by EnchantedWolf | May 14, 2011 | Nature Awareness
I’ve officially started my nature awareness work, kind of with a whimper instead of a bang, I guess. I have decided on a special little nook in my backyard for this purpose, and I’m going out there each week, to observe the changes over time to this little area, and to do some sketching and drawing, and watching and listening.
For my baseline to begin the observations, the little nook is at one corner of my privacy fence, out in the back 40 by Mr. Teddy’s sandbox. A large, wild Mustang grape vine grows on the fence, virulently so, and I have a small plaster bust of Diana of Aradia overlooking the area, attached to the fence amongst the vines. Today, the area is filled with movement, and dappled light, and residual coolness and damp from the front that just past through two days ago. The first ladybug I’ve seen of the season, was cruising up the fence on some sort of mission; the carpenter ants had found something on the crosspiece and were busy working on hauling it off. The birds were loud. Although I didn’t see many, except the occasional Blue Jay that landed on the fence and veered off when it saw me, only the birdsong let me know exactly how many birds were around. The Grackles are still courting, and their feather-ruffling and loud, whirling screeches can still be heard. The Mustang grape is fruiting out, and the Crepe Myrtle on the other side of the fence is blooming.
I started out in the sunshine, but, it is very hot – too hot to stay out long; I had to move to the shade. Since I’m in my yard, I’m barefoot, and I loved the feel of the sand – still wet – and I played with that for a while. The air smelled good and fresh, too.
I’m working on a sketch of the mustang grape – will post that when finished.
by EnchantedWolf | May 14, 2011 | Gàidhlig, Grian-stad Sàmhradh
Online at SMO’s dictionary, (also my dear Green Dictionary) I thought I’d document the Gaelic and feel through what I should use for this.
For Midsummer, there is a choice of terms, naturally; there usually is in the Gaelic.
- Fèill Eòin
- Leth an t-samhraidh (Sàmhradh alone is ‘summer’, adding ‘an t-‘ is an article, ‘the’ and ‘leth’ means ‘half’, lit. ‘half the summer’)
- Là Leth an t-samhraidh (That’s Midsummer Day)
- Cuthach na gealaich-samhraidh (Midsummer madness, HA!)
- Maraiche (Midsummermere)
For Solstice, here are two:
- grian-stad (Literally, sun-stop)
- seas-ghrian (Literally, standing-sun)
My guess is, and someone correct me if I’m wrong, PLEASE, that ‘summer solstice’ would be ‘seas-ghrian sàmhradh’ and the winter solstice would be ‘seas-ghrian geamhradh’.
by EnchantedWolf | May 14, 2011 | Grian-stad Sàmhradh
The next High Day, Number 2 for me, is the Summer Solstice, which, according to the Farmer’s Almanac this year, falls on June 21, at 1:16 P.M. EDT. That happens to be a Tuesday, and I still need to adjust for my time zone. I know I’m jumping the gun here about preparations, but, I wanted to make sure I knew exactly when, so I could start planning now. The quarters, since they are actually astronomical events, need to be celebrated at that precise moment, not when it is convenient. I am fine with a social, commemorative ritual for large groups at social convenience, but for my private worship, it must be at the correct time. The cross-quarters are basically social events, and I’m fine with convenience ruling those completely.
I’m starting early, too, because I need time to look into the history, traditions, and archeology, and do some better research than I’ve engaged in to this point.
Now, mind you, my Hearth Culture is not rumoured to have spent much time celebrating the Solstices and Equinoxes, but, they’re important to me. Also, that doesn’t really set right with me; why all the stone circles, cairns and other monuments all over the British Isles set to the Sun, if these dates weren’t important? That doesn’t make any logical sense to me – they had meaning to somebody, obviously; one doesn’t marshal an entire culture to erect massive stone monuments for just something to do. They couldn’t have been THAT bored.
As for the matter that it wasn’t ‘Celtic’ or ‘Druidic’, well, it doesn’t matter a pin to me quite frankly; what matters more to me is that my family came from Gaelic Scotland and Northern England, and for generations upon generations, my ancestors walked that island, from Neolithic times – and they must have interacted somehow over the milennia with those monuments. The timekeeping and astronomical events these circles and standing stones had meaning to them, my ancestors. Therefore, they have meaning to me as well, even if I can’t pin a convenient label on them like ‘Celtic’ or ‘Gaelic’ or ‘Druidic’. I’m pinning ‘My Ancestors’ on that. HA.
I know the Druids as we know them did NOT create Stonehenge or many of the other monuments, but, quite frankly, SOMEBODY did, and I’m willing to bet it was the Druids’ ancestors; the Druids capitalized on the construction projects of the past. Waste not, want not. Nevertheless, that does not make the Druids wrong for using these sites, and weaving their own meaning and ritual into the warp of time. In my own head, that also includes the Druids of the Revival and the last few hundred years. It’s what we DO. We all do this, it is the human way, whether we are Druids, Christians, Muslim, Wiccan, or Tolkien Elvish or just plain whatever. Again, I haven’t seen anywhere in the definition of ‘ancient’ the word ‘superior’ or ‘right’ or ‘exclusive’.
Earrach (lovely name, by the way) has posted some marvelous thoughts with regard to this on the ADF website; I checked out two posts, one entitled, ‘What Would the Druids Do at the Summer Solstice?‘ and the second, ‘Timing: An Essential Element in Things Magical‘, and quite frankly, I couldn’t agree more. I can see we are on the same page about it; I was pleased to run across these posts after I had already put some of my thoughts down above. Heck yeah!!! I feel better already.
by EnchantedWolf | May 12, 2011 | Nature Awareness
For help with this issue, I actually took a look at other peoples’ DP journals and when I stumbled on some extra reading resources, an idea I’d been knocking around with started to coalesce; part of my path is my art, and I’m thinking to do two things:
- keep a sketchbook; one hour a week is a shamefully small amount to study and draw nature, actually;
- pick one spot, and return each week to document and watch the seasonal progression
I’m still left with the problem of WHERE, but at least I’m figuring out WHAT.
by EnchantedWolf | May 10, 2011 | General Thoughts & Comments
As a matter of fact, I’ve spent a lot of time working on it, and I’m not sure I like it at all. It doesn’t seem to be as functional as the old standard wordpress template. I’m hoping that eventually, I’ll have a few visitors willing to leave me feedback, and I can work through it, but, right now I’m debating upon ripping it up again and redoing it.
Yeah, well, I did rip it up, again. This is version 3.0, and I’m still not happy with it. I think it’s the curse of the artist, not knowing when to quit.
