of Christianity. It wasn't all about fearing a woman's power... They had mothers back then, too - some were devouring sows, Medea and Cybele & Cerridwen, crones to be feared, and some nurtured their sons and daughters, Isis among women... everyone has a mother & it's a familiar & comforting symbol, even when She is the Black Sow. No, I think men feared (and still fear) the Hunter and the Hunted within themselves. They took the Stag, the He-Goat on the wild hill's way, and turned Him into a shepherd - someone who runs from the wolves because he has no weapons to stand against them. He still had to fulfill his ancient role - he still had to run and die and be reborn, but it was no longer the poppy-maddened women wearing fawn-skins chasing him down & ripping his throat open. The chaos, the divine madness, was stripped from the rite and he instead went willingly to a common criminal's death. He was no longer the Hunter and the Hunted, the God come to Earth - he was a common man, sober and filled with regrets. And somehow that was a more comfortable archetype for men to relate to than being filled with a God's infinity and knowledge of His own impending death and resurrection.

Especially when it comes to being sick. Rob was hung over all day yesterday, so who suffered the most? Well, there's only 2 of us in the house & it sure as hell wasn't him, I tell ya that much.
Samhain is here, ring in the New Year!!!