the landslide bringing me down

you know, I'm not much of a Stevie Nicks fan, though I've always liked the song "Landslide"...I kind of hold her responsible for millions of hippie chicks in lacy gowns thinking they can appropriate an ethnic slur against Roma people as a lifestyle and culture...but if she didn't know, she didn't know, I guess.  it's 2022 now, and we should all know better.  apologies are being made.  awareness is being raised.  it's not ok anymore (someone alert Cher, as well, please).

 

 

I watched a video this morning of Stevie singing "Landslide" in front of a video memorial for her dad who died in 2005, and of course it made me cry.  lots of things make me cry now.  used to be, I didn't cry at all, and was proud of it.  then I learned to not be such an impenetrable stone all the time and to be proud of the fact that I had enough heart and soul to cry.  then I had a baby and couldn't watch tv any more because the news made me cry...and commercials.  now, as I approach what I consider to be my 'official menopause date', I can and will cry about anything and everything, because my heart is simply broken completely open by the wisdom and humility of life (my personal Kabbalah). 

King Solomon w/birds

 

I'm dropping my son off at college tomorrow.  that's...huge.  on a number of levels.  first off, I've raised my baby alone from the moment of his conception.  I will not negate his father's contribution of the minimum amount of child support required to be in compliance with the current laws, but to be clear, his involvement truly has been minimal, for which I have apologized to my son profusely.  my son has very little family other than me - he didn't really get to know my Sapta (maternal grandmother) before she died, and has little memory of her, though he does have fond recollections of my Zayde (maternal grandfather).  my dad and his parents were long gone before my son was born, and though he had my mom in his life until she passed last year, we weren't always on good terms with her.  there was a brief minute when my brother allowed his three kids to accept their little cousin as a member of their family, but he cut what loose ties he had with me/us, irreparably damaging those relationships, and they will most likely take more work than most people care to do to repair them, so I don't have much hope that they will be.  my point is, this kid has mostly had to figure out how to be in this world on his own, with his closest non-Mom people being his guitar teacher, his show director, and his wrestling coach, in that order.  so...yeah.  a mostly solo project with some honorably mention-able supporters.

 

 

do you know how I got my son into the prestigious and expensive Paul Green Rock Academy?  I emailed Lisa Green and offered to do any number of things for her in exchange for a scholarship - write, edit, proofread, take photos, answer phones, scrub her toilet with my toothbrush.  so she agreed to a meeting with me where she explained that she had people doing all those things for her, except scrubbing her toilets, so she let me clean the building in exchange for my son's lesson and show fees.  and not only did I do everything in my power to go above and beyond for the Green's and their Rock Academy, my kid did, too.  when Paul and Lisa left, and Jason and Acacia took over the school, we didn't know if he would be allowed to continue, but they generously allowed him to stay with the program on a full scholarship until he graduated from high school.  I don't know who pulled what strings behind which closed doors in order for that to happen, but I will forever be grateful to them for that gift.

so here we are, after 18 (19 counting my pregnancy) years of this journey, in the same place we started - homeless in Vermont.  how did we get here again?  well...as a single mom making minimum wage, I can't afford an apartment anywhere in the United States on my paycheck, so I jumped at the chance to apply for a section 8 voucher, which has almost saved us from homelessness over the past decade, though not entirely.  a lot of landlords don't like doing the paperwork that section 8 requires, so refuse to rent to voucher holders, which is illegal, but there are a million ways around it.  one of which is to count on the fact that voucher holders don't have the money/time/knowledge to take them to court, and if they did, and they won, they still wouldn't have a place to live.  it's a lose-lose situation.  I had been living in Vermont for over a decade when my son was born, and when he was 3, I took a chance on moving to NY to be closer to my family...it didn't work out.  we stayed in NY for another decade and more, as we simply moved north near some friends of mine from the 'old days', though after not so long, I found myself regretting leaving Vermont at all.  

 

just one of many beautiful views in VT

 

Vermont was a dream I would return to after the boy was grown and didn't need me anymore.  Vermont was where I would go 'next', as with me, there's always a 'next'.  there were plenty of times I would have gone before now, but my son wanted to stay with his class in school until he graduated, so I stayed for him.  I cooled my hot feet and stayed put to the point of breaking, but I made it.  we still had to move fairly frequently as our rentals kept getting yanked out from under us by unscrupulous landlords raising the rent past my affordability, the State taking over the land through eminent domain, or other unscrupulous landlords taking advantage of the pandemic to sell their house/my apartment to an airbnb developer further adding to the issue of local workers not being able to find or afford housing in the communities in which they work and live...  but we managed to stay housed for a good stretch, and I did spend a good amount of time looking for apartments in VT before we pulled up roots in NY and moved, and though I wasn't able to find anything by the time we had to leave, I did have a place to land when we got here.  or so I thought.

what do you do when someone you've known for 20 years and more calls you up one day and says they're doing really well with their recovery?  that they're housed, in school, taking real steps towards getting their life back on track, and seeking employment?  what if they're really excited to hear you're coming back, and want to help support you on the way?  what if they see you not finding housing and offer up their living room as a place to call home for a minute, until you find what you need?  am I a poor judge of character?  do I make the wrong friends?  trust the wrong people?  well, let's look at my son's dad - 98% absent during the child's life, so much so, that when my young man screwed up his courage enough to ask his stranger of a father for a couch to crash on for a week (yes, dude lives here in Vermont), he wasn't overly welcoming, nor did he offer any financial help.  loser?  maybe.  I don't want to make excuses for him; I've been doing it for far too long for no good reasons, including my own pride, and his skill as a guitar player.

so our crash pad crashed and burned when it turned out my friend wasn't as in recovery as she thought she was.  she had a relapse, and used it as an excuse to behave in an abusive manner towards me.  the fact that she chose to take her relapse out on me when all I'd ever done was be a good and loyal friend to her was unnecessary and frankly unconscionable.  she's fooled me more times than it should take for someone with good self-esteem to walk away from.  and I regret letting the dreams in my head let me believe I could trust that someone was as loyal and honest as I am, though I know from years of experience that's rarely true.  I take the giving of my energy in relationship very seriously, and I'm often hurt by folks who enjoy more casual interactions, as I tend to connect pretty deeply, rather quickly.  and I'm finding that as I attempt to reconnect with folks I thought of as 'friends' here in Vermont, that I guess to them I'm more of an acquaintance, and there's been a 'no-show' of those I thought were 'my people' (some real help has come from unexpected places, too, I must confess).  so what does that tell me about moving forward here?

 

oh, these spiral paths we weave!

 

nothing I didn't already know, I guess - we're all just hurtling through space on this rock alone.  ever.  always.  and that's fine.  I'd just like to plant a flower garden, watch it grow and die, and come back again.  I want to write poems and prose, and create images.  I want to knit and sew and crochet - craft art with my hands again and be alone with the silence of late night/early morning hours.  I want to walk in nature, and be soothed.  I want to share my creations with others who create.  I want to hear from my son that he's doing well in school - that he's learning how to earn and manage money in a way that will bring him and his hoped-for future family more ease than his upbringing brought him.  "may he do better"...every parents' prayer.

 

from Isabella Rotman's This Might Hurt Studios

 

I used to travel when I was younger - just pack up my few belongings and my cat, and live on the road in my car.  it was a lovely lifestyle when planned for.  falling houseless because of broken systems built to keep women like me down is less fun, but again - can be navigated smoothly by people like myself who are wise in the ways of travel.  when I have to drag an unwilling and angry teenager and his fancy cat along?  it can get really tough, but I'm using All the tools in my kit to keep us buoyant in proactive ways, while doing my best to organize these experiences with my overtaxed mind to share with people in a way that encourages them towards helping me out financially.  I need help paying for gas, insurance, storage, cat supplies, and whatever my son may need for college that we didn't already think of, and for pet-friendly hotels/motels/b&b's/accommodations until I can find housing.  I'm really good at writing, editing, proofreading, and reading tarot cards.  please feel free to ask me to perform any of those tasks for you in exchange for any monetary donations.  we can work out a value together.  let me know how I can help you help me.

thanks ~

my paypal:  https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/mysteriamb

my gofundme, organized by some friends:  https://www.gofundme.com/f/miriam-mysteriam-and-teen-need-a-homehttps://gofund.me/835d9ce3https://gofund.me/835d9ce3https://www.gofundme.com/f/miriam-mysteriam-and-teen-need-a-home?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link_all&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-sheethttps://www.gofundme.com/f/miriam-mysteriam-and-teen-need-a-home?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link_all&utm_campaign=p_cp+share-shee

"To David" - from my mother

my mother died 7 1/2 months ago, and today is her birthday.  she would have been 77.  my brother has been sending me random boxes of her things (well, his wife is probably packing and shipping the boxes), and in the last box, there was a folder of Mom's writing both from her school days, and after.  in particular, there were several poems to and about a man named David, and a letter to her father begging to be allowed to come home.  I wish she were here to tell me about what must have been a difficult time in her life, but she chose to take her secrets to her grave.  I hope she found David in the afterlife - whatever that might have looked like for her - and I wanted to give voice to her longing.  she deserved at least that much.  I mean...there could be a reason these particular poems found me, whether my sister-in-law or my brother picked them purposefully out of a pile of other useless crap, or it happened organically, it feels like I was meant to see them, and as is my way, share.

To David

Do you remember, darling, our love?

I do - always, but especially tonite.

We were having a campfire to celebrate harvests end,

And as we sat - I began to sing and strum the guitar.

The people said I was great -

That I sang with real feeling

For the tears stood in my eyes.

I sang, "We Shall Overcome," and they thought the tears were for the Cause.

But they were not - they were for you.

For as I sang I remembered - 

Our days on the picket line, the nite in jail, 

Our first date and all of those thereafter.

I thought of what might have been - 

The children we might have had.

And then I thought of how you left me

And you said, "You'll forget me, but please, not too fast or easily."

I turned away then to hide my tears

And you went -

I watched until you got your first lift

In a chain of many, which took you away forever

Now, the seas separate us

But darling, I'll always belong to you even when I sleep beneath the Israeli sod - and you beneath the the Louisiana soil.

In death, if not in life, we shall overcome and live again to love.

    - Sue Meistrich, 12/5/63, 6:30pm

13 Feb. 1964

I am 19, an upper middle class, white girl.  The only thing that makes me a non WASP is my jewish religion and culture.  I suppose my normal pattern would have been college, job and marriage to a "nice jewish boy", a family, etc.  I would have lived a secure life, nice and easy with no disruptive influences.

I have, however, already broken with the pattern.  The whole thing began on 19 Sept. when I was arrested for civil rights in Syracuse.  At this time I met a man - David - who I fell subsequently in love with.  Now I am faced with a decision.  I have a choice to make between two lives.  The life I mentioned above, conforming to the "normal" pattern and the life I see ahead as David's wife.  I see a life much closer to the raw elements of life.  The element of drink, pot, sex, etc.  I see pure love, but sorrow, misery and heartbreak because of differences of background.  I see a man who loves me, but can offer me nothing in the material senses, a man who is mad at the world, and who must sometimes take out his frustrations on me, but thru it all I see a man in love who is tortured by this love.  I see a life with no security, only love to hold it together.  Children who grow up angry at the world as my husband is.  I see myself cut off from my people and relatives.  

I can now choose between this life of love and the other, a life of security without as much meaning as the other.  my problem - do I come back penitent, to my accustomed life and try to be a person in the "normal" pattern, or do I break with tradition to follow love wherever it leads me.  I cannot make the choice myself and yet I have no one I can turn to who is not prejudiced for one side or the other.  I wait for an event which will make me decide - in the meantime I am in a hellish limbo.

DREAMS  (8 April 1964)

I see the trains in

the yards going- 

god knows where.

And I long to jump

on one and go with it,

But I go home - to a bed

with sheets.

I hear my man- broke,

Saying

Come with me,

I have nothing but- come.

But I go home- where the dog

eats better than him.

I read the poet who tells

me to catch the winds of

destiny wherever they drive

the boat-

But it is too late.

I am a solid citizen- shit!!!

11:30 PM Aug. '70

When does it stop hurting - if ever?

When do longings die - or do they?

Why must I stop seeking

How long will I cry.

If tomorrow I see David

What then will I say

Look out poss - whats to ya

Come lets go away

 

But, now I have a husband - proper

Now I have a son

And a daughter - also proper

Will I never, ever win.

When I feel youth around me

With their psychedelic colors

Searching, crying, learning, trying

Then my heart cries from within

Come and hear what I have suffered

Hear of battles never won

Know that I will feel forever

Tho the things be dead & gone.

Its a long way till we finish

All the things that we must do

And in the end are only

things so dead & gone

 

memories will I cherish

in the dark & secret nite

but never will I give up

the long & hurtful fite

in my pillow will I smile

at a face that's long gone by

but mostly I remember

and in the dark I cry.

My Mother

My mother died the other day, and while going through her papers I suddenly found the reason for the far away look in her eyes she had every July, my mother hated July, I learned the reason for the black mark on the calendar in her private date book every July 16th.  

My mother was once beautiful, I know I have seen many pictures of her.  She was a brilliant woman and none of us knew why she had never finished college and become a plain housewife.  Now I know.  I have read her diaries and now I understand her as I never did when she lived.  

She was a free girl beautiful and reflective, able to find the beauty in the everyday things of the world we all take from granted and never really see.  She saw them, she could be transfixed by the trees against the sky, or sit up all night and watch the play of the air and the stars.  She loved storms, wild storms, when the snow and the wind and the trees lash at each other and the forces of nature threaten to overwhelm us.  She loved to watch a hurricane or a tornado and often would not take shelter but watch and revel in the passions of the world.  She found in them an answer to her own passionate nature, unbridled and untamed.

My mother loved then, she loved a man, she loved him with all the force of her nature and she allowed her passion to rage unchecked.  But she always knew that if they were to marry they would destroy each other.  She did destroy him in the end, he followed her to the city and became an addict, I don't know what became of him for she suddenly stops writing of him and yet every once in a while she mused in her diary about meeting him again and she admits to herself that she would once again follow him and leave her family, her husband and her children.  As I said she loved with all her being.

It was after she left this man that she met him.  The other one.  she never loved him. that she knew, but she conceived a child by him.  She was too proud to marry a man she did not love and so she bore the child and the burden of unwed maternity alone.  She left him with her head held high, and he never saw the scars on her soul.  He never knew how her arms longed for the child she could not have, the child she saw only once in her life, the tiny infant daughter we never knew about.  Never once during her life did he say anything about it, but her eyes grew dark every July and she cried.  

She wrote about an Independence Day weekend that she walked the streets of the city, finding no one to speak to, no place to have a meal, her large belly and unringed hand prevented her from going in to a nice restaurant and her pride prevented her from asking assistance.  She wrote how she slept in a downtown fleabag hotel until the time came to bear the child she had suffered for, and how when it was over she prayed for help to live the rest of her life without the child.  She wrote of the long days she spent looking at each baby she came near wondering if it was hers and knowing that she had no right to think of it, no right to wonder about its new parents or its life.  She wrote each July of what her daughter would be doing now, and followed the age of her child faithfully all her life, but she never said a word to me.  

The following year she met and married my father and settled down to an outwardly respectable life.  She had children who she raised with all the love she had left in her but something had died in her and she was no longer the wild girl she had been before.  She was a good mother and a good wife.  She and my father lived together in peace and happiness for many years and never a word to us about the weight on her heart, the burden she bore alone.

My mother died the other day and now I know why she hated July.

*it's a little weird to hear her write in what's supposed to be my voice, and assume my feelings.  I never noticed my mother liking or hating any month over any other, and I never knew the 16th was a hard day for her.  I does happen to be my half-sister's birthday, so I guess that answers that one.  Mom eventually finished college and ended up with two Bachelor's degrees and two Master's degrees, and there's nothing shameful about being a housewife, 'plain' or any other kind, in my opinion (Mom also had a long and lucrative career as a librarian).  she did not strike me as someone who cared much for the weather, past being inside when it didn't agree with her, which was often, though she did enjoy waking up in the early hours of the day when meteor showers tend to happen, and I did appreciate that about her.  while it sounds to me like her friend David came with some serious red flags, I can respect that from 19 through 26 she thought he was the great love of her life.  did she continue to pine for him after all the long years?  or did there come a point in time when the 30 years she spent living, loving, and fighting with my dad eventually overshadow David's memory?  I wish there was more to read, but what I've shared here is the bulk of what I was given, aside from a few other poems and letters.  she did eventually tell me about her other daughter, probably just over 10 years ago when my own baby born out of wedlock was in Kindergarten, and she had found her.  she wanted us to meet, and so we did.  I think she's a cool lady, and I call her my half-sister.  her mom, the woman who raised her, thanked my mom for completing her family.  I think it's sweet, I'm glad it had a happy ending for my mom, and I hope it brought joy to my half-sister and her mom, too.  it's sad to think how much more we could have shared with each other if my mom had managed to parent more from a place of love than a place of fear, but she did what she could with what she had, and she did her best, just like most of the rest of us.  so many lost chances, so many missed opportunities for understanding, healing, and communication.  people - talk your stories.  you never know which ones may make a difference in someone's life.  I wished I'd known more about my mom...I wish she'd felt empowered to tell me more about who she was.  either way, I loved her.  

💙 💜 💙 

Neptune (Pluto, Saturn, Jupiter) Retrograde Shabbat Community Reading

whew!  now that we're through the eclipses, mercury retrograde, and the full moon, are you ready to settle into some Neptune retrograde energy (along with Pluto, Saturn, and Jupiter)?  I know I am!  

 

Neptune goes retrograde every year for 5 months - and it stays in each sign for 14 years, which apparently gives a certain nuance to entire generations.  currently in its own native sign of Pisces, Neptune encompasses deeply personal, creative, & dreamy energy...too much of it and we get muddled, cloudy, and can't distinguish between the realms of imagination and the day-to-day.  during its retrograde - because those are internal journeys - we can embrace the clarity and insight of our feelings, thoughts, intuition, and dreams that Neptune brings forward for us,which makes these great times for soul searching, meditation, and reconnecting with Self.

 

cool dreamy/watery image I swiped off the internet - I honestly could not find any info on it.

 

finding ways to strengthen our intuition is a great creative practice, and the kind of work that is its own reward.  caution:  manifest with pure intent only!  having a heart-to-heart with anyone we need to forgive (or who needs to forgive us) and embracing love will strengthen those ltr's.  DO DREAM WORK.  take good care of ourselves to stay grounded, and don't make any rash decisions. it seems that the advice is once again to "slow down and reflect" on everything...I feel like every month I ask "how much more of that can we possibly do?!"  I've slowed down so much, I feel like I'm in retrograde! Neptune and his ocean waters...all that mystery in which to trust our intuition. stop, look, and listen - be clear and flush out the ugly truths that need releasing.

this week's tarot/oracle questions come from Christine @moonandcactus, who offers us the affirmation:  "I let go of any fantasies that aren’t aligned with my true purpose."  also, "don't run away from truth/reality"...that's a good one that I'm holding close to the bone for my personal journey at the moment.  yup, all the bullshit is being stripped away again, and it's time to face up to doing our work (I'm still going through the paces of my eclipse shadow work).  we are encouraged to do it through the arts to get ourselves on a higher plane.  the clarity here has so much healing potential, given our heightened ability to see where we need to focus our work, and our empathy.  for this reading I used The Faeries Oracle because I owed them a favor, and we could all use some playfulness in our lives.  here's what we got: 

 

image shows 4 cards from The Faeries Oracle (The Faery Godmother/The Singer of the Chalice/G.Hobyah/Laiste, Moon's Daughter).  flourite, amethyst, and lapis lazuli for Neptune/Jupiter/Pluto; hematite for Saturn/Pluto; quartz and malachite for Neptune/Uranus; and Herkimer diamonds and garnet for Pluto.  brooch, seashell, tiny Waterhouse mermaid, fairy sword, dried rosebuds, tiny feather, tiny gargoyle, swan feather.

1. How can I be more aligned with my inner truth?  The Faery Godmother

 

 

 

Sairie - The Faery Godmother - speaks of gifts, talents, grace, and helpful lessons.  good things that we don't think we deserve, or haven't thought to ask for, may well be happening.  she helps us open our hearts to love and acceptance.  keep an eye out for unexpected good fortune when you thought bad luck was coming for you, and pass that kindness on.  enjoy the feeling of doing good in secret.

 

 

 

2. How can I be more open to what I’m not seeing?  The Singer of the Chalice

 

 

trust, joy, patience, creativity, hope, and miracles.  the Singer of the Chalice is about being open to unconditional love, healing, and more, as one big feeling that flows through us from the Universe, and if we can open ourselves up to one of those energies, then we can open ourselves up to all of them.  all we need to do is ask, so they know we're consciously ready to let them in. 

 

 

 

 

3. What kind of deception or illusion is currently present?  G.Hobyah

 

 

 

imaginary fears, unreal hazards, realistic caution.  to gain a greater ability to open our hearts the way the Singer of the Chalice asks us, we need to look for the truth behind our fears.  for the strength to face real challenges, we need to see them for what they truly are - and face them honestly - so we can distinguish between them, and what is a projection of our old traumas and fears onto our imaginary futures.  

 

 

 

 

4. What step is needed to remove my rose-colored glasses?  Laiste, Moon's Daughter

 

 

light cast in shadows, spiritual guidance, illumination, riddles.  Laiste wants us to pay attention to the mystical, and she's not beyond putting an obstacle or pitfall in our path to wake us up to the multiverse.  she is encouraging us to mine for subconscious treasure, the cosmic wisdom we don't even know we know, but...we know.  step into the flow of those feelings and lean into trusting that process.  the Moon's Daughter will leave symbols for us to read in our dreams.

 

 

 

 

 "If you lean into the work of self-reflection and find within you a profound willingness to feel the scary feels, the potential for coming out of this lunar cycle radically transformed in deep places in your consciousness is about as good as it gets...turn to whatever connects you most to the Divine during these few days for the comfort and courage that may be required of you at this time.  And remember, there is  no wound that Spirit cannot heal." - Michael Lennox

 

again, thank you for coming along, commenting, and sharing - this reading is for anyone who wants/needs it!  as always, I hope there's something in here for you personally, and feel free to contact me for a private reading.  

💙💜💙

 

 

resources:

Lexi Hikari for Astrology Answers

moonandcactus

Jamie Partridge - Astrology King

Neptune music

Shabbat Community Tarot Reading #4

wow, what a crazy week it's been for me - how about you?  so much upheaval and emotional drama!  even though we're 'through' the eclipse, we're still feeling its energy, and will be for a few days (weeks, months), and as we all know, the cosmic reverberations just keep circling out forever...  

I'm not sure where to start this week, as the reading I did was very personal, and specific to my circumstances.  I feel like if I'm going to read for the community, I can't pretend to be 'love and light' all the time, and like nothing ever goes wrong in my life because I'm claiming to offer to help people focus on doing their own deep work, so I have to show how I do mine.  

 

so - let's just say my child needs their community now in the form of a strong support network to help them navigate away from their current situation into something healthier for them in the long run.  the evil rage monster that lives in me has decided it's time for them to be free, rip off the band-aid, they're ready, I've done my job of preparing for this day well.  why postpone the inevitable?  they've embarked on their own underworld journey now, plumbing their own depths...the astrology would blow them away if they cared to look.  it's not my job to tell anymore, it's my job to love and let go, now.  but they don't want to leave, is the thing.  they wants to make demands of me, threaten and lash out.  they want all the benefits I've always provided - few though they may be - and to act indignantly while taking advantage and bringing so much conflict into our daily lives, I've been triggered back to my father throwing the kitchen table at me when I told him I was moving out (with a great deal more resources than my child has at the moment, though his daddy certainly had a lot less).  

the running away started with the tenuous stirrings of what might become first love.  now that there's 'someone else', I've become obsolete overnight, and have been shut out, and shut down.  so the arguments have escalated to where we're both teetering on the edge of violence, neither of us wanting to cross that line, and for years now, I've been sending them outside to deal with those feelings to get them away from me - it's my house, I won't be disrespected - and get them moving to physically help cycle that energy through.  so we argued, I told them to get out, and they demanded a therapist, so I called in mental health.  they called in CPS.  so now I'm under investigation for abuse, exacerbating an already intense housing crisis (impending homelessness), and did I mention my mom died two months ago?  it's fine...I'm sure I deserve all that and more, don't I?  but the bottom line in my opinion is that they've hit their wall - as have I - and it's time to figure out how to get them what they need from the support network they will build with the help of the authorities they've called in.  we can't live like this anymore.  it would have been nice to have the clarity to handle it on our own, but...oh well.

yeah, it's time to get out of their way, and leave them to it.  I caught a bit of a reading a day or two ago (I wish I could remember where!) that spoke to a wisdom coming in from the side, somehow...that it was important to pay attention to snippets that may come from random sources, and that was the kid yesterday - three times in the midst of the chaos they spoke honest truth, though I doubt they recognized the importance of what they said.  and between my own shadow work, Lorelai Kude's talk of overwhelm, and protecting what you've mothered, and Sasha's speaking of needing to let go of something anything, and 'where do we go from here' energy aligning with true direction and drastic change that has been a long time coming...I'm hearing this message loud and clear.  as hard as it is to focus through all the emotional turmoil, miscommunication, power struggles/control issues, change/liberation/chaos cycles, I'm doing my best to simply survive each day, which in the moment mostly looks like me trying to drink enough water, and failing, repeatedly.

so some cards for me.  some wisdom on how to step out of this dance.  help the kid get what they need to move forward and move along.  there's no coming back...things are irrevocably different and damaged now, so it's time to change course, and let life flow on by without me.  for this reading I used my oldest deck,  and this spread Meg @3am.tarot posted for the New Moon & Solar Eclipse in Gemini (June 10).  here's what we got:

 

image shows an antler, a crystal ball, a small metal goddess figurine, three cards from The Tarot of the Witches tarot deck (The Lovers/The Magician/The Chariot), a quartz crystal, and a garnet on a pastel colored cloth with silver stripes.

 

reflect on:  The Lovers - one rose reaching towards the sun, while a briar entangles the moon.  such a strange card...look at the two of them, dispassionate mannequins entangled in her weird hair, that half dead-or-alive hill they're standing on.  a meaningful relationship...aside from all the love, beauty, harmony, deep feeling, trust, honor, physical attraction, there's the dynamic of sacred vs. profane, and a testing of theories.  an expansion - taking what we've learned, and re-centering from a new vantage point in a spiral progression.  widening the heart.  coming out of isolation into exchange - an act of radical vulnerability; a moment of truth.

revisit & explore:  The Magician - creative Source.  imagination, self-reliance, skill, willpower, curiosity, cleverness, unity in thought and feeling.  deeply connected to, and aware of, the resources surrounding us as well as the magic within them.  an expanding sense of possibility, the first step in a journey - packing The Fool's satchel.  confidence, awake to possibility, throwing open the doors.  expansion, opportunity, courage, tapping into potential.  knowing we are the magic.

seek truth within:  The Chariot - as soon as that expansion happened in the The Lovers card, the fool on their journey recognized their power, and met adversity with resolve and determination.  alert and ready for battle - horses charging forward, his foot on the yoke, he's prepared to balance his mental and physical strength in working towards greatness, as soon as he can get his emotions under control.

there is great significance to me in these cards, considering where my teen is currently holed up, and with cards 6 & 7 - The Lovers and The Chariot - showing up together like that, with only the Magician's spark between them.  there's that pattern of being pushed into things too early, before they're ready, because I'm already holding more than I can safely handle, and something's got to give.  this is my child, born three weeks early.  this is my child sliding down my leg because they won't hold on, they simply trust that 'I've got them'.  this is my child selling off their trains to pay the car insurance that one time.  this is my child's path to freedom - their first steps out on their own.  I'm not going to read their birth chart, or check their horoscope or anything because they didn't ask me to, and I respect people's privacy...but I can see what I see, you know?  all that trauma I tried so hard to avoid passing on, that I made sure to pass on.  our ancestors' hard-won aspirations now crushed beneath my personal failures, and it hurts to live here.

 

thank you for coming along, commenting, and sharing - this reading is for anyone who wants/needs it!  as always, I hope there's something in here for you, personally, and feel free to contact me for a private reading.  

💙💜💙

 

resources:

3am.tarot

good vibes binaural beats

Mom-eries

sometime after I turned 12, while rummaging around in my mom's little makeshift library in our large, well-lit basement, I came across a story she had written in the late 60's as a pregnant newlywed living on a kibbutz in Israel, while my dad was off fighting in the Six-Day War.  I think of her, painting the light-bulbs black and leaving only a small spot for the light to filter through, to conceal themselves as best they could, as some of the fighting was quite near the kibbutz.  how she must have looked, the anxiety she must have been feeling, and the hope she must have been trying to hold on to through those words.  I wish I had a copy of the story called "Sarah" where she began by recalled the story of the Biblical Sarah, watching her Abraham take her only beloved son Isaac to be sacrificed on the altar of this 'new god' he was communing with, and questioning what kind of god he was to demand such a travesty as tribute.  then there was a page break after which she wrote, "I am Sarah..." (it was her Hebrew name) and wrote about how so many of the women felt, watching their men go off to battle, wondering if they'd come back, and if they did, if they would come back 'whole'.  the story switched back to the Biblical Sarah's perspective - an anxious mother watching for her husband to return from the mountain alone, her heart deeply wounded, only to see two silhouettes on the horizon, and running to them filled with the highest joy and gratitude.  to conclude, she wrote about reading over the lists of names of the deceased, and her relief at not finding her husband there (though many other women did, and I don't wish to diminish the memory of those that we mourned), along with her elation when my father returned to her, safe and sound.

 

today is that dreaded stupid holiday I know I've written about on here before, though I couldn't find any of those posts in a quick search.  as a single mom, Mother's Day is just another day for me to do all the mom things, and get little to no appreciation for my efforts.  when my Teen was little, I'd get some cute paper projects that his teacher made all the kids do in school, and there was that one year when he drew me breakfast in bed - so cute!  there might have even been some cheap gifts that the wealthy school district donated for the poor kids to bring home, but that might have just been for Hannukah, I don't remember.  either way, my point is, today is a day for me to stay off of social media because seeing all the 'proper' families doing all the culturally acceptable things for the moms in their lives makes me feel inadequate on a good day, which is to say nothing of how it makes me feel on a day like today, when I'm missing my own mom, who passed away 6 weeks ago.  my day so far has consisted of the horrid odor of the septic tank being pumped, followed by the horrible smell of the bleach I used to clean the backed-up excrement out of my bathtub - though I am grateful that there's no longer human waste bubbling up from the drain, and that my toilet is once again flushing properly.  then I sat down to honor my mom by writing about her, and began to cry.  just now, my Teen woke up and emerged from his bedroom, mumbled 'good morning', made himself a bowl of cereal, and went back into his room to commence the day's video gaming.  yup.  that's it.  stuff that in your Mother's Day pipe and smoke it, because I have laundry to do, dishes to wash, paperwork to sort and file, etc, etc...no brunch and mani/pedi's here.  no champagne or flowers, massages, chocolates, what-have-you.

 

but the point here was to talk about my mom.  she was the ideal mother up until I hit puberty, and things went downhill for us from there.  even though we had a rocky relationship, she was my mom, and I always loved her, even when I hated her.  she drove 4 1/2 hours to the hospital in February - even though she hated Winter, and I lived in Vermont - when I went into labor, because she desperately wanted to see her youngest grandchild being born (she wasn't allowed in the room for my sister-in-law's three births, which I understand from my sister-in-law's point of view, though I can also understand my mom's disappointment).  she adored my son from the get-go (as she did all her grandchildren), even though she couldn't restrain herself from making some pointed comments about...ahem, the other half of his dna...when he was very little, which I immediately nipped in the bud.  we spent years on the outs, with a few good times here and there, but all in all, now that she's gone, those bad times hardly matter at all, and I just wish we had had more time to be friends, and keep making the good memories.  she spent two weeks with me before she passed, and I'm SO grateful we had that time together, for myriad reasons.  her death was unexpected, to say the least...and the hurdles that needed to be cleared in order to lay her to rest on our kibbutz in Israel, next to her beloved husband, during a global pandemic, were many - but it did happen.  

 

so yeah - I'm a big emotional mess today.  how to honor her memory?  she didn't like cut flowers, "because they were dead".  I do, so maybe I'll buy myself some.  she enjoyed being taken out for brunch by her grandkids, but I'm still estranged from the rest of my family, so that's not going to happen...perhaps I can cook up one of her recipes?  that's a possibility.  I can't visit her grave, as it's in another country...I'm not financially solvent enough to donate to a good cause like Miry's List, which helps welcome refugee families into new communities, or the National Bail Out fund, specifically for Black moms, but I can share the link, and maybe someone else who is, can.  I can visit the waterfall in Parksville where she spent childhood summers, and liked to go to honor her ancestors, watch a movie that she loved, or listen to music she enjoyed.  maybe I can even work on one of the several knitting projects I'm sure I have tucked away among my craft hoard.  I'm planning to do a tarot card pull and see if she wants to offer me any advice through that medium.  and - and this is big - I can mother myself.  that's right, I still need mothering, too (don't we all?  no matter how old we get?), and even though I've been working on that for years, I still need the reminder that I'm worthy of my own best mothering techniques, which include wrapping myself up in comfort, and making sure I feel nourished, whatever that might look like for me in the moment.  today, I guess that looks like doing dishes/laundry/paperwork and avoidance, but I may also take some time to lay up on the couch, and demand that the Teen cook me dinner - he's fully capable, and it's the least I deserve out of respect for all I do for him.  we'll see...(he made cheeseburgers and frozen French fries, yum!)

and not only that, let's take more than a moment to remember the Great Mother who gives life to us all, this amazing planet we live on!  here's a link to help find some ways to do that, if you don't (or even if you do) make caring for our Earth a part of your daily life.  

 

 

in honor of the mothers I've known, and the ancestors I didn't, today I remember Sue (Sarah), Ayala, Sapta, Sapta Liza, Grandma Mirjam, Little Grandma, Regina, and Estar.  thank you for everything ~ 💖

National Indigenous People's Day of Mourning vs. American Thanksgiving vs. Something Else Entirely

what an eye-opening visit I had with an old 'friend' recently - probably someone I'll be crossing off my list of people to visit when I have free time to play with in town!  as we've had more than enough Universal signs pointing to this being an important year for all of us to sever ties that don't serve us as we journey ever more fully into ourselves, it also comes as a staunch reminder of how the community I live near is decidedly toxic for me, and how I need to really and truly let go of any remaining connections I had to a small circle of people I used to know who also migrated to this area from other locales.  here's the set-up:  I tend to stop in uninvited to this particular person's house every few months, and just this week, I ended up having about 2.5 hours unaccounted for in my schedule as my commitments took less time than I thought, so I took the opportunity to do a little visiting.  was that my first mistake?  leaving unaccounted time in my schedule?  or stopping by someone's house uninvited?  here's what I puzzled out about it when considering how I would feel if that person (or any person I considered a friend or closer acquaintance) showed up at my door uninvited at 5:30pm; it might be a bit weird, initially, as it's dark this time of year, and everyone is so up into their electronic devices (and who even goes visiting anymore other than me), but I would invite them in, and into whatever activity I was involved in at the time.  the people I had dropped in on appeared to be watching a program or video that they shut off when I showed up, and when I asked what they were watching, they said it was something about whether or not the national November holiday - which many people still refer to as "Thanksgiving", and I call "National Indigenous People's Day of Mourning" - is racist.  "Ah!"  I said, "that's a hot issue, now, isn't it?"  and asked them what they do during the 'holiday', and why.

"you guys mind if I chill here for a few hours?"

for them, like for many people, it's a day of the year when families have traditionally gotten together for generations, to eat particular foods, and enjoy each other's company - an innocuous harvest festival, for the most part, celebrated by many people for both secular and religious reasons, across a range of dates.  so how and when did it become so politicized?  turns out, the American holiday is rooted in English Christian tradition, dating back to religious rifts in the church during the 16th century, mostly as a way to replace the ever-increasing number of 'holy days' on their calendar (and probably limit the amount of time servants had to be allowed to attend services).  these early 'feasts of thanksgiving' were usually celebratory responses to a victory in battle, or some other event where folks just felt like being thankful to whatever god/s they worshiped, and the colonizers of the United States brought this tradition along with them in their bag of tricks when they violently took over the Native Americans' land.  there is still much debate over where and when the first thanksgiving feast was held in America, with claims of a Spanish religious service being held in what is now Florida as early as 1565, and the ones in Virginia (1619) and Massachusetts (1621) being the famous misrepresentations for our current narrative, which had their respective histories whitewashed for generations, leaving out the parts that showed the settlers to be brutal murderers, and promoting the nonsense that has been taught in American schools ever since (that the Pilgrims and Natives shared a lovely meal, and everyone lived happily ever after - except not).  there was a feast of thanksgiving held after the Continental Congress enacted the Constitution in 1787, and the 'first national thanksgiving' was proclaimed by George Washington in November of 1789.  it makes me wonder about that supposed separation between church & state that was written into our Constitution just two years earlier, and even though it was considered a secular event, the name of 'god' was invoked in order to further push the agenda that all success was due to 'outside forces', which must surely indicate the spiritual superiority of the 'victors', and so must be acknowledged by showing gratitude to said 'higher power'.  apparently, some politicians from back in the day agreed with me about that particular hypocrisy, and some even saw it as an unwelcome declaration from 'the North', indicative of the long history of regional tensions between those above and below the Mason-Dixon line (the demarcation line between Maryland and Pennsylvania, showing the boundary between states that allowed slavery, and states that didn't, in 1767) .

depiction of the Pequot Massacre, 1637

all that said, "Thanksgiving" in its current iteration was midwifed by Abraham Lincoln in 1863 (in the midst of the Civil War), after decades of Ms. Sarah Josepha Buell Hale hounding everyone in government to do so via letters, and publishing poems, stories, and recipes that supported her vision for a national holiday in the popular 'ladies magazine' she edited.  it was only in 1941 when FDR - in a bid to extend the holiday shopping season - signed the resolution to establish the current date (the fourth Thursday in November) as a federal holiday across the entire US that we eventually arrived at the modern 'celebration' we know and love/loathe today, depending on your perspective.  for the above-mentioned 'friend' I dropped in on, it has been a day for them, as a parent to several children with different partners, to have all their kids (and sometimes one or more of the partners) together in one place, for a hearty meal.  and there's nothing wrong with that, is there?  for me, being 'cut off' from my family of origin the way I am, there are NO holidays that I celebrate with any blood relatives other than my own child, so I don't really care about That particular aspect of the traditional feast...also, being Jewish, I have no connection to any English or Christian feast or fast days, and the Jewish harvest festival of Sukkot happened back in mid-October, and is celebrated with foods and rituals indigenous to the Middle-East (though living in America, we do include indigenous American foods in our practices).  my people emigrated to the US from Europe in order to escape religious persecution in the same way the early settlers and colonists claimed to, the difference being that we didn't rape and murder millions of indigenous people, or force our religion onto them, in order to do it.  we were running from our own genocide, to be sure, yet I am well aware of how assimilated Jews have contributed to the racist and oppressive systems that continue to pervade our institutions, systems, and relationships - it's hard to be well-educated, and not accept that reality, however hard it may be to recognize our complicity.  in any case, this "American Thanksgiving" wasn't something my Romanian/Romani/Israeli father was overly familiar with, and I think that's why it hardly registers to me as anything other than a break in the school year, or a day off of work (if you're lucky enough to work at a job that doesn't require your presence for the gross display of mass consumption everything in America has become).

maybe give a little bit of yourself - take time to play a game with your family at home during the 'gift-giving' season.  bake cookies, make art together, sing songs, make memories by engaging in enriching activities together...

as a young adult living on my own, I never bothered with the national Thanksgiving holiday - I hardly had an oven to cook a meal in, let alone all that 'traditional' nonsense.  I usually had to work, or was happy to have a day off to catch up on some sleep!  during the years that I had a 'home' to go to, it became the horrible emotional roller-coaster for me that it is for many who are less than welcome at family gatherings for myriad reasons.  in my case, one of those reasons was my growing moral imperative to address the feast as the impetus for the genocide it became for the people whose stolen land I feel duty-bound to acknowledge we live on, even though my mother's people came here to avoid similar fates in their own lands (my dad's people went to Israel, and later to Canada - another nation with much the same issues as the US in regards to the indigenous people who live there).  social media can also make it harder, serving up a stream of pictures of people gathering together with loved ones, while I'm home alone with my kid, trying not to internalize the feeling of there being something inherently 'wrong' with us because no one wants us at their table - not that I'd feel good about going anywhere other than a memorial service for the murdered...  once I became aware of the true story of the colonial-settler-genocide this day commemorates, I couldn't in good conscience 'celebrate' anything about it, and in lieu of any local non-colonial-settler-genocide commemorations to attend (that I am aware of), my tradition with my son has become to light a yahrtzeit candle (Jewish memorial candle) in honor of National Indigenous People's Day of Mourning, wherein we eat whatever we feel like eating, and watch Native American centered movies.  when the rest of the national consciousness catches up with my understanding of how horribly the marginalized original people of this land feel about the 'celebrations' of their attempted murder, maybe I'll celebrate that.  I know change takes time, and I look forward to when it comes for this holiday (and many others like it).  it has nothing to do with me, and I don't need it.

this is where I got the name 'National Indigenous People's Day of Mourning'.  they've been trying to get us to notice these issues since the beginning of my life - I think it's time more of us listened to them.

so what does any of that have to do with my dropping in on someone who has to ask whether or not the day of feasting is racist?  well, I have a little bit of a problem with people who can't see past their own desires to continue to whitewash history, especially when they're the kind of people I expect to know better, because of their self-proclaimed 'advanced spiritual mindset' (remember that point from earlier in this essay?  how the colonizers saw themselves as being favored by their 'god' because they mostly succeeded in their murderous endeavors?).  I mean, how can you claim to be more 'spiritually-advanced' than the next guy, when the next guy is a Native American telling you how they feel on the third Thursday of every year while watching white people continue to eat the traditional foods they themselves have been disconnected from, while inventing narratives about what good friends we all were back in the day, before the colonizers tried to kill them all?  sure thing, man - take some more ayahuasca, and appropriate some more cultural ceremonies that aren't yours to claim (hint:  if the cops and paramedics get called out to your 'ceremony', perhaps you're doing it wrong).  for sure - I get having a day when you get to have all your kids together at once, but think about why you get that, why you need that, and what information you're passing on, given the opportunity to have a family discussion around sensitive, yet ultimately important, issues.  look into where your own family traditions come from, and decide whether or not they're worth carrying on.  look into your own ancestral history, and see if there isn't a celebration that makes more sense for you to connect with.  make up your own holiday, and share that with your family!  or take a moment to honor the people who died so you could have a place to spread your whiteness around.  yeah, I know...I'm white too, but I do my part to call out my fellow Jews and Roma on these points as well.  and there's plenty of stuff I get wrong and need to correct for - this just doesn't happen to be one of them.  aside:  also, I'm pretty sure people who are ever so spiritually enlightened ought, in my opinion, be more actively involved in promoting inclusivity through building community, rather than practicing exclusivity based on jealousy and petty rivalries, or socioeconomic status.

quote from a great article I read in Bitch media's Travel issue last summer - read the full piece here.

as to me turning up unannounced, etiquette begs several questions, and the mixed signals I got from the person in question wouldn't help me answer them, though I'm smart enough to figure it out on my own.  first off, I have known this person for 30 odd years, through two of their relationships (one with another former friend), and all through most of their children's lives.  I am often received with a hug, and a "come on in", though this last time I got the feeling I wasn't welcome.  if that was the case, I would have expected this person to know me well enough and/or feel comfortable enough to tell me it wasn't a good time, that they simply weren't in the mood to receive guests, or that they would prefer if I called before dropping in (or even that they would prefer I didn't drop in at all).  none of those responses would have hurt my feelings, and I would have found some other way to amuse myself for the 2 hours I had left to wait to pick up my son from his rehearsal.  the bottom line is that the mood in the room began to feel awkward at the first conversational lull, and their body language made it obvious that they wanted to be doing other things.  I asked if it was ok for me to just stay while they 'did their thing', as it was cold out, and I didn't have anywhere else to go, to which they responded in the affirmative, but again, I felt weirdly unwelcome, so I chose to leave after a bit anyway.  there are plenty of reasons for me to recognize that this is a relationship better left in the past, and virtually none to support continuing it, hence it is ended.  again, moving forward, I'm only going where I'm celebrated, not where I'm barely tolerated.  of my labeling the town as toxic to me, I'm referencing the few people I know who live there, and make overtures of friendship, yet act in ways that are the opposite of what I consider friendly behavior, regularly.  not only that, one of them recently got angry when I mentioned that I had stopped trying with them, because they always find a last-minute excuse not to meet up, then don't make an attempt to reschedule...if that doesn't say "I don't want to hang out with you", I don't know what does!  so the onus is on me to do a better job of scheduling my time there fully, or making sure I have somewhere to be if I happen to have an hour here or there between scheduled plans because something didn't take as long as I thought it might.  I'd take it personally, but since the advent of cell phones and laptops, people just don't seem as interested in spending time with each other as they used to, which I think is a shame, because I like to visit with my friends, and take inspiration from the conversations we have, and appreciate the ways in which live interaction deepens our connections.  guess I'm just weird like that ~




sources:

https://www.archives.gov/legislative/features/thanksgiving

https://time.com/4577082/thanksgiving-holiday-history-origins/

https://www.businessinsider.com/history-of-thanksgiving-2017-11

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Thanksgiving-Day

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thanksgiving