Last night while Devin was heading home from the shop he called me and we were talking about a bunch of different things and one of the things that he brought up was that he wanted me to consider writing a book for an actual publisher.  UGH…not again.  But, as my best friend he is allowed to tell me something I have heard before, at at length, so I let him explain his position before I did my usual “Yeah, that’s never going to happen” retort (or as Devin would probably say, in typical Aries fashion I used my ram horns to attempt to knock down that idea).  This is something I’ve struggled with for a while.  Should I or shouldn’t I?  For three years I sat with a set of Llewellyn submission guidelines on my desk thinking about what I wanted to do with them.  Do I want to write a query letter, submit a proposal, or just start writing something? And what do I have to write about?  I mean, I have a list of things I could write about, but where would I even start with it?

Yeah, it's pretty. But I'm not much of a fan of what's inside it.

This is where I also started to struggle a bit.  As someone who has been reading, studying, and practicing Pagansim and Witchcraft for 25+ years now I have read books from all sorts of publishers that work with these new age and occult areas.  Llewellyn tends to get the worst rap.  And really I think there are some merits to some of the comments people make about some of the books that they release; pretty covers but lacking in content.  And then you have some authors, like my friend and teacher Christopher Penczak, who writes stuff that, in my opinion, sets the bar much higher for what you might expect from there.  So I’m torn.  There’s sort of an automatic response of “Oh, it’s a Llewellyn book” by many people which is less than desirable.

On the flip side I don’t intent to write something that is really Red Wheel/Weiser material (at least not any time soon) and some of the other new age and occult publishers I just don’t want to deal with.  Publishing a book through someone like Llewellyn would only do one real thing and that’s help me with getting my name out there to a larger audience.  Traditional publishing doesn’t net a lot of money, despite what a lot of people seem to think.  I have, so far, made decent money with my self-published work.  But, as I am well aware, and have always been aware, publishing a book is never about money.  It’s about sharing stories, knowledge, and perspectives.  And that’s truly what I desire to do; teaching and helping others is what I love most even though I definitely consider writing as my art and my way of best doing that.

And so therein lies the rub, as they say.  Do I decide to finally write something with the intention of doing it for a “real” publisher or do I stick to my convictions of “I want to do it my way” and keep plugging away at trying to get the Pagan community’s attention on my own?

This isn't doing too bad...

The other issue is the true conundrum; what am I going to write about?  What can I write about that hasn’t already be written?  What do I have to add to something that’s new and unique?  This is one of the biggest issues with rejection in the non-fiction world; if you don’t have something unique and new to add to a subject then a publisher isn’t going to be interested in taking the time, effort, and money in order to publish something that regurgitates another author’s work.  That is my biggest worry.  I don’t want to write spell books, though I could certainly do that.  I don’t want to write about Wicca specifically because I’m not Wiccan.  I would be able to write a more general book on Witchcraft and personal practice but my biggest concern there is that anything I write would sound so my like something Christopher would say that it wouldn’t have a real uniqueness to it.  And this isn’t just because I’ve been studying with him for 3 years but because I have always found, even before then, that when I would read his books or take his classes and workshops that he was saying things that mirrored my own thoughts, ideas, and teachings so closely.  In fact, funny as it was, a few weeks ago on the radio show after something I said Devin’s response was “Wow, that was so Temple of Witchcraft.”  The truth is my personal views were that way before I even got involved with ToW.

So I don’t know what to do.  I know that Devin probably is right.  And I should make this a big part of my work for the year.  But I am having those feelings of not knowing where to start or what to do.  I can tell there’s some magick to be done here too.  I just have to figure out which of the many hurdles I need to get over with this is the one I need to deal with first.

If anyone wants to toss some suggestions my way, I’d be more than happy to hear them! 

The house isn’t in Salem, which was the only request that it doesn’t fulfill. The house is basically on the line of two towns in the Boston North Shore area, Lynn and Swampscott.  I’ll be 5 miles from Salem and 15 miles from the Fenway area of Boston.  The house is 100+ years old, made of stone and shingles, and 3 houses from the ocean.  It is in a quiet residential area where most of the people in my neighborhood will be older, with one couple next door who are younger and just had a baby.  It will be quiet, something many of you know I haven’t had in ages and just long for!

I have a mix of pictures; some of these are from when I first was contacted by the owner of the home and other were actually taken today when my Mom went to bring paperwork and money to the owners.  So empty house pictures are from today. 

So here it is!  My new house that I will be moved into in about 36 days!!

Welcome Home!!

Entry into the house from the front...

Living room looking into my office...

Some of the living room...

More living room...

My new desk in my new office!

Another office picture....

The dining room which will likely be a library/lounge.

The house even comes with an antique piano that I've been encouraged to play!

A kitchen picture (yay for counters and cabinets!!)

Kitchen into the future library.

Built in table in the kitchen!

The bedroom.

The view from the bedroom.

Coming down the stairs...

Pretty stained glass window at the landing.

A small three season porch.

A very cool back yard...I think it's screaming for a firepit/ritual space!

The backyard also has a funky sand area. Can we say meditation space outside!?!

One of the bathrooms...there are two, they're bathrooms, nothing special.

And a few steps away this is what's at the end of the street!

And there you have it, my new house!  Once I’m there and settled I’ll do a video tour and share a bit more.  There is also a basement area for storage.  We’ll be renting and the owners will be using the attic for storage.  There is also an in-law apartment which the owners will be using a few times a year when they come up from Delaware where they are moving to.

I’m in love!  It’s perfect!  My ritual space will likely be in my office again unless that three season porch proves to be something more than it looks like in the pictures.  But I’m anticipating I’ll be using the office for that too.  Now I’m ready to start picking out furniture and all that fun stuff!  And I can’t wait for my first full moon on the beach!!!

Here’s the deal.  I live in an apartment in a part of town that is known as being a laid back party town.  It’s a surf town on the beach but it’s also a place that is known for it’s droves of homeless people, drug addicts, and stoned randoms.  I’ve walked to get coffee in the mornings a few blocks away and had to dodge piles of puke, someone took a shit in our walkway to the parking lot last summer, and at night if you go walking anywhere you tend to run into tweakers looking for money.  It’s ridiculous.  I will say that I didn’t ever have this impression of this place before I actually lived here.  I had been on the hunt for a place specifically in this town for a few years and was so excited to move here; no I am literally counting down the days until I leave (88 as of today).

In the apartment building where I live there are 8 apartments.  My husband and I live in the downstairs apartment that is part of the common area, for lack of a better term.  There is a patio area right where our living room window is.  It’s a really small area so when you have people out there it’s almost like they’re in my living room.  I hear your conversations, I smell your dinner you’re eating.  It’s that close.

A few weeks ago one of the guys upstairs, we’ll call him Old Curly (I could think of a number of less favorable names for him but we’ll go with the fact that he’s 46 and has really curly blond hair), brought over a new set of patio furniture to the apartment.  He just got divorced from his wife and apparently needed to take some of the stuff out of the house and for a few weeks before this random piles of crap that you would find in someone’s garage or basement were piling up in our small patio area and laundry room.  Then this table arrives and he takes the 1984 pastel pink and sea foam green set that was there, takes it out to the dumpster, and puts his out there instead.  Then a patio fire pit shows up.  And that’s when all hell broke loose.

Old Curly has a new roommate, Scumbag.  Scumbag, or SB for short, is apparently an out of work investment banker who had to borrow money from his mother to stay out here this month because he spent all his money and couldn’t afford his rent. I overheard him saying someone to someone outside my window one night about how he spent his last money on weed and a hooker.  Classy.  I’ve never seen this guy with a shirt on and all I ever see him doing is sitting up on the steps to his apartment smoking cigarettes and hocking loogies.  He’s gross.

They play music at ridiculous volumes until all hours of the night too.  One of the people in the building,  we’ll call him Sad Sack because that’s just the only way to describe him, will start blasting music when he sees people starting to gather outside as a way to sort of invite himself into their little shindig.  The thing that sucks is he has the most horrific taste in music and plays the same damn thing over and over…Alice In Chains Greatest Hits.  I would have sworn it was the only album he owned until he actually played something different the other night…Dookie by Green Day.  *faceplam*

Old Curly apparently works from home but I never see this guy working because he’s either outside at the table smoking weed with random people that come to see him, or he’s at the beach down the street.  Now SB sits out there too during the day because he’s certainly got nothing to do. Then suddenly these girls started showing up from who knows where and they started having these all day parties outside that would start just before noon and go well into the night.  And they have this fire pit that just isn’t designed for such small spaces so everyone’s apartments end up smelling like smoke because of it.

They also all like bringing their bongs out to the table and getting high outside there which in turn makes my apartment smell like weed.  Now, I’m not opposed to marijuana, but I don’t partake of it.  But in this town that’s a big thing when you don’t.  In fact Old Curly actually once asked me if we were narcs because he never saw us partying or getting high.  For fuck sake, really!?!

The patio has been constantly covered in garbage, beer bottles, boxes from beer, and cigarette butts for the last couple of weeks.  Then I notice something last weekend that had me enraged.

I have a large planter outside my apartment, below my window, pushed over against the stairs so it’s out of everyone’s way.  I used to have a small pine tree planted in it but the tree died so I just pushed the planter aside rather than take it in the house since it had nowhere to go.  I figured since it wasn’t in the way and it was actually next to the “plants” that we have planted here already it was almost fitting.  And it’s been there for easily six months.  Well, since SB moved in it’s become an ashtray and rubbish bin.

SB sits at the top of the stairs, smokes his cigarettes, and then tries to toss the butts into the planter form the top of the stairs.  I heard him say to someone out there “Usually I’m pretty good….I get them in like 90% of the time.”  And sure enough, the whole thing is full, at least an inch thick, with cigarette butts and random crap.  WTF!?!?!  Did you really think this was your personal bin!!

So today I had to run out to the post office and I decided I’d had enough of all these douchebags in this building who are just rude and inconsiderate and I dumped all the stuff out of the planter right where it was and took it inside.

Old Curly is coming down his stairs and says to Aging Skater Punk that lives upstairs “Dude, did you see where that pot went?  It was here earlier…”  He then starts saying something about how he’s going to ask his roommate (SB) about it and see if he knows anything and I yell out of my window “IT WAS MINE!”  Old Curly says “Oh…that was yours? Thanks for getting it out of here, but you could have emptied it in the dumpster.”  Then he got on his bike (which is parked right in front of my window) and he says something about “an attractive nuisance” and he peddles off.  I wanted to say “HEY!  Who told your scummy friends to use it as an ashtray?  Does it look like an ashtray?  No!  You’re shit’s been all over this place for weeks and as soon as someone asked you to move it you flipped out, so just clean up the mess you, your dirt bag roommate, and your loser friends keep making and shut the hell up!”

Instead I said nothing and just ignored him.

Could I do something to make these people shut up?  Sure.  Could I do something to maybe try and get them all to move away?  Yeah…I could.  But what’s the use?!  I’m moving in three months (88 days…did I mention that?) and I’d rather just focus on my own state of calm and my needs to get out of here.  There are so many people involved in the situation and most who I couldn’t identify in a line up if my life depended on it, so I don’t even know who to focus on!  Although it is crossing my mind to do something…like go out there when everyone is asleep (you know, 9am on a weekday) and wash everything down with Chinese Wash and then sprinkle Hot Foot powder around their front doors.

I mean, use the common area, go for it!  But be considerate and then clean up after yourselves when you’re done!  I don’t do that sort of stuff anymore because I burned myself out on all that partying when I was in my 20s…because that’s when you’re supposed to do things like sit outside drinking all day and being a bum…IN YOUR 20s!!  Not in your 40s and 50s!!!  Grow up people!

Well, this pretty much sums it up…(crappy quality but it’s what I had to work with at the time)

But if nothing else it feels good to vent about it. 

So my aunt is on her way, my grandmother is the hospital, my Mom is calling me not knowing what’s happening or what to tell me and trying not to make me feel bad about being 3,000 miles away.  They were doing tests at the hospital to see what was up with my grandmother and after two days they determined she had acute leukemia.  Just out of nowhere.  They did some things to see what she might respond to and for the first 24 hours she was reacting well to blood transfusions so the doctors decided to plan for her to move to a rehab facility and take transfusions until she was ready to go home.  But things took a turn for the worst a day later and suddenly she wasn’t maintaining any of the necessary blood levels.  Again, more tests and more things going on, and another few days pass. Meanwhile my aunt and uncle are here, planning to cut their vacation short to the point where they were going to put their camper in storage here in San Diego and fly back.  But they decided against that and instead started to drive back because, while she wasn’t doing well with treatment, my grandmother was still doing OK and was on morphine for any pain and was just hanging out in the hospital basically. But, as my Mom kept saying, she could hang in there for a week or she could pass tonight; nobody knows what the longevity of this is or how this is going to turn out.

Unfortnately it was almost like someone flipped a switch.  She was good one night and then the next morning she didn’t want to wake up and she didn’t seem to recognize my Mom.  She went back to sleep and didn’t wake back up, eventually passing late that night.

It took a little less than a week and, frankly, I’m happy that it was quick and she didn’t spend months in hospice just waiting to die.  And I’m really quite fine with the whole thing.  I had my breakdown over the first two days of all of it but then it was very clear to me that she wasn’t going to ever come out of that hospital.  I just felt it and I was at peace with that almost instantly.  She was 91, she had a long and wonderful life; she had more of a “life” than I ever have!  My Mom was making sure to call all her friends before the obituary hits the newspaper because she was literally out playing bridge with her friends the week before and then just *boom* in the hospital and gone, so she didn’t want any of them to be too shocked.

I could tell stories about her all day.  She was the reason I got my first deck of tarot cards (she didn’t want me messing with her bridge cards anymore so she bought me a tarot deck), she took me to see Pretty Woman in the movie theater because she loved Richard Gere (and she didn’t realize it was a movie about a hooker), and she used to swear once a year, usually at Christmas, and it was always met with applause, mostly because it was expected.  But she was super cool and I’ll definitely miss her but I’m not sad about her passing because I know she’ll be there watching over me cooking from her recipe box that my Mom is saving me from her house and likely telling me to slow down and not try and cook so fast (because I’m horribly impatient when it comes to cooking).  I just can’t wait to have her gravy recipe (i.e. tomato sauce).

But now that I know things are settled at home, everyone is OK, and there is seriously NOTHING that I have to worry about for the next couple of weeks until July 6th when I’ll be teaching a class on gris-gris and mojo bags at Tree of Life.  So for these next two weeks I have to focus on getting things ready for the book to come out!!! Frankly I’m expecting that it’s going to have to be pushed back again.  I’m not happy about it but I don’t want this to be a half-assed thing, so I’m going to do what I have to do.  My motto right now is just one thing at a time.  I have the first episode of Shadow Walking to do which is already all planned out, I just have to record it, and I’ve got some wicked cool music for the episode.  That’s going to get done on Monday so I can get it out there for July 1st, and the book is in progress…I just booked an interview on Pairanormal, a wicked fun show on FateRadio, and I’m going to be doing a guest co-host spot on Rowdy Readers with Dax and Mary soon too!  Wicked!!

So that’s what’s up for now.  Remember when I used to blog almost daily and post actual posts about magick and Pagan news and all that fun stuff?  Yeah, I’m going to start doing that again…lol.  Seriously!  I miss doing it and I think I’ve done all the “oldies but goodies” worth posting on Facebook over the last few months.  And, yes, Ask A Witch is going to be starting again soon.  I’m going to answer some of those questions in the first Shadow Walking show too.  But, after months of disruptions and problems, I’m going to do my best to get back to a normal schedule between now and when I move to Salem in October.

Hey, if nothing else you know I’m alive and kickin’ on Facebook!  So until later…

Current Mood:  crazy

So simple but so true!  You need to deal with things just one at a time.  It’s nice to have lots of dreams and goals and ideas but you can’t do them all at the same time, you have to take them one at a time.  What’s the one thing you know you can handle and complete right now?  Or what’s the one thing that you really need to get finished that, once done, will make you feel less stressed?  One thing at a time.  That’s all you need.

So I’ve had to adopt this idea and put it to use and the first thing that I did was took the actions necessary to leave After Hours Radio.  Many of you probably already know about this because I talked about it yesterday.  There are a lot of reasons for my decision but there were a few really big things that stood out.

1. I didn’t want to be intimately tied to all the alien stuff that’s going on over there.  It’s becoming more of a common topic, with related subjects taking prominence, and I don’t want to be part of the Tin Hat Society.  As Witches and Pagans we have enough trouble being taken seriously and I didn’t want to be “the Witch of After Hours Radio” trying to put out a good (i.e. sane) impression of the Craft one night of the week while the other nights were taken up with talks about motherships, activating latent alien DNA in humans, “cosmic brothers”, communicating with aliens through crop circles, and other similar things.  A few people made it clear to me that they saw the potential damage that this could cause for me in the future (even with AHR being small and giving room for the possibility that it grows) and I realized that was saying something.  Plus the term “alien cannibals” was used in a serious manner in a conversation the day prior and that was when I had that “I gotta get out” moment.
2. The listener stats couldn’t actually be verified.  I was told that the show last week had “just shy of 650,000 listeners”.  But nobody can say where they’re coming from, who they are, etc.  I never once received an email or a contact from someone that found me through AHR.  I would be told “we got a lot of compliments and emails on that show”, for example, but nobody ever forwarded an email to me or gave me anything solid to show me that this was happening.
3. It was taking a lot of time.  Recording a show would take well over three hours and if we were doing a specific topic (which I like to do but I was the only one that liked to really know ahead of time what we were going to talk about and then be prepared for it), I would spend time prepping the day before.  I wanted to deliver quality shows with accurate and diverse information, not just a fun chat.
4. The overall chaos and never knowing when things were going to happen just got to be too much.  Hearing that something was going to be ready, like MP3s of the shows that everyone was looking for or that we’d be going live, only to have weeks pass with nothing actually happening.  It just started to seem like a gloppy, unprofessional mess (and don’t get me started on the website, the articles, misspellings of people’s names, and sloppy or non-existent research and fact checking).  I don’t know, call me a perfectionist, but if you’re going to do something, do it right.  Especially when you’re looking to get people to pay you money for things like advertising.
5. And…the old timey radio voice…it hurts my soul.

So I realized that a big part of what was killing me and my time was that.  I had done a great deal of divination at the start of the process and I had seen a pattern was going to develop; uncertainty followed by feeling comfortable followed by returned uncertainty and then something just causing a complete breakdown of connection.  I misinterpreted the time frame though since I originally saw this coming within a year, not two months, but it happened in the time that it needed to happen.

As a result I’ll be starting a podcast instead, something that I have long thought about but never really had the desire to do.  There were always other people doing them and doing a better job than I ever could.  But after doing the radio show and getting so many wonderful comments from people within the magickal community about it I decided that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to try my hand at a simple, old school podcast.  Nothing fancy, no interviews with “big name Pagans”, no open mic or call in segments, just me sharing my knowledge and my take on different subjects that are of interest to Witches and Pagans and anyone else that might be curious enough to listen.  But my goal and focus will be to make shows that will be aimed at other magickal practitioners, not the general public which was the case with the show on AHR.

So the podcast, which will be called “Shadow Walking”, will be coming really soon, most likely in a week.  Further details will be on their way shortly.

Please be sure to come by and add your comments, show suggestions, or questions that could be part of a show by visiting the Shadow Walking thread on my Facebook page!

Other Updates
Other than that, I guess things are as you’ve seen them on Facebook.  I’ve been trying to both get caught up on the prep for the tarot book to come out next month as well as dealing with getting caught up on some personal things. I’ve also realized that there are a few things that I need to start doing…

First off, I’ve been missing a huge, and no doubt important, venue for writing; WitchVox essays!  By the end of the summer I hope to start writing articles and posting them over there as well.

Second, I need to really start reading more of the blogs that I follow.  That sounds so terrible, right?  I follow so many really great Pagan blogs but I don’t get the chance to really read them and there is so much important news going on that I want to comment on but I don’t ever get to it.  Again, a plan for the coming months.

And lastly, I need to finally suck it up and pay some cash for a branded blog layout.  I think it’s time.  I’ve played with trying to do them myself for so long but I’m really ready to have something that is unique and just for me.  Any graphic designers familiar with creating WordPress sites out there want to talk?

And that’s where I’m at.  Lots of things to get done, lots of things to focus on, but as Goddess Leonie reminds us in her video…One thing at a time.

Mood:  determined 

So far it’s not a big deal since they aren’t going to be as in-depth as my descriptions of the major arcana cards (I always knew I wouldn’t be dedicating that much time to the minors, though that may end up being another small e-book down the road).  While doing this today something came to me.  Sure, writing a description of the cards is nice, but how about showing how they express themselves?  So I’m writing a small story for each of the suits called “The Tale of Ten ____”.  These don’t include the court cards because they have their own chapter, but this is just a story that will show how the story of each suit.

I thought I would share the one I wrote for the Wands.  I thought it would also be nice to see some of what I’ve been working on like mad!  So here you go!  I present to you…

The Tale of Ten Wands
A spark, a thought, a creation; everything began with an idea and a dream and the realization that anything is possible if one is willing to seize control and power in their own lives. At least that’s how the story started out for Edward. (Ace of Wands) Edward grew up in a castle which overlooked the ocean. As he grew up living his days in this remove seaside village, Edward began to get restless and started to daydream about what else might be out in the world for him. He’d never left him hometown and didn’t know if the stories he’d grown up on were true. He would stand atop the parapet of his home, looking out at the ocean dreaming, contemplating, and wondering about what could be. (Two of Wands)

As the years carried on, Edward grew even more restless and one day, while standing on the edge of the rocks overlooking where the ships came to port, he decided it was time to go out and find adventure. (Three of Wands) After announcing to his friends and family that he was ready to venture away from home they threw a lavish party for him to celebrate what would surely be a wonderful time for him. Edward knew as he stood looking back at his parents who waved at him as he left, that he would come back one day as a man they could be so proud of. (Four of Wands)

Edward found a group of other boys and young men who were seeking adventure and they spent their time together developing their battle skills, learning how to fight and work with weapons. Edward learned a lot about dealing with others his own age during that time and learned about the power of competition. He’d never had to deal with this before and he learned so much about himself during that time. (Five of Wands) After a handful of years away, and having fought several battles with success, it was time for Edward to return home. He’d had his adventure and he’d been victorious, proved what he felt he needed to prove to those around him, and now he was on his way back to his seaside village. Never did he imagine that his return would be full of so much celebration and fanfare! It was in that moment, as he crossed the threshold he’d previously waved farewell through years ago, that he sat up taller on his horse with more pride and realized that he would need to take time to adjust to life in the village again. Edward also knew deep in his heart that he now had a responsibility to those he would be among to guard them and protect them. (Six of Wands)

One morning there was a loud noise coming from the shore that startled Edward from his sleep. Immediately he was reminded of his silent oath he took to defend his home and the people of his village so he sprang into action, throwing on whatever clothes and shoes were within arms reach. He grabbed his wand and ran to the edge of the cliff at his home, ready to defend against the intruders who were slowing making their way up the cliff face. (Seven of Wands) Edward worked hard to defend the village that day but all his battle skills came rushing back to him as though he’d never put down his wand in the first place. He battled and was quick to run off the enemies that would have come to ravish the small village. As a sign that all was well and that everyone was safe, Edward flung the wands of those he defeated through the air from the clifftop and toward the village. He did this to send a message; no one shall defeat him and he shall always keep the village safe. This news left everyone to let out a sigh of relief and they had hope that they would never need to worry about intruders again. (Eight of Wands)

As time went on, Edward continued to defend the village and he worked non-stop to ensure that everyone was safe. Edward was seen as one of the most treasured guards of the villages and his endurance and stamina were shown in his willingness to go to great lengths to keep watch on everyone around him. Even though he knew this was his calling and what he needed to do, Edward began to grow tired and this caused him to get overly defensive when someone would comment on his work or efforts. Edward knew it was almost time for him to give up his post. (Nine of Wands)

Then, one day, after so many years of holding this position in the village, Edward decided it was time to leave and go home to rest for good. Edward gathered together his wands and his trophies from all his hard work, including the wands of those he’d defeated in his battles, and prepared to leave. As he made the journey back to the castle of his family, his back began to hurt and he started to walk hunched over from the weight of his load. Edward stopped for a moment to rest and realized just how much he’d been doing for others for all these years and how now, at a moment where he could have used someone to come to his aide, there was no one there to help him. While Edward held no regrets for his years of service, he knew that he was making the right choice and that it was time for him to go home and release his burden. (Ten of Wands)

Current Mood: crazy  
(only because I don’t have an icon for batshit crazy)

I got an email from someone that just signed it “Dan” and another by someone who signed it “AmethystWytch”.   Dan says:

I think it’s really arrogant of you to try and ask your facebook and twitter followers to nominate you in a poll that you really aren’t even qualified to be in. If you ever manage to get Llewellyn to publish one of your books then you might earn a place on that list.

AmethystWytch says:

I’m a newbie and I’m just starting to get a hang of what it even means to be a pagan.  I was glad to find your page and your info with your blog because I’m still learning but if it wasn’t for a friend on Facebook I never would have known who you were.  I looked and the poll and I didn’t see you there so I voted for Silver Ravenwolf because I read her books and I’ve liked what she has to say.  But the point is I don’t know you.

I always kind of operate under the assumption that if one person tells me something or sends me an email with a comment or question there are at least ten more people with the same thought that either don’t want to say anything or are too lazy to bother.  So I thought I’d comment on why I posted what I did both sharing the poll and then somewhat soliciting myself to be added to it.

First, I think it was well said, in a way, by one of the options that someone added to that poll which was that “being well known doesn’t make someone trustworthy”.  When I look at some of the name on that list I cringe a little bit.  The Frosts?!  Really?! Here’s what those “trustworthy big name Pagans” want you to know about children in the Craft:

It is hoped by Wicca that the first full sexual experience will take place in the plesant[SIC] surroundings of the coven and that the spiritual as well as the physical aspects of the experience will lead the child to a complete life.

Or how about this one, from the same book…

At the last sabbat or eshbat before the initiation, the female novice is given the sacred phallus and the instruction sheet in Table 5 so that she can learn to insert and remove the phallus quickly and comfortably. She is also taught how she should lie and what she should do during the initiation ceremony.

That’s from their book “The Good Witches’ Bible” which has some really damn scary information about the participation of children in Wiccan covens. You can read more here in this examination that talks about this with the consideration if that might be the beginnings of “Wiccan pedophilia” that has been clearly exposed.

When they're not advocating the teaching of how to break the hymen on a pre-pubescent coven member, the Frosts will teach you how to dance at a Pagan gathering!

You can visit Pagans Against Child Abuse to learn more about the issues with the Frosts.

Silver Ravenwolf?!  Really?!  Someone who caters to teens (which I think is a good thing) but tells them to lie to their parents about their practices or interests in Wicca and Witchcraft and advises the use of spells to pass tests and get back at teachers and other students that give them trouble?  Really!?  This is the “trustful” voice you want in a young developing Witch’s ear?

There are a few articles online that address why you need to take her with bit of a grain of salt:
Tarnished Silver and Why We Despise Silver Ravenwolf are both worth a read.

Where you'll find other books by Christopher Penczak that haven't been published by Llewellyn.

I can’t agree more that being well known doesn’t mean you can be trusted.  Anybody can publish a book.  Publishing a book, writing a blog, having a podcast, or having a Facebook page doesn’t make you trustworthy.  It’s what you do and what you say and how you conduct yourself that makes you worth being listened to and trusted.  So I don’t care if you have a whole library of books published by Llewellyn; if you sound like a loon, you’re a loon and I’m not going to trust you just because some big publisher decided to print and distribute your book.  Because, folks, publishing is a business and their concern is selling books not selling knowledge;  if something is kitschy enough or eye grabbing or slightly controversial within it’s given topic and it looks like something people might buy, it gets published.   Even authors that are published by Llewellyn still self publish books that might not otherwise get out.  Christopher Penczak and Michelle Belanger are two that come to mind (and Michelle has books published by both Llewellyn and Weiser but she still has self-published through Lulu as well).

I have made a conscious choice not to go through a conventional publisher for my work.  I don’t want to have to fit a marketing box or compromise my writing for the sake of sales.  If people like what I have to say they’ll buy my books and anything else I do in the future.  And I leave it at that.  I want to be trusted because I don’t compromise or pander to anyone but because I write what I believe in, say things as I see them, and not do things just for the sake of making a buck.

Now, back to why I made the comments about wanting someone to nominate me.  First, no, I didn’t end up nominating myself.  Someone else did that but, yes, I voted for myself…lol.  I trust me!  I also voted for a few other people in the poll who I felt I could honestly say are trustworthy voices in the magickal community.  But the reason I wanted to get my name on that list and in that poll of “big name pagans” was because I feel that I’m more trustworthy than some of the people on that list and I wanted to get my name out there for others to see and consider.  Someone’s going to go on there and see my name and not know who I am because, no, I’m not a “big name pagan”, and they are going to wonder who I am and what I’m doing.  Would I like to be a “big name pagan”?  Sure!  But only because I want to teach and share what I know with others and learn from those I connect with, allowing me the chance to do something and make a difference in the community where I can.

That leads me to another comment I made the day before that I honesty was sort of surprised by the replies.  I said Saturday night that I wanted to be the “Lady Gaga of Witchcraft”.  Apparently this made some people think that I was idolizing Lady Gaga.  I do not now, nor have I or will I ever idolize Lady Gaga.  That just sounds silly to me to even say!  Lady Gaga, to me, is more of a symbol.  Yes, she’s manufactured, but she manufactured herself.  Yes, she has elements of other performers that she emulates in her work, all performers have their inspirations that they draw on (I’m sure if some of you really look at some of my writing you’ll find the people that wish to emulate in there…I’m not shy about that).   I’m not going to debate the merits of Lady Gaga or get into the Madonna comparison or anything like that.  All I was trying to do was say that here’s a strong, smart, bold woman who has something to say and, like it or not, she’s out there, she’s in your face, and she’s saying what she wants.  I think that’s what a public Witch needs to do; you can’t be in the public eye, even in the small scale that I am at this point, and not be able to talk back, be bold, and stand up for yourself.

So when I talk about wanting to be the “Lady Gaga of Witchcraft” I’m talking about wishing to be well known, heard, and therefore able to help as many people as possible.  Because, trust me, Witches in the public eye are not rich from selling their books.  Publishing is a tough industry and not a money making one.  Why do you think most of these people are touring and teaching most of the year and also often working with clients doing readings, healing work, and so on?

So, to wrap this little rant up, yes, I did ask for people to vote for me in that poll.  No, I don’t think it was arrogant and I didn’t think I really needed to explain why I wanted to be part of it.  But now you know; it’s because I want to get my name out there in the community on a greater scale for a greater purpose.  I also thought that when you consider the idea of it being a list of people you trust within the Craft, I like to think I’m a pretty trustworthy person because I tell it like it is, I do my homework, and I don’t spend my time watering things down or spreading lies and rumors.  I’m more interested in using my time and energy for teaching and helping other people, not just being out there for the sake of being out there.

And as for the Lady Gaga bit, if you don’t get it then I can’t help you.  Maybe my sense of humor and irony is just too full of tiger blood for you.  ^_^

Currently Feeling: amused  

Rowan,
I see you post a lot of music videos on Facebook and they seem to really stretch over a variety of types.  I like rock music myself and I was wondering what your 5 favorite rocks songs are.
Take Care!
Kurt

Hi Kurt…thanks for the question!

Yes, I listen to a lot of different types of music.  Music has always been a big part of my life.  I took piano lessons for about 5 years as until freshman the 8th grade when I wanted to play softball instead (frankly, I would have been better off sticking with the piano) and in high school and college I taught myself to play guitar and bass (neither of which I’m terribly good at).  I love to do hand drumming too and have a nice little collection of djembes at this point.  But in college I was a DJ and played a lot of goth, industrial, electronic, and weird music (if it ever scared someone then I felt like I did my job).

With that said I do like good old rock music but I’ll admit that most of my favorite rock songs fall more into the alternative realm.  Hopefully these five songs don’t disappoint!  But here are five of my true favorite songs from some of my favorite bands!

Say Anything – Wow, I Can Get Sexual Too

Coheed and Cambria – A Favor House Atlantic

Clutch – Electric Worry

Alkaline Trio – Private Eye

We Were Promised Jetpacks – Quiet Little Voices

Ok…I can’t help it…I have two all time favorite Alkaline Trio songs…

And two bonuses…
I’m a big Weird Al fan and this is one of my favorite’s of his…
(and not surprise for anyone that knows me…lol)

And for those that don’t know me personally, here’s a little trivia about me. One of my heroes and life inspirations is Henry Rollins. I just love everything this man ever does from acting to writing to his pseudo-stand up to his music. This is one of my favorite Rollins Band songs…

And there you have it! Hope you enjoyed that.

OK, let me start by saying that when we moved into this place over a year ago, in January of 2010, I couldn’t have been more excited.  It’s 2 blocks from the ocean and 2 blocks from all kinds of bars, restaurants, shops, and fun stuff.  For me, someone that doesn’t usually drive because I hate driving in California, this was awesome.  I could go to the beach every day if I wanted and walk to anything.  Moving closer to the beach was the big thing for me.  I had done some spellwork looking for the perfect apartment, then we found this…and then I did some more spellwork to secure this place.  Within a few days we had it and we moved in slowly over the course of a few weeks.

In our first week of actually living here in January last year we had a few really wicked winter storms.  In San Diego that means rain, and lots of it in a place that isn’t used to seeing rain.  Things flood, roads become horribly dangerous, and people freak out.  On night it was raining really heavily and it actually started to rain in through our bedroom window and I wasn’t able to fall back asleep.  I got up and went into my office to play some Bejewled and hope to get sleepy and I walked in to find that we have leaks!  And it rained A LOT onto my altar which is normally positioned below my office window (as you’ve seen in any of my altar photos from the last year).

This is what I walked into.  Water all over my altar.  I pulled it away from the wall and positioned a bucket to be able to catch the water.

This went on and one for weeks because we had an unusually wet winter in San Diego.  We called the management company every time it happened and all they would do is send someone out to clean the carpet and dry up the water because they were worried about the carpeting more than anything else (since it was new when we moved in).  Naturally this didn’t do anything to make anything better because it still got wet every time it rained.  What were they going to do, just keep replacing the carpet padding with each rainstorm and keep cleaning the carpet?  Yup!  Just slap a band aide on it and we’re good!

They sent out a guy a few times who didn’t speak English terribly well and both didn’t listen to me or understand what I was telling him when I would explain where the problem was.  All he did, both times he came out was put silicone caulking around the window; the first time on the inside and then the second time on the outside, even though I showed him that the problem wasn’t at all related to the frame of the window.  The rain was dripping from the part of the wall/window where the blinds were screwed into place.

Then the rain stopped and we had moths of fine weather.  In the summer it rained once or twice and this happened again but by this time not only did I have a perfect set up for catching the water when it rained but it would rain for a short period of time and it would be warm enough that it would all dry pretty quick.  But then this winter came and things were worse than last year.

We got lots of rain and the water was coming in from the window, through the floor (it seeps in from the seam where the floor and wall meet) and now through the corner of the ceiling.  To be honest I didn’t bother trying to make a ton of calls because nobody ever responds and they dance around doing anything but in December the smell from the rotting carpet and carpet padding got so bad that I have to start moving from my desk to the living room couch to work because I couldn’t stand being in there for too long.  Then in January it got so bad that there was never a chance for the carpet to dry.  In February we started to complain but got a lot of run around again.  Five different people were sent out to look at the problem but apparently the management company must not have been happy with the answers to what it would cost or what needed to be done because nothing ever happened.

Then one guy did get hired and came out and started to work.  He cut a hole in my ceiling…

Then he kept saying he was going to come back…first it was the next day he was sending “one of his guys” to start ripping out the wall to try and find the leaks but nobody showed up.  Then he told me that night that the next day he would be there around 1pm.  He never showed and never called (I found out later he didn’t come because he was afraid there was going to be a tsunami because of the earthquake in Japan).  Then the following Monday this “other guy” he was sending just shows up knocking at me door.  He also didn’t do anything and just checked for moisture in the walls.  Which has already been done by everyone else every time they come in.  Two days later the woman we deal with from the management company calls me to ask if the contractors are there patching everything up…to which I say “uh…no…nobody’s been back to do any work for a week.”  Naturally the incompetent office staff had no idea the work wasn’t being done!

A couple more days go by and then one of the guys that had been here before is back to, yet again, give it all a dirty look and nothing more.  Now it’s been another week and all I have now are more holes in my ceiling and walls.

And carpet (wet carpet, mind you) pulled away from the wall and floor…

And for several months now my desk has been this…

I sit on the couch hunched over the coffee table and I have to leave all my stuff out here like this because I can’t use my room and my actual desk currently looks like this…

And I’ve had to pile stuff from my room all over the house.  I’ll spare you to pictures of our bedroom with the exception of where I had to put my altar and all the stuff normally around my altar…

It’s a horrible picture and you can’t really see it but in that corner in the right is our laundry basket (the black table behind it is my meditation altar table which I’ve had to put away form the time being). All around the laundry basket are piles of stuff from my altar because there’s no where for it to go…the book shelves in the bedroom have stuff piled in and on them and my drums and cauldrons are just everywhere in there. I also had to take everything down off the walls so I have framed things in all the closets so they don’t get broken.

Then there are bins of candles, oils, incense, herbs, altar tools, other witchy things, and office stuff just all over the bar next to the kitchen because I have nowhere else for them to go.

In the other part of the living room there are piles of books, shopping bags of other stuff…and my hall closets are filled with statues and chalices and other breakables.

This is MADNESS!!!

And the thing that makes me the MOST upset is that my birthday is next week and I was going to have a party here but clearly that’s not going to be possible!  We now know that the roof needs to be completely replaced.  When that’s going to happen we don’t know.  It rained last night and I’m still getting water through my floor where the carpet is pulled up and water is still dripping from the holes in the ceiling.

SOOOO…I keep thinking that I need to do some super juju here but, if I’m being honest, I’d rather focus my super juju towards making it possible to move back east sooner.  I just want to get to Salem and leave San Diego behind like a bad memory.

It would just be nice to be able to get some work done and not feel so distracted all the time…and have a place to meditate in comfort again!  I did my little Ostara ritual in my makeshift altar area and it was not a comfortable experience.  So, yeah.  It would be nice for this to stop now.

Hi Rowan!

I recently started reading your blog and your Facebook page and I love the stuff you do!  I find you really inspiring and interesting.  Since you don’t write about yourself a lot on your pages I was wondering if you’ve talk a little bit about yourself?  Could you tell us 25 things about you.  They could be about your life as a Witch or about your personal life but stuff about you that we don’t know so that we could get more of an idea of just who Rowan Pendragon is.

Love and Light!
Cathy

Hi Cathy!  Thanks for writing in and thanks for a question that I know so much about. 
Wow…25 things…well, here we go, I’ll give it a shot!

1. I got started in the Craft when I was 13.  At least that’s when I made my first dedication.  I discovered Witches and Witchcraft when I was 8 and started reading whatever I could find about it from that point on but this was when I had discovered Wicca and decided that this was the path that I was destined to follow.  Years later my path would move away from Wicca after spending time studying BTW traditions and I have since become comfortable in being an eclectic solitary Witch who is very influenced by Wicca in a spiritual sense but magickaly I am much more of a traditional Witch.
2. I am Italian, German, and Native American in heritage.
3. On of the first adult movies I remember ever watching was when I was about 7 or 8 years old and my Mom showed me “Night of the Living Dead” which is one of her favorite movies.  There is a scene where one of the woman in the movie gets killed with a garden trowel but to me it looked like one of those square cake knives/servers.  For years I got freaked out by seeing someone pull one of those out at birthdays and holidays to serve cake.
4. When “The Craft” came out my Mom wanted to go and see it so she took me with her.  We bought our tickets and went to have them torn so we could go into the theater and the ticket taker looked at me funny and said “What movie are you going to see?”  I told him we were going to see The Craft and he looked down at my shirt and back at me and said “That makes sense”.  I was wearing a Marilyn Manson shirt at the time.
5. I am planning to go to Paris for my 40th birthday (that’s 4 years away for those counting).  It will be my first time out of the country.  I’ve never even been to Canada.
6. I got my first cat when I was 6 years old.  She was a beautiful calico kitty that I picked out from the pet store in the local mall.  I picked her because she was the one standing the back away from all the other cats and looked lonely.  I named her Cindy after Cindy from the “Brady Bunch” which was my favorite show when I was a kid.  For some reason though I couldn’t always say Cindy and she got the nickname ChiChi soon after.
7. I love playing video games though I’m especially found of games like Call of Duty.  I can’t play driving games unless I’ve been drinking; surprisingly I’m much better at those when I’m a few steps away from being sober.
8. I took piano lessons as a kid, starting when I was about 10, but stopped when I was 14 because I wanted to play softball and since they were on the same nights I had to pick one.  I was really good at the piano and I soon learned that I sucked at sports and that I was not meant to be put in clothes made of stretchy material.
9. If I could be anywhere in the world right now it would be sitting at Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans having a cafe au lait and an order of beignets.
10. When I was 15 I went through a six month or so phase of being fascinated by Satanism.  I had started listening to a lot of metal thanks to discovering the college radio stations and I fell in love with Slayer.  I have found my time reading and learning about Satanism was helpful for me to be more open to people from different paths in the occult.  I still to this day find Anton LaVey to be quite an interesting guy.
11. I failed my drivers test the first time I took it when I was 16.  I went on a weekday morning before school and, after failing, begged my Dad not to make me go to school because I was so embarrassed.  My friends were waiting for me when I got there thinking I’d have my license and I broke down in tears when I had to tell them I failed.  I ended up getting my license when I was 18 the morning before leaving to go to Rhode Island to attend my first Lollapoloza festival.
12. If I could only have one book on Witchcraft it would be “The Element Encyclopedia of 5000 Spells” by Judika Illes.
13. I had my first computer with an internet connection when I was 19 and I had an account with Prodigy that my Mom paid by the minute for.  I was on there all the time.  I was addicted to the chat rooms and message boards.  I ran up a $700 bill one month.  That wasn’t pretty.
14. I was a communications major in college and worked on the school newspaper as a writer and editor and I was a DJ on the radio station.  I had two different after hours radio shows.  We weren’t like a lot of college stations where you could do whatever you wanted; were were in an actual radio market and had to follow certain FCC rules and regulations.  One of these was the reading of the station sign off at the end of the night.  I did the last show of the night, signing off around 2am.  We were supposed to read the station sign off over silence after playing the last song of the night.  One time I was extremely over caffeinated and very anxious to get out of there and go party and decided to goof around and read the sign off over the theme music to “Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure”.  I got in a lot of trouble the next day.  I also once laughed during a news story I had to read during a news break and I got suspended for three days for that.
15. I was one of 15 people to make it into the honors program my first year of college because of an essay I wrote.
16. I decided I wanted to be a writer after doing an exercise in my junior year creative writing class where the teacher had us listen to Pink Floyd and then write whatever came to mind.  She was highly influential on my junior and senior years of high school and it was because of her that I wrote that essay that got me into the honors program in college.
17. I love all different kinds of music.  Favorite bands of mine include Godsmack, Clutch, The Decemberists, Arcade Fire, Nine Inch Nails, Lady Gaga, Lorenna McKennitt, Dead Can Dance, Kellianna, and Michelle Mays.  I just love music.
18. I’ve been vegan and I’ve been a vegetarian about 4 different times in my life.  Typically my love of a good burger draws me back in to eating meat.
19. One of my all time favorite moves is “Goodfellas”.  I went through two copies of it on VHS and the DVD I currently have is started to skip and is going to need to be replaced soon.
20. I’ve seen Les Miserables on Broadway four times.
21. I wanted to be Wednesday Addams when I was little.
22. When I was 10 one of the very first magickal chants I ever learned was one you would say while visualizing yourself being surrounded by purple light that went “Thirce round, the circle’s bound, evil sink into the ground.”  I still use it when I feel panic attacks coming on.
23. One of my favorite meals is my Grandmother’s Italian sausage and string beans.  My other is my Great Grandmother’s Italian stuffing that involved 18 eggs, 4 lbs of sweet Italian sausage, a whole loaf of stuffing bread, and Parmesan cheese (which I never measure and just go by taste).
24. My first car was a Geo Metro that I bought after graduating college.  I got in an accident driving it back home from Boston one weekend.  I would go to Boston to stay with friends for the weekend and would usually come home on Sunday very tired from too much drinking and too much clubbing.  One Sunday in particularly bad traffic on the Mass Pike I heard my Spirit Guide at the time talking and I couldn’t hear her very well and when I asked her to be more clear she started laughing.  It was coming from the back seat it seemed like so I turned my head and drove right into the back of a mini van.  I had to drive all the rest of the way home with a crushed up hood to my car. I stopped at the deli down the street from my house to tell my Mom before I pulled into the drive way because I knew she’d freak out.  And she did.  She took the car away from me, had it fixed, and sold it.
25. When I was 16 I went to my first Witch shop.  I went with a bunch of friends from school.  The woman that ran the shop came right over to me when we walked in and she started to talk to me about the stuff in the store, telling me that she felt as though I’d been practicing my whole life…she asked if I’d been raised a Witch, which I hadn’t been.  She was convinced that I would go on to do special things as a Witch; she blessed a piece of snowflake obsidian and gave it to me telling me to always keep it as a reminder of the need to be balanced in the Craft.  I still have it and carry it in my Witch Bag.

And there you go…25 things!  If there are any specifics that you’d like to know about that I didn’t mention, please feel free to ask!