Dancing Willow

Moving

Can't pay the bill ...

Moving to Dancing Willow over here ...

I think I'm going to get a custom template ... If I can talk Raven into it ...

Also, moving apartments on the 31st ... Any of you with my address or telephone number, it's changing. Email me if I don't send you new information.

Shi Changes Everything ...

Today I had my first day working the register at my new job. You see, I was hired on the spot last Wednesday when I went in to fill out an application in my second round of job searching at the Mall. I came in for 6.5 hours last Thursday, to do a training and to help move things in the store before Inventory. My manager said shi would call Monday and let me know my hours, since I'm full-time.

Well, Friday I stayed home, and breathed in the fact that I no longer needed to spend my days searching for a job, I have one. It's a really lovely feeling. Except, it was freezing cold in my house. Like, only 60 degrees. Frigid, really.

Raven just brought up a huge bowl of macaroni and cheese, and pomegranate seeds. Yum.

Saturday, Raven and I looked for an apartment for hir. See, shi's been staying here for the last two months, until shi could save up enough for hir own place. Now it seems that I have to move, and so shi wants a place big enough so I can stay with hir until I can get onto my feet. It's been complicated. So, we've been looking for a place.

Because I can't live here, where the thermostat gets held at 55 degrees all day.

Sunday, we went to a friend's for ice cream cake and movies (we didn't watch any, but we did watch Elvira Kurt). It was a lovely time, and we had birthday pizza, and I got 100 colored pencils, which I promptly took from their holding box and color-organized, in all the colors of the homo rainbow ... Yes, it was a wonderful thing. Both dog and cat wanted to assist. It was discovered that I did not own a coloring book (to go with my colored pencils), so I was given one to assay the trouble of having 100 colored pencils, and nothing to color.

Today, I got to work for another 6 or so hours, and then Raven picked me up to go look at other apartments, then we came back to the house, and I made left-over pizza for dinner (first thing I ate all day), and now we're watching V For Vendetta and trying to stay warm. There might need to be a huddle later, to generate body heat to share. It's freezing!

It is so cold, there is snow inside my window.

Long Time Gone ...

Yes, yes, I know. It's been a very long time. But I can explain ...

You see, first, I went to Michigan, back in December. I spent a week hanging twinkly lights and decorating a Christmas tree for a friend who works so hard shi didn't have time, what with a recent hip replacement and all.

I came home, and that night had a "date" to a company holiday party ... At a fancy restaurant/lounge in downtown. I didn't really feel like I was wearing the right outfit, and I didn't feel like the prettiest grrl in the room ... Except that my date, wonderful butch shi is, made certain I was wined and dined and adored all evening. Such a lovely thing, a good butch.

The next night was ritual for Yule, a wonderful celebration of the returning of the light. Such a breath-taking experience, especially the Dianic Genesis and the "moonshine" light! And then, the weaving of the sun-catcher with intentions for the year. The joy those little grrls expressed while running under the sun-catcher.

Three days later, I receive the news that I am fully accepted in the Spiral Door School, and that wondering, that confusion, is lifted from my breast and I am able to prepare to leave for Washington with a light heart and a smiling face.

Thursday, Yule-night, Raven and I left for Washington, truck packed and provisions supplied. We had hoped to make it through the North route (Minnesota-NorthDakota-Montana) without much inclement weather, though the grass was frozen in spires by the time we reached Minnesota. A bit of ice through there, a bit of snow, but much better in North Dakota. A beautiful golden sunrise across the plains of rolling wheat, bitter crisp air whistling past a barely cracked window through to Montana. Slushy roads to clear mountain passes, round the bend where Raven once crashed; through the darkness to a truck stop in Spokane, where breakfast is served all night long by a womyn who just wants to go home. Sleeping a few hours at a rest stop near Sprague till a wake-up call from Goddess letting me know I need to drive. Wake up, put in gear, and pull out into whiteness which stretches on forever; finally, too thick for me to drive, we pull over and Raven changes seats, preparing to drive into another winter storm ... Barely making it over Snoqualmie Pass before the avalanche control begins (blowing up the snow so that the avalanche will occur, then cleaning it up before traffic can pass through again. How crazy is that?), in a two-wheel-drive truck, with 300 lbs. of sand, and no tire chains. To finally reach the other side, where green is the only color for miles above and around, to a hot chai and a warm shower and a rest.

Five days in Washington, one spent in Port Townsend/the Olympic Peninsula.

Then a drive home, my sleeping through Washington, waking briefly through Coeur d'Alene to spy eagles in a tree near lake Coeur d'Alene, then sleeping again through Idaho, into Missoula, and through to Butte and  Billings. Waking briefly to see Raven's childhood home, hir cottonwood tree, the Blue Basket where shi would ride hir bicycle to buy candy. A shower in Beach ND, then ice, and snow, and blizzard, and 12 hours at a truck stop in Jamestown, stranded because the snowplows are not running and even the FedEx trucks have pulled over. Several semi's in the ditch, one even rolled, and a sideways snowplow. 24 hours in North Dakota is far too long to spend riding and sleeping in the cab of a little truck. Finally into Minnesota, then through to Wisconsin, and home, a day late, just four hours before New Year, and off to friends' for pudding cake and a warm shower and a bed for the first time in days,weeks,months to sleep upon.

Up in the morning for a drive-through hugging from a mothir and dear friend, then back again for coffee and conversation. Unpacking the truck, hauling scads of boxes up the steps to the porch, to the living room, up the steps to the bedroom, piled high and annoying. Slowly, slowly, the boxes are unpacked, first clothes and shoes, then knitting, then office supplies (pens! paper! notebooks! staples! why do I have 16000 staples?), then books (Oh! the BOOKS!). Yesterday I crafted bookshelves out of boxes carried halfway across the country (in a blizzard, and much rain, without getting the tiniest bit wet), then bolstered them up with paint stirrers gotten from the Homo Depot. A board from the basement serves as a shelf to hold the stereo on the bookcases, and a basket from the front porch holds all in-process knitting projects (save a few still packed away in the big box of knitting). I'm hoping for a very tall bookcase soon (one like this, perhaps), one that will hold all my books, and a desk soon (I was thinking a secretary might be nice, or a writing desk, or well, even a table [with cool legs] would do well). None of which will arrive until I can get them, which requires an income, which I am working on still. You know, I had an interview last Friday, which I am hoping will work out, because it would be for full-time, 40-hours-a-week, and that would be really nice.

My first Spiral Door weekend is the 27th/28th, and my birthday is Sunday. I'm not sure what's happening yet ... Apparently plans are being made without my knowledge. I am hoping for an ice cream cake from Dairy Queen with a witch on it. And lovely time with friends. I need a good birthday. The last few years have kind-of sucked.

Okay, that's enough for now. I'm exhausted. Oh, I might be moving to WordPress in a week or so ... Depends on if I can pay my bill here or not. I'll keep you posted. For now, I'm going to go make soup and grilled cheese for lunch! YUM!

Wah-Wah-Wah

Today I am hearing everything the way Charlie Brown's teacher says it: Wah-Wah-Wah-Wah-Wah. Considering that the sound of the teacher's voice was made with a trombone and a plunger, it shows you how my day has gone ...

It is raining outside, tiny drops of ice falling from brown-grey clouds and clicking against windows and sidewalks to create a crystal cacaphony of quiet contemplation. I've been trying to write for hours, instead distracting myself with tea and art supply catalogues and dreams of just a few colored pencils so that I might draw knitting to be designed. It is cold here, again, and I have just turned down the heater so that my housemate does not worry about the bill. I was recently in a house where they keep the thermostat at 72 degrees ... I was so warm it was nearly uncomfortable. Such a radical change from my norm.

Tonight I will be even colder, sleeping in my bed alone for the first time in a week, uncertain of how I will keep from shivering all night. Ribbons of rain have frozen onto glass panes in scattered, shattered lines. The other window in this room is mostly covered in thick spiderwebs of frost. The occasional plume of dryer steam escapes the vent into the driveway outside, signs of life in the neighbor's home. I'm vacillating between cooking dinner and just going without, confused by the thought of feeding only myself tonight. For the last month, I have done for two: cooked, cleaned, laundered. Tonight it is I, and I am unsure what to do.

I have grand dreams of writing, of working days and writing nights, spending hours in coffeeshops with bottomless cups and pouring my every thought and desire through ink onto the page. Christmas songs ring on the radio, some strange station I could not identify having a marathon of holiday music. I stopped here because the news was too depressing to tolerate.

Friends came by this afternoon, bringing frozen soup and boxes of goods and a fleece jacket in which to drown in the warmth. They do not want me to be cold, and yet here I am, just six hours later, bundled in layers of sweatshirts and denim and socks, my breath just visible in my upstairs room; my writing tools downstairs, in the common room, waiting patiently for my hands to embrace them. I am afraid to do so, afraid to pick up the pen and draw ink from my veins onto the bark beneath me. I am afraid of what lays there.

So I sit in the darkness of this office, the blue glow of an electronic screen my only companion, the back door slamming in the gusts of frigid air, and wonder: Do I dare? Do I dare pick up that pen and write? Do I wake the slumbering giant and find the golden egg beneath hir breast? Do I dare? Do I dare?

What would you do? Would you dare?

In the Last Hour ...

I started this post yesterday. Typepad doesn't let me change the time stamp, so I can't post it for yesterday and blog today. So this is Monday's post, what I wrote of it ...

I woke up, got up, put on clothes, pulled back my hair, carried a jacket and hat downstairs, made a sandwich and packed a lunch for my best friend, sent hir off to work, went to the bathroom, turned on the computer, checked my email, read Jessie's Sunday Scribbling, and am now brushing my teeth while creating my own Sunday Monday Scribbling.

It is cold here, cold outside, so much colder than I enjoyed last winter. This time a year ago I was packing and shipping boxes to Washington, preparing to embark on an extravagent new journey. I was blogging about planning and packing and my trip to Seattle. It's funny how so much can happen in a year. It makes an hour seem like nothing at all, like no time has passed.

I have noticed how swiftly time passes when I am with Raven. What seems like an hour is really three, and before either of us realize, it 3am and we must go to bed soon, for shi has to get up for work. Yesterday we lost several hours between World Market and Michael's, just wandering, browsing together. Time seems so soft and malleable with hir.

There is a spiderweb of frost on the window next to the desk. My writing notebooks are all upstairs, and today I really must work in them. I cannot shower because my housemate decided shi was finally tired of bathing in a plastic bubble and started to re-caulk the bathtub yesterday. It won't be done until Wednesday or Thursday. I'm sad, because showering is something I do daily, religiously. This is really bothering me, the inability to bathe when I'm feeling a little scrungy.

It's Going to Be Raining Outdoors

Listening to Cassandra Wilson again, just calm and mellow on a Snow Day, where the sun peaks thrugh the clouds on occasion and reminds me again how nasty snow-blindness can be. It's cold in my house but warm in my heart, where I am preparing for a nice, quite weekend without much chaos or panic.

Goddess hope.

Today is the first of December, rent day (which I don't have), World AIDS day (which I thankfully do not have), and the first day of lasting snow here in the Mad City. I woke up to snow on the inside of my window, between the outside glass and the part I raise to let in the breeze. And I mean SNOW. Not just frost, or ice, but actual tufts of snow in the space between. Strange, I tell you. And it was only 54 degrees in my room last night, almost too cold to fall asleep. I know, because I was up until at least 3am.

I had been doing really well with the notebook a month task, until about the middle of November, when I became very afraid of writing about things I experience with others, primarily because I like posting my writing here, but situations have caused me to fear the abuse of my words by others for their own selfish and manipulative means. I'm not okay with that. So I figured, why put my writing out there at all?

But that's not who being a writer is, really. The words of writers have been used and interpreted and mis-interpreted and abused for centuries. The bible, the holy books, early Greek poetry, Sappho, the Oracle at Delphi, the words have all been cut and copied and re-written so many times it is a wonder we can believe them at all. I believe it is the role of the writer to put hir words out into the world, to be read and heard by many or few, and to defend those words in their truth as long as that truth exists.

However, it doesn't make it any easier, or any less terrifying.

Last night, in my last class of the Feminist Witchcraft series I have been taking, I brought Sarasvati to visit the womyn. We each brought a Goddess: Danu, Juno, Ercea, the Lady of the Lake, Spider Womyn, Lilith; a circle of Goddesses in the womyn I have come to know and cherish these last six weeks or so. Each Goddess brought a message to the womyn gathered.

Sarasvati's message was to remember the breath in everything, and remember the ink, the permanency of ink, the lasting-staying of words written down and carried forward. Sarasvati is the breath which maintains that ink, which keeps it permanent. We must write, we must write down our words, our stories, our memories.

Sarasvati will keep the ink alive.

And so, even through the fear, I must remember Hir words, and write.

My tea's gone cold, my arms are icicles, my heart is chilly and seems frozen in fear. The ivy on the neighbor's house is solid now until the next thaw, tendrils stuck in place as if they looked into the eyes of Medusa. My skull is spinning -- quiet, fierce -- my own gravitational field rotating on the axes of spine and heart. The words, the words, they slip like penguins on the first ice of the winter journey.

I'm drawing inward, catching breath, storing it in cells and organs, waiting for the moment to release, to breathe deep again, to let it go.

Welcome ... to the Dream Time.

**Photo from here.**

I stole this

One word. No explanation.

1. Yourself: Passionate.
2. Your partner: far away.
3. Your hair: down.
4. Your mother: unavailable.
5. Your father: gone.
6. Your favorite item: journal.
7. Your dream last night: terror.
8. Your favorite drink: coffee.
9. Your dream car: bug.
10. The room you are in: office.
11. Your ex: painful.
12. Your fear: disappointment.
13. What you want to be in 10 years: happy.
14. Who you hung out with last night: best friend.
15. What you're not: alone.
16. Muffins: blueberry.
17: One of your wish list items: moleskines.
18: Time: forever and swift.
19. The last thing you did: read.
20. What you are wearing: jeans.
21. Your favorite weather: partlycloudy.
22. Your favorite book: one?
23. The last thing you ate: mac&cheesewithbrats.
24. Your life: waiting.
25. Your mood: confused.
26. Your best friend: far away.
27. What you're thinking about right now: partnership.
28. Your car: nonexistent.
29. What you are doing at the moment: feeling.
30. Your summer: chaotic.
31. Your relationship status: limbo.
32. What is on your TV: Zim.
33. What is the weather like: icy-snow.
34. When was the last time you laughed: lunchtime.

Peace in My Heart

A year ago, I emailed the link to this image to myself:

Lately, I've been feeling the need to find that place again, that peace in my heart. I think I'll go for a walk in the woods tomorrow, after baking french bread and making banana creme pies for Thanksgiving dinner.

Soon to come: What I'm thankful for ...

All the Colors of the Homo Rainbow ...

[ RED ]
1. Closest red thing to you? A red Pilot V Razor Point pen (extra fine), a red stopwatch/timer, and a red box of Gee's Bend notecards. There is a red letter opener on the table next to me, and red-orange terracotta pots with herbs in them to my right. A red camera bag on the floor, and a red spine on the Utrecht catalogue on the table in the kitchen.
2. Has anyone ever cheated on you in a relationship? I don't know. I don't think so, but then again, I haven't had many actual relationships, usually just passing encounters. And they don't count as relationships. But I have been "the other womyn," all but twice without knowing it. I'm more often the one cheated with than the one cheated on.
3. Last thing to make you angry? Listening to my best friend tell me about the atrocities committed against hir by someone shi was married to, and feeling the heat rise in my throat.
4. Are you a fan of romance? I was certain to be a hopeless romantic forever. Now, I'm a romantic who isn't quite so hopeless anymore.
5. Have you ever been in love? Yes. Each time I fall in love, one of us seems to fall out of love. I just try to love as deeply and fully as I can. I learned my lesson the last time. I'm wary of falling in love. But loving someone ... That's a whole 'nother story ...
6. Do you have a temper? Mostly not, but I'm learning to honor my righteous rage and feel that anger. I'm working on it.

[ GREEN ]
1. Closest green thing to you? My housemate's green folder, the plants in front of both windows, the box from an iPod shuffle, Toni Childs' "the woman's boat" cd case ... I like green. I want green shoes. Oh, and my green wristwarmers. I forgot I am wearing them.
2. Do you care about the environment? Intensely, passionately, deeply. My closest friend is a nature photographer, and I'm so lucky, because I get to be in the environment all the time.
3. Are you jealous of anyone right now? I'm not "jealous" of anyone, but I am feeling a little bit of envy on occasion because there are things I would like in my life, things I want to do and see, and I'm not in a place where I can do those things, and that makes me a little envious, but then I get really happy for them and know that if I am meant to do them/have them/see them, it will happen. I can make it happen.
4. Are you a lucky person? Ummmm, I've been called a good luck charm by others, but I just know that I am lucky to be alive and healthy and happy, despite all the shit and crap in my life. I could be dead now, so that makes me lucky.
5. Do you always want what you can't have? Well, when I was young my mum told me I have champagne taste on a tap-water budget ... I like nice things, but I don't always want them if I have something else. I try to be really grateful for what I have, materially and otherwise.
6. Are you Irish? I don't think so, but I have always felt an affinity for the Isles. I'd like to visit there, living in a little cottage on the shore, writing and taking photographs. Yeah, that'd be nice.

[ PURPLE ]
1. Last purple thing you saw? My arms, as the shirt I'm wearing is purple, and I can see them as I type. Before that, probably the fitted sheet on my mattress, it's purple too.
2. Like being treated to expensive things? Yes. I do. Because I deserve nice things, and often those nice things are expensive. But I don't expect them. That's the thing I've learned in life ... I like them, but I don't expect them.
3. Do you like mysterious things? That's funny. Growing up, all my favorite books were mystery books, and I still love Agatha Christie's works. But now I'm in a magickal tradition that is based in the Mysteries ... I guess we all make our choices, which lead us to our future ...
4. Favourite type of chocolate? Dark chocolate between 55%-68% cacao content ... Oh, and REAL truffles. Yes, I like those a lot.
5. Ever met any royalty? I met Tipper Gore when shi was Second Lady ... And I've seen Dolly Parton, the Queen of Country Music ...
6. Are you creative? Yes. At least, I think so.
7. Are you lonely? Not in this moment. I am trying to let go of my fear of being alone and being lonely, and honoring my time in solitude. And enjoying my time in the company of others.

[ BLUE ]
1. Closest blue thing to you? My blue notebook for November and the blue on the SmartWater bottle.
2. Are you good at calming people down? If they will let me ...
3. Do you like the ocean? Yes. I need the ocean. The first visit to the ocean, the Pacific, I knew I would come back at least once a year. I'm about due for another trip ...
4. What was the last thing that made you cry? Listening to the horrible things that a close friend has experienced, and being afraid at losing our friendship.
5. Are you a logical thinker? Umm ... If logic is a spiral, I'm all over it.
6. Can you sleep easily? Sometimes. If there is someone else in the bed, someone I have invited, I sleep really well. Otherwise, I usually wake up screaming.
7. Do you prefer the beach or the woods? Normally (pre-Washington), I would have said the woods. But romping on the beach every day (practically) gave me a new beach, one I love and miss deeply. So, I need both, actually. The grey beaches of the Pacific Northwest, and the deep green forests of both Washington (cedars) and the Midwest (pines)

[ YELLOW ]
1. Closest yellow thing to you? A donation flyer for the Easter Seals and the sunshine in the backyard.
2. The happiest time(s) of your life? Oh, there are lots. In ritual. On the beach. At the ocean. Watching Grr and Invader Zim snuggled on the sofa. Eating a bowl of Special K my best friend bought me. Michigan Womyn's Music Festival. Singing. Dancing to the drums around the fire. Too many to name ...
3. Favourite holiday? One spent with family and friends, with laughter and joy, with good food and lots of fun!
4. Are you a coward? It depends. What do you want me to do?
5. Do you burn or tan? Tan. And then it stays that way for a long time. My skins got olive undertones ... Like the Gypsies ...
6. Do you want children? I don't know. Sometimes. I'd rather support children who are born unwanted.
7. What makes you happy? The happy times of my life. And thinking about being happy. And cheese.

[ PINK ]
1. Closest pink thing to you? A highlighter on the table next to me.
2. Do you like sweet things? Yes. I do. Especially chocolate
3. Like play-fighting? No. Bad memories associated with that. No. Hate it.
4. Are you sensitive? Does it rain in Seattle?
5. Do you like punk music? No. I have a couple of CD's, and there might be one or two songs I like, but I don't consider them punk, so No.
6. What is your favourite flower? Lilac and lavender and hyacinth and rose and alyssum in the springtime.
7. Does someone have a crush on you? I don't know. Do you?

[ ORANGE ]
1. Closest orange thing to you? A piece of scratch paper and a business card in the rolodex.
2. Do you like to burn things? Yes. I burn candles almost daily, and I have recently found a wonderful incense I truly enjoy called "Song of India Temple" incense, and I'm hoping to get some of my own so I don't keep burning other peoples. It is delicious.
3. Dress up for Halloween? The last time I dressed up, it was as a nun with black fishnet stockings and six inch heels. I love dressing up.
4. Are you usually a warm-hearted person? I try to be, unless you've done something to piss me off. Strong to my enemies, tender to those I love ... Leslie Feinberg said that.
5. Do you prefer the single life or the security of a relationship? I am fiercely independent and can become overly dependent in a relationship. I'm learning how to balance the two. I need to be in a relationship with an equal, then things will be right.
6. What would your super power be? The ability to create a rennet-free brie cheese. Oh, and world peace. :)

[ WHITE ]
1. Closest white thing to you? Pieces of scrap paper, the MacBook I'm writing on, mail, powerstrips, my eyeballs.
2. Would you say you're innocent? No. I don't remember being innocent ... :D
3. Always try to keep the peace? I'd like to think so, but I know I have caused problems and not helped the peace in some situations. I'm only human, not perfect, and I'm okay with that.
4. How do you imagine your wedding? Um, a handfasting done by the two most important High Priestesses in my life, in the woods, with water from the ocean and rocks from the mountains, with my Butch partner, in a lavender gown with a wreath of lavender on my head. I hadn't really thought about it ...
5. Do you like to play in the snow? Hoooray! Snow Angels! Hooray!!!!!
6. Are you afraid of going to the doctors or dentist? Not afraid, just unable to afford. And I'm only willing to see femelle physicians ... The boys fondle me too much.

[ BLACK ]
1. Closest black thing to you? Three black pens, black socks, black underthings, black camera, black cords, black poster. I want a black journal here, but not yet.
2. Ever enjoy hurting people? No. It makes me physically ill.
3. Are you sophisticated or silly? Both. Sophisticated at times, a big kid on the playground others.
4. Do you have a lot of secrets? Not really. There is usually at least one person I tell my secrets to; they don't know them all -- I tell one person one secret, a different person another ... That way, no one knows them all.
5. What is your favourite colour(s)? Purple. Red. Green. Black. Silver. Anything sparkly or glittery. Sequins.
6. Does the colour you wear affect your mood? Sometimes. But it is more often that I pick my color to match my mood. It's why I need so many different colored tee-shirts. One in every color of the homo rainbow ...

Sankofa

Oh Sankofa, high on the Heavens you soar
My soul is soon to follow you, back to yesterdays moon
will it remember me?
Back to yesterdays sun, It will rekindle me
Rekindle the spirit into tomorrow and high on the wind
Sankofa flys again and again

Oh Sankofa, high on the Heavens you soar
My soul is soon to follow you, back to yesterdays moon
will it remember me?
Back to yesterdays sun, It will rekindle me
Rekindle the spirit into tomorrow and high on the wind
Sankofa flys again and again

Oh Sankofa, high on the Heavens you soar
My soul is soon to follow you, back to yesterdays moon
will it remember me?
Back to yesterdays sun, It will rekindle me
Rekindle the spirit into tomorrow and high on the wind
Sankofa flys again and again

~Cassandra Wilson

According to some, Sankofa means "We must go back and reclaim our past so we can move forward; so we understand why and how we came to be who we are today." I like that a lot ...