Letters from the Editor

It’s hard living in the grown-up world of life like this. Compromises and times when your pride and honor are called into question, you are assaulted and insulted and there are times when a self-evaluation will make you truly believe that you are a coward.

There is a hope however. There are many kinds of courage.

It’s easy to yell and scream at some one who calls you a coward and implies that you are a gutless spineless good-for-nothing. It is one kind of courage, the courage of a stung pride. But it takes an entirely different kind of courage to stay right where you are, take the abuse because it means you will be able to retain your job and
bring home another paycheck and save your home and allow your family to eat.

I call that the Courage of Consequences.

The impulse in the human being is that you retract and hit back when attacked. It is the ability of a reasoning person to be able to look forward to the future and see the results of actions. Logic is not something that an animal is able to do and they may be able to understand that there are consequences after having them occur multiple times, but that’s simple learning. But to be able to notice that your family may be affected by your actions and to allow someone to demean you to prevent your family from coming to harm, that’s real coruage.

There is the courage to stay silent when you are in pain or ill because there is nothing that anyone can do about it, but you don’t want to mess up other’s enjoyment of whatever activity is going on. Like when Grandma doesn’t talk about how much the winter weather is hurting her joints while the family is gathered together for the Thanksgiving meal. That’s a very different kind of courage as well.

Just becuase you don’t run ito situations that angels would avoid does not mean you lack courage or that you are spineless and a wimp. So don’t think that again. You HAVE courage, it is simply determining which kind you have.

Well, it’s Solstice and Yule.

I guess I should do a page on what it is and why it’s important.

Today the Lady sleeps. In our cosmology the Lord and Lady are people and they sleep. But they sleep at different times. From Samhain to Beltane the Lord is leading us and taking care of most of our problems. He does this because the Dark Half of the year is when the Lord of the Hunt is responsible for providing for the People (since you can’t grow things during winter, so the ancients are dependant on meat to live). From Beltane to Samhain, the Lady (in her guise as the Earth Mother) provides.

Following this, different times of responsibility and celebration, those two transition times are EXCEEDINGLY important. That’s one reason why there is so much lore on them.

The times between them are important, Imbolc and Lughsnadah since those represent the mid point of that “stewardship” and a time when It is good for us to be especially grateful. IT’s a hard job to provide for people and we need to ALWAYS remember that.

The Solstices and Equinoxes, in our cosmology, are the times when the other, who is not taking care of us, sleeps and wakes. On the Solstices, the Logest night and longest day, the one who is not responsible lays down to get rest from their work for the last 9 months. They have been up for a long time and they are tired. It’s understandable, the other parent is there and willing to take on responsibility, so that’s important to remember. At the equinoxes, the one who is asleep wakes to be reunited with their loved one. They are groggy and probably cranky, and I’m sure their partner is probably horny as hell and so generally there is rabbiting involved.

So, it goes like this:

Samhain: October 31 Transition of stewardship from the Lady to the Lord
Yule: December 21 Lady lays down to rest.
Imbolic: January 31 Mid point of the Lord’s Guardinship
Ostara: March 21 Lady wakes and is reunited with her love
Beltane: April 30 Transition from the Lord to the Lady
Litha: June 21 Day of retiring for the Lord
Lughsnadah: July 31 Mid point for the Lady
Mabon: September 21 Day of waking for the Lord and reuniting him with the Lady

It’s an elegant and simple structure when you look at it and consider the way it’s designed. Both get to sleep, both get to wake, they are together during the Spring and Fall times to ensure the fertility of the fields and herds, there is time when their love is sleeping and they guard them, and so on. Just like any family.

But as parents they do wake and take care of problems when they are asleep and are needed. It’s hard and they may be short-tempered, but it happens. I’ve had to wake the Lord in the middle of the Summer, and also the Lady at February as well.

If you look also, you can see how the wake/sleep theme fits with the cycle that has been celebrated for years and the seasonal interpertations as well. Lughsnadah for instance celebrates the Mother in the Games of Talitu. Just for one instance.

Get to teach this to Barbara tonight I guess.

Damn, I have to finish that book.

Two new articles up on the Journal.

Spells and Power
The Candle Contest

The second article is referenced off the first and I think all new people to the path need to listen to the first article.

Learning hurts. It hurts a lot.

I learned however.

I learned that you cannot trust another to keep their word unless it’s in writing and you have a battery of lawyers to back you up and enforce it.

I have learned that when money is involved, all the promises in the world is worth nothing.

What prompted this you may ask? Things are going south with the house. Our landlady is being a bitch who is only interested in the bottom line, the cash on the barrel head, and is screwing us to the wall and refusing to rent us a home that we can actually live in. There are gaping holes in the walls and in the windows that we can’t get fixed due to not having the extra cash.

So we spend my entire check on rent, the next entire check on utilities, and freeze the rest of the time because she won’t repair things that were promised to be fixed.

So following my new learning, I’ve learned that legal action will get people’s attention.

I hate the person I’m turning into.

Well, I have a new article up. It’s probably going to cause some controversy, but that’s fine too.

Sacrifice

Maybe it will cause some people to think for a few minutes before they condemn Sacrifice next time.