7
Sep
Last week my post for PNC-Minnesota on Temple of the River’s Irish Cottage House drew a lot of attention. My editor says that to date, the post has the highest traffic. This may have something to do with me submitting it to Stumbleupon. That said, it’s definitely getting some strong blog reactions. Wild Hunt opened debate about other Pagan temples in the United States. Over at Aedicula Antinoi, it prompted serious thought about what might go into building a temple. I realized from observing reactions to my post that I’m a bit of a physical-space agnostic. I vaguely remember dreaming of having a ritual room all my own; now I literally just stock a tray and work my magic in my kitchen, on my balcony or load a bag and go to the park. Perhaps because I dwell on a different wavelength from my fellow Pagans, I bear different needs when it comes to physical space. So while a lot of people are really excited about any temple, on some level I see it with a bit of concern: maintain well, and plan ahead, or all that effort is lost.
Ah, there it is. “Planning ahead” and “maintaining well” aren’t concepts that come up much in Pagan discussion, especially as they’re side effects of formal organization. There’s a trend towards a sort of mental and attitude declutter, and accomplishments like Temple of the River’s may impact that. I hope so.
I set aside the loud pentacle-wearing approach to Wicca several years ago, not just for the sake of my job, but because I’ve gradually found my brethren that do take this approach mortifying. Even so, I’m not exactly in the closet about what I write, and if someone asks me my religion, I state it straight out, without blinking.
That said, in some circles I travel I don’t talk about myself much. I guess that the genuinely curious will find my blogs and end up knowing quite a lot about me as a human being, and the rest aren’t terribly interested in me if they’re not asking me questions. At least, that’s how I think it works.
So yesterday, when an acquaintance assumed I was Mormon, I guess I shouldn’t have been totally surprised. It’s hilarious, but still surprising – and I have absolutely no idea how he got that impression.
Gnostic Conjure just led me to the Traditional Folk Magic Festival. It happens over my birthday weekend. I had wanted to go to Paris for my 35th birthday, but since I got married a month after my 34th, we decided to shift my trip. (Husband is theoretically OK with me taking vacations alone. In practice, notsomuch.) This is tempting, although it’s doubtful I could raise the plane fair and class fees in time. I’m bookmarking this and hoping it happens again – I love New Orleans, and I haven’t been able to pay my respects since before that big storm.
16
Aug
To my ancestors, I remember you
and send you my love as I resurrect your visions in this life.
The world is different now.
I give you the past, and you may rule it -
and in exchange, give me the present and future,
Because the divide of the universe makes it so I must live beyond you.
Live in the past and know you are remembered -
Make me proud, and I will do the same for you.
- Diana Rajchel
This came to me today, one of those whispered visions I get while making tea and minding my own business.
Obviously, I know about Wild Hunt and its related sites. I’m also finding some really good blogs on Hoodoo, and thinking a lot about how magic practicing American Wiccans like myself at some point face up to how very much of our own practices come straight from Hoodoo. I am loving RuneSoup, as it’s putting into words things I just haven’t found the juevos1 to say, with a better grasp of the corporate concepts I’ve been wanting to integrate. But I want to know: what is really, really good?
- I like juevos as opposed to the English balls. Since juevos means, literally eggs, it applies to women, who have eggs, or to men, since it’s slang for testacles. [↩]
5
Aug
I’ve extended the survey for those who have experienced divorce and who identify as neopagan to October 31, 2010. I may extend it again. This is for my book, currently with a working title of Divorcing a Real Witch.
What does knowing all this unpleasant stuff about divorce mechanics do, and how does it help you?
1. If you are neopagan/Wiccan or any other type of non-traditional spiritual type who has experienced divorce, you get a safe place to talk about your experience. I’m not sharing the information that makes you identifiable, and using the explicit identifying material such as your name only if you give me explicit permission to do so. Incidents shared will be given pseudonyms. Also, I’m surprised at the popularity of throwing angry cats.
2. If you are neopagan/Wiccan who has NOT experienced divorce, you get two benefits long-term from helping this book come about:
1)If you go through a divorce, it will help to know what other people have done. It reminds you you are NOT alone. It also gives you a place to work from if the stress shuts off the creative part of your brain that designs ritual. 2)If you are a clergyperson, it’s a specific guidebook on the topic. It won’t make you accredited as a counselor or anything, but it gives you a platform to work from, especially if you do get that counseling accreditation from someplace like Cherry Hill Seminary.
So, how can you help? In a way that takes very little effort, where you need not leave the computer. You just need to direct people to http://survey.dianarajchel.com. If you have the ShareThis plug-in you can send it to multiple spaces at once. Or you can click thumbs up on StumbleUpon. Otherwise, you can just cut and paste that link – drop it in your Facebook and Twitter, send out a message to your pals still on Myspace, comment on the Reddit Link to it, add it to your delicious.com bookmarks, digg it – just the clickity you’d do without really moving anyway.
Just a little bit of help from all of you goes a long, long way.
Great, so how’s the book coming?
Along.
After evaluating where I’m at with the rough draft of the entire book (sitting at around 65K right now) and with the book proposal (in the third draft on the opening chapters right now) I’ve decided it’s OK to slow down, as long as I keep working at it daily.1
I’m finding I’m excising all the stuff about my personal history. I’ll work it back in later, or maybe use that stuff to write a memoir down the road. With Mercury Retrograde starting August 20, and with planetary conjunctions making waves right now, I’m thinking this is a good time to lean back and really analyze my work, get feedback, do yet more revision. (Remember: Mercury Retrograde is a RE opportunity. Revise, reconsider, remember, relax.)
I’m also trying to work up a little something for Witch’s Voice that will hopefully bring the survey to the attention of people who want to participate, and I did exchange emails with the Minnesota Pagan Newswire Collective. At some point we plan to do a special interest story – and at some point, I plan on bringing all those journalism skills I developed in college to them.
That’s where I’m at – still working on that book!
- Well, more or less daily. I’m also engaging in a gym exercise schedule because I have to face the fact that I need to look a bit more conventionally attractive if I want any of my creative work to get the chance it deserves. For me this in itself is a long, long road and is not actually about weight, though it is about health. But not because I believe overweight is unhealthy, counter to “common knowledge” thought that is. Read Fat Chic, you’ll get it. [↩]
23
Jul
This local public art project that asks people to identify locations of strong emotional memory actually seems like a useful energetic map for magical types. 
Our emotions are usually are first conscious sensor for anything non-physical, so recognizing areas of "frequent break ups" or "true love stories" or "great chidlhood moments" might help us understand why we react to certain areas in certain ways. Also, since building emotional frequency often helps a spell manifest, it’s especially useful to know areas where you might more easily tap that human energy if the needed emotion is one you’re striving to experience but haven’t yet.Tags: magick, wicca, spellcraft, minneapolis
Today did not go as planned. My writing buddy had to cancel our scheduled coffee, but since I was already wearing a skirt – and I don’t just wear a skirt casually – I decided to go for coffee on my own. Unfortunately, MetroTransit bus system seems designed to keep college students contained to one part of town and to prevent anyone from outside that area from entering. Since the bus I needed to get to Espresso Royale had just passed me on the way to the bus stop, and another would not come for a good 25 minutes. I climbed on the next bus I saw coming assuming it would still go on up University and I could at least enjoy a slightly shorter walk to my destination.
It did not.
Instead I found the bus careening down 35W, and I found myself deposited at Roseville Mall. Roseville may boast expensive stores, but free wireless for a writer looking to work it does not. So I sucked it up, bought a ticket to the next movie I could tolerate the idea of seeing and then took myself for lunch at a restaurant where the waiters attempt to ply you with booze when there’s a pretty good chance you’re on your lunch hour.1 Lunch was pleasant enough – read Proven Guilty 
It was totally worth it. Not only was it totally worth it, I am elated I got to see it by myself.
If you are in any way magically minded, you will want to see this movie. It explores layers of the conscious and subconscious, lucid dreaming, dream projection…all sorts of fantastic ideas we talk about but rarely try to express visually. While I know some old-school shamanic types get hung up on “well that’s not how it looks to me,” we can shove those aside into the Gallery of Point Missers and carry on with the exploration. There are certain TV shows and movies I bookmark as teaching tools, though I’ve yet to really use them: the tarot episode of Xena, What Dreams May Come
Thank you spirit of G.O.D for sending me to that movie, and letting me enjoy it alone so I can process it wholly on my own terms.
- In the US drinking alcohol at lunch on weekdays is frowned on. We gossip about you Europeans and the beer in your workplace refrigerators with tones of scandal but looks of envy. [↩]
OK, the survey is up and ready to go. If you or someone you know is neopagan and has been divorced for 1 year or more, please ask that person to participate in this survey. It is intended to grasp the range of experiences happening within the community for a book and a possible online documentary.
I am looking for
- Neopagans who have experienced divorce
- Those who have been divorced for one year or more (it takes about that long for all the consequences to come to bear)
- You need not identify yourself fully – pseudonyms are allowed
- You can skip questions that are not relevant to you or are too upsetting for you to answer, or complete a survey page and simply leave it
You can go to the survey at survey.dianarajchel.com.
I freely admit to a lot of skepticism about astrology. That said, over the years I’ve become far less skeptical than I used to be. Stuff really does seem to break a lot more during Mercury Retrograde. Weird, intense and oddly dramatic stuff happens whenever Uranus swings its influence around. (Uranus, a guaranteed pain in the ass?) While I probably should blush to admit it, I do check my Astrozone monthly forecast and mark dates where I need to duck and cover.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t find some aspects of it just plain silly, so I’m kind of looking forward to this next book poking fun at it coming out. I’ve been around women who only talk about the men in their lives in terms of their zodiac signs. It’s crazymaking to me, undermining the basic values I uphold that every person is responsible for his/her actions, and that your nature is simply the challenge you carry with you – not something that determines your actions for you.
Still, I have to admit. How to Spot a Bastard by His Star Sign: The Ultimate Horrorscope
On a related note, Gordon over at RuneSoup has a new theory of using divination forecasting in business. It actually looks a bit handy.