A Dream of Death and Release

I woke up from a dream in which someone I loved very much had died. Someone had insulted my lost loved one, and I went on a rampage, screaming and crying and throwing things around, wanting to wrap my hands around the offender's neck and choke the life out of them. I collapsed on the floor crying, and that's when I awoke with real tears streaming down my cheeks.

I realized immediately that the dream had been about my father, who died almost three years ago, and that I still have a lot of anger and grief that hasn't been released. The dream, while distressing, had the feeling of one that had been sent to me to teach me something, and I'm taking it to heart.

After I woke up, I rolled over to look at the clock. It was 3:33 A.M.. That number, for personal reasons, has a lot of significance for me, and considering the work I have been doing lately to establish a relationship with Hekate and the chthonic gods, it seems even more significant.

I have been feeling the push to work on the deep, dirty crap I've been hanging on to, but I've been resisting. Ready or not, here it comes.

I'm Confused and Bewildered and I Love It

So recently I have been feeling this huge shift. It comes after about a year of huge blockages (which, it turns out, were easily solved by asking the god who owned me first to let me go -- something he did immediately and with some relief. Long story; I'll tell you later.)

Once the blockage began to clear, I felt a strong pull to the Roman pantheon. "Ah," I thought, "here is where I belong." It was the Magna Mater who sucked me in, along with Diana.

So I start reading and studying, still confused, and then yesterday, a bolt out of the blue. It was to HEKATE that they were leading me. As soon as I recognized it, everything got so much clearer, and so much of what I have gone through over the last couple of years began to make sense. She came through very clearly and demanded attention in a way I have never experienced before. And then she quickly delivered me into the hands of . . . the Greeks! It wasn't Rome after all. I was just refusing to see what was in front of my face.

I'll detail some of the signs and coincidences that accompanied all this later. Let's just say that since I made the connection, it's as if the world has opened up to me in a whole new way. I'm still a bit confused. After all, the Greek myths are a labyrinth in more ways than one. But it all feels right. It feels clear. And I have needed that.

Expect lots of rambling and posts on mythology. And lots more about the Queen of the Crossroads. This is going to be a bumpy ride, I can tell.

Dionysos

Dionysos has fascinated me for as long as I can remember, but I have always avoided him because he scares me. Maybe it's because I've had so much first-hand experience with real-life madness that I don't want to invite any more into my life. And he's always seemed to respect my hesitancy, though I get the feeling that he could break down my walls any time he wanted to and leave me a gibbering wreck.

But he's moved closer lately, and the fear that I feel, while still there, has turned into something more. I feel like maybe I'm ready to see where this leads.

All Roads Lead to Rome

The pull is there. It has been there a long, long time. I just never took the time to listen to the voices that said, "Come home; give us cultus; worship us; enlarge us; stop ignoring us, for we have been ignored and mistreated for far too long." Maybe I was afraid to listen, because going to that place would require work I wasn't ready to do. Gently, gradually, the spirits I serve have been pushing me towards Rome, saying, "Here. Go. We will always be with you, but you do not belong to us. You belong to Them."

When I first recognized the call, I thought it was coming from the Greeks. I didn't WANT it to be Rome. Ancient Roman religion, I thought, was too cold, too transactional. The gods were just  Greek knockoffs anyway, right? Greece is where it's at -- Dionysos and Hermes and great, thundering Zeus. They had the myths. They had the mysteries.

But no. The voices became louder. "Not to Greece. To ROME." So I started reading, and as I did, the cultus of the Romans opened up to me in a way I had not anticipated, and I realized that so much of the foundation of Roman polytheism, particularly the concept of Numen, appealed to my little animist soul. The worship of the Lares and Penates, the spirits of land and house, was something I was already intuitively doing, though I used different names.

The transactional nature of worship became something beautiful to me, giving cultus and worship to the gods because it is right and pious to do so. To see the hand of the gods and the spirits of land, family, household, and community, even the state, at work in the lives of everyone took my breath away as I uncovered it piece by piece. The precision of ritual -- doing it over if you got it wrong, offering propitiatory sacrifices in atonement for unknown offenses, paying attention to the signs and omens the gods send -- makes sense to me. It is done because it is right to do it and because the gods deserve it, because it is ultimately about them and not us, though we hope to help our families and communities by and through them.

So everything has shifted for me. I have been reading over the classics with a new eye (and pen and paper beside me), poring over my beloved Aeneid for the umpteenth time, and making up a new and unfamiliar calendar of feasts and observances that is sure to make the coming year an interesting one.

This blog, young as it is, will also be taking a turn towards Rome. I may retitle it. I will definitely be staking out new territory here and will probably make some mistakes. If you feel like it, I hope you will follow along with me, and we'll walk towards Rome together. After all, all roads lead there, at least for me.

It feels good to finally be heading home.

Life Intrudes

Work, work, work. I've been buried under it. It's a mercy and a pain in the ass. Lord knows I could use the cash, particularly as the holidays loom (I promised my mother the new HDTV that she's been wanting; that's going to take the biggest chunk as I have resolved to use no credit this year and only buy what I can pay for outright with cash.) I work from home, and I've been feeling a little isolated, like a kid home sick watching all of her friends play outside while she's stuck in bed. I've been doing lots of whining.

Sometimes I feel like it would be healthy for me to get a part-time job outside of the house. At least I would be around other people a little more. But a part-time gig at this time of year would most likely mean retail. No thank you. I have done enough retail to last me three lifetimes, and retail at Christmas is soul-destroying in a way I can't afford right now.

I've been having bad dreams lately, including a whopper of a nightmare about my late father that put me into a funk for an entire day. That one hit during the dark moon, a really weird time for me, usually.

My new tarot deck continues to delight and amaze. I am so happy I decided to get into it and wonder why I didn't do it sooner. I'll be starting a series of meditations on the cards this week.

The fall colors are at their peak in my part of the world as my absolute favorite time of year descends upon us. The neghbors have been lighting their fireplaces, and the smell at night is intoxicating.

Overall, I'm feeling loaded down with mundane crap right now -- family, job, friends, health, house. I feel a little disconnected from my gods and guardians, and my spiritual year work has taken a backseat. I feel like I need to nest and retreat, and I'm not sure that's what's actually good for me right now.

Ungrounded

Good lord, there is a lot of energy flying around today. My hands are shaking and my anxiety has ramped up big time. I thought that it was JUST anxiety until I noticed the dogs acting weird and went for a little walk. The hot spots around the neighborhood are LIT UP. I had to ground a shit-ton of extra energy into one of my traps, and I still feel a little buzzed and jittery. I need to put it to good use. I've already done some cleaning, but I think I need to get back outside. This is more than my traps can handle. I need to get rooted into the earth and let some of this go.

The Red Queen

I saw her first in a cavern made of amber. I'm still not sure whether it was a dream or a waking vision. It doesn't matter anymore. The reality of it has been established, solidified by signs and long conversations and a particularly sticky night spent sweating and dancing and fucking.

She slithered along the floor in a violently scarlet gown, with long hair golden and black. The cavern glowed faintly, the rock itself illuminated from within. I was backed into a corner. She appeared from a bend in the corridor. I sensed without seeing that it went on for miles, maybe even to the other side of the world, but I also sensed that I was not allowed to walk that hall. Not yet. Over us stretched the World Ocean, as vast as space. I could see it through an opening in the ceiling. The black water dripped down into the hall but did not flood it.

She said nothing. She looked me over and smiled. It was a shifting smile. She looked the way you do when you stare into a mirror for too long -- familiar yet alien, serene and dangerous at the same time. She stretched out a hand to me and from her wrist dangled a silver bracelet loaded with charms. They rang out in the silence of the hall like bells, like chimes.

I reached for her hand, terrified and desperately in love at the same time, but before I could grasp it, a great call sounded from the Ocean. She gave me one last mercurial smile and expoloded in a whirlwind of color and sound. She spiraled up through the opening in the ceiling and into the Sea. I am not sure who or what called to her.

I awoke after that, or that is all I can remember. I have seen glimpses of her since then, felt her presence, even danced with her, but I still do not know her Name. She will tell me when she thinks I am ready. I call her the Red Queen or the Mother. She is the serpent, the lion, and the blood-red rose. I hope to see her again like that. I hope to meet her in the amber cavern and see her stretch out her hand to me. I hope the next time I am able to take that hand and follow her into the Ocean.

Conjuring Up Our Own Gods

Conjuring Up Our Own Gods - NYTimes.com

The mere fact that people like Jack find it intuitively possible to have invisible companions who talk back to them supports the claim that the idea of an invisible agent is basic to our psyche. But Jack’s story also makes it clear that experiencing an invisible companion as truly present — especially as an adult — takes work: constant concentration, a state that resembles prayer.

Interesting little article on thoughtforms and created entities. Doesn't do much more than barely scratch the surface, but it's something I've been thinking about a lot lately, as I have done this more than once.

Hat tip to the Wild Hunt for the link.

Atonement

Many years ago, I did a terrible thing. I won't go into the details. It is enough to say that I caused terrible, undeserved pain while in the depths of the blackest period of my depression. Through my own neglect, I caused pain. There are many reasons but no excuses.

Now I am being called to pay for this pain I caused. I can't go back and undo it, but it's time to give up my pound of flesh. I think the blood I saw on the tree today was a part of it, a sign, a reminder that I have never truly sacrificed to make up for the terrible thing I did.

So now I need to work out where that pound of flesh will come from and to whom it will be paid.

I am planning to begin the work as the tides change at the end of this month. I will pay what I owe and ask for forgiveness. I hope that by doing this, I will be able to forgive myself as well.