Don't Just Do Something, Sit There

New Milk Moon

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It is that darkest of dark time of the year when we review the year that just passed and begin to prepare for the one coming up. For the last three years I have done this in a more formal way and rather than making new years resolutions, I have gwished a theme for the upcoming year. As 2013 comes to a close the need for review of the old and gestation of the new is here again.

Part of a Tribe in the Spring

2013 was one hell of a year. The theme I set last January was Naming My Superpowers, Calling My Allies and it came with a wish and a hope to put my talents to good use and to build my community of allies to help with that work. I was looking for more discernment in my activities and my companions. I think I did a better job in 2013 than in previous years, but my skills of discernment clearly need more honing.

I didn't do as much blogging this year as in the past but going back through my Facebook feed allowed me to review the year in pretty good detail. Last winter and spring were amazing times of growth and exploration. I fell in love with an amazing man and we had some wonderful adventures together. Food, sex, conversations; it was mind and life expanding. My one blog post from this spring dates from this period and sums up a lot of my thinking during this time. And then my life exploded. That relationship fell apart and then I got very ill with a bacterial infection that took all the king's horses and all the king's men to put me back together again. The physical toll was great and the emotional toll was possibly greater. Emotions I didn't know I had overwhelmed me so I did what I am in the habit of doing.... more stuff. The late summer found me in another intense romantic relationship and then in an amazingly intense job. I got the middle school science teaching position I've been angling for for years and it is everything and more. This autumn has felt like a crisis time when everything is falling apart. My summer motto of 'better but not yet betterer' took on whole new levels of emotional and existential meaning. I wrote about my thinking along these lines in this post from late November. Apparently, it is 

Dolled Up Mid-Summer

difficult for my seventh grade students to be 12, but almost just as difficult for me to be thirty three.

Even with the major hiccup in the summer of being, ya know, almost dead for close to a month, I still followed my standard M.O. of going full speed ahead in 2013. I may have still had difficulty knowing what to say no to, but I had allies all along the way. My friends were amazing during my illness and recovery and I learned so much from the men I met and loved this year. Building community, or at least thinking about how to do it, was a major theme of this year. In my 2013 gwish post I used a photo with the african proverb, "if you want to go fast, go alone, if you want to go far, go together." I don't know how far I got, but I know I got there because of my friends this year.

During this time of gestating my intentions for 2014 I have employed many of my traditional gwishing techniques. I drew a tarot spread, listened for resonance with colors, images, animals and phrases. I thought about what I wanted and what I did not want from this upcoming year and finally, after weeks of thinking and listening, found my theme for the year.

2014, Don't Just Do Something, Sit There.

By Sharon Flowers

The phrase is a title of a book by Sylvia Boorstein, a Buddhist teacher I first heard through Krista Tippet's amazing interview with her. It is a joke, a play on words, a phrase that always makes me chuckle and smile wryly. You're right, you're right, I know you're right I mutter as the phrase pops into my head. In the last few years I have cultivated my doing self and have learned so much from that, but as I continued doing and did not feel any better about my life it became more frantic and obsessive. In a particularly dark moment of this last autumn I was on a date with a gentleman caller, drinking beer, talking about politics, looking forward to our adult sleepover, when my internal commentator noted, "Dang, girlfriend, you got this doing-and-not-feeling thing down to a science!" That frantic doing has metastasized into uncontrollable worry and anxiety this winter and I feel miserable much of the time. And it is all so boring. It is the same stupid patterns I've had for years but now that I see them they are achey and dull, not even succeeding at what they were designed to do.

I did draw a tarot spread this winter (and will talk more about it below) but this year my theme came a lot from listening for resonance with words and images. The blue heron, a patient and stealthy hunter, will be my theme animal for this 

By David Jakes

year. Herons sit still as a tree waiting for their prey to forget they're there. They work hard to not spook off the good stuff that will surely come their way. Like herons, chicory flowers have been making themselves known to me for years. They are the weediest of the weedy plants and will grow out of sidwalks, along highways, in gravel drives and on the edges of lawns. It is used for salad greens, livestock forage, a coffee subsitute and a medicine for all sorts of ailments. The gorgeous blue flowers are said to be able to open locked doors. Powerful allies to have in this year of bravely facing the habits of mind and heart that rear their head in physical and mental stillness.

Other symbols of stillness and introspection have come to work with me. The first was an unlikely and ancient copper Buddha found in Helgo, a Viking town dating to about 800 C.E. The small, beautifully worked statue appears to have been made about two to three hundred years earlier in northern India and then worked its way through trade and capture this important center of Viking trade. 1500 years after it was made and thousands of miles away, the Buddha continues to be a visual representation of the ability of humans to achieve some kind of peace. This Buddha is a conundrum,

The Helgo Buddha

 though, because this statue has traveled so far away from where it started. Like the heron who can spread its 7 foot wing span to find a better pond or stream and the weedy chicory that has hitched rides with humans to all ends of the earth, the Helgo Buddha has traveled but not lost it's stillness. My tarot card for the year is the Hermit, another character travels with stillness. This Hermit card came at the end of a spread full of winged hearts, this is the cups suit in my Fairy Tale Tarot deck. This suit is correlated with emotions, dreams and the moon and the winged heart itself is a Sufi symbol for unconditional love and devotion. My spread indicated that work must be done finding or giving support and unity in this realm before connection and healing can happen. Then those powers of love can be used to help others, fight for what is right and increase the true wealth of love in this world.

• 2014 will be green like old copper and healthy trees, grey like heron feathers, carved stones and a hermit-wizard's cloak, blue like summer skies and weedy chicory flowers. 
• 2014 will be a year of answering the phone with "What fresh hell is this?" and hoping it really is a new problem rather than the reheated boring problems I have seen before.
• 2014 will be a year of knowing what to keep and what to let go. It will be a year of cultivating Right Memory (seeing the patterns but facing the world fresh), of Right Heart (Finding new ways of love while releasing obsessive and painful habits) and Right Attention (now that I don't have to be perfect, I can be good). 
• 2014 will be a year of attending to my people, building patterns of connection and of swirling round and round with others who want to dance. It will be a time of building the world I want; don't just sit there, do something.

This last gwish is based on my Sabian symbol for 2014, Gemini 22: Dancing Couples Crowd the Barn in a Harvest Festival. The first part of my theme for this year is all about finding peace and joy in stillness, introspection and changing my own patterns of thought and feeling about the world. This symbol and gwish provide the other side of this coin, that of cultivating peace and joy through healthy connection with other people. My best friends and I are working out plans for a game night of sorts, an attempt to build our friend community back up into fruitful health, a project streaming directly out of my work at calling my allies last year. The allies have been called, now they need to connect with each other into a true caring community. This symbol brings to mind ceremonial times out of the daily grind of work to connect, enjoy and celebrate the turning of the seasons. In addition to our game night, I think this image is calling me to 

New Years Day 2014

find ways to connect in my church and school communities as well as rekindle my connection to the wheel of the year through blogging and celebrations. 

Many of my friends found 2013 to be an exceptionally challenging year. Some have much more painful horror stories from this year than I do but my year was hard. I was sick, I was heartbroken and I struggled a lot with uncovering truths about who I am and how I operate. I did have moments of pure bliss, wild adventures and times of deep connection. 2014 will be a year of more discernment, more stillness, more interesting problems and more dancing joyfully in the stream of the cosmos. I for one am looking forward to it. 

* Full text of Gemini 22: DANCING COUPLES CROWD THE BARN IN A HARVEST FESTIVAL

When achievements have been made and there is a sense of security and 'Harvest' in the air, it is time to celebrate with one another. There is a need to get back to a simple, conservative level of enjoyment. There's a sense of being in tune with seasonal rhythms. The feeling of a healthy heart and a healthy mind, while taking a break from the struggles of providing, can bring joy to everyone involved. See if you can take time out to celebrate and to enjoy your environment.

Celebrating the warmth and providence of the Earth. The joy of nature's harvest. Joining with others to celebrate. The reality of rhythmical or seasonal adjustments. Dancing. Barns and dance halls.

The Caution: Being the wallflower, not participating. Waiting for a special invitation rather than responding to the openness of the situation.

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New Milk Moon 2009: New Milk Moon

New Milk Moon 2010: Forty Two with a Seventy Percent Chance of Rain

New Milk Moon 2011: The Quaker Year

New Milk Moon 2012: Year of the Dragon

This post is a New Year's Gwishing post. Be sure to check out previous year's posts: 2011 Building a Better Teacher, 2012 Grabbing the Tiger By the Tail and 2013 Engaging My Superpowers, Calling My Allies. There are older and other New Years day posts under the label New Year.

Changing our Stories

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This is a First Word I presented to my Quaker community, West Hills Friends. A First Word is a time to share a story of how God's spirit is moving in your life and through sharing these stories we can more fully understand the world of the spirit in the world. I hope this story can shed some light on this big crazy world for you. Writing it helped me. 

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Hi, my name is Alyss and I am a middle school teacher. As far as I can see, the only thing on earth harder than being a middle school teacher is being a middle school student. Some of my students come into my cramped but well appointed classroom with worried faces, and folded, tight body language of those trying to be unobtrusive. Others show up with manic grins, big bouncing steps, drawing attention to themselves with wild gestures and loud words. Not a single one of them is sure of themselves or how they fit in this world and in that, I feel a great kinship with them. Being twelve is really, really hard… but it turns out being an adult is almost just as hard. Actually, I think it’s just hard to be a people.

I teach science and my main objectives as a science educator are to introduce kids to great minds that have come before them and to give their minds the tools they need to see the great world in front of them. We just started a unit on the Solar System and so, fittingly, we started with an introduction to how astronomers have viewed the solar system throughout the history of western civilization. I should not have been so surprised at their eagerness for these stories – stories of men who looked and saw, were confused and then made sense.

One of their favorites and mine is that well-known Polish astronomer Copernicus. 500 years ago he spent his life watching the stars trying to understand what was going on in this big crazy world. My sixth graders love it when I tell them that the world is crazy and we’re all just trying to understand it…. Copernicus, me and them in the same boat of having no idea what is going on. After years of dedicated watching, Copernicus realized that the observations he was making about the heavens did not fit with story he had been taught about how the solar system worked.  For over 1000 years western culture had been sure that the earth stood still in the center of the solar system and the rest of the heavenly bodies moved around it. But Copernicus’ data just wouldn’t fit that model. He had to change his story to make sense of his observations.

He had to change his story to make sense of his observations. I probably said that 25 times this week and at some point it dawned on me – I’m not just talking about astronomy, or science even. When Copernicus realized that his new information didn’t fit this old story he most likely felt the excitement of discovery but I suspect he also felt confused, insecure, anxious and maybe even more intense emotions like fear, dread, sadness or grief. Or maybe I’m just projecting.

We have to change our story to make sense of our observations. We tell ourselves lots of stories about how the world works – that the earth stands still, that God created heaven and earth in 6 days, that those people are taking our jobs, that that person will always act like this, or I will always do this or someday my prince will come. So many of these stories were built on outdated information but humans are meaning making machines and we hold onto our narratives like a drowning man, even when we know how to swim.

We have to change our story to make sense of our new observations. Hah, if only it were so easy. The child psychologist Piaget recognized that when humans get new information they can either ignore it, assimilate it seamlessly into their old story or reshape their understanding. Fundamentalists, hack scientists and addicts of all kinds are prime examples of the ignoring strategy, but we are all guilty. Piaget called the reshaping strategy disequilibrium, recognizing how uncomfortable and complex this process is.

Disequilibrium. Yeah, I know about that. Feeling like the ground is shifting under your feet. Like nothing makes sense anymore. Like all the old rules and old stories are a bunch of garbage and you are left with…. Well, you have no idea what you are left with. Anxiety and fear, sadness and grief are marking my disequilibrium. I see confusion and distress in the disequilibrium that my students are going through – because what is middle school if not a time when you are learning new things that don’t make sense in your old world order. Their bodies are changing, their brains are changing, their social networks are changing and nothing makes sense anymore. Yep, I know all about disequilibrium.

Piaget says that disequilibrium is a motivator for intellectual growth and creating schema, understandings, that are ever more adequate for dealing with reality. The astronomers we studied eventually came to a schema about the solar system that has allowed us to send men to the moon and probes to the worlds throughout our solar system. I have faith that my 6^th graders will some day be generally functional adults and I’m sure I will come to an “ever more adequate schema” though I have no idea what that will look like. And none of these disequilibrium events are easy or comfortable. But as my Zen Buddhist friend says, with that very serious look Zen Buddhists so often have – what’s wrong with being uncomfortable? You just want to tell them to shut it, but he’s probably right.

I have to change my story to make sense of my observations. I’m anxious, uncomfortable, upset scared and sad these days. I’m in a state of disequilibrium. I’m not miserable, though… a new thing is rising or else I would still be happy in my old understanding. Its hard, it’s not fun, there are a lot of tears. But I guess one of those stories that doesn’t really work is the one that says life will be simple, comfortable and pleasant at all times.

Engaging My Superpowers, Calling my Allies

Full Birth Moon

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Welcome to 2013! I hope your 2012 wrapped up with joy, fun and enough time in the dark to be ready for the growing light. I was happy to get a couple days of work at the Nature Park over winter break, which is always fun and fulfilling as well as an adventure. Two of the days over break were snowshoe adventures on Mt. Hood that were sublime and painful in all the ways taking kids into the woods can be.

Like last year, I spent much of the time between Christmas and New Year's Day reflecting on last year and looking forward to this upcoming one. My theme for 2012 was Grabbing the Tiger by the Tail and one of the biggest lesson I learned is to be careful what I wish for, I just might get it. As I reread my New Year's post from last year I chuckled. Yep, pulled all of that into my life, didn't I? The 2012 Tiger roared into my life and chased me round and round all year. I think I came out on top and have some awesome stories to tell from the year,  like this one, and this one... and OMG this one. It was a crazy year, one of outward focus, of splendiferous adventures and of saying yes, just like I said I wanted. By the time this autumn was coming to a close I felt ragged and overused, but also like I had learned many lessons along with those great stories. 

I employed many of my traditional gwishing techniques these last few weeks to help cast my magic spell for 2013. I have heard many people compliment me recently on things both mundane and sublime and that started my thought process in the direction of looking at my gifts. I'm good at many things, and have much to offer the world but a year of chasing a tiger around didn't get me very far in using many of them. A peek into the Sabian Symbols brought me the images of crowds coming down the mountain to listen to one inspired man and of a group of people entering a large canoe for a journey. Taking what I have learned and sharing it with others, bringing it into the physical, daily realm. Joining with others on a journey of discovery and action. A tarot spread with my Fairy Tale Tarot deck brought me the Seeker/Knight of Wands as the symbol for the whole year. Traditionally the Knight of Wands is a fair haired youth full of inspiration and action, kind of an act first, think later kind of guy. Ambition and desire to do good in the world are his driving motivations. In my fairy tale deck this card is 

Peacock by Today is a good day

Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, a character who moves forward towards her destiny and her adventure despite challenges that plague her. Sounds like a theme for the year is shaping up!

2013 will be:

• Peacock blue, vibrant green and shimmering purple. Or a super suit and cape in bright, primary colors.
• It will sound like footsteps on gravel, like a pen scratching on paper and the chatter and clinks of a happy dinner party. 
• It will smell like sweat and leather and dusty horse after a hard day's riding, freshly tilled still cold earth in the spring and a roast beast dinner that took hours to prepare for my friends and family.
• It will include Bruce reminding me that I deserve to work for and have it all or nothing at all, the Lone Ranger reminding me that "God put the firewood there, but every man must gather it and light it himself", and The Doctor reminding me that I'm bigger on the inside.

I will remember that a goal without a plan is just a wish. That I am too good for half assed. That other people can be my allies on this trip, but they have their own stories and are not just my "sidekick". 

Last year, 2012, was all about gathering experience. I said yes to everything and I think it changed me. It made me less scared of some things and certainly gained me lots of experience doing lots of other things. The theme for 2013 is shaping up to be about discernment, about engagement and about connection. It is 

not enough to do stuff, it has to be the right stuff. When taking a journey in a canoe or to Oz you need to have the right companions and the right supplies, not just any companions and supplies. The people I gather for my companions are the heroes in their own stories and their time spent with me should be as helpful to them as it is to helpful to me to have them. I think the theme of companions, allies and community will come to be an important one for me. I've been thinking about this a lot over the last year or more and it is time to put some concerted effort into building my community into the community I really want. I know a lot, I'm good at a lot, it's time to step up to the plate and do the work requires to reap that harvest, rather than just letting the fruit fall as it may. 

I don't know what this year will bring, but it will be hard work and good work if I play my cards right. If I Engage My Super Powers and Call My Allies.

How have you gwished, set intentions or discovered themes for your upcoming year? What do you need to work on as 2013 rolls through the door and sets up shop? What are your superpowers and who are your allies?  

Happy New Year!

SCORPIO 24
CROWDS COMING DOWN THE MOUNTAIN TO LISTEN TO ONE INSPIRED MAN

You may feel that you have had some wonderful realisations after hearing an inspired message and now you need to bring these understandings down and integrate them into everyday life. People will have many different responses to the messages being given. Not all will be responsive, but the message will resonate with some. What will be done with this new information?

Power to sway the feelings and thoughts of many. Having a large audience. Holding the floor.

The Caution: Naivete, gullibility Feeling like someone else holds all the answers. Wanting everyone to listen regardless of their needs.

CAPRICORN 4
A GROUP OF PEOPLE ENTERING A LARGE CANOE FOR A JOURNEY BY WATER

To embark on a journey with a number of people is to embark on an emotional discovery. With cooperation, there can be great success. You may also find this to be a time when different and separate aspects of your personality come together to explore an emotional situation.

Cooperation. People coming together with a shared goal in sight. Feeling like you're on a journey of destiny. Travelling or living together.

The Caution: Uncoordinated energies. Not wanting to go along with anybody.

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Full Birth Moon 2008: Outer Darkness and Inner Hope

Full Birth Moon 2009: New Year! and A Story for the Birth Moon 

Full Birth Moon 2010: The Dark of the Dark.

Full Birth Moon 2011: The Columber and Grabbing the Tiger by the Tail 

Solstice Celebration

Winter Solstice

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One year, the wind blew down the mountain fiercer than it ever had before. The wind screamed so loud sometimes that Lucia could not hear her mother humming as she rocked the baby by the fire. Frost covered the nail heads in the walls, and the wind that sneaked in through the cracks tossed the last of the flour in the barrel around, so that it seemed to snow inside the house as well as out.

One day, the sun did not rise over the mountaintop. And the next day and the next and the next, not a glimmer of sun shown, no matter how long Lucia watched for sunrise. Dark roosted on the land.

"Where has the light gone?" Lucia asked.

"I don't know," her mother replied. "Even the oldest tales never told of this darkness." She wrapped Lucia in her arms. "We will be each others' sun until the real sun returns," she said.

Today is Winter Solstice, the day with the shortest sunlight hours here in the Northern Hemisphere. It is the height of winter, the darkest time of the dark season. Starting tomorrow, the sun will stay in the sky just a little longer. And that is more than enough reason to celebrate.

I spent the day at the Nature Park doing a day off camp with elementary school aged kids. We spent the morning reading the wonderful story Lucia and the Light by Phyllis Root, which I have exerpted here, hiking in the woods and seeing what was growing and what was not out there. We found some awesome newts and an amazing fungus forest, with six or seven varieties growing out of a single pile of logs. Of course, we sent arms full of leaves and twigs over the railing of the bridge and down the swollen Beaverton Creek, an all time favorite activity for kids of every age. 

In the afternoon we made lanterns to celebrate the returning of the sun. We talked about the science of the solstice and how the days will begin to get stronger with each passing day and then provided them with colored tissue paper and plastic lantern forms. As the dusk came on we lit them with electric tea lights and paraded around the office building, welcoming back the sun. Later, ask evening came on for real, the kids asked if we could turn off the lights in the room and they proceeded to leap over their lit lanterns. Screams of laughter greeted the gathering darkness.

Sunlight followed Lucia through the front door and poured across the floor, warm and sweet as honey. A fire blazed and the hearth and the baby cooed and clapped to see Lucia.

"I thought I had lost you," her mother cried, sweeping Lucia into a hug."and then the sun came up, and I knew you would come home. My brave child!"

Lucia's mother held her close. "My sunshine," she whispered. "Light of my heart."

How do you celebrate the darkest day of the year? How did you welcome the dark, or greet the growing light? When was the last time you heard children howling and screaming with laughter? Happy Solstice!

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

Winter Solstice 2009: Christmas and Advent, Awaiting the Birth

Winter Solstice 2010: Christmas, 2010, Solstice Story, and The Dark of the Dark  

Winter Solstice 2011: Advent and The Long Nights of Winter and It's Christmas

Winter Solstice 2012: City and Sky Advent

City and Sky Advent

This is a special note to let you know about my other writing project for the month of December. I am making an online Advent calendar of sorts and publishing a short piece every day this month. My regular readers here will probably not be too shocked at what they find - Pagan Quaker Hippy Scientist Nerdilicious goodness. I hope you will stop by and check it out!

http://cityandskyadvent.blogspot.com

Winter

Mushroom Season

Full Death Moon

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It is distinctly winter here in Portland. I spent these weeks around Thanksgiving dog sitting for a number of families and have been very busy getting a whole pack of dogs tired, work that means hiking in the woods and fields every day. The days have been cold and wet, but some more cold and more wet than others. Some even sunny lately. They say if you don't like the weather in Oregon just wait a few minutes. With about five weeks of rainy weather behind us, the ground is getting saturated and the trails are starting to get muddy - muddy trail season is a distinct time of year in my lived calendar. The days are short with the sun coming up just after 7 and it being quite dark by 5pm but my "work" has had me outside about as much as I want each day, a real luxury this time of year. 

Hoyt Arboretum Mushrooms

The cool and wet weather is bringing out a special kind of wildlife in the woods of Western Oregon - the mushroom. Every walk this last week has brought me strange and amazing visions of the fungal world. Tall and skinny mushrooms, fat little toadstools, shelf fungus firm, frilly, white and brown, entire logs covered in mushrooms and mushrooms shooting out of the leaf litter under the trees. Some logs have patches of fungus growing on them that seem to ooze a deep red liquid and others collect drops of water like a jeweled crown. The diversity of forms is really mind blowing even just in the small areas and single ecosystem I have been exploring.

What we call mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of fungus that live in soil, rotting wood or some other substrate. Fungus is one of the five major categories of life (the others being bacteria, protists, plants and animals) and despite their outward similarity with plants, they are actually more closely related to animals in many ways. Mushrooms, a specific kind of fungus, can be found in an astonishing array of habitats and are vitally important parts of their ecosystems. They are decomposers, breaking down plant and animal material to get at the nutrients inside and in the process release those nutrients back into the environment for other plants and animals to use. The mushrooms we see sprouting out of logs and forest duff are actually just a tiny part of a huge organism that impregnates the wood or soil. The mycelium, the internal filament like structure of the fungus, spreads out and eats away at the material the fungus is growing in and only creates the fruiting body for a couple days or a couple weeks at most. 

Shelf Fungus in Forest Park

Mushrooms fascinate me. They are mysterious and unlike other living creatures I know in really fundamental ways. Many of the websites I've checked out recently to learn about them use the word cryptic to discuss their life cycle and habits. They inhabit the deep part of the forest but create these amazing and beautiful bodies that push out into the light and they do that so quickly that the English language uses their name, mushroom, to describe something that multiplies almost too fast to be measured. They are an important part of cleaning up the detritus of a forest, making sure nutrients are recycled for reuse and many are eaten by other forest creatures. Some species are even eaten by humans while others are important medicines, some are so poisonous they kill almost instantly and some do other crazy things to our brain chemistry. They are deep, dark forest magic. Not like us at all, but vital members of their communities.

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Mushrooms Berkeley 

A classic recipe from the Vegetarian Epicure by Anna Thomas. Described as such "The mushrooms and peppers will be very dark and evil looking, but irresistible in flavor and aroma."

1 lb mushrooms, halved
1 medium bell peppers, cut in 1-inch squares
1 onion, peeled and chopped
1/2 c butter

Sauce
2 T Dijon mustard
2 T Worcestershire sauce
1/2 c brown sugar (or less)
3/4 c mellow red table wine
Fresh ground black pepper
Seasoned salt

Melt butter and saute onions till clear.

While sauteing make sauce. Mix together mustard, brown sugar, and Worcestershire sauce till perfectly smooth. Add the wine, season with lots of fresh ground pepper, seasoned salt to taste. Stir well

When onion is clear, add the mushrooms and peppers and saute. As the mushrooms begin to brown and reduce in size, add the sauce.

Now simmer at medium for about 45 minutes or till sauce is reduced and thickened. Serve over steak, polenta, pasta or as a vegetable side dish. 

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Mushrooms remind us of the hidden and dark parts of life. They grow in the dark, sometimes literally but always the figurative dark of wet forests and short days. The mycelium remind me that even when things look dead, like the spongy rotting logs that litter my beloved temperate rain forests, there is often much going on under the surface. The fruit will pop up only when it is ready and then it might just "mushroom" out, being so prolific we can't even believe that was just a pile of dry leaves three weeks ago. Mushrooms have completely unusual and fantastical shapes, colors, uses and jobs. They are, in short, simply unexpected and simply amazing. 

Forest Park Mushrooms

What unexpected and amazing things are popping up in your life right now? Are there mushrooms sprouting in your yard or some other neat natural growth in these dark days of winter? Do you have a favorite mushroom recipe or do you generally stay away from the fungus? Is this a time of hidden growth deep inside the rotting log of your life or are ideas or projects ready to mushroom out? Happy winter!

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Death Moon 2011: The End of the Year, Favorites and Living in Relationship

Death Moon 2010: Night and Day , Wear it As Long as Thou Canst, and Doggy Heaven (still makes me cry years later) 

Death Moon 2009:  The Soldier and Death (one of my all time favorite posts!) and Moving From the Season of the Dead

Death Moon 2008: Full Moon in Taurus and Time is a Circle

The Year Ends

Old Sorting Moon

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I always like it when my human affairs line up nicely with natural cycles and seasonal change. There was a full moon on October 29th that marked the height of the Sorting Moon, the last month of the lunar year, and also happened to fall right at the end of my Outdoor School session. As the last week of the Sorting Moon came and went so did the last week of Outdoor School and right as I was packing and getting ready to leave the coast for the last time, winter showed up. I honestly felt like I left the coast in the autumn and arrived in Portland in the winter with cold air, cold rain and bare trees. 

Smith Lake during the last week of camp

Daylight savings that week made the transition all that much more abrupt. It is now the dark, cold, wet time of the year. 

The end of the Sorting Moon also the end of my fourth year of blogging at The Wheel and the Disk. Holy cow! Really, four years? As I look back over my work this year I see that the 2011-2012 lunar year was a busy (er, totally crazy) one, but there is a lot here that I am very proud of.

At the beginning of the year I was struggling heavily with my work as a student teacher. I struggled with that hard work and other hard work that came up over the winter. At the beginning of the lunar year, I set the goal of working with material from Jessica Prentice's book Full Moon Feast and some of my best writing this year came out of my engagement with that material. The posts about the Wolf Moon and the Sap Moon are shining examples of the kind of writing I do best - an eclectic mix of explanation, spiritual musing and connection making. In the deep winter I did some gwishing and set a theme for 2012 - Grabbing the Tiger By the Tail - which has manifested itself in all sorts of ways I didn't even imagine were possible. The craziness of the rest of the year was foreshadowed by my messing up on the naming of my moons in the winter and having to realign the posts and dates months later. As the spring waxed my focus shifted outward and my posts tended to get shorter, more full of poetry, and more full of pronoic epiphanies. It simply was not a season for digestion or self reflection. It was a time for adventures! In the summer I told you about my adventures in dogs, men, soccer and theme parties. Man, I sure had fun this summer. The fun didn't end, though, as I moved to Outdoor School and enjoyed autumn 

Wondering what tha?

on the Oregon coast. I may not have posted twice for each month, but I did post once for every moon and considering how much else got pushed aside this year I consider that an accomplishment. 

I'm not sure what I see in the future of this blog. It is clearly a very important tool for me in my self reflection and continued spiritual practice. I look forward to spending the winter really digesting the work (and play!) that I engaged in over this last warm season. I would like to continue to incorporate stories and poetry to help illuminate my findings as well as to highlight the science of the seasons as they come and go. I expect to have another very fruitful winter of blogging and hope that I can sustain that into the spring and summer next year. Again, I promise to post for every moon and every festival. That commitment keeps me on track in a very real way. 

I have been enjoying this change in the season and the beginnings of this season of dark. This soli-lunar calendar that I follow allows for a generous season of end before the birth of the new year and I have grown accustomed to using it for all it is worth. Reviewing, putting things to rest, sorting through and making ready to let go or spend the winter working of what needs to stay. It is a fruitful season for inner work and I need some of that brand of medicine right now. How is the year winding down for you? What have you accomplished since last fall? What of that is worth keeping and what of that is ready to be transformed into something worth keeping? How is winter beginning to show itself where you live?

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This post is labeled Old Sorting Moon because it was written so late in the month. Here are previous Full Sorting Moon posts. 

Full Sorting Moon 2011: Snow Moon: Connecting with our Food

Full Sorting Moon 2010: The Rains Have Come and Year Two Complete

Full Sorting Moon 2009: Full Sorting Moon

How Can I Help You?

Halloween

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About a week ago we marked the last autumn festival day and began our move into winter. In American culture that festival day is usually called Halloween, but it is similar in nature to the Celtic Sahmain and the Catholic All Saint's/All Soul's day festivals. It is the end of the year, the last harvest of animals, the time when the veil between the land of the living and the dead is thin and the beginning of the cold and dark winter season.

I marked the holiday during my last week of Outdoor School in both festive secular and a more religious manner. On October 31st we had a really fun Halloween party that included carving pumpkins, searching for beads in bowls of gross "guts", a haunted house and costumes. The four of us Field Instructors made capes out of space blankets and were Super Field Instructors all day. Too much fun. The next day the classes, all from Catholic schools, invited a priest to come and conduct an All Saint's Day mass. I made the time to attend that as well.

Taking the communion by amioascension

I have only attended Catholic mass one other time in my life, in the spring of 2005 when Pope John Paul II died. That was at the Catholic church in Ashland, Oregon and I remember the feeling of awe in looking at the program realizing that people all over the world were saying the same words, hearing the same scriptures, engaging in the same rituals as I was and that the older gentleman next to me had been doing these same things for decades. That kind of ritual and continuity are so very attractive to me, but that's another story for another time. This mass was different because it was in a lodge at a camp and the other attenders were 12 year olds. The nun who was their teacher actually did a really good job of reviewing some of the important parts of the mass which was helpful to me. I knew that mass was a reenactment of the last supper, but she explained it very clearly. She also introduced the topic of saints and how they become saints. During the scripture reading portion of the service a number of kids participated by reading singly or by being a part of a chorus of readers. It was interesting to see how into the whole process some of the kids were and how "along for the ride" others were.

It being an All Saints Day mass, the priest gave a homily about saints who are not yet canonized and the priest read a story about a man in a homeless shelter who acted as a saint, even as he was so in need himself. The priest was a bit of a doddering old man, but he asked the kids to share examples of people they know who are unrecognized saints and many of them had wonderful things to say about neighbors and grandparents. In summary, the priest reminded us that Jesus didn't ask us how smart we are, or how perfect we are, he only asked us to help each other. That was how he lived, and that is how he asks us to live.

Food Not Bombs by Ann Arbor Free Skool

There is a flip side to this idea of generosity and assistance. There are times when we are the ones who need to be helped, and it can be even harder to accept help than it is to give it. I saw this in action a couple days later when I was at the Food Basket, the little grocery store in the town near camp in the early morning. A woman, buying family groceries and struggling with her cart and walker, was terribly embarrassed that her card wouldn't go through. The checker was trying to be helpful but a line was building up behind the woman. The man directly behind her was a bicyclest, one of the many who do medium to long distance trips along the coastal highway, and clearly better off than the woman buying groceries. He tried to offer to pay for her things, handing the checker the cash but the woman just wouldn't accept his help. She insisted that there was money on the card and finally ended up not getting everything she had picked out so that she could afford it with the money in her purse. This interaction reminded me that it is not enough to help, but we must also come to terms with being helped in the winter. The woman could have graciously accepted the gift and been able to use her grocery money for other things, or even buy groceries for someone else next week. Instead, she got caught in her insecurity and shame and could not allow the bicyclist's generosity to flow into her life.

BIG RIVER
(one of my very favorite camp songs, sung this week at camp) 

There's a big river flowing, it'll be there tomorrow
It's time we should be going, there's no time for sorrow
The stars will light the way back home, the song will keep the fire
Remembering the days we've roamed, the song will lift you higher

So sing for the river, and sing for the stars
Sing for the friends you've made, wherever they are
Sing to bring you back again or to take you away
Sing a song for me my friend, sing for today

There's a big river flowing, and it's always in motion
It carves out its journey, on down to the ocean
Now you can choose your path alone, and take it to the sea
Remembering the song's your own, the song will set you free

So sing for the river, and sing for the stars
Sing for the friends you've made, wherever they are
Sing to bring you back again or to take you away
Sing a song for me my friend, sing for today

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Trick or treat by Mark J P

It is now winter, the cold dark time of the year when resources begin to run short. Thinking about how to help and how to be helped is natural at this time of year and one of my favorite parts of the Waldorf autumn and winter festivals is how they ritualize and make concrete this impulse to help. The autumn festivals begin with Michaelmas, at the Autumn equinox, when we receive a spark of heavenly light from God's own warrior. At Martinmas, in early November, we nurture that spark in lanterns and honor a man who cut his own cloak in half to help a person in need. As we get closer to Christmas, we light more lights, spend more energy giving gifts and energy to help each other through the dark time until the cosmic light is reborn at solstice and Christmas. By St. Brigid's day, or Candlemas, in early February our own lights are feeling weak and worn, but the light is taken up by the earth again as spring begins it's rebirth. Honoring this feeling of needing to help and encouraging us to take steps to actually help are important reasons for these winter festivals.

How did you celebrate this Autumn-turning-to-Winter festival? Do you have a tradition of jack-o-lanterns and trick or treating or do you do a different celebration? Have you been feeling the pull of the season of giving? Do you have trouble letting generosity into your life? Happy All Saint's Day, Halloween, Sahmain and winter!

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Halloween 2011: Day of the Dead and Dia de los Muertos Altara and Nurturing Warmth at Martinmas.

Halloween 2010: Doggy Heaven (still chokes me up, years later) and The Power of the Dog and Martinmas. 

Halloween 2009: What Do You Really Want to Be? and Moving from the Season of the Dead. 

Halloween 2008: When the Veil Between the Worlds is Thin

Year of the Dragon

New Milk Moon

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I am the unquenchable Fire,
  The center of all energy,
  The stout heroic heart.
  I am truth and light,
  I hold power and glory in my sway.
  My presence
  Disperses dark clouds
  To tame the Fates.

  I am the Dragon.

Year of the Dragon

Gung Hay Fat Choy! January 23 is the new Fasting Moon in Annette Hinshaw's calendar and the first day of the lunar new year, a huge celebration all over Asia. The festival is called Tet Nguyen Dan in Vietnam, Chaul Chnam Thmey in Cambodia and Chun Jie, or the Spring Festival, in Chinese speaking communities. When I was a little kid in San Francisco Chinese New Year was almost as big of a holiday at my elementary school as Thanksgiving or Spring Break. We made red envelopes to fill with chocolate coins and watched lion dancers at school and parades in Chinatown. 

Every year in the Chinese calendar is ruled by an animal, creating the Chinese zodiac. The year 4710, or 2012 in the Gregorian calendar, is a Year of the Dragon, a headstrong, charismatic, and enthusiastic animal who's luck just never stops. Dragon is known for being a free spirited doer who always wins people's admiration and never accepts defeat. Though my theme for 2012 is Grabbing the Tiger By the Tail, the Chinese Dragon is a perfect poster child for the kind of year I want to have. Bright, buoyant, active and adventurous. There is a caution, though, with Dragon because they can tend towards being a bit brash, abrasive or prone to power-over dynamics. I am liable to fall into these patterns myself so I will be calling on the Water Dragon, this year's elemental dragon, to help me remain more open minded, to see other people's points of view and weigh all the options before rushing into action. Martin Luther King, Jr., Woodrow Wilson and John Lennon were all born in the Year of the Dragon. I wonder what will be born this year?

Dragon and Mandarins

Food plays a central role in the celebration of the Chinese New Year and there is much symbolism on the banquet table. Oranges and tangerines are given as gifts and eaten at meals both because they are so deliciously in season this time of year, but also because their names sound like the words for luck and gold in Chinese. Whole fish are often served to represent the beginning and end of a lucky year and sweets of various kinds bring a sweetness to the year. The local Asian newspaper here in Portland printed the following recipe and I hope to try it sometime this season. Long beans or long noodles represent long life and lobster represents the dragon of the zodiac. Shrimp or chicken can be substituted for the lobster, or combined with the dragon of the sea. Combining lobster and chicken is another traditional food, symbolizing the lucky union of the dragon and the phoenix.

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Dragon Beans

1 tbs oil (vegetable, peanut, or lard)

1/4 tsp Sichuan peppercorns, crushed

1/2 tsp Chinese five-spice powder

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 1/2 pounds Chinese long beans (also called yard long beans, string beans can be used)

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup oyster sauce

1 tbs soy sauce

1 tbs toasted sesame oil

splash of Sriracha sauce

7 oz cooked lobster meat, chopped (substitute/combine shrimp or chicken)

1 tbs toasted sesame seeds

In a wok or deep skillet over medium-high, heat the vegetable oil. Add the peppercorns, five spice powder, and garlic. Heat, stirring constantly for 30 seconds.

Add the beans and toss to coat. Add the water, oyster sauce, and soy sauce and cover. Allow the beans to stem for five minutes, or until just tender. Add the sesame oil, Sriracha, lobster meat, and sesame seeds. Toss together and cook until just heated through. Serve immediately. 

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Lion Dance

How are you celebrating this ancient and global festival? Do you have family or community traditions around the Chinese New Year or is all of this new to you? What foods bring good luck and wealth in your home? How is the dragon going manifest its optimistic, exuberant and charming energies into your life this year?

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New Milk Moon 2009: New Milk Moon

New Milk Moon 2010: Forty Two with a Seventy Percent Chance of Rain

New Milk Moon 2011: The Quaker Year

This post is about Chinese New Year, which I mention in the Full Fasting Moon 2009 post and The Nian.

** This winter was tough and I got messed up in my calendar. I wrote this thinking it was the Fasting Moon but it was really the Milk Moon. Since the post itself is more about the the Chinese New Year I just changed the tags and labels. For more on my thoughts about this, see this post. **