I spent Beltane weekend waiting with a dear friend of mine while she died. Of course, being a very devout Pagan High Priestess, there was no way she was going to die at a festival of fertility; she waited patiently until it was passed, then slipped quietly away.

Now, at 50-something, I've experienced my share of bereavements. But this one really had me reeling. Why? Well, I'd known this woman for well over 2 years. We worked together. We lost our jobs with one company on the same night, and we started working for a different company within weeks of each other. We took our breaks together. We shared morning coffee and a jigsaw puzzle together. We walked the dogs together. We visited after work every night. And we never met face to face until 2 hours before she died.

I'm not sure how I'm supposed to be feeling. My life is certainly emptier without her in it. I feel lost, not telephoning her between clients at work, or playing cards online with her in the evenings. There are all the little things that I would share with her, all life's little nuances and synchronicities that would really make us giggle in awe and wonder at how the Universe was unfolding. Not since I lost my Medicine Elder did I have a friend who was so totally on my wavelength. And I met her 2 hours before she died.

I shared this with another friend, who commented that it may be harder to lose our 'chat buddies', because our minds have to work so hard to build up an identity for them. I've been thinking about that a lot. I'm guessing that the way our mind works, it is similar to the differences between watching a movie, or listening to a radio play, or reading the book. Different levels of mental stimulation are required.

I don't know if this makes it harder, because they are not as 'flesh and blood' in our lives, or easier, for the same reason. All I know is my life is quieter now. The evolved spiritual being in me is totally accepting, its all just as it should be, and she lives on in the kindness of her actions, the generosity of her deeds, and in spirit. There is no death, only evolution. But deep in the very core of my being is a five-year-old child, stomping its feet and throwing a fit, because she misses her playmate.

Journey well, dear one. You will be missed until I too cease to breathe.

For all the people who asked me to start producing a newsletter, I surrender.

The first issue of 'Stontalking' will hit cyber-space on or around 1 May. I will shamelessly post links to it here, and endeavor to make it a monthly event.

T minus 2 days, and counting...

I saw a bit of a documentary about TerraCycle on the television last week. This company is awesome. They go garbage diving for what they can use, and make it into something usable, and market it. Tote bags made from empty 'Caprisun' pouches. Perpetual totes made from discarded single use plastic bags. Bird feeders made from water bottles. And much more.

I was amazed at what they were doing. It is both 'green' and very inventive.

My first thought was, "What a great idea!"

My second thought was, "Why didn't I think of that?"

Visit TerraCycle here.

This story about regulating the resale of goods aimed at children under 12 years old had me spitting tacks.

Where I understand there has to be some sort of regulation, the way this law is worded makes no sense at all. The items have already been regulated before they entered their original shops. Why then must they be regulated again when they enter resale shops? The mind boggles.

This is going to close many resale shops,  and make it next to impossible to purchase second hand children's goods at thrift shops and church run charity stores. It is going to put a monumental amount of perfectly good items in the land fills. And it is going to take food out of the mouths of families who can not afford to purchase new items. Are children's items at garage sales and rummage sales going to be a thing of the past, now?

The US government is pleading poverty. We are in an 'economic crisis', a 'credit crunch'. Reports of the 'worsening economic situation' are on every TV station and in every news paper. Yet we can afford to throw away perfectly good items because of some poorly worded law??

Can we not just put a disclaimer label on these goods that they have not been tested, much the same as the flammable warnings on some fabrics'?

Can we not just take responsibility for our own actions, and choose where we shop and what we buy? What ever happened to Caveat Emptor? Yes, we need some regulation, but when it comes to purchasing things from a retailer or a rummage sale, shouldn't we have some say in the matter? Or is that just asking too much? 

Beam me up, Mr. Scott...

When I first heard the news, then researched the article, I got mad, but then I remembered that anger without action does nothing. So here I am, after months of silence (and that was not deliberate; mundania took me away from the computer for a time...) taking action.

I urge everyone who thinks that this law is poorly written and hurting the lower class to do two things.

First, contact your congressperson and ask that they amend the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act in a satisfactory fashion.

Second get involved in your local freecycle group. The main freecycle page is www.freecycle.org. This new law may prevent the resale of these goods, but I'll be damned if I'm going to let someone tell me I can't give them away!

Talk about square pegs in round holes...

Earlier this week I posted that others supposedly more experienced than I had led me to believe that I could not read Tarot cards because I didn't read the cards 'their' way, and I learned that was an outmoded belief system. I can read the Tarot. Quite well, in fact.

I now realize that I've been equally misled about my painting skills.

See, I love to paint. I love the colors. I love the feeling as the hues flow from my paintbrush (and quite often my fingers and thumbs when the brush won't cooperate). My teachers throughout high school always graded my work as 'adequate', but suggested other ways of doing it. Ditto college. Ditto when I took A-Level art in England.

The teacher there was great, though. I'll always be indebted to her.

I'd started working in clay, because it was three dimensional, but I was never completely happy with what I produced. I attended the college open house and I met the art teacher (funny, I met the writing teacher that day too... I wonder if there is a pattern emerging, with ysabetwordsmith telling me I could indeed write, and another friend telling me I could indeed read tarot...). The art teacher -- Kathleen although her last name escapes me (6 degrees of separation; anyone know Kathleeen W who teaches at Blackpool and the Fylde College?) -- looked at my attempts at sculpting and told me I needed to learn to draw.

I enjoyed the art classes immensely. I enjoyed the escaping of working in a factory and dealing with financial shortages (ahem, another pattern??) and getting away from it all for 5 hours a week. To say I was successful is rather an exaggeration, though.

Kathleen was always telling us, "Draw what you see." When we did our first nude, I did just that. I saw a series of triangles where the muscle tissue lay under the skin. My nude was just that, a series of adequately proportioned shaded triangles. Kathleen just rolled her eyes and said, "We haven't covered Picaso yet."

Another time we were doing a still life, and I was getting increasingly frustrated because I couldn't make the bowl look round by building it up, like I could with clay. Finally Kathleen let me loose on a collection of items in the studio. String, paste, sand, whatever made me happy, as long as there was paint in it. I think once I added my fingers to the mixture rather than work with brushes (something else that made Kathleen roll her eyes) I managed to produce something of a passing grade.

So you see why I liked this teacher; she 'did' let me explore being me, even though I still had to conform enough to adapt to the curriculum.

The point of all these ramblings is I have discovered I can paint. I can paint reasonably well, in fact. Just because it looks more like folk art or The Beatles' Yellow Submarine (thank you Peter Max) or something from Morgan's Tarot than a Turner or Rembrandt doesn't mean it isn't art and doesn't mean it isn't acceptable art. Just because it doesn't conform with someone else's idea of art doesn't mean it has no value. It has value to me. Talk about enlightenment!

(ponder) Perhaps this is why Van Gogh is my favorite 'old master'; he too didn't conform. My friend Ron calls Van Gogh 'a dauber' (Ron's hero is William Morris). Ron would probably call me a caricaturer (if that is even a word). I know he calls me a hippy (laughs)!

The point of this post is that I am learning not to take others' opinions to heart. I'm learning also not to impose my opinions onto anyone -- including myself -- because I'm learning that for the most part my opinions are now outdated and no longer fit the Old Crone I am becoming. 

I'm breaking molds, reaching out, touching new realities. I'm enjoying what I paint, I'm painting what I enjoy. I may even make some of my creations into collages or bead embroidery one day.

I'm discovering a whole new world of creation free of constraint and preconceived ideas, and life is becoming very very VERY rich indeed.

I think I am loving turning 50. Watch this space......

I found this 'really' useful Tarot exercise on Mary K. Greer's blog.

After studying the Tarot for nearly 20 years, and telling people for that long that I couldn't read it, I discovered something amazing this summer. I can read the Tarot. Quite well, in fact. I just had teachers (and books and other Tarot readers) tell me I was doing it 'wrong'. Apparently I either didn't lay the cards out in the Celtic Cross which I supposedly 'had' to do, or the meanings I got from the cards didn't agree with the meanings someone else got from the cards, ergo I must be 'wrong'.

And it was that 'ergo' that was 'wrong', not the way I was doing things!

I also find it interesting that as I am exploring Shamanic Astrology and making manifest my shamanic garden and writing about shamanism in classes at the Grey School of Wizardry, now I realize that the Tarot is also speaking to me shamanically, and very vividly, too. Fancy that. I'm seeing all sorts of correlations and correspondences, and the Tarot is not just speaking to me, it is whispering and singing and shouting and dancing and invading my dreams. I don't think I have ever been quite so prolific in my writing since I have started working with the Tarot once again.

When I first realized that I 'could' read the cards -- only I did it 'my' way rather than the way everyone else told me I 'had' to do it (duh moment, I've always done things 'my' way, why should this be any different?!) -- I banged my head on the desk, because I have -- as I mentioned -- spent the last 18 years drooling over Tarot decks then passing them along to someone else because I didn't think I was gelling with them. I took four different Tarot classes from four different instructors; never finished one of them because I was so very frustrated that I wasn't seeing in the images what they told me I was supposed to see.

Maybe I had to spend the last 20 years learning about the Totem Animals and Spirit Guides, working with stones and crystals and herbs in order to get me into a place of receptivity so, that when I did finally start working with the Tarot, I could fly with it like I am doing now. Some nights I don't even want to go to sleep, because I just want to keep writing and studying and working with the archetypal images. (Never fear; this is actually developing into dream work, and another Grey School Class on "Dreaming with the Tarot"!)

The moral of this? Never ever ever let someone tell you that you can't do something, just because you are doing it differently. What is the quote? "Either I will find a way, or I will make one," (Phillip Sydney).

My friend ysabetwordsmith always told me I was a better writer than I thought I was. She helped me with ideas, worked with me when I got stuck, and edited my work to the point that I started to recognize what errors I was making before I made them. She enabled me to want to better myself. Thank you, so very much, dear one.

And now, I have "Astrological Tarot" to write!

PS:

Current 'drool deck' is Tarot of Dreams by Ciro Marchetti. Yes it is digital art, but oh my goodness what talent!

Current 'pen and ink' inspiration comes from our own haikujaguar (although she probably doesn't even know I exist *grins*). Seeing her past work has given me the urge to get painting again; something I haven't done in over a year.

Apart from writing, my most recent addiction is knitting tarot card bags. Maybe I should change my name from Rainbow to Tarot....

For those of us not living in China, NASA is broadcasting the eclipse live here: http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse.html

http://www.marthastewart.com/article/good-thing-t-shirt-bag

My girlfriend uses these all the time.  I'm keen; my daughter has lots of old 'band' tee shirts that would be great for this.  I was disappointed that it is a Martha Stewart site as I never was keen on the woman, but I have to admit this is an awesome idea.

This site is posting that they are giving away free environmentally friendly reusable shopping bags.

http://www.greenbagsgiveaway.com/

Free is good.

Environmentally friendly is good.

Reusable is good.

Now, when I 'do' find them with bags available, I wonder what the catch will be?

Welcome to the Picasso School of Cosmetic Surgery!



Well, it made me giggle........

When I was in Montana last year Bear and I drove past a couple of the entrances to the Blackfeet reservation. At each entrance stood one of Jay Laber's sculptures.

Jay goes into Nature and finds manmade things that have been abandoned, then creates awesome interpretations of Native American life from them.

His work has to be seen to be understood, and even then people are amazed by what he creates simply from old junk.

For more information, visit this site:  http://www.firstpeoplesfund.org/Grant%20Programs/Fellows/Fellows2003/JayLaber.htm

I don't really feel I have anything to say, but as it has been over a week since I posted I figured I ought to write 'something'...

I'm not a firework fan. I'm not a patriot. I don't do razzmatazz and I certainly don't do picnic food (for the most part); Styrofoam cups leave me shuddering. I celebrated y 4th of July by getting up at some ungodly hour before the Sun was even awake and driving 112 miles to be with my daughter.

Said daughter has volunteered for Greenpeace this Summer. She's been in DC for 4 weeks and a week ago they hit the 'campaign trail' to lobby various bodies regarding energy consumption. As she was within reasonable driving distance (yes, I realize the irony, that she is campaigning against the energy crisis and I used 6 gallons of gas round trip) I went to spend time with her.

That quality (?) time was spent marching in a parade, in a torrential downpour. The heavens opened just as we gathered to commence the hour long parade. The rain stopped just as the parade ended.

Said daughter was dressed in a polyester (yes, I see the irony again) polar bear suit, carrying a placard that said 'here's to the next 100 years with polar bears'. She had to take off her polar bear feet because they were saturated and weighed about 10lbs each. As she waved, she flicked torrents of water at the bystanders from her drenched polar bear paws. And there was Mom, walking behind her as she did her polar-bear-fat-man dance, holding a golf dumbrella over her as best I could, and chanting with the rest of them:

"Ooh, its hot in here, there's too much carbon in the atmosphere!
Take action! Take action! We need some satisfaction! Whoo!"

Greater love hath no mother.

http://www.oneplusyou.com/bb/cadaver

Well, I got a giggle out of it anyway. Even at under $5000 I'm worth more dead than alive......

To say that it has been an eventful week is an understatement. 19 inches of rain in 72 hours, and 2 tornadoes later....

We fared okay. Lost an ornamental pear tree, but we'll cope. My daughter's boyfriend's family lost their entire home; it is sitting in a creek somewhere. I think this is Mother Nature going, "Can you hear me now?"

On a much more positive note, Yarn Lady called me back to her house to give me another carload of yarn. Yes, you read that right. Car load. It was packed in copier paper sized boxes and I must have collected at least 13 of them. I shared some of it with other friends who enjoy needlework. Most of it was 'red heart' type acrylic yarn, but at least two of the boxes were different cottons. There was single embroidery cotton, double embroidery cotton, and craft cotton. I've started a cardigan for my friend in the craft cotton. It was mostly yellow and / or white, and her favorite color is yellow. There was also a bit of needlepoint and embroidery. I'm never going to have to buy yarn again, unless it is just an odd color to 'fill out' something. I'm a happy camper. Okay then, I'm a happy knitter.

I also have been given some old blue jeans with which to make a fray quilt. Yarn Lady gave me a smaller, oval quilting frame and has a full sized one for me to collect on Tuesday. And she said she had a lot of craft and needlework books, too. Freecycle is awesome.

I've been too busy playing with my new toys to spend much time on the computer......

My latest kitchen invention is homemade 'Pam".

My husband has been buying 'Pam' to spray on the frying pans ever since they started making it in an organic version. This always rather bothered me, because not only was it expensive at over $3 a can, but he was going through one every two or three weeks, and I it always pained me when I chucked another empty can in the bin.

No more.

I bought a 50c spray bottle, the kind that is used to mist houseplants, with the adjustable nozzle. I bought some good quality olive oil. Hey presto, home made 'Pam'.

Does it work as well as the spray? Not quite. But for what I paid for one can of the spray I have a pint of my home made version, and when it is finished I just wash, rinse, reuse. Easier on the budget. Easier on the environment.

Off to play in the yarden now. I've had the neighbor (who has a big tractor and mows a big meadow) to till me a strip of the lawn measuring 5ft x 25ft, and after I've hung out the dog beds on the washing line I'm going to go play with my seeds.

I met with some friends for coffee this morning. Gas is one tenth of a cent away from being $4 a gallon. That is a 27 cent increase since I put gas in the car less than a week ago. It's a $2 increase since I started hanging out with the 'coffee crowd' two and a half years ago, and a $4 increase since I came back to the US in 2001.

Ouch.

I don't resent gas being $4 a gallon, it is nearly twice that much in the UK. What I do resent is the impact it is having on my lifestyle and the lifestyle of those near and dear to me.

I can't just whip off to the shops with my daughter now. We have to figure the cost of gas, budget everything, then decide if we can really afford to go, and if we can go, we have to decide before time where we are going to go, and what we are or are not going to spend. She has a 45 mile trip to come home from University, so instead of us seeing each other once or twice a week like we did when she was a freshman, we see each other maybe once every three weeks now.

I can't just nip to Walmart with my sister-in-law and then out for lunch on a whim (going to Walmart seems to be rather a family pastime for folks that live around here). I can't just jump in the truck and pass an enjoyable sunny day bimbling around a garden center. I can't go visit my family-out-of-town like I used to do, and I even have to watch how often I visit my closer-than-family-but-still-out-of-town friends.

My mother was born in England in 1920. I remember her telling me stories of how as a young girl she hated this particular pair of shoes, so she pulled the tongue out of one of them in the hopes of getting a new pair. Grandma pulled the tongue out of the other one and said 'now they match', and my mother said she had to wear them until her feet grew out of them, at which point Grandma cut the toes out of them so Ma's feet didn't get harmed by wearing shoes that were too tight! Ma said she remembered the days when she could have margarine on her bread, or jam, but not jam and margarine.

Rationing during WWII in England was much different than in the US. It started with bacon, ham, sugar, and butter in January 1940. Candy was the last item to be rationed, in 1942. Bread, milk, and eggs were also controlled.

My in-laws owned a 'bake house', and they baked the bread for the county. I remember Aunt Joy telling me how they dreaded doing wedding cakes during the war, because they had to use egg substitute for the icing. They would ice the cake as close to the time of the reception as they could, and then pray that the icing stayed on the cake long enough for it to be cut!

Rationing continued until June 1954, when meat was the last item that came 'off the ration'. My father-in-law says he still remembers how the 'top' off his dad's boiled egg was a weekly treat. According to a ration book he still has, a week's ration for an adult looked like this:

Milk  --  1 pints
Sugar  --  8 ounces (that is a cup, per week -- there is more sugar in most breakfast cereals!)
Butter  --  2 ounces (that is half a stick! per adult! per week! to be used in cooking, on toast, everything!)
Margarine  --  4 ounces
Cooking Fat  --  3 ounces
Cheese  --  3 ounces
Bacon  --  4 ounces
Meat  --  to the value of 1s 2d (2d had to be spent on corned beef)
Eggs  --  1 (if available!! ONE EGG per week IF AVAILABLE!), and one packed of dried eggs per month
Sweets (candy)  --  2.1 ounces
Jam  --  2 ounces
Tea  --  2 ounces

This 'converts' into something like six ounces of vegetables, a pound of potatoes, two ounces of oatmeal, an ounce of fat, and six-tenths of a pint of milk per day, supplemented either by small amounts of cheese, pulses, meat, fish, sugar, eggs and dried fruit. (1) There is a rumor that a man's weekly rations were laid on a table for the Prime Minister (Winston Churchill) to view. Churchill is said to have commented that he didn't know why people were complaining, he thought it looked a very substantial day's food!

'Digging for Victory' was the slogan of the times. It must be understood that the average 'lawn' in the United Kingdom probably measures something like 20ft x 40ft, if people are lucky enough to have a lawn at all. Many houses in the cities are terraces, as was the one in which Homer and I lived. Our left wall was next door's right wall, and our right wall was next door's left wall. We were right on the sidewalk and then on the road in the front; to the back we had a concrete yard that measured 17ft x 20ft that backed onto next door's little postage-stamp sized concrete back yard. I don't know what the people living in those houses did for the 'dig for victory' campaign; I'm assuming this is where the idea of allotments arose, so that everyone could dig their pocket handkerchief of land.

Clothing and soap were also rationed, as were cosmetics. My mother said that the American soldiers coming to the UK with their nylon pantie-hose and their lipsticks and soft-lather bars of soap were very popular, as these things were in such demand. Mom also mentioned the British guys didn't like this at all!

'Make do and mend' was another slogan that was promoted during the war. Items that were usually discarded were reinvented into something useful. Clothes were patched, socks were darned, tools were mended.

As gas tops $4 a gallon, I consider myself lucky indeed that even though I was raised in more fortunate times, I was surrounded by people that knew how to 'dig for victory' and 'make do and mend'. They remembered those skills, and were kind enough to pass them onto me (when I could be bothered to listen; now I understand what my mother used to say, about old heads on young shoulders, and youth being wasted on the young...).



I found this propaganda when I was researching something for Grey School yesterday. Who would the character in the passenger seat be today?

Margarine or jam on the bread? I'm wondering if they day is going to come when I tell Homer he can either have milk or sugar in his tea, but we can't afford both.



1) Food Rationing, Smith L. W. N., 2003 - 2006

I'm absolutely thrilled to report that through freecycle I got in touch with a beekeeper about 8 miles from here. He was absolutely thrilled to find that we had a swarm, and I was absolutely thrilled to find that he had empty hives. This is the most excitement we've had here since the plumber's merchant on the corner of the next street caught fire the week before Christmas.

Anyway, even as I type this, my bees (funny how in the space of about 8 hours they've suddenly become 'my' bees) are being placed into a hive, where they will go to their new homes.

And I have found a great local source for organic honey and beeswax.

What an absolutely thrilling episode!

Yup, they are still there.......   I've got a larger photo but don't know how to post it here, nor have I worked out how to get a photo into a reply yet. Oh well, something to enjoy learning another day!

I walked the dog this morning to find a swarm (cluster? herd? what is the collective noun for 'parked' bees that are not yet homed in a hive?) of bees nestled in my pussy willow bush.

Metaphysically this is a 'very' good thing. Bees represent prosperity, focus and concentration, reward through hard work, divine feminine energy, finding our proper niche in the Universe, and deeper connection with Spirit.

Environmentally, I'm rather thrilled. It means that in my own little corner of the world we are doing what we can, and it is working because wildlife are finding what they perceive to be a safe haven here, even if only to catch their breath.

On a practical note, I'm a bit concerned, as I don't know the first thing about beekeeping (although I know slightly more than Homer, who thought we had a hornet's nest!). I'm putting out feelers to see if there are any beekeepers locally who could come and take the swarm.