Thursday, November 25, 2010

Earthen Spirituality and the Mysterious (25 November 2010)

(Edited version; originally posted at MySpace; 3 November 2009)


It is the season known poetically and spiritually as “the Gloom.”  I stand between Samhain (Halloween) and Winter Solstice; two very powerful, symbolic moments in the earthen round of the seasons for me.  These two ‘holidays’ always bring out my imaginative side!  This year for Halloween we set up a séance table on the porch with an old witch ball in the middle of it propped up on an LED light, so it was illumined from below.  We sat to either side of the table with end-tables decorated with pumpkins and skulls, cornshalks and candles, etc., and then acted as if we had just ‘conjured’ a spirit and were waiting for it to ‘materialize’ on the other side of s curtain that shut off the far side of the porch.  There we had set up rocking chairs to which a string was attached, so I could make the one rock by pulling on it.  We had made a CD-R of spooky music that we kept playing throughout the evening, and had a really good time.  Now, I’m anticipating beginning to decorate for the Yule (probably later this afternoon).

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Enclosure: Towards a Spirituality of Winter (23 November 2010)

It is the time of the year that has long been called ‘the Gloom,’ and I’ve been out for an afternoon walk in wooded places.  “The Gloom” describes that time between the falling of the colorful leaves and the coming of the snows that whiten the world and remind us that Winter Solstice is growing nearer.  The Celts called this season An Dudlach, and in Tolkien’s world, the Elves refer to this same time as ‘The Gloaming.”  This time of year has always inspired me.  It is a transitional time, when my symbolic engagement with the natural world shifts.