Travesty

travesty - burlesque or ludicrous treatment of a serious work or subject; any grotesque or debased imitation. French: travest - dressed to appear ridiculous.

Sometimes a series of events gets us so angry and frustrated that we can't see straight and we have to sound off. We're sounding off here not as dancing Wiccans but as private citizens of the United States. The recent flap over "Should we negotiate with terrorists or should we blast them out of existence?" is a travesty.
Do you remember when Libya under Gadafi was the foremost terrorist nation and they were shopping for nuclear armament? First Washington tried to bomb his house. When that failed, guess what? We negotiated. Gadafi promised to be a good boy and not to go looking for nuclear arms. Last month Mr. Gadafi wrote to George W. Bush complaining that the United States had reneged on the earlier deal, because the Senate in its wisdom was going to allow companies doing business with Libya to be sued for past transgressions.
Do you remember when North Korea was part of the "axis of evil"? Madeleine Albright negotiated an agreement with that nation; by it they would not pursue nuclear technology in return for food and for aid with oil. The Republicans reneged on that deal, but North Korea rattled its sabers, and lo and behold, we negotiated with them. The deal benefited this nation less than the one the Democratic administration had concluded.
Now it's reported that Washington is negotiating with the terrorists in Iraq--in fact we are paying them not to attack American military troops--paying them in cold hard American tax dollars.
Another subject we see in the news is materials supposedly supplied by Iran to terrorists in Iraq. It is suggested that Iran either made these themselves or got them from Russia or China. Why then are the packing crates stenciled in English, in the Roman alphabet?--not in an Arabic alphabet, not in the cyrillic alphabet, not in Chinese characters, but in Roman letters. Were those materials stolen from U. S. stockpiles, or even materials supplied to Iraq in the days when we were friendly with Saddam Hussein?
One last bitch while we're letting off steam. We wrote a blog a few weeks ago about the lady buying dog food to eat. Part of her problem is that she receives a Social Security check which gets adjusted for the cost of living. It sounds wonderful--a system perfect and benign. There's just one minor problem. The CoLA that our enlightened government uses does not figure in the price of food or fuel. Apparently, in Washington's Olympian indifference, these are not essential items to be calculated. In our CoLA all we Frosts can do is go out into the garden and beat the tomato plants so they'll give us an adequate crop this year. But you, my friends, can do something more emphatic. You can tell everyone what unadulterated BS the Republican stance of not-negotiating with terrorists really is. They've done it; they're doing it; actually it has worked.
You may rest assured, of course, that the administration has read both the Koran and Mao's Little Red Book. From the Koran source, "One sword is worth 10,000 words." From the Little Red Book, "Trouble at home? Start a war."
Okay; we've gotten it out of our systems. It does make us feel better ... until we turn on the news again. If you aren't angry, and if you're not planning to vote, boys and girls, you're not paying attention. As St. Timothy Leary said (whom that same Gadafi saved from the CIA and the Black Panthers), "Hold your nose and vote."
Ah well. Just keep payin' your taxes; everything will be okay. Blessed be. Gavin and Yvonne

Bulletin from the Garden

We're finally back from Florida Pagan Gathering (FPG), the best one yet. See flapagan.org to learn the particulars of the sponsoring organization, Temple of Earth Gathering. The site is a fantastically beautiful one within Ocala National Forest. All praise to the hard-working, creative staff.
At FPG's bardic circle we enjoyed a lot of bass guitars. What ever happened to saxes? to trumpets? to drums? to all the other instruments? And by the way, what ever happened to intelligible lyrics? A respected music teacher once told Yvonne's glee club,
"Instruments can make music. Humans can make words."
The most beautiful singing voice on earth is meaningless and insulting if the words are indistinguishable.
We saw fewer children on site than in earlier years. Is that because the parents just want to party? Our kids are the future, in spirituality, in creativity, in play as well as in the whole mundane-world culture. If we don't bring them to festivals, we'll lose them to the Muggles and the conformists. Is that what you hope for your descendants (shudder)? Granted, they may see naked people--if they actively seek out the concealed area. And yes, they may get naked themselves. Quel horreur! Sometimes we grind our teeth in such frustration with American "morality"--that is, with inflicted cultural prudishness--that we want to bang our heads against the nearest wall. Didn't thinking "alternative" people learn anything at all from Prohibition and its fallout?
We're planning a trip to Europe this autumn. We'll get to be on a naturist beach in Brittany where gendarmes come down and run off anyone in clothes--the "textiles". It's a glorious feeling on a sunny autumn day to experience sea, sun, breeze on natural bodies. There's a picture postcard available (in Brittany) showing a nude man holding the hand of his nude daughter paddling in the waves. It is untitled; no title is necessary.
Let your kids have that gift at festival. Outgrow cultural assumptions when it is appropriate. Lay aside the shalt-nots of "normal" people. We've seen "normal"--and it's not for the faint of heart.
On our return to West Virginia the lawn was a foot tall, of course; and the snap peas (mange-tout) had grown about two feet. Because our daughter Jo had carefully covered the tomato plants, they in turn were not damaged by a late frost. We're looking forward to a heavy crop. This year again, we planted each with a Tums tablet at its base to furnish the calcium that prevents blossom-end rot. (All this is gardener-jargon. Ignore it if your interests lie elsewhere.) Adding a few tomato-leaf tips to your green salad will help with any lack of calcium; and we all know that a deficiency of calcium is the defining factor for osteoporosis in people of all genders. Don't add too many leaves, though. An excess can upset your tummy.
While we were away the asparagus buds did not get harvested, so more of it went to seed than we usually let happen. In one way asparagus resembles rhubarb: They both need infinite patience. It is best to wait two years before you crop either of them, even when you start them from good root stock.
Blessed be each one who seeks. Gavin and Yvonne

The Morning Affirmation

It has been said that Jews and Witches hid out together during the Burning Times. In those dark hours they shared information that the dominator combination of church and state had officially forbidden. Here you have the root cause of the high interest in Qabalah(1) and in "high" magic found in many Wiccan groups. Traditionally such groups have used the affirmation

Ateh Malkuth Yours are the kingdom
Ve Geburah, Ve Gedullah, and the power and the glory
Le Olam. Amen. forever. Amen.

To us this felt chauvinistic, though some of our friends insist it is equally applicable to the female side of the Life Force. Thus for the feminist Wiccans (and for herself) Yvonne created this equal-opportunity affirmation.

Lady Queen, Lady Queen, Lady Queen, (2)
Shining Maiden, strong Woman, wise Crone:
Yours are dominion, power, glory. (3)
Yours are grace, nurturing, justice. (4)
Thus it is. Thus let it ever be.

You may be interested to know that in our personal life we also use a dawn affirmation of gratitude : gratitude for all the good things that came to us in the previous day and gratitude that we are alive and living today.

We are grateful for yesterday. We are grateful for today.
We honor all the things that make our life possible and pleasant.
So let it be.

Notice here we use "So let it be", in contrast to the more popular "So mote it be". This latter expression again is a dominator way of thinking and speaking. We who have thought through some of the traditions know that it might be just as well not to tell the gods or the Elder Ones arrogantly, "It must be this way" or to demand that the coming day meet our specification.
Use what you like from the ideas above. If you think they stink, suggest something better.
Blessed be those who live mindfully. Gavin and Yvonne
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(1) Choose your favorite spelling from among the many variations on the theme.
(2) Because She is three.
(3) Fair enough, but there's another whole half of the Life Force to be acknowledged.
(4) Attributes approximating the way a human mind can perceive Her grace, Her nurturing, Her justice that correspond to the three aspects of the Goddess, to balance the dominator-male attributes of the original version.
- - - - - - - - -
We'll be out of town to address Florida Pagan Gathering (FPG) presented by Temple of Earth Gathering (TEG), in Ocala National Park/ Forest, Florida. If you're within range to attend, there will be some great speakers and presentations. Information: flapagan.org

Proud to Be a Taxpayer

Before we begin this blog, we should mention that the opinions expressed below are personal opinions, NOT positions of the Church of Wicca. Why? Because legally an exempt organization is not supposed to take political positions. Would it were true for the rest of the nation's churches and ministers in this election year! The law governing the expression of opinions by an exempt organization is one (of many) honored more in the breach than in the observance. Remember "Render unto Caesar" ? Anyway ...
News channels on TV are showing food riots in several nations of the world. The Wall Street Journal says that food prices in the States have risen 83 percent in the last three years. If we remember accurately, they have gone up about 50 percent in the last six months.
At the checkout counter today, I watched an elderly lady stock up on dog and cat food. She doesn't own a dog; she doesn't own a cat. The cashier had known this woman for years, and was close to tears at the sight. She left her register and brought a sack of apples, giving it to the lady. Once the lady had departed, the cashier confided to me (next in line) that the lady was on a fixed Social Security pension, and that the dog and cat food was all she could afford to eat.
The shopper looked as if she was somewhere in her eighties, and actually looked pretty healthy.
Of course she had traveled to the grocery store in the senior citizens' bus, because she could no longer afford to operate a car. That means a dramatic drawing-in of her horizons. Our small town does not have a movie theater, for instance, or (since a recent fire) any quality clothing store. A shoe store? Forget it. Optometrist? Same story. Dentist? You're kidding.
We all know what has happened to the price of fuel. The problem is a very simple one; that is, that people on federal Social Security get a cost-of-living increase each year--but that increase does not acknowledge or figure in the prices of food and fuel. Apparently the federal government (our elected officials) thinks that life does not require either of these commodities.
Something needs fixing. It's only going to get worse, and your own retired parents and grandparents will end up eating cat and dog food--relying on the pity of a supermarket cashier for fresh fruit.
Write your congressman. Write your representative. Hell! Write to the candidates. Ask what they're going to do about it all. We ourselves have given up on the AARP. That body now seems to be part of the establishment, assuming that the biggest decision we currently have to make is how to manipulate our comfortable retirement funds.
So blessed be anyhow. Gavin and Yvonne

Global What?

April is in its second week. As we drove toward aquarobics yesterday we noticed that the service trees (officially Amelanchier, aka "sorbus" trees because of the dialects common to the early European settlers of West Virginia), were blooming on the mountainsides. Why "service" trees? Their blooms revealed two seasonal things: the ground had thawed sufficiently that the bodies of the winter's deaths could be buried; and itinerant circuit-riding preachers could travel to conduct services over those burials and could christen babies born in the season of freezing.
At the same time, for some reason best known to themselves, this year the redbuds (Cercis canadensis) have suddenly bloomed. This means that Spring is well advanced and that we can probably put the bean seeds safely into the ground.
All these signs are encouraging in that Nature is doing its thing, for the most part ignoring politics and politicians. Of course our calendar from last year's garden journal hints that we're two weeks ahead of schedule; so global warming is hitting even us in the mountains.
Somehow in all the talk about global warming and the greenhouse effect, the studies on global dimming have been forgotten. In the few days after 911, when all civilian flights were grounded, the good people at NOAA (national Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency) took the opportunity to calculate the effect of jet exhausts on the planet's atmosphere. Their calculation showed that the planet could be as much as three (3) degrees Fahrenheit cooler because of the jet exhausts than it would be without them. Most of the global-warming studies are talking about 1 degree F in ten years or so--but global dimming is accounting for 3 degrees! Without dimming the world would be 3 degrees hotter today.
Just thought you'd like to know. Blessed be. Gavin and Yvonne

Thoughts from France

There is a love-hate relationship between the United States and France. The French often seem to do things to enrage this nation's government (and who can blame them, when we get such stupidities handed down as "freedom fries" instead of French fries?).
Remember how this whole caper escalated? It was engendered when
1. Emperor George decreed that every right-thinking nation would gladly fall in line to support his one-man vendetta against Iraq.
2. France declined to obey.
3. The American government decreed that all visitors holding French passports suddenly needed visas to enter this nation.
4. In return France dumped its American dollars.
5. Your dollars and mine abruptly lost who knows how much value against the Euro.
In researching earlier cultures, we ourselves have spent some time in Brittany (Bretagne) (a land not to be confused with France itself because the Bretons too have a love-hate relationship with France).
We have observed that French people have some wonderful, effective, innovative ideas that make a lot of sense. When diesel prices climbed outrageously, French truckers united to blockade access to the oil refineries of France. Only emergency vehicles could get fuel. The blockade lasted one (1) entire day; then the French government decided to change the tax structure on fuels. We hear truckers complaining impotently on TV today about diesel at $4 a gallon--and well they should. Why don't American truckers take positive action?
From the point of view of gasoline prices in this nation, the only thing that will convince the oil cartel to lower its prices is if we all stop using as much fuel. Again if we turn to the French, they used the good old Irish boycott--they declared a no-driving day. Of course with public transportation in Europe it is easier to do that than it is in the United States. Of course. We understand--but still we could do it too. Surely if we can declare a no-smoking day, we can declare a no-driving day.
As a last resort, write your congressman, futile though it may be, to tell them in words of one syllable that while the oil companies are making today's obscene profits, they don't need or deserve multi-million-dollar tax breaks and subsidies.
Have a good day. Have a nice walk.
Blessed be. Gavin and Yvonne

Suggestions
1. All of us drastically cut our consumption of fuels. Carpool, ride a bike or a motor scooter, take a bus.
2. Consolidate errands to do them all on one trip instead of on three or four.
3. Until the auto makers catch on, simply stop buying and driving the big SUVs and vehicle-envy machines that implicitly vaunt their low mpg.
4. Finally, a four-letter word that we hesitate to use on a site accessible to young people:
W A L K

Locking Our Shields

We think Basra can teach us a bloody lesson in helping our community survive.
Under British control, Basra was a scene of calm. The city and its docks worked. The oil flowed. Then the British withdrew. For over a month the city continued to function "normally" ... whatever "normal" may mean in the Middle East. Then for reasons best known to itself and to the imams, the central government decided that a city with a "different" sect and its own militia could not be allowed to exist.
Chaos ensued--hundreds of deaths.
The Basra no-win situation can be compared to what heppens when one self-appointed section of our own pagan/Wiccan community decides that another section is wrong. Our community combines a vast spectrum of people. There are those who waft around in pretty robes and gossamer wings, calling themselves Lord Everup and Lady Candy-Ass. Such a worldview shades over into more mature behavior when those individuals begin journeying on to La-La Land.
Beyond La-La Land we find more serious practitioners of the Arts on a more serious path, who spend years in putting together well-thought-out magical systems and cosmologies. In some ways these two activities are diametrically opposed. Cosmology in general is concerned with beginnings and with spirituality. Magical systems in general are intended to influence events in this horizontal dimension.
Everyone is on a progressive ladder. Those in their kindergarten-level dress-up phase will graduate--at least that is our hope. Thus we should embrace their activities, just as we should try to support the activities of those who would like to move to higher levels and to expand the boundaries of Wiccan spirituality and technology. The community cannot afford to bite and claw at each other when people out there are lined up to dance on our graves, people waiting to elect stealth candidates to school boards and to government at every level, itching to make this nation into a theocracy on their terms.
So please. Let us take our heads out of our ... centers of gravity ... and administer to ourselves a reality smack. If we don't lock our shields, the fanatics will not need to destroy this community; its own members will do it.
Why did the British succeed in Basra when the American offensive elsewhere was such a dismal failure? The answer lies in their respective attutides and assumptions: The British went in expecting to meet friends. The Americans went in expecting to meet enemies. Why don't we turn our heads around, you good pagans, and start believing that other members of the community might just become our friends instead of our enemies?
In the hope that we can all lighten up, Blessed be each one cuts the others a little slack. Gavin and Yvonne