Psalm 23, Dedicated to My Mother

Full Fasting Moon

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"When have you encountered the Light through music?" 

For the first time all day I was alone. Not really alone, nurses bustled about down the hall and the whole hospital building buzzed with the hushed vibrating energy that was still new and uneasy to me. My sister had just left and I knew her leaving came with both relief and worry for her. This hospital was hard for her, but she had been my rock for hours.

For the last time in a week I was all alone. The pain hadn't become tear wrenchingly unbearable yet. The nurses faces still shined with optimism and hope. But as I was left alone, alone for the first time all day, alone for the last time for a week, I cried. I was on the edge of a chasm though I couldn't see it at the time. All I knew was I was alone, ill and scared.

I found myself searching my mind and heart for something to comfort me. A fragment of a story, a glimpse of a melody. Where had I heard it before? I don't even know. But I found what I was looking for on YouTube (G(!)d(dess) bless the internet!) and listened to it all night.

The Lord is my Shepard, I have all I need,
She makes me lie down in green meadows,
Beside the still waters, She will lead.

She restores my soul, She rights my wrongs,
She leads me in a path of good things,
And fills my heart with songs.

Even though I walk, through a dark and dreary land,
There is nothing that can shake me,
She has said She won't forsake me,
I'm in her hand.

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The song is Psalm 23rd, Dedicated to My Mother written by Bobby McFerrin and performed by the choral group Cantus. I've never been much of a Bible reader and the imagery of god as a shepherd has never resonated with me. God as a tall, thin, bearded man with a white robe and a shepherd's crook reeks of watered down bible stories for children and patriarchy. C.S. Lewis reminds us, though, that we don't have to understand how something works to know that it does, whether that thing is a good meal or redemption in Christ. I don't know how these words, words that may or may not describe how I view the Divine, came to make themselves known to me that night. I certainly do not know how they soothed my very being in that dark and dreary land of the OHSU emergency room but I do know that they did.


This was written for my Quaker Meeting's collective journal, Minding the Light. Check the link for our web presence, and check out all my other posts labeled Minding the Light here. 

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Full Fasting Moon 2012: The Sap Moon

Full Fasting Moon 2011: Of Peacocks, Pride and Park Rangers

Full Fasting Moon 2010: I didn't post a Full Fasting Moon post in 2010, but Spring is Springing is a New Fasting Moon post for that spring.

Full Fasting Moon 2009: Full Moon in the Fasting Moon

Nothing But Good Can Come of This

Mothers Moon

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The Story of the Lost Son

Then he said, "There was once a man who had two sons. The younger said to his father, 'Father, I want right now what's coming to me.'
"So the father divided the property between them. It wasn't long before the younger son packed his bags and left for a distant country. There, undisciplined and dissipated, he wasted everything he had. After he had gone through all his money, there was a bad famine all through that country and he began to hurt. He signed on with a citizen there who assigned him to his fields to slop the pigs. He was so hungry he would have eaten the corncobs in the pig slop, but no one would give him any.

"That brought him to his senses. He said, 'All those farmhands working for my father sit down to three meals a day, and here I am starving to death. I'm going back to my father. I'll say to him, Father, I've sinned against God, I've sinned before you; I don't deserve to be called your son. Take me on as a hired hand.' He got right up and went home to his father.

"When he was still a long way off, his father saw him. His heart pounding, he ran out, embraced him, and kissed him. The son started his speech: 'Father, I've sinned against God, I've sinned before you; I don't deserve to be called your son ever again.'

 "But the father wasn't listening. He was calling to the servants, 'Quick. Bring a clean set of clothes and dress him. Put the family ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Then get a grain-fed heifer and roast it. We're going to feast! We're going to have a wonderful time! My son is here—given up for dead and now alive! Given up for lost and now found!' And they began to have a wonderful time.

 "All this time his older son was out in the field. When the day's work was done he came in. As he approached the house, he heard the music and dancing. Calling over one of the houseboys, he asked what was going on. He told him, 'Your brother came home. Your father has ordered a feast—barbecued beef!—because he has him home safe and sound.'

 "The older brother stalked off in an angry sulk and refused to join in. His father came out and tried to talk to him, but he wouldn't listen. The son said, 'Look how many years I've stayed here serving you, never giving you one moment of grief, but have you ever thrown a party for me and my friends? Then this son of yours who has thrown away your money on whores shows up and you go all out with a feast!'

"His father said, 'Son, you don't understand. You're with me all the time, and everything that is mine is yours—but this is a wonderful time, and we had to celebrate. This brother of yours was dead, and he's alive! He was lost, and he's found!'"

Luke 15:11-32 from The Message Bible

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 I've never been terribly fond of this story. I never understood why the brother who stayed wasn't celebrated while the brother who left got a party. It seemed so unfair. The light of the Mothers Moon this summer

 has allowed me to see the story, the Father's actions, in a different way. In the way of motherlove.

The Mothers Moon reminds us that we are all worthy of love not based on what we do or believe or say, but based simply on the fact that we exist. We are the Mother's beloved child and she will love us no matter what we do or don't do. The Father in the parable of the Prodigal Son loves the boy who left and came back just as much as he loves the son who stayed. Both are beloved sons, both are deserving of barbecues and dancing. Neither deserve punishment or chastisement.

I think in the past I have always identified with the son who stayed. Of course I was the child who who played by the rules, didn't strike off on my own, didn't do dumb or silly things. Worked hard, played it safe. No one would ever have to throw a party for me when I returned, because I would never leave. This spring, however, I have done some "leaving". I like to think that I have been splashing around in the shallows of hedonism for a couple months. I have felt far from some aspects of my spirituality, 

especially my contemplative practices,  but I have never felt far from the spirit of god. I have felt a bit like the kids I took to the beach last week; they ran and screamed and poked dead things and climbed on things while I watched from the sidelines. They might have gotten hurt, but that is part of growing up. I might have gotten hurt or distracted as I splashed around in all this emotional and physical muck, but the Goddess is near by to comfort me when I scrape my knee or bang my head.  She loves me no matter what I do, or don't do.

The epiphany that came right around the full moon of the Mother's Moon rang so true with pronoic motherlove energy: Nothing but good can come of this. She loves me no matter how prodigal I am. 

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Mother's Moon 2011: Freedom, July and Krishna and the Gopis

Mother's Moon 2010: You Are the Mother's Beloved Child and Motherlove and Caring for the Environment

Mother's Moon 2009: Gifts from the Mother

July

Full Mother's Moon

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The full Mother's Moon is upon us and so is summer. As I talked about in my Summer Solstice post, this is the time of late nights and early mornings with long, busy, lovely days in between. I feel like I have been set on Energizer Bunny mode and there is no real end in sight. Its an exciting time, a beautiful time, and a crazy time. The Mother is showering us with gifts of fruit, sunshine, flowers and friendship. Do we see these gifts? What do we do with them? What do we do with all of them??

July
THE meadows slumber in the golden shine;
Full-mirrored in the river's glass serene,
Stirless, the blue sky sleeps; knee-deep in green,
Nigh o'er-content for grazing are the kine.
The russet hops hang ripening on the bine;
The birds are mute; no clouds there are between
The slumbering lands to come and the sun's sheen;
The day is drowsed with Summer's 'wildering wine.
Peace over all is writ: fought is the fight;
From Winter for the nonce the field is won
And the tired earth can slumber in the sun
And dream her summer-dreams of still increase;
Whil'st, as the long rays lengthen to the night,
The breeze o'er all the landscape murmurs 'Peace!'
- John Payne

The weather has been so lovely here in Portland these last two weeks. We've had a couple spells of mid to upper 80s broken up with cooler days. I feel like I have been either opening or closing windows constantly all month to keep the temperature reasonable in the house. I've been camping, hiking, swimming and hanging out on patios like it's going out of style, which in a way it is. Realizing that there are only two more weeks of July and then only 4 weeks of August and then it is September makes you want to run around and soak up all the sunshine and warm weather you can get. Gotta store up that vitamin D and memories of outdoor living for the inevitable gray and wet winter ahead.

The plant life in my neighborhood is showing the first signs of the summer drought. The roadside weeds are clearly no longer in the full flush of growth that they were in three weeks ago. Many grasses are three or four feet tall (and some are even taller) and beginning to ripen their seed heads, adding hints of gold and purple to the green of the medians and unmowed fields. Even the trees seem to have settled out of their sparkling spring green into a more steady summer green. The flashy spring flowers like irises and rhododendrons are past but the beautiful little field flowers are making their appearance in yellows, purples and whites.

And the roses! Portland isn't called the City of Roses for nothing. The area all along the freeway that runs right around downtown Portland is planted in a riot of pink, red and white roses that are all in bloom right now. I get a flush of civic pride every time I drive it. And of course, the rose gardens at Washington Park and Peninsula Park - as well as every grandma's front yard in the neighborhood - are in full, blossom.

Its a frantic time, these long, warm summer days. It's alright, though, to lean into that frantic energy. There will be time for rest and sleep in the shorter, cooler days of autumn yet to come. Its hard to think that summer is sliding into autumn already, but its almost impossible not to feel that way. Counting the weeks, watching the grasses turn colors or even noting that the sun is setting just a few minutes earlier each sunny evening is proof positive that Summer Solstice, while the zenith of the sun's power, is also the tipping point into the waning half of the year.

What does July look like where you are? How are you enjoying summer and the Mother's gifts that come with the long days? Is your area known for any flowers or fruit and are they in season right now? Are you noticing the waning of the year already or does it just look like go go go from your standpoint? Are you remembering your sunscreen? Happy summertime!

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Mother's Moon 2009: Gifts from the Mother

Full Mother's Moon 2010: Motherlove and Caring for the Environment

Freedom

New Mother's Moon

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The new moon this month is the Mother's Moon, the moon full of the unconditional, formless, limitless love of the mother goddess. This year's new Mothers Moon happens to fall right around the Fourth of July, a holiday that last year I called the epitome of the Father's Moon energies. I still think that American Independence Day is, at its core, more aligned with the Father's Moon than the Mother's Moon but it is interesting to think about how it embodies the moon it falls in this year.

Freedom is an elusive concept. The dictionary defines it as being exempt from confinement, external control or regulation or the power to determine action without constraint. Many people don't really understand what freedom means because we middle class, 21st century Americans enjoy a level of economic, political, religious and personal freedom that is virtually unprecedented in human history. I just finished reading the Hunger Games trilogy, a young adult science fiction set in a world where people have very little freedom of choice or even thought. The books are so well written that I really had an emotional experience living into that constrictive, harsh world. I actually had moments, walking in the woods or driving down the road, wondering if I was in my world or Katniss' world and fearing that the gamemakers or people from The Capitol were controlling my experience or watching me. Realizing that I was not, in fact, in that world allowed me to literally breathe free. My experience is nothing compared to those of people who have been incarcerated, held captive or otherwise stripped of their freedom but it was enough to make me think about how blessed I really am.

Freedom's conjoined twin is responsibility. Some kinds of freedom - school boys in June, a factory worker at the end of day whistle, a dog in the woods - are the result of a lack of responsibility. Other freedoms, like those of citizens in a democracy, members of a Quaker meeting or adults who pay their own rent, come with a very hefty dose of responsibility. I find it interesting to think that the freedoms from responsibility can only be fleeting. Eventually those school boys need to eat and someone needs to have worked to get the food on the table. Freedoms with responsibility, though, can be very long lasting because the person enjoying the freedom is the person doing the work to maintain it.

I spent some time this week with my friend and her 4 month old twin sons. The babies enjoy existence in a blissful state of freedom from responsibility. Sure, they are working hard to grow and make sense of this crazy world they just got born into, but they don't have to do any work to provide for their own needs. Their mama does all of that. And though my friend loves her new life, she is also acutely feeling the lack of her previous freedoms. Hopefully, the work she is doing now and the freedoms she has given up in this season of her life will lay a foundation of love and trust in her sons so they can move out into the world in a healthy way as they grow. With care and luck, they will have the emotional home base to return to so they can explore the freedoms that come with responsibilities in the coming decades.

Sometimes I wonder about the mothers of America's Founding Fathers. They must have been amazing women. Not only did they raise sons to adulthood in a time when that was a feat accomplished against all odds, and not only did they do it with none of the modern conveniences we think are necessary, they did it so well as to raise men who were willing to make giant leaps into the unknown. Men who were so confident that they were loved that they were willing to take the enormous risk of breaking with all the cultural, political and philosophical traditions they knew. And even if the Founding Fathers' actual mothers didn't succeed in providing that foundation for their sons, someone did. Motherlove, the unconditional love that values you just for being you, is something we have turned to god for all over the world and in many traditions.

This is a big topic, and I can't quite find a way to wrap it all up with a bow. I'd rather end with some more quotes and questions....

Janis Joplin says freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose....

Stan Lee says with great power comes great responsibility....

The second Sabian Symbol I drew for this year, Building a Better Teacher 2011, was A Deserter from the Navy Stands Suddenly Aware of a Dawning Truth: Freedom is Never the Result of Compromise.

What does it all mean? How does one secure freedoms and enjoy responsibilities? How do we nurture the secure foundations of freedom in ourselves and others? What compromises do I need to be careful about? When do you feel most free, most secure, most loved? What does Fourth of July mean to you?


The photos all came up when I searched "freedom" on Flickr. Thanks izarbeltza, _ambrown, The U.S. Army and Nicolo Paternosters. Click on the photos or their names to see more of their work.


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Mother's Moon 2009: Gifts From the Mother

New Mother's Moon 2010: You Are the Mother's Beloved Child

Very Bad Things and Our Lady of Sorrows

Full Seed Moon

Full Seed Moon 2009: Seeds! Seeds!!

Full Seed Moon 2010: Planting Seeds in My Mind, Heart and Garden

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The full moon that happened on March 19th was the full moon in the Seed Moon. This moon asks us questions about the things we begin at every scale from small project to lifetimes and beyond. This is the time of year when so much in nature is beginning anew - plants are growing new leaves or sprouting completely new from the soil, animals are mating and giving birth - it is natural to think about how we begin and nurture new things in our lives. It is a time for tiny, sweet things.

Tiny, sweet things are scary, though, because we tend to imagine all the terrible things that might happen to them in the future. A seed is taking a risk in sprouting and we take a risk every time we start something new. I usually like to focus on the benefits of taking a risk, the positive potential outcomes and the biggifying good in the world. But you know what? Sometimes we take a risk and fail. Sometimes our seeds don't even sprout, or they are killed by frost or torrential rain or jays or slugs. Sometimes bad things happen that aren't our fault, like a hailstorm or earthquakes. Sometimes these things are crushing, awful, Really Bad Things.

I have been struggling mightily in the past few weeks with this realization; bad things happen and there is nothing we can do about it. It may seem trite or obvious, but my life has been really blessed and there has been thankfully little in my past that qualifies as a really bad thing. I've been witness to some Really Bad Things recently, though, ranging from earthquakes, tsunamis and war to more personal disappointments and disasters. It's not much fun and has turned me to that possibly most ancient of ancient questions - how can a good God allow such bad things to happen?

There is no way I can really do justice to the question, but I can share an insight I had as I was struggling in that mire. My insight was not novel (what is in theology?) but it was brilliant to me. As I prayed into my hurt and disappointment I had the realization that God is there, too. She is in the blossoms and sprouts, but she is in the frost bitten, dead and dying bits. Upon realizing, or remembering, this Truth I was comforted. It was like a balm had been applied to my ache.

I have always been a little baffled by the Catholic preoccupation with the sorrow of Christ and his Mother. One of the popular rosary devotions is called the Seven Sorrows, churches and schools are named Our Lady of Sorrows and the Lamentation of the Virgin - the image of Mary holding the crucified Jesus - has been depicted in sculpture and painting through the ages. These images of god just never resonated with me before (and yes, I fully realize just how lucky and blessed I am to be able to say those words). In this month of thinking about the seeds that sprout and the seeds that don't, these images have started to be meaningful to me.

For years my motto has been "Everything will be OK in the end; if it's not OK, it's not the end." I still believe that but I am starting to see the real truth that the not-OK stuff is OK, too. It hurts and sucks and is scary. But it's OK to be there in the hurting, sucky, scary stuff because God is there with you. I've felt her there, holding me, rocking me, crying with me - just like the Virgin in the Pieta. She feels the suck and hurt, and it sucks for her and hurts her. But we are here, together, in this mess and knowing that gives me the strength to put one foot in front of the other and start walking towards the not bad stuff that is still going on all around me.

Prayer in Sickness

Holy Mary, Mother of God,
and my Mother,
I come before you
in the knowledge that you will help me.

My faith tells me so
and my heart makes sure of this.

In my sickness,
and in the midst of my suffering,
I often call out to you: "Mother!"

Just saying this word
makes me feel better.

When I feel misunderstood and all alone,
I know that you are with me
and that you love me.

Help me, Mary,
and when I am well let me love God more.
Amen.

Brigid - Goddess of Poetry

February First

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February 2nd is a holy day known by many names throughout western civilization. Some people call it Imbolc, the festival of the first lambing and ewe's milk. Some people call it Candlemas, the purification of the Holy Virgin forty days after the birth of the Christ child. Some people call it Groundhog Day, a time of weather augury to see just how quickly spring will come. Some call it Brigid, Bride, Brighid, Brigit, the day of the Celtic Goddess who has become the most beloved female saint of Catholic Ireland. I usually just call it February First.

No matter the name of the festival the Goddess is the central focus. At this time of the year the crone of winter goes to the sacred well and comes away the maiden of spring, the maiden goddess Brigid. Brigid is many things to many people; the patron of metal smith, healing, weaving and prophecy. She is also a goddess of poetry.

by tattereddreams

At the end of my first year of blogging here at The Wheel and the Disk I said I wanted to incorporate more poetry into this blog. I have not only been successful in posting poems on the blog but also in reading more poetry. Many years ago when I was a freshman in college, in a late night in a dorm room when the world was young and new, I asked a friend of mine what poetry is. I don't remember the answer she gave but I remember the question. It is still a question I have and still ponder. All I can think to say is that poetry is magic made of words.

As winter tips into spring I give to you a poem to commemorate Brigid and all the other forms of the Goddess.

POEM
by Mary Oliver
The spirit
 likes to dress up like this:
   ten fingers,
     ten toes,
shoulders, and all the rest
 at night
   in the black branches,
     in the morning
in the blue branches
 of the world.
   It could float, of course,
     but would rather
plumb rough matter.
 Airy and shapeless thing,
   it needs
     the metaphor of the body,
lime and appetite,
 the oceanic fluids;
   it needs the body's world,
     instinct
and imagination
 and the dark hug of time,
   sweetness
     and tangibility,
to be understood,
 to be more than pure light
   that burns
     where no one is --
so it enters us --
 in the morning
   shines from brute comfort
     like a stitch of lightning;
and at night
 lights up the deep and wondrous
   drownings of the body
     like a star.

from Dream Work Atlantic Monthly Pr., 1986

Happy Brigid! Happy Groundhog Day! Happy Candlemas! Happy Spring!
 

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Other The Wheel and the Disk posts with Poems:
Winter
Christmas, 2010; Winter is Dark, Yet Each Tiny Spark; Forty Two with a Seventy Percent Chance of Rain; Christmas; Moving from the Season of the Dead

Spring
To Everything There is a Season; The Lusty Month of May; The Seed Moon is New

Summer
Robin Hood; Glory Days; The Aftermark of Almost Too Much Love

Autumn
Martinmas; The Power of the Dog; The Rains Have Come; Here Be Dragons; Ramadan; August Eve, the Subtle Turning

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February First 2009: February the First

February First 2010: Lovely Luz and Sweet BridgitThis happens to be my all time favorite post from all two plus years of blogging. Please go check it out. 

Solstice Story

Winter Solstice

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 I woke up for the sunrise on Solstice morning and hiked up to the top of Council Crest. The day was grey and I didn't see much of a sunrise, but I did hear a story told by the sky and the trees...

Long, long ago in a time before there was either time or ago, all there was was the Darkness of the Divine. Out of this Darkness the Goddess formed herself and for almost as long as there had been just Darkness there was just the Goddess. Eventually, she came to realize she was alone, and then realized that she was lonely. Out of the one that was The Goddess became the Two, the Goddess and her consort the God. And they were happy.

Out of their happiness and their love sprang the myriad things. Out of their love sprang the stars and the earth, the water and the stones. Out of their love sprang the plants and the grass, the birds of the sky, the fish of the sea and the beasts of their land. Out of their love sprang rain and snow and the light of dawn and the still of twilight. All these myriad things were beautiful and rejoiced in their love of the Goddess and the God. And they were happy.


As time passed the God and the Goddess watched the drama of life play out on Earth. They watched plants grew and deer eat them. They watched deer grow and wolves eat them. They saw the vultures and flies eat the wolves' flesh after they died and the plants grow out of them again. The Goddess and the God watched this cycle, and the countless other cycles of birth and death and rebirth and saw that something else was needed in this world they had created. Just as the mouse sacrificed its life for the life of the snake and the minnow sacrificed for the perch and the fruit for the monkey, something or someone needed to sacrifice their life so that all the life of the myriad things could continue. And they were not happy, but they were at peace.

The God, the Goddess's consort, lover and partner, knew that it was his role to sacrifice himself for his creation. As he grew into the full strength of his power he prepared for his own sacrifice. Finally, despite the Goddess's sorrow, he chose his moment and sacrificed himself in a blaze of color and light. And they were not happy, but they were at peace.

The Goddess mourned his death and plant life seemed to die back in the face of her sorrow. The world grew colder and darker but the God's sacrifice had worked. Like autumn leaves mouldering under the snow to produce the next years light spring soil, his life force permeated all of creation. His sacrifice gave all things a chance at rebirth and renewal. And, miracle of miracles, like the cow elk in the early winter The Goddess found herself pregnant; pregnant with the God himself. And she was happy.

She grew larger in her pregnancy as the world sunk deeper into a winter hibernation. When it felt like the Earth could not be colder or darker, or the Goddess any greater with her child she gave birth. She gave birth to a son, to the God, to light and warmth and growth. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and held him close to her as he grew. And they were happy.

The Goddess was so happy with her child, with the birth of light and of summer to come that she wanted to celebrate. In her joy she created humans to help her celebrate, to keep watch over the year as the God is born, grows, becomes strong and fills the world with growing green and warm thing. The Goddess and the humans she created watch and celebrate as The God reaches his full strength, realizes his destiny and sacrifices himself in light and color. The Goddess and the humans she created watch and celebrate even as the Earth sinks into restful dark and cold, renewing and waiting. And again, we celebrate at the birth of the new year's Light. And we are happy.

 
These images are created by AlicePopkorn. Please check out all of her amazingly beautiful and spirit filled work on her flickr stream.

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Winter Solstice 2008: Good Morning Sun! and also Solstice Creche

Winter Solstice 2009: Christmas

The winter 2009 post Advent, Awaiting the Birth and the winter 2010 post The Dark of the Dark are also about Winter Solstice.

Motherlove and Caring for the Environment

The full Mother's Moon took me by suprise. It has been a busy couple weeks of gardening, summery outdoor activities and get togethers with friends so I had completely lost track of what the moon was doing. Then on Friday night I was driving home and the almost full moon jumped out from behind a tree or a building and BAM, it was the Full Mother's Moon. The weather was finally feeling summery so I took a late night stroll in the moonlight. Not dark until 9:30, night time walks in shorts, flowers and growing grass and warm breezes - it is finally summer!


The main energies of the Mother's Moon are those of the unconditional love a person, animal or land deserves just for existing. Annette Hinshaw describes this as Motherlove and contrasts it with Fatherlove, the love one earns through their merit or accomplishments. We know about this dichotomy in the raising of children - kids need to know they are loved for who they are no matter what, but they also need to be praised for striving and doing good work, and reprimanded when they choose harmful actions. We can bring this idea of Motherlove and Fatherlove out into a broader realm of dealing with our planet, the Earth we walk on, as well. When I was a ranger at Crater Lake National Park a man asked me, "What do we do with all this water?" I didn't really understand and am sure I stared at him blankly for a moment. "How do we use this water? Is it used for power generation or do people fish in it?" he asked again. "No," I finally stuttered out, "It's just here to be beautiful." This man wanted to care about Crater Lake because of what it does for us while I (and the forward thinking individuals who created the National Park Service) understood that sometimes we need to care about nature for it's own beauty and presence, not for anything it provides us.

One specific area that this Motherlove for Our Planet has been popping into my thoughts lately is in our culture's use of plastic. Cat over at Quaker Pagan Reflections has recently felt a leading to examine her use of plastic and is documenting it in her newer blog Chestnut Tree. A few days after reading her blog I came across Beth's website Fake Plastic Fish. Beth has spent the last two years reducing her plastic use and helping others understand the threat plastics pose to our environment and how to find more appropriate options. I'm not sure I have sensed the same urgent leading Cat has felt, or the same level of revulsion-leading-to-action Beth has had but I am on my way.

As these two blogs, and all the other articles out there show, there are many, many reasons to avoid plastic (and many, many equally good reasons to use plastic). The arguments against plastic usually fall into two camps - the it's bad for us camp and the it's bad for the planet camp. In the it's bad for us camp are arguments about leaching toxins, off gassing, hormone disruption, and the unsustainability of petroleum production that will leave us in a nasty lurch if we don't wean our habit now. These are good reasons to avoid plastic. But the reasons that really get to me, make my lip sneer up in disgust and give me indigestion and insomnia, are the motherlove type, it's bad for the planet reasons.

Our use of plastic, or more specifically, our improper disposal of single use plastic products, leave an enormous mark on our planet. As a person with a lot of science and specifally geology training I find it hard to believe that we as individuals or humans in general can really make a mark on the geology of our planet. The processes that make rock or create volcanoes are massive processes that cover emense amount of time and space. But we are. Our plastic garbage has collected in the Pacific Ocean to form a a giant patch of plastic garbage that might be as big as the continental United States, or it might just be as big as Texas. No matter how big it is the pieces of plastic are ending up in everything from albatross to diatoms. And, as I learned from my favorite TV Geologist (Iain Stewart... swoon!) in his new series on National Geographic our plastic detritus is actually getting into the ocean sediment that will, over geologic time, create new rock. Someday, millions of years in the future, geologists will look at some future incarnation of the Grand Canyon or the Himalayas and see bits of plastic in among the snail, fish and whale fossils. How gross is that?

Iain also told me about a mud volcano in Indonesia that has been erupting for years and has covered entire villages with dozens of feet of hot mud and displacing thousands of people. What does this have to do with plastic? The "volcano" is actually a broken well pipe from a drilling rig exploring for gas and oil, the raw materials for plastic. And I don't need to remind anyone about the tragic Gulf of Mexico "oil leak" (as NPR insists on calling it. Yes, I have written letters. That's no "leak", my friends). That disaster is not going to stop getting bigger, let alone start getting smaller, anytime in the forseeable future. I am quite confident that huge swaths of the Gulf of Mexico and U.S. Gulf Coast will be uninhabitable wastelands before it is all said and done.

Our actions show a profound lack of basic respect and love for our planet and the other living things that live here with us. We are absolutely failing to show any amount of Motherlove to our planet. And thats no way to treat any one or any thing.

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I have been thinking a lot about the importance of building the world we want instead of focusing on destroying the world we don't want. My hero and personal astrologer, Rob Breszny, once said in an interview "The new culture is a blend of rage at what exists and love [in creating] something you like," Brezsny explains. "The answer isn't just to say 'no' to what's going on, but to imbue it with your own spirit." How does this apply to massive, planet scale environmental degredation rooted in thoughtless personal habits? We have to work at consciousness raising and use all the tools in our toolbox, including righteous rage, to bring the problem to people's attention.

We also need to work at how we build the new world we do want. How do we live a life without plastic, or without disposable plastic? How do we rearrange our priorities so that bringing reuseable shopping bags, cups, and to-go containers is not an inconvenience but simply the way things are done? How do we plan our lives and the lives of our cities so that we can use less oil for transporting our bodies and the goods we need to live? I certainly don't have answers to these questions, but maybe asking them - in the spirit of motherlove to all of creation - is the first step.

"The secret of change is to focus all your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new." - Socrates

You Are The Mother's Beloved Child

The other night my cousin was in town and wanted to see the sunset from Council Crest, the higest point in Portland. The weather has been unseasonably wet lately so I wasn't optimistic about our chances for a nice sunset but the cloud cover broke just enough for us to see something besides rain. To the east was a solid wall of dark, red-purple rainclouds, like a curtain dropped between town and the mountains. To the west were fluffy blue clouds rimmed with gold and pink. Above those spectacular clouds was a new crescent moon. I don't think my cousin was as excited to see the moon as I was, but after close to 6 weeks of rain I have hardly seen the moon at all. Hello, New Moon! I'm glad you are back!

The new moon this month is the Mother's Moon which brings unconditional motherlove to all the myriad things. The Mother's Moon celebrates the energy of a love that is given simply because you exist. You are The Mother's beloved child; of course she loves you.

My cousin and I spent some really good quality time talking about our lives and our families during his visit this week. It was interesting to hear his thoughts about his father and stepmother and how little connection he feels with them. He says that even though his mother died when he was very young and his father and stepmother married before he started elementary school he has never called her "mom", only her given name. I contrasted this with my own family and am grateful for what I find. My parents did not have the ability to provide the material comforts my uncle was able to give his family, and from the outside we may look like a less loving family (my dad always half-jokes; "We stayed together for the kids, the screaming and yelling was good for them.") but I know my parents adore(d) me. I know my parents sacrificed their own wealth, their own dreams and even their own friends and relationships to provide my sister and I with everything they could. I have never for a moment, not even in the heat of our adolescent battles, doubted that my mother loves me more than anything in the world. And I am so, so grateful for that.

One of the easiest ways for me to conceptualize god is as an all loving Mother. I have always preferred a feminine pronoun for the divine, love the images of female goddesses of the world and find great strength in knowing that god adores and delights in me as a mother adores and delights in her children. At this time last year I wrote about a couple of my early influences in seeing god in this way and those influences are still strong in my relationship with the divine. The image of God as a mother big enough to hold and rock me, who showers me with gifts and loves me no matter what is comforting. I usually start my prayers with the address "Sweet Mother" in place of the more common "Our Father". I recognize that this isn't the only way to address god, or even always the best way, but it is what feels best to me, most of the time. It feels comfortable and safe. Motherly.


Motherlove, however, is not always comfortable. The Mother loves all her creatures equally and without regard to their merit. This means She loves murders and addicts (see this description of Gabor Mate's In The Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Additions). She loves unscrupulous politicians and selfish executives. She also loves man-eating tigers, rip tides, blizzards and tornadoes. After the earthquake in Chile this last winter a friend of mine made a quip on Facebook about "Mother Earth just wants to get us off her back." I offered the idea that the earthquake didn't have anything to do with us. The Mother loves the planet and the physical processes of it's geology as much as she loves the billions of humans living on its surface. This is a much scarier idea to me. It's not that God/Mother Earth/Destiny has bad things planned for us, it's that we are rather insignificant in Her plans. Or no more significant than an earthquake.


Holding that juxtaposition of a God that love me specifically and also loves everyone and everything else just as specifically is a hard one for most people to grasp. People like to think of god as loving them so much that obstacles are removed from their path no matter what that means to other people or other beings. I just read the book of Joshua in the Old Testament and the people of Israel clearly worked within that paradigm. God promised them this land and they fought, slaughtered, burned and pillaged to get it. I just kept thinking about the poor people of Jericho and Ai and all the others. What part of God's love was shown in their slaughter?

This is a huge, HUGE question and one that I am in no way prepared to answer. I only have some ideas and some experiences to fall back on. At Meeting a couple weeks ago someone gave vocal ministry repeating the old saying "Never show a fool a work half done." I am the fool to God's work. Sometimes I have to give up thinking that I can know what form The Mother's love will take for all of her beloved. Just yesterday on my morning walk, while meditating on this post, I came across a robin's egg in the trail. It wasn't just the usual shell fragments you see this time of year, it was an egg with a fully formed but still embryonic chick, smashed and dead. Where is the Mother's love in that? That is not my question to answer. I just have to have faith that, as I feel and know Her love for me, that love is extended to all other beings sentient and otherwise. And in this glorious month of June, when the days are long and the garden is green, it's a little bit easier to remember.

A Story for the Birth Moon

As I was writing the previous post on the Birth Moon I couldn't fit all the pieces in my head together into a coherent post, so I split the post into two. Here is a story for the Birth Moon. No commentary, just my own block crayon illustration.

THE ADORATION OF THE SHEPHERDS
ST. LUKE, II, 1-16

AND it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed. And this taxing was first made when Cyrenius was governor of Syria. And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.

And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; because he was of the house and lineage of David: To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.

And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered. And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us.

And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger.

Gifts from the Mother

The new moon in June this year marks the beginning of the Mother's Moon. The neo-pagan and Wiccan traditions the Mother is the unconditionally loving Goddess, the source of all fertility and all growth. She provides for her children, the plants, animals and people of the earth, and cares for us on a daily basis. She has many names and many faces, but she is the Mother who brings life to our planet.

I probably first heard about a mother goddess through the novels of Jean Auel and Marion Zimmer Bradley. Bradley's The Mists of Avalon is a re-telling of the King Arthur story from the point of view of the women in his life. The narrator of the story is Arthur's sister, Morgaine, who is brought up in the Goddess tradition of ancient Britain. Auel's Children of the Earth series is set in prehistoric Europe and her main characters travel the breadth of the continent meeting different groups of people who all share a reverence for the Great Mother. Both are fictional but based on archeology and legend as much as is possible. Both served as inspiration to a young woman who felt drawn towards "god" but had no reasonable images of the divine in her own life.

One thing that struck me about Jean Auel's books in particular is how the people she describes live completely off the gifts of the Mother. These are people who, like all pre-industrial people, collect all of their food, shelter, tools and everything else they use or own from natural materials. There was no option to go to the hardware store or grocery store, you had to make, find or build everything you ever used. Envisioning the divine as an ever providing Mother seems only natural to people who live this way.

In college I read a book for a class called Salmon Without Rivers by Jim Lichatowich that explored the indigenous salmon cultures of the Pacific Northwest. The Chinook people of the lower Columbia River were shrewd traders and had relative material wealth when compared to many other groups in the area. In fact, Lewis and Clark were not fond of the Chinook people because they felt them to be greedy and a bit too clever. Really, their culture was more like that of Europe than any other Native group they had met so far. They were too much like the traders of European influneced America. Lichatowich notes that there was a fundamental difference between the Chinook economic system and that of the European and American capitalists.

The Native people worked in what he calls a gift economy, while we work in an economy of extracting wealth. The Chinook understood that the salmon and beads they traded, along with every other material good they had, were a gift to them from the Earth and that gift requires an equal exchange in the future. They were not free to extract that "resource" from the Earth with no repayment, and they were not free to exploit other people or their goods. They could use them, but that use came with a price, with a debt.

The Pacific Northwest tradition of a potlatch is a tangible example of this philosophy. From our Euro-centric view a potlatch seems to be simply an act of great generosity but in reality each gift given at a potlatch must be repayed, in equal value, in the future. The potlatch is both a display of wealth and a binding of community members through indebtedness. Members of these tribes would keep tally of blindlingly complex webs of indebtedness but the ultimate indebtedness was to the Earth, the ultimate source of all wealth.

I too aspire to live off the gifts of the Mother, however difficult that may be in our capitalist, consumerist, industrial society. The Goddess is still here, still providing for us, but in some very real ways we have forgotten how to recieve those gifts. Another fantastic mentor and inspiration of mine is Riana of These Days in French Life. She has worked hard over the years to create a life without money. She gardens, forages, dumpster dives, barters and creates. At first it seemed so easy for her and so hard for me, after all, she lives in the south of France. She has wild tangerine, almond, loquat and lemon trees in addition to a wide variety of herbs and a fantastic growing season for vegetables. The more I looked around my environment the more edible plants I identified. I started dabbling in foraging last summer and learned to identify a number of plants that I have actually collected and used this season.

Last week I made a meal out of foraged grape leaves stuffed with beef and rice. The beef and rice were not wild harvested (I need to learn me how to hunt next!) but plenty else in the dish is.


Wild Stuffed Grape Leaves

1/3 lb ground beef
1 tbs goose fat or other cooking fat if necessary
A handful of green onions (home grown)
1/2 tbp chopped peppermint (wild foraged)
1/4 tsp dried dill (home grown)
salt and pepper
2/3 cup rice
1/3 cup canned tomatoes (home grown and home canned) diced with their liquid
1 cup chicken stock (homemade) or water
1/4 cup raisins (wild grown and home dried)
1/4 cup chopped almonds
12 young grape leaves the size of your hand (wild harvested)

• Trim the stems from the grape leaves with scissors or a sharp knife. Pile six leaves together and dunk them in boiling water, holding them with your tongs, until they change color to a darker, almost olivey green. Take them out and rinse them under cold water. Repeat with the second batch. You want to hold onto them because you want them to stay whole and not tear. Handle them carefully before and after blanching.
• Cook up the ground beef along with the onion, salt, pepper, and dill. Add more fat to the pan if it's looking dry and add the rice to the pan. Stir and cook until the rice is coated in oil and starting to look a little translucent around the edges. Add the tomatoes, mint, rasins and almonds and liquid and stir to combine. Bring rice mixture to a boil, turn the heat down to a simmer and cover.
• Cook approximately 20 minutes until the rice is cooked, but the contents are still a little wet. Turn out onto a plate or shallow bowl so it can cool a little.
• Lay one grape leaf down on your work surface shiny side down. Add about 2-3 tbs of filling on the "palm" of your grape leaf in a little rectangle or log shape. Fold the bottom of the grape leaf over the filling, then the two sides in. Then roll the filling into the leaf as tightly as you can without ripping the leaf or spilling the filling. Lay the filled leaf, seam side down, in a bamboo steamer basket and continue to fill the rest of the leaves.
• When they are all filled and in the steamer place over boiling water and steam for just a few minutes to heat through. Serve warm or room temperature, as is or with a yogurt sauce.

It feels so freeing to eat a meal of wild harvested greens and fruit and know that the only debt you owe is to the Mother herself. How do you fully take advantage of the gifts of the Mother? How do you honor those gifts and the gifts of other people's skills and time? What have you been growing or collecting this seasons?