Labyrinth Walking & Apple Magic at the Equinox

It is the start of autumn, and the time of year when my Work takes me down into the internal labyrinth, seeking to know myself better.

What do I want to work on? What do I want to explore? Where do I need to go?

We all have versions of ourselves we have been that no longer are. There are versions of ourselves we thought we might be. And there are versions of ourselves that, whatever the circumstances, we can no longer be.

I hold this at the entrance. I focus on breath. I focus on walking, feet on the earth.

Today the world is dark and hard. The way ahead is uncertain. But I am here, breathing. Walking in and out of the labyrinth within me.

Who have we been? Who are we becoming? Who will we be tomorrow?

I stand at the first turn. What do I no longer need? What no longer serves me? What do I still hold onto that hurts me? I shed them, one by one, breath by breath, step by step, going deeper down into the labyrinth.

It’s been a hard year. This winter will not be easier. I carry this knowledge into the dark with me, making it an ally not a deterrent. I use a favorite fictional passage to stoke my courage to see the truth.

“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.” (Frank Herbert, Dune)

The Ritual

In preparation I make a rattle each year with apple seeds harvested from our local orchard and an empty medicine bottle. And for meditation purposes, and lack of yard, I use a finger labyrinth. I’ve walked enough labyrinths that I have body memory of that turning inward and outward but the visual movement is still helpful. 

The ritual I do is simple. As always, I encourage people to adapt it to what works for them. This is what works for me.

I rattle until I feel myself slipping into a calm awareness of everything but pulled by nothing. 

And then I walk the labyrinth, pausing as I make each turn. Each time I ask myself, what do I no longer need? What no longer serves me? What do I still hold onto that hurts me? I shed them, one by one, breath by breath, step by step, going deeper down into the labyrinth, deeper into myself.

What do I need to work on? Where do I need to go? Who am I becoming now?

The Labyrinth

I use a lap labyrinth made by my teacher and friend Tracy at One Path Labyrinth. The grooves are the perfect size for my finger. But you can also use a printed labyrinth of the internet or draw your own. Get creative. The more personal you make it, the better the experience it will be. And by all means, if you have access to an actual labyrinth, or have enough yard to create a temporary one, I highly recommend it.

Call to Prayer in a Time of Change

It is time now, for those of us who commune with our ancestors, who petition them, who pray to them, or who simply pass their names over their lips… it is time for us all to reach out to them and pray for their strength and guidance. It is time to ask Spirit for aid.

Our world is in imbalance. We are being asked and required to hold down our home fronts and isolate ourselves from each other.

          May those without shelter be watched over and passed over from harm.

It is Spring Equinox here and today the world smells warm and dark and earthy. It smells like promise and hope. My lilies were poking out of the ground three days ago. Today their shoots are four inches tall! Change is happening rapidly and it is not all pleasant.

We will not see the end result until we are on the other side. Hold the Tower card up high. Change does not have to be bad. Ride it. Do not let it ride you. Get creative about problem solving.

Your ancestors have done it before you. They know the way out. They found a way out. You will, too.

          May those without resource know kindness from those who have more than needed. 
          May everyone eat. 
          May everyone have access to a clean and safe environment.

I am thinking of my friends who are losing work indefinitely and sometimes permanently because of our current global need to stay home, whose jobs do not allow a work from home option, whose jobs require crowds to come to them.

I am thinking of my friends in the essential industries that do not get to stay at home, but also, and I mean this, barely get to go home and in some instances are not getting paid for all of their time in because the money is not there. And they are all working with a lack of supplies to safeguard themselves.

And they are still working.

          May the hands of the elders guide them. 
          May the skill of the healers work through them. 
          May they be safe and as free from harm as possible.

And I was thinking about how hard my time in the hospital would have been if we had been in such times and my loved ones could not have come to see me. And I am thinking of those who now have to hold off on surgeries, who are preparing to need hospital care, and who are ending their lives in care.

Tonight I will light candles to my ancestors with specific intention.

          May those who are born during this time be safely seen into the world in good health. 
          May they be brought into life with love and joy and ease.

          May those who die during this time be surrounded by their chosen ancestors.
          May they be shepherded into death with compassion and care. 

          May it be so.

Preparing the Way for Spirit to Come Through

Autumn has New York State in her grasp, even though my morning glories are still trying to grow new tendrils. We turn towards All Hallow’s Eve and it feels as though winter will not be far behind. Indoors, I make preparations to honor my Ancestral Dead and welcome them into my home and hearth. I do this every day but at this time of year I do it more formally and intently on a night when the lines between the living and the dead blur.

I see movements out of the corner of my eye, things tucking behind chairs and bookshelves that aren’t there when I look for them straight-on. I feel people entering the room behind me but no matter how certain my body is that I am not alone I cannot see anyone with my naked eye. And my scalp prickles as if a hand has gently touched me. It warms beneath another palm. I no longer reach up to check because I know it is not a physical presence.

This is how I live every October. The blurs are what I refer to as wayward spirits, harmless travelers drawn towards memories of being alive. The closer we get to Samhain the brighter my inner lighthouse gets. My room lurker is currently The German Guy who has made another appearance. He belongs to my maternal Grandma Art’s side. And the hand on my scalp is my Great-Grandma Elsie. Always. She is my spirit traffic guide. She is never far.

I leave her cups of tea and horribly salted chicken wings. She lived with us in the summers and was alive until I was seventeen. There is a space in my heart that was shaped by her, a part of me that remembers how she molded me. 

You can’t let the bullies stop you from living your life, she'd tell me.

That goes for spirit bullies, too. Sometimes, if you are sensitive to them, they can crowd the room and demand attention. So when I clean my Ancestor Altar and refresh it for the season I call in peaceful spirits here that do not wish us harm. I take a shot of some pungent liquor and make an offering at the edge of our property for those spirits seeking offerings with no regard for the living.

There is room for them all to be honored…just...out there. Not in my home.

On Samhain we feast a Dumb Supper with our ancestors, setting a place for special guests and one place for all the rest to come and join. Together, the collective of us living and dead will say a final farewell to those who have passed since last year and I will ask the Ancestors to safeguard those who may not yet be at peace and to watch over their families.

Some years the names of my Recent Dead are few. This year, the list is longer than I'd like, and the losses are heavy. A dear friend and community member. Several other community members... oh, my heart. My Great-Aunt. A beloved friend and college companion. The loss of him is still rippling out through our hearts. It will be felt for years.

I wish them peace even as I grieve the loss of them, the loss of their physical presence, of their wisdom, of all the time we’ll never have to repair or strengthen wounds and hearts. And I am left to figure out how to move on from unfinished work.

But not alone. Those Who Have Gone Before aid me in my grief. The Ancestral Dead, the centuries of others who have felt such loss, have been deceased long enough that they can hold space for my sorrow. When I am open to it, in my darkest moment, I do not feel alone.

For some people the thought of ghosts is isolating and frightening. We often feel such a way about things we cannot explain. I’ve always trusted what I am experiencing more than just my eyes. We do not see everything and we do not see everything the same way as everyone else. It makes our personal experiences valuable.

Open your heart to the thinning of the walls between this world and the next. Do not try to quantify or qualify. I will tell you that yes, your loved one is gone. And they are alive. And they are reincarnated. And they are with you. All of that is true, all at once, right now.

Now they are gone. Now they are everywhere.

How will you honor them this year?



(post updated from October 17, 2018)

An Evolution of Spirit

“I am fundamentally an optimist. Whether that comes from nature or nurture, I cannot say. Part of being optimistic is keeping one's head pointed toward the sun, one's feet moving forward. There were many dark moments when my faith in humanity was sorely tested, but I would not and could not give myself up to despair. That way lays defeat and death.” ~ Nelson Mandela

I talk pretty on my blog about kindness and compassion. My words are honest and I work every day to live by them. But I wasn’t always this person. We are born with open hearts, and then the world happens and shapes us and we spend the rest of our lives fighting to get back to that original place of faith in humanity. Every year I get closer. But I like people to know how different I was, to understand how much I have changed. Because if they do not perceive my change, how can they believe themselves capable of the same transformation?

“Loving ourselves through the process of owning our story is the bravest thing we’ll ever do.” ~Brené Brown

I used to be an anger ball. By that I mean I was very quick to anger. I was angry at the violence I had suffered. Angry at the people around me who found relief by taking out their pain and insecurity on others. I was angry at the hardness of a world I did not seem to belong in. I was no better. I curled in or lashed out, always one of two extremes, as a way of taking what I needed from the world to survive it.

“Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.” ~Mark Twain

I didn’t know there was another way. I was a heavenly body on the inside of the circuit, the sun that the solar system revolved around. I didn’t see that the world was smothering me because I put myself at the center of it. All I saw was that I was suffocating. And I couldn’t see a way out.

“The way is not in the sky. The way is in the heart.” ~Buddha

I was at a crossroads, my own personal Equinox. I was disconnected from myself, from the earth beneath me, from the sky above me. I could see the forest of trees but not the roots of them entwining and holding each other up. I didn’t know how to bend. I didn’t know how to flow. Everything was fire and lava. I wasn’t living in the world, I was burning my way through it.

“If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. … We need not wait to see what others do.” ~Mahatma Gandhi

When we feel lonely we push out at the world, keeping it further at bay. I pushed everyone away before they could leave me, before they could hurt me. I thought pain was inevitable and that was the face I gave.

“Listen—are you breathing just a little, and calling it a life?” ~Mary Oliver

It wasn’t what I wanted. I was at a crossroads and I made a choice. I turned away from chaos and insanity, from trying to fit in and struggling to breathe. I let go of the anger that was eating me from the inside out. I didn’t know what to do with it, so I just released it in small breaths. I didn’t know what to do with it, so I gave it up to the universe. I rediscovered faith and turned my attention to finding a path that felt firm beneath my feet. I took the time to get to know myself.

“Can you remember who you were, before the world told you who you should be?” ~Danielle LaPorte

I had defined myself for so long by what I didn’t like, what I didn’t want, and what I thought I was supposed to want, that I found I didn’t know what it was I did want. What did I like? Who was I? I first heard an answer in a ritual in the dark in the mountains. Deep in the core of you, what are you? I quieted my soul and listened, and the word that came from my mouth surprised me.

“Light,” I said, with tears in my throat. And later, the overwhelming answer I found was kindness, goodness, compassion, and joy. When I removed the protective layers from my heart, I discovered the brightness I had been searching for all along within me.

“The dark does not destroy the light; it defines it. It’s our fear of the dark that casts our joy into the shadows.” ~Brené Brown

The world I live in is a better place for having me in it. I believe that. I feed it my hope and my optimism and my compassion. It does not mean I am perfect. It does not mean my heart is not weighed down by the violence and evil that men do. It does not mean that I do not cry in the quiet nights within the safety of my walls. But I cry because I am connected now. I feel part of the earth beneath me and the sky above me. I feel part of the roots connecting the trees beneath the surface.

“Softness is not weakness. It takes courage to stay delicate in a world this cruel.” ~Beau Taplin

“Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.” ~Iain S. Thomas

Do not be ashamed of the ways the world has tested you. Do not be ashamed of the times you have fallen, of the times you have failed to get it right. What matters is that you picked your head up. What matters is that you picked yourself up and you kept going, even though you did not have faith that what lay ahead was better. It is not our perfect moments that define who we are. It is the moments we are imperfect that shows the spirit that lies beneath the flesh and bone. It is how we carry ourselves through those moments that reveal the soul of us.

“Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.” ~Buddha

We are meant to follow our own paths. It is never too late to change tracks and find your way back to you. Our original state is harmony and peace. The world is hard but there are others in it, lighting candles in their hearts against the dark, struggling to grow despite the resistance. Every action is a choice. When you stand at the crossroad, open yourself to compassion and hope. You just might be surprised where you find it.

“For a seed to achieve its greatest expression, it must come completely undone. The shell cracks, its insides come out and everything changes. To someone who doesn’t understand growth, it would look like complete destruction.” ~Cynthia Occelli


[Originally posted September 24, 2014.]

Preparing to Revere the Dead

Spring has finally sprung. This is the time of year that I pull out my box from Samhain, from when we spoke the names of Ancestors and Beloved Dead and burned their ribbons in the fire. It is the time I take to prepare for the shrines I hold between Beltane and Samhain.

I pulled out white muslin and cut new ribbons, one inch by twenty-one inches. I cut one-hundred and one ribbons, adding them to what was left of last year. I folded them up and slid a straight pin through them.

A little danger as sacrifice for standing in the presence of the Ancestors.

I cut blue ribbons for those who died since last year’s shrines. My hands trembled at the list of names of loved ones who passed this last year. The seasons of hard losses stick under my ribs.

I ironed the ribbons one at a time. It is a meditation I enjoy. That level of mindfulness is the least I could do. So many remembered dead dance through my heart, as they did in life.

Mark Dutcher Eaton*, Melinda Tanner, Elizabeth Fricke, Jeff Patterson, Willie Lingenfelter, Elsie Durant Riddle*, Gabe Reynolds, Joel Pelletier, Victoria Eaton*, Edward J. Jerge II, Trent Illig, Donna MacDonald Riddle*, Jurgen Banse-Fey, Charles ‘Sienna Fox’ Duvall, Jack Singer, Tommy Amyotte, Paul Seeloff, Richard James Riddle*, Andrew Begley, Susan Alvarez-Hughes, Coswald Mauri*, Norm Herbert, Jad Alexander, Dr. August Staub, Princess Leather Falcor*, Melvin Chausse, John Simeon Croom, Karl Weber, Luna Jackalope*, Albert Gritzmacher III, Freya Moon Greenleaf, Patches the Crazy Circus-Freak Dog*, Barbara Jean Schiffert, Bella the Bear-Cat*, Joe Quagliano*, Soja Arumpanayil, Tracy Lee Flint Jr., Christina Adkins, Harry T. Brashear, David Ruston Eaton*, Carol Quagliano*, Paul Ames*, Robert Kiff, Sumant Malhotra, David Knight, Amy Maxwell, Ruth Ann Livingston Kiff, Zami*, Joseph Croteau, Norm Eaton*, Patricia Ann Art-Slomba*…

They are not forgotten.

I breathed deep and exhaled. And then my heart skipped.

This year the heat startled me. It pulled me from my litany of names, from my ancestors. The heat scared me. It’s a sign of how well-recovered I feel that I stepped back into my spiritual habit without remembering that I have not handled the iron since being on fire. I forgot that my wife did this part for me, sacredly, the last two years.

I ironed all of the ribbons. Slowly, reverently, cautiously, and carefully. My hands were unsteady and clumsy as I have been since recovering but I did not burn myself. My ancestors stood with me, hovering like they did in the Burn ICU.

But I ironed all the ribbons.

My wife came home soon after and ironed the prayer flags I use to mark the entrances to the shrines. There are 63 flags, all hand cut and hand sewn. It was a way of layering magic, fluttering flags calling those who hear to come greet their ancestors.

This is what it means to build a practice. This is how I prepare to honor the dead. Focus. Intention. Work. The spirits from the other side who meet me in the middle sure do help. This is how we open a doorway that others may walk through if they desire it.

Have Gratitude for the Day

I stood in the warm spring sunshine of the morning, cleaning out the garbage pail. The most current tenants across the way played something they probably called music on their phone at a volume that rivaled any boom box of my youth. Another neighbor walks her dogs, spilling gossip and unrealized hate from behind a white face mask. The kitty-corner renters, an elderly mother and daughter argue over whose turn it is to run to the gas station for cigarettes. And yet another neighbor smiles and me and waves good morning.

Her smile is enough to make me blind to the garbage littering the street. This is where I live. This is my life.

And it is good. It is heartfelt. It is honest. And that is enough to make me smile.

My thoughts turn to spring planting and the coming summer months and scheduling and before I know it, I am already mapping out October again. And I have to stop myself. And turn my face to the sun. It’s a balm, even though my eyes are hidden behind wrap-around glasses.

I let myself think of summer. I have to prepare myself for the coming days of compression garments and heat. I am still recovering and the road I am on is long. But there is sweetness in the distant promise of fresh strawberries. The bright red berry pops into my head and I think of my Great-Grandma Elsie, and the summers she spent with us.

Strawberries were a delight for her.

And in that moment, she is standing with me, face to the sun, in the small patch of yard in front of the apartment we rent. I was taller than her when she died. A lot of people were taller than her. But I see her ghostlight shimmering below my chin and I can feel Elsie take my hand. Even in death hers is always cool to the touch. She squeezes gently with all of the wisdom of her old age.

This time is a gift. Enjoy each moment. Have gratitude for the day. For right now. For what you have. For where you are. Count your blessings.

You were always one of mine.  

I totally cried in my front yard, unabashedly. She died when I was seventeen and my heart still yearns for her. Elsie loved summer. And I loved Elsie.

I turn my face to the sun, grateful for its heat and the warming winds. I know in my bones that those who came before me had the same moment of gratitude, over and over each spring. They were all New Englanders. We are connected in this gratitude. It transcends time within me.

And surely every creature who has survived a darkness, has that moment of knowing the worst of it has passed and a reprieve has come. And they turn themselves to the light.

Have gratitude for the day. For right now. For what you have. For where you are. Count your blessings.

Modraniht, id est matrum nocturum

“the Modraniht, that is, in the night of the mothers[=matrons?]”

History

I came across this celebration when I was researching the pagan roots of my German ancestors. Early Germanic peoples celebrated the night before Winter Solstice as Mothers Night. The Venerable Bede, a Christian monk from the 8^th century wrote about it in his description of the pagan calendar. In Old English they called it Modraniht. More than 1100 votive stones and altars have been found through the centuries, dedicated to the mothers, or matrons, and half of these altar stones were inscribed and dedicated with Germanic names.

The main areas of worship have been uncovered in ancient Germania, northern Italy and eastern Gaul. There are a few larger cult centers with temples found along the Rhine. Many of these altars were found near rivers, wells or springs. The dedicated altars and votives reached as far as present day Scotland, southern Spain, Frisia and Rome. There is reference to the Germanic Mother Cults in the writings of Bede in 725 AD: “And the very night that is sacrosanct to us, these people call modranect, that is, the mothers’ night, a name bestowed, I suspect, on account of the ceremonies which they performed while watching this night through.”

Altars and votive stones, as well as temples, were often carved with images showing three women of matron age and appearance, often holding baskets of fruit and a baby. Based on the inscriptions found, it is thought that these altars were dedicated as offerings of thanks for abundance, gifts and blessings that soldiers and sailors had already received. They believed the Mothers had responded to their prayers and this was their way of acknowledging them, burning incense and leaving sacrificial offerings of food.

Many of these goddesses or spirits were named for the family that was dedicating them, as well as being named for the river or spring that watched over the local town or village, such as the Albiahenae matrons of the town of Elvenich or the Renahenae of the Rhine. Of the 1100 votive stones found, over 360 different ones name the same sets of matrons, the Aufaniae, the Suleviae and the Vacallinehae. Based on the age of the stone inscriptions, it appears that the cult of the Matrons began to die out in continental Germany around the fifth century CE, and Modraniht fell out of favor as Christianity gained foothold.

Home

The Night of the Mothers was the time to honor the familial and tribal “soul” mothers who watched over them. It was intended to honor those who had crossed over, not for those still living. On Mothers Night we honor the sacrifice of life so that the ancestral matrons might become a source of wisdom and strength for those still living.

I begin my celebration by creating a small rock cairn on a temporary altar. I honor first those of my mothers who have crossed over, inscribing their names on stone in chalk. I light a candle for each of them. I remember them and tell what I know of their stories. I do also choose to honor the strength of the mothers still living, that they may become part of that ancestral current when it is their turn to pass through the veil.

I drink a cup of tea and invite them to share my cup. I crochet, something my Great-Grandmother taught me on the front porch over the summer when I was younger, gifting me her hooks when she could no longer use them. One way to honor the mothers is to honor their work and pass on the skills that have been taught to you by your mothers, and their mothers, that they live on through you, and the crafting of your hands.

What was special to them? Before dusk falls on Modraniht, I sit and hand-sew, darning old clothes. With each stitch, I pray. Tonight I stitch runes of rebirth, recovery, and courage into cloth. Each stitch is a small prayer of hope, a way of pushing forward despite the adversity.

This night is the night for daughters and sons to honor the line of birthings that occurred throughout history, that opened the way for their births. That made their presence in the world. It does not matter what current feelings might be complicated around maternal relationships.

You are because they were. Do not rewrite the past. Honor the journey.

Heartsong

A year ago I prayed to my mothers from a hospital bed on the rehabilitation floor. I thanked the spirit women who stood by my bedside on the Burn ICU. I thanked the faces I recognized from photos and the ones I may never identify.

            Again, I pray for them. I thank the ICU nurses who mothered me back to health and back to myself. I thank and pray for everyone who had hands in easing my recovery, brightening my heart, or tended to my body needs in any way. And this year I thank the courses my brain stories took that enabled me to step out of the fire without succumbing to madness.

            In light of that new prayer, I light a candle for the mythological goddess Frigga, who sheltered me in the darkest moments by wrapping what was left of my bones in a cool cloth and tucked me away from the glare of the blinding sunlight. In the next moment, in my ICU bed, I knew a moment of relief.

Hearth

I am Sarah,

daughter of Margaret,

daughter of Patricia,

daughter of Margaret,

daughter of Eliza,

daughter of Mary of Ireland,

daughter of mother unknown…

Daughters of daughters back to the first mother,

I pray to you in stitches.

The needle between my fingers devolves into metals of various kinds, into bits of bone, until my hands roughen, becoming one with the first hands of my line to stitch skins together. Whoever is unknown to me, whatever countless number of generations of mothers led to my birth, we are joined in this familiar act.

I pray for health for my loved ones.

I pray for my continued healing and recovery.

I pray for happiness for all who walk the earth.

I pray for moments of joy for all who are grieving.

I pray that the echo of the wisdom of the mothers who have come before is remembered.

I pray for the earth, for our Great Mother, whose bones and minerals and animal DNA gave us life.

I pray for all mothers who came before me, all who walk with me and all who will come after... though my line ends with me.

May my life touch others while I am living it.

Grandma Donna MacDonald (m.Riddle)

Grandma Ruth Emma Ruston (m.Eaton)

1xGG Minnie Estelle Wicker (m.Ruston)

1xGG Hattie Eva Smith (m.Eaton0

2xGG Ruth Ireland (m.Ruston), Grandma Ruth Emma Ruston, 2xGG Emma Angeline Whitcher (m.Wicker)

2xGG Hattie Eva Dutcher (m.Smith)

2xGG Theresa Cordelia Tenney (m.Eaton)

2xGG Frances Gillette (m.Riddle) back, far left, & 3xGG Jane Berry (m.Gillette) front, right

3xGG Eliza Marsh Bird (m.Dutcher)

3xGG Sophia Sears (m.Smith)

4xGG Mary Ann Boots (m.Gillette)

4xGG Elizabeth Ann Hill (m.Berry)

[Adapted from an article originally published December 21, 2011.]

Equinox Descent Mythologies

Covering beds for the winter

as garden snakes go underground.

The sun retreats from half of the world,

hibernating through longer nights.

“We must carry the dark,” Autumn whispers.

“What do you bring into the dreaming?”

Inanna descends into the Underworld of her own free will. She makes the journey to meet with her sister, Ereshkigal, her shadow self. She goes to face her hidden half and she will be undone in the dark. But when the dawn comes she will *know* herself wholly for the first time, and will re-emerge from the deep in her strength and power. 

What do you see when you face your reflection? What is light? What is dark? Can you breathe in all of the pieces and make a whole image? Do you have the strength to stand naked and unflinching before it?

Unwinding her thread, Ariadne gave her lover the map to the labyrinth beneath the surface of the earth, beneath the surface of her skin. He went in to meet her shadow self, her twin brother chained at the center of the labyrinth. The beast we call Minotaur is the primal darkness within her breast, the animal part of her that she hides. Her twin is made of big bang, the original star. She is betrayed as the hero slays that same monster in order to woo her, to protect her, to impress her. Ariadne’s hero cut out her very heart. 

Do you keep your ugliness hidden from the world? Are you not made more beautiful in the shadow of your flaws? Who decides what is ugly or what makes a thing flawed? Do you have the strength to expose your vulnerabilities? The things that make you different help shape the world. Can you shed those who would stand in judgment of you for those who will embrace you as you are?

Persephone leaves the child of springtime behind her as the sands trickle towards autumn. She steps on the path winding into the hillside, away from her mother’s eyes and arms. She leaves her parent’s home, known and fragrant with summer memories, towards the unknown house of her husband, in shadow, where she shall be lover, spouse and woman. She steps lightly on the path. She knows where it is going though she does not know the landscape and she cannot see its end. As she journeys she grows more sure-footed. She trusts that it is the right path. Either way, she embraces her choice.

What shades of yourself have you shed in your journey? Have you learned to let them go and accept the changes? Can you be a daughter or son to your parents without still being a child? Can you step into uncertainty? Can you keep your feet to your path, though you cannot see the ending?

Orpheus descends to the Underworld in grief, passing where no living being can pass. In his love, he wins Eurydice back. But the path out of the darkness is too long and too quiet and his grief was too deep. Orpheus loses faith that she is behind him even though she promised she would be there. He turns around before they reach the light and she is lost to him forever. 

Can you face the moments when you slip? Can you take responsibility for your mistakes? Can you rise above them rather than sink into embarrassed despair? Can you find faith in those darkest moments?

Oya stands at the cemetery gate as the recent dead descend into the ground. She is the beacon of light calling them to rest. She greets them with a candle or lantern, standing against the flood of their fresh grief. Oya knows the darkness and she guides them through.

That strength lives in you. Do you know how to find it?

The key of the labyrinth is a crossroad of souls. Papa Legba waits in the darkest shadows for a cry, a whistle, a trumpet of need, ready to ferry bargains and deals as we wander through our winter nights. And his hand will be the warmest hand, and he will greet you as an old friend. And he will take what you offer to appease your heart. But you can never have it back.

What would you sacrifice? What have you already given?

Tlazolteotl balances the act of love with the act of defecation. Sacred in, sacred out. She is the flow between connection and release. Birth and death. Life and loss. One follows the other, like night follows day and day follows night. She walks-between for us, holding the memory of light when the darkness overwhelms, and holds the dark so we don’t forget to find gratitude for the light.

What is sacred to you?

The veils are thinning. The darkness is winning favor as we turn into autumn. Our mythologies provide us with archetypes we can use to illuminate ways to navigate the path ahead, that we can move forward. 

What do we learn from these stories? 

We learn to not fear the dark, but to tread gently through it and embrace it. Use your personal dark as a space of transformation. Face your twilight reflection and prepare to challenge and test yourself against the chilled slumber of the earth and the lengthening nights.

Covering beds for the winter

as garden snakes go underground.

The sun retreats from half of the world,

hibernating through longer nights.

“We must carry the dark,” Autumn whispers.

“What do you bring into the dreaming?”

*Original poem, Equinox, by Sarah Lyn.

[First posted as Equinox Mythos & Mystery on September 28, 2011.] 

Morning Glories in Meditation

Every year, as spring begins to blossom, I push the base of a wooden trellis into the fresh dirt next to our little stoop. I watch as the small seedlings from the previous autumn poke their way through the earth and unfurl. I weed the bed and water the small beings reverently. As the vines grow, thin and spaghetti-like, I teach them to move towards the trellis. They grow thicker, covered in short fuzz. The leaves grow bigger, shaped like hearts. The larger they get, and the deeper the color, the closer they are to budding.

I spend each morning in a gentle meditation, wrapping the sweet vines around the trellis, and watching them catch on over the days, until they wind themselves, in and out. The trellis is the loom where nature and I create beautiful art together. As the weeks pass, the vines become a green wall, offering us a sense of privacy; our nature guardian.

When the buds first come, they are tight little spirals, growing bigger each day. When I can see the color threaded through them, I know they will open the next morning and it will be a morning treasure hunt to see where the early blooms have hidden themselves.

The flowers are full and thick and brilliant at dawn, staying to the shadows. The beautiful heart-shaped leaves act like umbrellas, extending the lives of the blossoms by shading them. At mid-morning, the blossoms glow with a luminescence that makes them seem otherworldly, as if tiny portals are opening from within the heart of the flower.

This is my favorite time of day to be in the garden, to be sitting on the stoop with a book and a notepad, stirring my own creative juices in their wake. I watch as the bees frolic and pollinate, leaving tiny dustings of pollen on the petals. I watch as the light fades from the petals.

As the day lengthens and the sun climbs in the sky, the morning glory blossoms grow weaker, their petals more translucent. The softening flowers tear easily and stick to the leaves around them. By mid-afternoon those that have survived curl in upon themselves. At dusk, the day-old flowers drop unceremoniously to the ground below.

Every day in the world of the morning glory is a new beginning, a new life. Their beauty doesn’t last because nothing lasts. The nature of life is that it ends. That is the magic of the morning glory for me. They are dead when dark descends, but tomorrow, there will be life again.

In the fall, when the garden withers, small buds of seeds are left behind on the browning vines. They will dry and shrink and loosen their eggplant-colored seeds into the ground. There, they will slumber through winter, waiting to emerge come next spring. So even in their seasonal ending, there is hope. There is always hope. But for today, under the last of summer sun, there is still beauty and joy.

[New photos, 2016. Reprinted September 2, 2015. Originally published August 14, 2013.]

Random Acts of Kindness

Every time there is a mass shooting because of senseless gun violence, it breaks my heart and shakes me. I don’t like guns. I don’t own one. I’ve never held one.

I’ve had one held on me. That was life-altering. Metal is cold, like the cowards who hide behind them while pointing them at another being, as if any life is other than sacred.

If you like guns, I don’t have a problem with you. I have a problem with people who own guns and think they have a right to take lives with them.

What happened in the Orlando nightclub is devastating. Forty-nine people of every age, celebrating life and being alive, gone so quickly. It took me three days to get through all the victim’s names and their known stories. So many couples were taken out together, a mother died saving her son, and a son’s last text to his mother before his death was heartbreaking.

That seismic a loss is too overwhelming to comprehend.

I have new skin from my skin grafts. It’s baby butt smooth and just as sensitive, discovering sensations for the first time again. The emotion that comes over me when I read the names of the dead literally makes that new skin crawl. It’s painful. My new animal skin understands better than my grown-up brain how very <wrong> the loss of people-I-don’t-know is.

My animal skin understands that murder is never okay.

Gun violence. It happened here, in the city where I live, in 2009. We are one of the statistics that come up in the news every time there’s a mass shooting. The shooter had barricaded the back door of the American Civic Association with his father's car, so no one could escape, and went in the front door. I wasn't there. But I was a few blocks away. I lived there and still do.

It was surreal. Shots had been heard. The shooter had gone in through the front door and shot the receptionists, he went into his old classroom and opened fire. He never said a word. He shot four more people than he killed, and he took thirteen lives.

It happened in my city. Blocks from my house. We were downtown when we heard the final news. We were helping to prep for an art opening, but the tone was somber and sober under the sounds of helicopters above. Even at the art gallery, we were just two blocks away.

Thirteen people were murdered. It seemed unbelievable.

I walked home after the all-clear was given. I walked home through the throng of people waiting outside the ACA, waiting to hear the fate of their loved ones. The shock and grief were palpable. Everyone was crying, both those wailing and those stone silent. I didn't feel anger, just stunned unreality. It was so quiet. Everyone was holding each other up.

I barely made it through them and when I did get home, I collapsed. When I <keep hearing> about these mass shootings with semi-automatic weapons, I think about that wave of grief and pain that comes in the aftermath...

What I know of gun violence is that it can happen anywhere. I have an idea of how stunned Orlando is by what happened there. Like everyone, I feel helpless. I am at a loss of understanding.

How could one person be responsible for so much pain? Does it matter why he did it? Will that erase the damage? Will knowing waken the dead? No. There is no answer or discovery the police could uncover that will offset those lives taken, or give peace to the grieving families.

This shadow side of our world is so ugly, it hurts. I have seen the ugly. I have lived the ugly, and in response, I chose love and kindness. It was not easy. It was a hard and difficult journey to get there. But it was a choice. I live it every day.

Violence breeds violence. It is never an answer.

You can't just sit in grief. No one can. Not for long. You have to find a way to transform it into something useful, or you're just multiplying grief, and sending that out into the world. You have to transform it. Transmute it. Turn darkness into light.

I will honor the forty-nine innocent lives taken with forty-nine random acts of kindness for strangers. Each time I do, I will pause and honor another name from the list of the dead. I will keep this journey as a mindful exercise as I work to spread love into the world instead of hate.