Greetings, patient readers.
Just a quick thought before we depart our matrix : How about if we label pagan meet-and-greet events Pagan Alliance Day -- PAD -- or Pagan Friendship Day -- PFD?
See you soon. Keep a light in the window. Blessed be all. Gavin and Yvonne
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Pagan Unity Day
It's probably a good thing that we two are retired. Our life is chronically so busy that even writing a blog keeps falling off the end of the schedule. And since we're leaving next weekend for four weeks in Europe, this blog will be the last utterance for another extended period.
What we want to do today is claim precedence for the title Pagan Unity Day. Notice the date of this publication and compare it with the dates of other claims.
Why? Apparently the title Pagan Pride Day has been taken over and cannot be used except with the gracious royal approval of some central authority--an attitude diametrically, violently at odds with the way we believe pagan/Wiccans should act toward each other. With an approach like that one, who needs Pat Robertson? After all, freedom is what we loudly tout in our actions toward each other; non? Yes, of course some people might actually have made a couple of bucks from using the name; though surely such an experience is unique in the world of alternative spiritualities that we Frosts are acquainted with.
So we hereby propose that everyone who wants to run a full pagan/Wiccan information-booth, meet-and-greet kind of day call their event a Pagan Unity Day, or Wiccan Unity Day. After all, our paths are not supposed to decree marching in lockstep, are they?
So who do we think/propose can use "Pagan Unity Day" as a title for their event? For now and forthwith, the answer is: Everyone. And we mean everyone.
The other day we had an interesting discussion abaout anti-discriminatory "statements" along the line of "This letterhead does not discriminate against ... " Well, against what? Against people who don't enroll in the same credit union we might belong to? Against people who don't use the same brand of ketchup we use? Against people who butter their toast north-to-south instead of east-to-west? Is it an act of discrimination when we say, "We will not discriminate against gays"? or "lesbians"? or "people with freckles"? Surely the very act of distinguishing and naming such stereotypes means we are ipso facto discriminating, exhibiting an attitude that says, "I'm so desperately tolerant that I won't discriminate even against those guys, though they're clearly sub-human and (gasp) different from me"? Whew--what a humanitarian attitude. Let's all be awed and grateful.
That's all for now; we'll see you in October. Or (wow) au revoir jusqu'a l'octobre. Blessed be.
Gavin and Yvonne
What we want to do today is claim precedence for the title Pagan Unity Day. Notice the date of this publication and compare it with the dates of other claims.
Why? Apparently the title Pagan Pride Day has been taken over and cannot be used except with the gracious royal approval of some central authority--an attitude diametrically, violently at odds with the way we believe pagan/Wiccans should act toward each other. With an approach like that one, who needs Pat Robertson? After all, freedom is what we loudly tout in our actions toward each other; non? Yes, of course some people might actually have made a couple of bucks from using the name; though surely such an experience is unique in the world of alternative spiritualities that we Frosts are acquainted with.
So we hereby propose that everyone who wants to run a full pagan/Wiccan information-booth, meet-and-greet kind of day call their event a Pagan Unity Day, or Wiccan Unity Day. After all, our paths are not supposed to decree marching in lockstep, are they?
So who do we think/propose can use "Pagan Unity Day" as a title for their event? For now and forthwith, the answer is: Everyone. And we mean everyone.
The other day we had an interesting discussion abaout anti-discriminatory "statements" along the line of "This letterhead does not discriminate against ... " Well, against what? Against people who don't enroll in the same credit union we might belong to? Against people who don't use the same brand of ketchup we use? Against people who butter their toast north-to-south instead of east-to-west? Is it an act of discrimination when we say, "We will not discriminate against gays"? or "lesbians"? or "people with freckles"? Surely the very act of distinguishing and naming such stereotypes means we are ipso facto discriminating, exhibiting an attitude that says, "I'm so desperately tolerant that I won't discriminate even against those guys, though they're clearly sub-human and (gasp) different from me"? Whew--what a humanitarian attitude. Let's all be awed and grateful.
That's all for now; we'll see you in October. Or (wow) au revoir jusqu'a l'octobre. Blessed be.
Gavin and Yvonne
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Walking Your Talk
We're back from Sirius Rising at Brushwood. Some 1,200 or so assorted pagans, Wiccans, new-agers, had a wonderful time. The weather cooperated, mostly; and the Saturday-night bonfire, where we burned the Thunderbird of Communication, was as enormous as usual.
The idea of the daily community meeting ("village meeting") is to pool ideas for making things even better. There was much discussion on our joint carbon footprint and what attendees could do to "green" Brushwood. The final conclusion was that each person should bring such things as solar-powered path lights and solar panels for any electronic requirement at their own campsite.
The wood burned in the bonfire is generally scrapwood and offcuts from sawmills; still it makes a significant addition to the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The unspoken mantra is, "My bonfire is bigger this year than yours was last year, so ha ha!" We've heard the concept verbalized as a dick-waving contest.
If you didn't see the PBS special last week on global dimming, you should endeavor to see a rerun of it; or go to the PBS website and see what you can call up. Anyway, the gist of it is this: Throughout the world significantly less radiation from the sun is reaching the earth's surface than reached it even ten years ago. In Israel, for example, monitoring instruments show that over the last 12 years radiation has diminished by 30 percent. Why should you care? Sunlight is the only source of photosynthesis for all the crops of the world, and the pattern extends worldwide. Experts estimate that we would be experiencing something like 2 degrees more global warming than is currently happening if the dimming weren't going on.
The principal sources of dimming are jet contrails, vehicle exhaust, and smoke. The question is, What can you do?
One morning at Brushwood as we walked away from the community meeting, we had to step over a pile of discarded soda cans thrown into the grass with a sprinkling of butts. This from professed earth-loving pagans.
Okay. You know what would make us happy--or happier? Congress, you pass a law (and occupant of the White House, sign it!) stipulating the following:
1. If you want to buy 20 cigarettes, you bring in 20 filters.
2. Any filters found abandoned on the face of the earth must be (a) recyclable or (b) compostable
Prove to me that I'm wrong, or offer a better choice of dispositions, and I'll withdraw my suggestion. Meantime, I for one am heartily sick of what smokers do to themselves, to me and my descendants, and to the face of the Mother. I am heartily sick as well at the thought that my tax dollars may be going to repair the ravaged bodies of individuals who have knowingly addicted themselves and now expect me to pay for their rehab.
And how about a federal law (not piecemeal state by state) mandating, say a refundable deposit of $1--that's not a misprint--on every aluminum can and every plastic bottle that passes by a merchant's cash register?
Who else feels the same way?
Sure, in some states you already get money back for the cans anyway--but people still can't be bothered to pick them up.
Ah well. We're just a couple of cynical old grouches after all. In another few years it won't matter to us. But if you have (or expect to have) descendants, don't forget. It could conceivably matter to them. Let us know.
Blessed be those who walk respectfully on the earth. Gavin and Yvonne
The idea of the daily community meeting ("village meeting") is to pool ideas for making things even better. There was much discussion on our joint carbon footprint and what attendees could do to "green" Brushwood. The final conclusion was that each person should bring such things as solar-powered path lights and solar panels for any electronic requirement at their own campsite.
The wood burned in the bonfire is generally scrapwood and offcuts from sawmills; still it makes a significant addition to the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The unspoken mantra is, "My bonfire is bigger this year than yours was last year, so ha ha!" We've heard the concept verbalized as a dick-waving contest.
If you didn't see the PBS special last week on global dimming, you should endeavor to see a rerun of it; or go to the PBS website and see what you can call up. Anyway, the gist of it is this: Throughout the world significantly less radiation from the sun is reaching the earth's surface than reached it even ten years ago. In Israel, for example, monitoring instruments show that over the last 12 years radiation has diminished by 30 percent. Why should you care? Sunlight is the only source of photosynthesis for all the crops of the world, and the pattern extends worldwide. Experts estimate that we would be experiencing something like 2 degrees more global warming than is currently happening if the dimming weren't going on.
The principal sources of dimming are jet contrails, vehicle exhaust, and smoke. The question is, What can you do?
One morning at Brushwood as we walked away from the community meeting, we had to step over a pile of discarded soda cans thrown into the grass with a sprinkling of butts. This from professed earth-loving pagans.
Okay. You know what would make us happy--or happier? Congress, you pass a law (and occupant of the White House, sign it!) stipulating the following:
1. If you want to buy 20 cigarettes, you bring in 20 filters.
2. Any filters found abandoned on the face of the earth must be (a) recyclable or (b) compostable
Prove to me that I'm wrong, or offer a better choice of dispositions, and I'll withdraw my suggestion. Meantime, I for one am heartily sick of what smokers do to themselves, to me and my descendants, and to the face of the Mother. I am heartily sick as well at the thought that my tax dollars may be going to repair the ravaged bodies of individuals who have knowingly addicted themselves and now expect me to pay for their rehab.
And how about a federal law (not piecemeal state by state) mandating, say a refundable deposit of $1--that's not a misprint--on every aluminum can and every plastic bottle that passes by a merchant's cash register?
Who else feels the same way?
Sure, in some states you already get money back for the cans anyway--but people still can't be bothered to pick them up.
Ah well. We're just a couple of cynical old grouches after all. In another few years it won't matter to us. But if you have (or expect to have) descendants, don't forget. It could conceivably matter to them. Let us know.
Blessed be those who walk respectfully on the earth. Gavin and Yvonne
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Researching Festivals
We're sure that by now you're getting used to the erratic schedule on which we write blogs. Stay tuned: It looks as if it's going to get a lot more erratic. The middle two weeks of July we'll be at Brushwood Folklore Center (Sherman NY), the first week attending one of the best festivals in the northeast, Sirius Rising. (Remember Orion's dog Sirius? He's the reason we call this warm season dog days. In mid-July, the dawn sun rises between earth and Sirius.) The second week we'll be on site basically meeting old friends who will also atend Starwood: ACE's* massive festival and party.
Festivals and festival speakers seem now to us to fall into definite categories: Some festivals, those that refuse to pay speakers or even reimburse them for honest travel expenses, are only a money machine for the promoters. Other festivals pay to get good speakers and musicians but have a hard time breaking even. These, though, are definitely much more worth attending.
Speakers and presenters as well fall into two distinct categories: The "big names" who charge the earth and are pushing the same old tired message; and those who have a new and different view (which they have thought through past the point of ego-stroking blither). Here the pattern is to charge very little if anything, and to be well worth listening to.
With both speakers and festivals, then, we ourselves perceive a strong negative correlation (note: negative) between sincerity and profit.
So how can you tell which gatherings are worth attending? You really can't, unless you can psychometrize the announcements they publish. You pays your money and you takes your choice. After once or twice researching Festival X or Speaker Y, you'll at least have something to push against; you can review the experience and say to yourself, "Not this!"
We can promise that at the ones we attend, the organizers are not making much if anything in the way of profit. We ourselves ask for expenses but never an honorarium.
Meantime, get out and sniff around any festivals you can get to. Do your research. Look at the attendees and listen to them. Where do they fall on the Flake/Weird Index? Look at the program. Is it too bizarre or too hackneyed or too gasping to fit your interests?
By the way, has anybody got any ideas on ways we can compensate for the carbon footprint that we incur with the bonfires?--ways beyond making attendees pay for carbon credits.
We hope to cross paths with you at one or another of these gatherings.
Blessed be. Gavin and Yvonne
- - - - - - - - -
* The Association for Consciousness Expansion
Festivals and festival speakers seem now to us to fall into definite categories: Some festivals, those that refuse to pay speakers or even reimburse them for honest travel expenses, are only a money machine for the promoters. Other festivals pay to get good speakers and musicians but have a hard time breaking even. These, though, are definitely much more worth attending.
Speakers and presenters as well fall into two distinct categories: The "big names" who charge the earth and are pushing the same old tired message; and those who have a new and different view (which they have thought through past the point of ego-stroking blither). Here the pattern is to charge very little if anything, and to be well worth listening to.
With both speakers and festivals, then, we ourselves perceive a strong negative correlation (note: negative) between sincerity and profit.
So how can you tell which gatherings are worth attending? You really can't, unless you can psychometrize the announcements they publish. You pays your money and you takes your choice. After once or twice researching Festival X or Speaker Y, you'll at least have something to push against; you can review the experience and say to yourself, "Not this!"
We can promise that at the ones we attend, the organizers are not making much if anything in the way of profit. We ourselves ask for expenses but never an honorarium.
Meantime, get out and sniff around any festivals you can get to. Do your research. Look at the attendees and listen to them. Where do they fall on the Flake/Weird Index? Look at the program. Is it too bizarre or too hackneyed or too gasping to fit your interests?
By the way, has anybody got any ideas on ways we can compensate for the carbon footprint that we incur with the bonfires?--ways beyond making attendees pay for carbon credits.
We hope to cross paths with you at one or another of these gatherings.
Blessed be. Gavin and Yvonne
- - - - - - - - -
* The Association for Consciousness Expansion
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Our Week in the Garden
Let us apologize for not keeping the blog updated. If there is a problem, it is the garden. We live on a city lot; our Spread is 44 feet wide and ... maybe ... 100 feet front to back with everything behind the house a steep uphill climb. The house and the front lawn presently occupy the streetside half of it. If this nation continues on its present track, one of these days we will put in a front fence, ideally securing it where plain traces of an earlier fence remain in the retaining wall, and dig up the lawn too. Sure, we know full well that growing our own is definitely a non-profit operation; still, it's worth it for the reward of having really fresh vegetables, free of pesticides and all the rest of the toxins that abound in the environment.
So far this year we've had four feeds of asparagus and three feeds of rhubarb; we've lost count of the feeds of snap peas (mange-tout or eat-'em-all or snow peas) and green beans--many of which now reside in the freezer section of the fridge after being tray-frozen.
Today we're cooking up the first batch of plums off the two trees we planted, and we'll probably have harvard beets with lunch. The small beets from the thinning of the rows go well in that recipe. This besides the ongoing supply of tender young beet greens for salads.
The first tomatoes have come in, of what promises to be a very heavy crop.
Birds are wreaking havoc among the raspberries, having previously had a go at the strawberries. We find that feeding the local cats is an enormous help in vigilance over berries of every sort. So long as they loiter around the yard, the birds take their appetites elsewhere.
Between all that, and putting a new roof on the conservatory, and painting the back of the house, it's a good thing we're "retired" (ironic smile). Otherwise we'd never manage to get any of it done.
Yvonne has to go now. She's about to time the blanching of another batch of mange-tout peas. Oh, and did I mention the gooseberries and the apricots?
The compost bin has become even more of a shrine for certain creatures, and the volunteer toad is doing his part to restrain the airborne population. Talk about a squatter ... It's all a beautiful demonstration of the Mother's bounteous cycle, with us gratefully functioning as enablers or custodians.
Blessed be those who walk respectfully on the Earth. Gavin and Yvonne
So far this year we've had four feeds of asparagus and three feeds of rhubarb; we've lost count of the feeds of snap peas (mange-tout or eat-'em-all or snow peas) and green beans--many of which now reside in the freezer section of the fridge after being tray-frozen.
Today we're cooking up the first batch of plums off the two trees we planted, and we'll probably have harvard beets with lunch. The small beets from the thinning of the rows go well in that recipe. This besides the ongoing supply of tender young beet greens for salads.
The first tomatoes have come in, of what promises to be a very heavy crop.
Birds are wreaking havoc among the raspberries, having previously had a go at the strawberries. We find that feeding the local cats is an enormous help in vigilance over berries of every sort. So long as they loiter around the yard, the birds take their appetites elsewhere.
Between all that, and putting a new roof on the conservatory, and painting the back of the house, it's a good thing we're "retired" (ironic smile). Otherwise we'd never manage to get any of it done.
Yvonne has to go now. She's about to time the blanching of another batch of mange-tout peas. Oh, and did I mention the gooseberries and the apricots?
The compost bin has become even more of a shrine for certain creatures, and the volunteer toad is doing his part to restrain the airborne population. Talk about a squatter ... It's all a beautiful demonstration of the Mother's bounteous cycle, with us gratefully functioning as enablers or custodians.
Blessed be those who walk respectfully on the Earth. Gavin and Yvonne
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Armchair Strategists
This is Yvonne's musing, nobody else's. Feedback goes to her alone.
The countries now labeled Ireland and Northern Ireland have been the scene of untold sorrow and grief, the scene where thousands of lives have been aborted, wasting their talents and their skills and their potential, visiting grief and loss on their families and associates in needless warfare laid on the land by--whom else?--by religious leaders. We ourselves in this generation are living witnesses to essentially the same pattern being inflicted today on the Middle East, in Africa, in North Korea--again--by religious leaders.
So whether the front lines of battle be official or guerrilla or catch-as-catch-can, where are the self-appointed old men who daily urge murder and destruction in the name of their religion? Why, they're at home, thanks, clean and comfortable, well-fed, safe from danger, with time on their hands to think up new accusations against the Enemy, those faceless humans who bear the artificial label "to be destroyed for not believing as I believe."
Let's indulge ourselves a moment in the name of fantasy. What if, in the Middle East, people were to say something to this effect? "Hey! Let's knock off this nonsense and go home to what's left of our life. Let's let the old men meet with wooden swords in the soccer stadium to fight out their own battles if they're so deeply troubled by their aging prostates. It's not really our problem. Didn't Allah tell us somewhere in the holy book that it's okay to live and let live? Let's all cut each other a little slack and do something beneficial--just for the novelty of it."
But that's only my fantasy. It probably won't amount to anything.
Occasionally I fantasize about what might have happened in the Emerald Isle if the touchy old religious leaders had all gone away and some sensible person (probably a woman) had said, "Let's dump these dominator religions altogether, each with their malevolent juju-on-a-stick, and let's return to the gentle worship of the Lady Who was here before any of these soreheads hit town."
Just a fantasy. Never mind.
Blessed be those who refuse to buy into the propaganda. Yvonne
The countries now labeled Ireland and Northern Ireland have been the scene of untold sorrow and grief, the scene where thousands of lives have been aborted, wasting their talents and their skills and their potential, visiting grief and loss on their families and associates in needless warfare laid on the land by--whom else?--by religious leaders. We ourselves in this generation are living witnesses to essentially the same pattern being inflicted today on the Middle East, in Africa, in North Korea--again--by religious leaders.
So whether the front lines of battle be official or guerrilla or catch-as-catch-can, where are the self-appointed old men who daily urge murder and destruction in the name of their religion? Why, they're at home, thanks, clean and comfortable, well-fed, safe from danger, with time on their hands to think up new accusations against the Enemy, those faceless humans who bear the artificial label "to be destroyed for not believing as I believe."
Let's indulge ourselves a moment in the name of fantasy. What if, in the Middle East, people were to say something to this effect? "Hey! Let's knock off this nonsense and go home to what's left of our life. Let's let the old men meet with wooden swords in the soccer stadium to fight out their own battles if they're so deeply troubled by their aging prostates. It's not really our problem. Didn't Allah tell us somewhere in the holy book that it's okay to live and let live? Let's all cut each other a little slack and do something beneficial--just for the novelty of it."
But that's only my fantasy. It probably won't amount to anything.
Occasionally I fantasize about what might have happened in the Emerald Isle if the touchy old religious leaders had all gone away and some sensible person (probably a woman) had said, "Let's dump these dominator religions altogether, each with their malevolent juju-on-a-stick, and let's return to the gentle worship of the Lady Who was here before any of these soreheads hit town."
Just a fantasy. Never mind.
Blessed be those who refuse to buy into the propaganda. Yvonne
Thursday, June 12, 2008
You can't be my friend
We Frosts have a relatively wide circle of friends and aquaintances. With the passage of time many of them have become divorced or have separated. For years we have ignored a common assumption: that is, that we are not supposed to remain friends with both parties to the breakup. Ridiculous as it seems, when you've been friendly with, let us say, both the husband and the wife, after a divorce you can be friends with only one of them.
It isn't true, you know. We can remain friends with both of them as individuals as well as friends with them as a couple. Our principal guideline in behaving thus is this : Never discuss one party's doings with the other party. Genuine friends are not so thick on the ground that we can afford to lose either or both.
As well as couples, covens and groups break up. Here, deplorably, we see exactly the same phenomenon. Instead of separating and then still working rationally together for the common good of the Movement (the Community) toward shared goals, especially on mundane matters, or simply going their own way, the two groups assume that now they have to hate each other--to such a degree that third parties outside, who now have friends in both the groups, are hated and reviled because we are so stupid that we don't see the terrible things the "other" fraction of the former group is doing. It doesn't take an Einstein to figure out that this behavior pattern isn't doing any good for the community or for our mutual spirituality. Must we assume that pagans are incapable of rational behavior?
Such either/or sulking and pouting behavior occurs on the playground of second-grade seven-year-olds. It is unworthy of self-styled "adults". Please just get over yourselves, you individuals who claim to exhibit adult behavior. Do something useful with your lives instead of staying crouched panting for the death of your new enemies. Don't you still share some inkling of the feeling that almost any pagan is better company than almost any (say) Christian?
Blessed be those who can demonstrate their maturity. Gavin and Yvonne
It isn't true, you know. We can remain friends with both of them as individuals as well as friends with them as a couple. Our principal guideline in behaving thus is this : Never discuss one party's doings with the other party. Genuine friends are not so thick on the ground that we can afford to lose either or both.
As well as couples, covens and groups break up. Here, deplorably, we see exactly the same phenomenon. Instead of separating and then still working rationally together for the common good of the Movement (the Community) toward shared goals, especially on mundane matters, or simply going their own way, the two groups assume that now they have to hate each other--to such a degree that third parties outside, who now have friends in both the groups, are hated and reviled because we are so stupid that we don't see the terrible things the "other" fraction of the former group is doing. It doesn't take an Einstein to figure out that this behavior pattern isn't doing any good for the community or for our mutual spirituality. Must we assume that pagans are incapable of rational behavior?
Such either/or sulking and pouting behavior occurs on the playground of second-grade seven-year-olds. It is unworthy of self-styled "adults". Please just get over yourselves, you individuals who claim to exhibit adult behavior. Do something useful with your lives instead of staying crouched panting for the death of your new enemies. Don't you still share some inkling of the feeling that almost any pagan is better company than almost any (say) Christian?
Blessed be those who can demonstrate their maturity. Gavin and Yvonne
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