Friday Cat Blogging

Miss Thing on the Coffee Table

Friday Morton's Blogging

Mabon

I swear by all that's holy (and, let's face it, I'm a witch. I think that it's all holy. The pretty stuff: the flowers and the mountains and the flowing river and the sunlight on the water and the softness of a baby's cheek and the maiden's blush and an eagle and waves and firelight and brave deeds, and the widdershins stuff: the worms and the decay and the mold and the spiders and the cold and the dark and the crone's greed for the warm spot by the fire and the fear and the death. So, it's a lot to swear by.) that yesterday, when I drove home from work, the trees along the Potomac River were green. And, tonight, literally overnight, they've begun to turn yellow and brown. As if Mother Earth were saying: here. Here's the boundary. Summer's off on one side and, here, on this side, we're beginning the slide into darkness, and coldness, and death.

Sunday, for one day, everything will be in perfect balance: day and night; darkness and light. And, then, Monday, we begin, will we or nill we, ready or not, the decent into the underworld. And, no less of us than it did of Innana, the underworld will demand that we gift it with all that we hold dear. It will take more from us than we are really prepared to give. It will end with us hanging, naked, from meathooks in our evil sister's kingdom. It will end with me tired of winter and bulky clothes, sick of worrying about slipping on the ice, desperate for a taste of spring greens. And, as a witch, I celebrate this process every bit as much as I celebrate Springtime when everything is new, and fresh, and, as my G/Son says, "hap-py!" I celebrate it as much as I celebrate Summer, when the sun makes the most passionate love on this planet to the tree leaves and photosynthesis happens, when tomatoes and blackberries and peaches and corn and crabs and basil explode in the garden and on the table of my screen porch. As a witch, I am eager to stand once again at the gate to the darkness and offer up my earrings, calling, "Sister of Darkness! I've left Dmuzi on the throne; here I come!"

Balance, the Wheel of the Year teaches us, is seldom found. Two days out of 365. The other days, it's all about movement, trends, the turning of the wheel. Here's a spot worn smooth. Come put your shoulder up there against it, with mine. A witch's job is to turn the wheel, and round and round the wheel must turn. It's turning now towards darkness. How can you help it to turn? Next Eostara, it will shift, and turn again towards light. What secret wlll you bring out of the darkness, clutched, bloody and weak, but glowing, to your breast? What is it that you need to learn during the next six months of germination? What do you need to leave behind to decay and be slowly transformed in the permafrost of the dark northern nights?

My New Name For A Blog

What trifecta said.

Batshit Insane And They Can't Sing

We Should, More Often

My New Name For A Blog

What echidne said

Patriarchy

Notice his jewelry.

My Girl Medea

From WaPo: As about 150 peace activists gathered by an entrance to the building on First Street SW, chanting slogans and singing protest songs, a dozen officers took up positions by the doors, a duffle bag filled with plastic handcuffs at their feet.

But getting arrested wasn't on the agenda.

Before leading the group into the building, one of the protest organizers, Medea Benjamin, a founder of the antiwar group Code Pink, approached the officer in charge, Capt. William Hanny of the U.S. Capitol Police.

"Okay, if we do anything you don't want in there, would you give us a warning first?" she said. "We don't want to get arrested today. We've got people catching planes tonight."

"We will give you a warning," Hanny replied. "But it's going to be up to you."

"Because sometimes people want to get arrested," she said. "They do what they have to do to get arrested. This is not one of those days."

The captain nodded. "Just don't block the hallways. Don't blow whistles. Don't cause a disturbance. Don't do any of that, and we'll be okay."

"Will you tell them to put the cuffs away?" Benjamin, 55, asked, smiling. She believes the Iraq war is criminal. So she said, "You can take those cuffs to the White House."

Hanny did not smile back.

And First, A Word From Our Sponsor

/Hat tip to Shawk Kenawe at Atrios

We Have Just Begun To Fight. And, We Are Many. They Are Few.

Shut it down.

Encampment in front of Congress.

October National Mobilization to End the War

Download some leaflets here.

Listen to NTodd's podcast here.

Listen to me you dirty, fucking hippies who run the peace movement! Start putting the code for a button to your sites in IN AN EASY-TO-FIND PLACE ON YOUR FRONT GODDAMN PAGE. And, no more long speeches before the marches start! Don't make me call out the flying monkeys!

And A Few Final Pictures From The March

Sunday Relevant Poetry Blogging

Barbara Fritchie by John Greenleaf Whittier

Up from the meadows rich with corn,
Clear in the cool September morn,

The clustered spires of Frederick stand
Green-walled by the hills of Maryland.

Round about them orchards sweep,
Apple and peach trees fruited deep,

Fair as the garden of the Lord
to the eyes of the famished rebel horde,

On that pleasant morn of the early fall
When Lee marched over the mountain-wall;

Over the mountains winding down,
Horse and foot, into Frederick town.

Forty flags with their silver stars,
Forty flags with their crimson bars,

Flapped in the morning wind; the sun
Of noon looked down, and saw not one.

Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then,
Bowed with her fourscore years and ten;

Bravest of all in Frederick town,
She took up the flag the men hauled down;

In her attic window the staff she set,
To show that one heart was loyal yet.

Up the street came the rebel tread,
Stonewall Jackson riding ahead.

Under his slouched hat left and right
He glanced; the old flag met his sight.

"Halt!" the dust-brown ranks stood fast.
"Fire!" out blazed the rifle-blast.

It shivered the window, pane and sash;
It rent the banner with seam and gash.

Quick, as it fell, from the broken staff
Dame Barbara snatched the silken scarf.

She leaned far out on the window-sill,
And shook it forth with a royal will.

"Shoot, if you must, this old gray head,
But spare your country's flag," she said.

A shade of sadness, a blush of shame,
Over the face of the leader came;

The nobler nature within him stirred
To life at that woman's deed and word;

"Who touches a hair of yon gray head
Dies like a dog! March on!" he said.

All day long through Frederick street
Sounded the tread of marching feet:

All day long that free flag tost
Over the heads of the rebel host.

Ever its torn folds rose and fell
On the loyal winds that loved it well;

And through the hill-gaps sunset light
shone over it with a warm good-night.

Barbara Frietchie's work is o'er,
and the Rebel rides on his raids no more.

Honor to her! And let a tear
Fall, for her sake, on Stonewall's bier.

Over Barbara Frietchie's grave,
Flag of Freedom and Union, wave!

Peace and order and beauty draw
Round thy symbol of light and law;

And ever the stars above look down
On thy stars below in Frederick town!

Pictures From The March

Chants From Today's War

Hey, Bush, what do you say?
How many kids did you kill today?

1,2,3,4
We don't want your fucking war.

Stop the funding
End the war
What the hell is Congress for?

This war for oil
Makes me sick
Impeach Bush and
Impeach Dick

Tell me what democracy looks like
This is what democracy looks like

What do we want?
Peace
When do we want it?
Now

Whose streets?
Our streets.

Pictures and more later.

Music

If you're coming to DC for the peace march tomorrow (and if you can come, you must come), hang around and listen to my brilliant friend, Amy who'll be singing on Saturday at 9:00 at The Red and the Black, 1212 H Street, NE. You'll be glad that you did.

SAT SEPT 15 - Washington, DC
9PM DOORS, 9:30 SHOW, $8
AMY CLARKE @ THE RED AND THE BLACK
H Street Corridor NE, Washington, DC
free shuttle to/from Union Station until 2AM
after the A.N.S.W.E.R. march on Washington, DC
w/D.C. ACOUSTIC UNDERGROUND & Special Guest DJ Michael Blair (Turtle DC)
www.redandblackbar.com

Friday Cat Blogging

More Miss Thing, with a Baba Yaga reference, here.

And, NTodd takes some gorgeous pictures of Miss Thing.

Best Candidate To End The War

Polls show that Dems favor Hillary to end the war.

Within the liberal blogosphere, Hil takes quite a bashing for what's perceived to be her less-than-adequate disavowal of her vote (along with many other Dems, including Edwards) to authorize Bush to go to Iraq. Josh Marshall reports, however, that among Democrats in general, Hillary is: actually viewed as the best Democrat to end the war.

Hillary wins easy victories among Democrats in Iowa, New Hampshire[,] and South Carolina on this question: "Regardless of your choice for president, who do you think would be best at ending the war in Iraq?" Hillary scores in the mid-30's in all three states, outpacing Barack Obama by over 15 points in all three states, with John Edwards in third.

And among voters who said the Iraq War is the most important issue to them, Hillary still leads the pack: 30% in Iowa, 32% in New Hampshire, and an astonishing 63% in South Carolina.

A possible explanation could be that despite her 2002 vote for the war, Hillary Clinton is consistently viewed in polls as the best experienced top-tier Democratic candidate.

I suspect that Josh's explanation may be correct.

The Arc Of The Moral Universe Is Long, But It Bends Towards Justice

Come to DC this weekend. Let's help the arc to bend.

We Shall Overcome, Someday

N., one of the most naturally-gifted witches that I know, and, lucky me, a founding mother of my circle of magical women, led us last night, on the September 11th dark moon, in a magical working mere blocks from the Capitol. All over the city, as if just to piss me off, flags were flying at half mast. Everywhere, that is, except for the school across the street from our magical working, where Betsy Ross' flag and the flag of the District of Columbia flew high, and strong, and proud.

N. used this song, one which I'd have thought was too over-used to affect me. But by the time that Bruce got to the verse that says: "We are not afraid, we are not afraid . . . ." I was sobbing like a baby and shedding magic into the Earth like a big-old-magic-shedding thing.

Come to DC this weekend. The witches have been making it ready to hear that the people want an end to this war.

A Marching We Will Go

Those of us of "a certain age" keep looking at each other and saying, "I can't believe that we're still having to protest this shit." We've been to more marches than we can count (shit, at my age, I probably can't remember them all, even if I could count them). Marches to end the Viet Nam war, the March for Women's Lives, the Million Mom March, marches to protest our entry into the Iraq war, marches to end the Iraq war, etc., etc. Here's some marching advice from a seasoned marcher to those patriots coming to Washington, D.C. this Saturday, September 15th, for the march to end the Iraq war. If we're lucky, if enough of us show up, maybe we won't have to keep protesting the same damn thing over and over.

I admit to a lot of pride of place in Washington, DC. It's my home and the "city of my heart." It's a beautiful city, especially in the Autumn, with monuments that take away your breath everywhere that you look. It's easy to come directly into DC by train. Union Station is just a few steps from the Capitol, where Saturday's march will end up. DC also has a very good metro system that allows you to get almost anywhere in the city (Georgetown is one exception) without a car. If you're taking metro, buy an all-day pass so that you won't have to stand in line and buy a farecard each time that you want to get on the subway. The trains can get kind of crowded during major marches.

There's tons of logistics information available by clicking the "End the War" button at the top of my blog: transportation, housing, maps, etc.

Right now, the weather services are calling for near-perfect marching weather -- clouds in the morning and high temperatures in the mid 70s. DC can be muggy this time of year, making it feel hotter than the thermometer says, but Saturday should be great.

Wear comfortable shoes and socks and loose, comfortable clothing, preferably with pockets. Sunscreen and a cap or hat to keep off the afternoon sun is a good idea. You'll want to carry a cell phone, chapstick, bottled water, a snack such as an energy bar, cheese stick, apple, sandwich, etc., some cash, and maybe a credit card. Lots of people make signs and bring them to the march, but the groups sponsoring the march will have printed up signs that you can pick up at the site and carry. Metro can be a bit weird about signs on sticks sometimes, although sometimes they go through with no problem.

I've been to lots of marches and have never been arrested. All of the peace marches that I've been to have been, well, peaceful. There's no reason to believe that this one won't be, as well. DC police are used to demonstrations and are generally better than some other police departments at not provoking protestors. I try to remember that it's just their job, they're not "the bad guys," and they're humans, with feelings, as well. You've got no argument with them and thus no reason to provoke them. All of that said, it's a good idea to wear a bandana or a scarf. If the police do use tear gas, you can douse the bandana with water from your water bottle and pull it up over your mouth and nose. If the police use tear gas, they'll release it so that the wind will disperse it over the crowd. While it's counterintuitive, that means that, if you can, you're often better off running towards the tear gas, so that you can get out from under it, rather than away from it. DC has lots of museums, monuments, etc. that will be open on Saturday, and there will be normal tourists touring those sites. Thus, if trouble does start, it's fairly simple to ditch your sign and head into a museum or other building until things calm down. You likely won't need this advice at all, but it doesn't hurt to have a plan.

If this march is anything like other anti-Iraq war marches, you'll never even see a counter-protestor. The few dozen (at most) chickenhawks who do show up usually stay together in one spot and content themselves with yelling insults at the marchers who outnumber them by several-hundred-to-one. I recommend ignoring them. The press will be there and they love to cover a "conflict" between the marchers and the counter-protestors, rather than focus on the fact that tens of thousands came to ask for an end to the war. Yeah, the chickenhawks are assholes. It's a free country and they've got a right to express their asshole opinions. Ignore them.

NTodd, Sinfonian, and possibly others are planning to liveblog the march. DC does have lots of places (Starbucks, etc.) with wifi, although you need your own laptop, which I wouldn't want to cart around on a march. If you can access the web with your cellphone, so much the better.

Come see my beautiful city this weekend. Come exercise the right that lots of people have died to ensure for you: "the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." It's what patriots do. We've got a hell of a grievance that needs redressing.

Please add any other suggestions or sites that will be liveblogging in comments.

Dirty Little War

We got to talking last night about the chants we used during the protests to the Viet Nam war: "Hey, hey, LBJ! How many kids did you kill today?" "Hey, hey, ho, ho, Tricky Dick has got to go!" "Out, now!" My wonderful friend B. brought up a John Prine song that I'd somehow missed. Here, for the march this Saturday, is an updated version.


YELLOW RIBBON With Apologies to John Prine

Well while digesting Reader's Digest
In the back of a dirty book store,
A magnetic yellow ribbon
Fell out on the floor.
So I picked it up and I ran outside
And I slapped it on my SUV,
And if I could see old Betsy Ross now
I'd tell her how good I feel.

Chorus
Oh but your magnetic yellow ribbon won't get you
Into Heaven any more.
They're already overcrowded
From your dirty little war.
Now Jesus don't like killin'
No matter what the reason's for,
And your magnetic yellow ribbon won't get you
Into Heaven any more.


(Well) I went into the bank this morning
and the teller she said to me,
"If you join our Christmas club
we'll give you ten of those magnetic yellow ribbons for free."
So I didn't mess around a bit
and I took her up on what she said.
And I stuck those magnetic yellow ribbons all over my SUV
And one on my wife's forehead.

Oh but your magnetic yellow ribbon won't get you
Into Heaven any more.
They're already overcrowded
From your dirty little war.
Now Jesus don't like killin'
No matter what the reason's for,
And your magnetic yellow ribbon won't get you
Into Heaven any more.


(Well) I got my SUV so stickered up
That I couldn't see.
Then I ran it right upside a curb
And then right into a tree.
By the time they called a doctor down
I was already dead.
And I'll never understand why the man
Standing at the Pearly Gates said...

Oh but your magnetic yellow ribbon won't get you
Into Heaven any more.
They're already overcrowded
From your dirty little war.
Now Jesus don't like killin'
No matter what the reason's for,
And your magnetic yellow ribbon won't get you
Into Heaven any more.

Ecstasy

Wicca is, or is "supposed to be" an ecstatic religion. Faith plays no part in Wicca; Wiccans either have direct experience of the divine, of the ineffable, of the Gods and Goddesses, or they are just play acting. Play acting is ok; I'm a huge believer in the magic of "acting as if." But Wicca must be a religion of ecstasy; at some point, you either know the Goddesses and Gods or you don't. I was talking about this notion last week with my brilliant friend E, when we were watching The Unmentionables at Wooly Mammouth Theatre. How do you work towards ecstasy in a society that fails to recognize the need for a balance between ecstasy and "normalcy"? E reminded me that Pagans are not the only group to grapple with this issue.

You know, they're not easy on the body, esctatic religions. Nor, upon career goals, nor family life, nor upon effective everyday living. And it's clearly difficult for many, many Pagans to thread a path between spending time lost in reverie at the mystery of the universe and, you know, getting dressed, paying bills, providing themselves with clean, effective living spaces, taking care of their own health, remaining gainfully employed, getting good haircuts, thinking through and conducting effective ritual, etc., etc.

However, there are exceptions. My favorite recent experience occurred at Pagan Pride Day here in DC. A gifted young man took it upon himself to herd the disorganized Pagan horde into a circle. Using a voice actually loud enough to be heard outside and pronouncing words clearly enough for them to be understood by everyone, he said: "OK, introducing a new concept to the Pagan community. It's called a circle. You get into it by looking to see if there's someone directly to your right. Good. Now, look directly to your left. Is there someone there, as well? If so, you're in a circle. If not . . . ."

I love that guy.

I Think That There May Be A Few People Who Read This Blog But Don't Read Atrios. This Is For You.

I heart Glenn Greenwald

It's One Damn Thing After Another With These AssClowns

Goddess, they're just such freaking fascists, even when there's really no need for them to be. And, incompetent.

I'd love to know what Pagan books made the "cut" and what Pagan scholars were consulted (not).

The First Amendment mandates that: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

You can't deny people access to their religious books without prohibiting the free exercise of religion.

Update: I'll just add that I've never practiced First Amendment Law, but I have a vague memory from ConLaw that restrictions on the First Amendment need to be designed so as to be no more restrictive than necessary to promote some important government interest. I'm willing to bet that the government could ban a book from a prison library if it could show that that particular book advocated violence, for example. (Course, I remember a whole lotta smiting going on in the xian holy book, and I don't imagine they're going to ban that one any time soon. Sad; it "disparages" my religion if you believe the correct translation is "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.") But that's exactly the opposite of a movement to only allow "approved" books. The Liberty University-stocked DoJ has chosen the Most restrictive approach to this issue rather than the Least restrictive.

And, again, I'd like to know what Pagan books are allowed. And which esteemed Pagan scholar got to do the choosing?

Sunday Relevant Poetry Blogging

Funeral Blues

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message: He is Dead.
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

W.H. Auden

No One Expects The Plastic Chairs In The Deep Woods!

Not the plastic chairs! Sweet Mother of the Goddess, not the plastic chairs! My Moon in Taurus canna' take the plastic chairs!
But, otherwise, this is a nice introduction.

The Ophelia Cantos

Lilies tangle in her hair: green stems

Like water-snakes.

A disembodied hand

Floats on the surface. So much has been lost

Already: toes, the lobe of her left ear.

But this remains, a damp, immaculate

Sign, like a message saved from the dark current.

She wandered through the courtyard in her tattered

Dress distributing wild violets.

She called us whores—your son ma'am, not your husband's

I think—and knaves—the taxes sir, your cellar

Is stocked with sweet Moselle. We called this madness.

Indicia of her innocence: to be

A maiden floating dead among the flowers.

She will become an elegant and mute

Image: the sodden velvet coat, the sinking

Coronet of poppies, virgin's bower,

And eglantine. The replicable girl.

(A blob of Chinese white becomes a hand.

The artist puts his brush in turpentine,

The model pulls her stockings on.)

And yet,

Surround by the water-lily stems,

Her face appears an enigmatic mask:

A drowned Medusa in her snaking hair.

The lilies gape around her like pink mouths,

Telling us nothing we can understand.

Her eyes stare upwards: dead and not quite dead.


by Theodora Goss

A Nurturing Society -- What Would It Be Like?

What would it mean to live in a nurturing society, one where even men nurtured self, one another, and others? . . . From a theological point of view [it would mean] the recovery of the tradition of God as Mother.

Matthew Fox, as quoted in As Above, So Below: Paths to Spiritual Renewal in Daily Life, by Ronald S. Miller

Beautiful Planet

In case you get to doubting, for even a minute, what an amazing, beautiful, wonderful, glorious planet the Goddess gave to us, just go here.


Hat tip to Joanna Colbert

Saturday Goddess Blogging

Here's an entirely fictional harvest Goddess, Jeyriall of Santharia. Santhria's apparently a Tolkein-like gamers' world. In the fantasy world creation of Santharia you'll find tons of fantasy art, magic, fantasy pictures, maps (continent maps, town maps, village maps), a RPG bestiary, a herbarium, free online RPG games, RPG material - and everything else a fan can dream of... Let the magic come true again! Let's heed the legacy of JRR Tolkien and his world creation... Feel the magic, enjoy free role playing and dream the dream!


I love the idea of entire new pantheons being created on-line. You just know that, somehow, hundreds of years from now, at least of few of these deities will have their own actual worshipers.

Hail, Jeyriall!

Meg Murray. The Girl Who Was Willing To Trust Her Own Intellect. What A Hero She Was To Me.

That ball that bounced out of rythym. The terrified mother who snatched the child inside. It may have been the very first time in my entire life that I felt understood. It kept me going for a v., v., v. long time. That's what good writers can do. They can toss a lifeline to the drowning and hold on tight. Madeline L'Engel did that for me.

Of a kindness, she named the witches in her story Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who, and Mrs Which. It was grace for me to find witches in her v. xian story. Her story was, for me (if your only tool is a hammer) a political tale about propaganda, the evil use of psychology, the value of the intellect and of not conforming, and the importance of the First Amendment. Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who, and Mrs Which (the one with whom I always most identified) simply fought that evil as if it were the most natural thing in the world for a woman to do. It was a lifeline and I grabbed ahold and never let loose.

Once, when I was in NY, I tried to find the church where Madeline L'Engle spent her declining years as a librarian. A huge yong NYC policeman told me, "You don't want to find her." Like the stormtroopers told that these were not the droids they were looking for, I grabbed the first ex Mr. Hecate and ran away. Now, I'm sorry that I never met Ms. L'Engle, never told her how she saved my life. Her stories about running a country store in New England, about the value of piano practice, about the need to keep a daily journal, Crosswicks, canning, children, Europe, music -- they meant so much to me.

May The Goddess Guard Her. May She Find Her Way To The Summerlands. May Her Friends And Family Know Peace.

She paid the Earth the inestimable compliment of being reluctant to leave. Madeline L'Engle has died. I loved her work beyond almost anyone else's on Earth. Her writing on writing has been hugely important to my own, paltry, development as an aspiring writer. The characters that she created helped me to grow up, got me to agree to grow up, showed me that it wouldn't be futile to grow up, helped me to become a grown woman, a middle-aged woman, the mother of a son, a grandmother. I can't believe that she's gone.

It's fair to say that I truly loved her.

It's funny, because L'Engle was a quintissential Christian writer, a woman who waxed so poetic about the Episcopalian Book of Common Prayer that she made me buy a copy and read it. And, yet, I'd dub her "witch but doesn't know it" in a heartbeat. She wrote about angels in a way that made it clear to me that she had direct experience with forces larger than human. She clearly understood, in an almost Charles Williams kind of way, that there is nothing mundane about the mundane world and that Earth is crammed, crammed to the brink, with Heaven. And, vice versa.

As the NYT noted: “Wrinkle” is one of the most banned books because of its treatment of the deity. . . . The book used concepts that Ms. L’Engle said she had plucked from Einstein’s theory of relativity and Planck’s quantum theory, almost flaunting her frequent assertion that children’s literature is literature too difficult for adults to understand. She also characterized the book as her refutation of ideas of German theologians. . . . “Why does anybody tell a story?” Ms. L’Engle once asked, even though she knew the answer.

“It does indeed have something to do with faith,” she said, “faith that the universe has meaning, that our little human lives are not irrelevant, that what we choose or say or do matters, matters cosmically.”

Thank you, Madeline L'Engle. Goddess-speed.

Friday Cat Blogging

Why u is flashything me?



Oh noes! I haz to ignores u like bad cheezburger.



Kthxbai!

And After The March, You Can Hear My Brilliant Friend Amy

Some Good News On Emissions

From today's EEI newsletter:

Early Data Suggest Growth in Carbon Emissions May Be Falling

Emissions of CO2 slowed last year according to preliminary data from the U.S. Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center. Gregg Marland, a senior scientist at the Center, warned: "It is hard to put too much emphasis on the last number in a time series; it is always the most subject to revision," reported Reuters. The Center's data show a rise in carbon emissions of only 2.6 percent in 2006, compared to 3.3 percent in 2005, 5.4 percent in 2004, and 4.7 percent in 2003.

The preliminary estimates for 2005 and 2006 come from information provided by BP, while the earlier estimates are based on U.N. energy data. According to Marland, the most recent data include emissions from burning fossil fuels, making cement, and flaring natural gas. The Center provides DOE with most of its climate-change data and information analysis. In prior years, preliminary estimates of this kind have had to be revised upward.
Reuters , Sept. 4.

Time Flies When You're Having Fun

Happy Fiftieth Birthday to Jack Kerouak's On the Road.

"They danced down the streets like dingledodies, and I shambled after as I've been doing all my life after people who interest me, because the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones that never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn..."

What Are Witches For?

SheWho asks: What are witches for?

I once had an intense crisis that caused me to seriously consider the question: what was the point to my being incarnated at all, especially if it was all going to end far sooner than I'd been led to believe? (As SheWho notes, we can ask for teachers, but we can't control the nature of the teacher that we get. It can be an experience. Sometimes, it can be an experience that we hate. Teachers come in so many shapes and colors. Often, they're long gone and ill-lamented before we go, "Oh. That was a teacher. Shit. Was it necessary to fuck me over like that?" Answer: apparently, yes.) And the answer that I got, resoundingly, was the answer that it's easy to give to SheWho's question: you were incarnated because deity wanted to find out what it would be like to be you.

But that answer's too easy to give to SheWho's question. It answers the question: why is any one of us here, but it doesn't explain what witches are for. My general answer is that witches are here to help to turn the wheel. I've long since forgotten where I first read that "a witch's job is to turn the wheel and round and round the wheel must turn," but it made immediate, instinctive sense to me. Gael Baudino's fiction often captures this concept. So does Terry Prachett's. So, I was oddly reminded tonight, does Zena Henderson's.

But, again, that's too easy. What does it mean to turn the wheel? The wheel of the year turns of its own accord, it can seem, and certainly it would go on turning with or without the aid of any individual witch. There are, as SheWho's post notes, different ways to help to turn the wheel. The wheel has so many spokes. They can all use a shove. Some witches teach. Some care for animals. Some do magic to heal the land. Some care for women or children or ancient herbs. Some pray unceasingly. Some sing. Some inspire others. Some create beauty, which always stands as a bulwark against the breaking of the wheel. Some work directly for social justice.

What matters, I think, here, just before Mabon in 2007 CE, is to figure out which spoke of the wheel feels most comfortable against your shoulder. Where can you provide the greatest torque? Are you providing that torque? If not, why not? If not now, in the words of the saying, then, when?

I had an amazing weekend, this past Labor Day. Deep dreams and deep insights into where to go next. One moment I was running errands and the next moment I was surrounded by green vines and branches and experiencing a vision of what the next ten years or so of my life are about. From that point on, I have been filled with such a deep, underlying joy. Not that anything's likely to be easy. Only that it's likely to be right. The longer that I practice as a witch, the longer that I do the boring, difficult daily practice, the more that I come to depend upon and expect these experiences.

What are witches for? Witches are for manifesting the Goddess here on earth, for turning the wheel of the year, for performing the amazing act of appreciation, an act which nature requires, an act upon which the gods and goddesses depend. And witches are for whatever your are for, for putting the shoulder up against that particular spoke of the wheel that calls to you, that sings your name, that cries out for your particular shoulder. You know it when you are about to fall asleep, when you are in deep meditation, when you let your Better Self roam free.

So mote it be.

No One Could Have Anticipated . . . .

Today's WaPo reports on something that I think we all saw coming.

[M]ansionization comes with a twist: Some of the new homes, neighbors and town leaders say, are being used as boardinghouses for several families or unrelated people. Some are college students from the University of Maryland. Others appear to be immigrants.

"Our concern with these McMansions is they are not single-family homes," LaVerne Williams of Lewisdale told a group of county planners and elected officials in Riverdale. "You are turning our communities into rooming communities."

Williams, 81, is leading a campaign to protect her neighborhood and beyond. She walked into the recent meeting with a cane in one hand and a fistful of pictures of oversize houses in the other.

"I'm a law-abiding citizen," she said. "You have to do something about this."

In my Northern Virginia neighborhood, there are a number of these ecological and aesthetic monstrosities -- crowding out light for the surrounding modest bungalows and leaving no room for trees or grass -- sitting empty. It's a matter of time before they, too, turn into rooming houses. Great job, zoning boards!

Pagan Pride Week

DC · BALTIMORE AND NORTHERN VIRGINIA PAGAN PRIDE WEEK

Harvest Events Feeding The Spirit, Mind, & Body
Washington, DC; Baltimore, and Northern Virginia
Saturday, September 8 - Saturday, September 15

Welcome To Pagan Pride 2007! A multi-day harvest celebration hosted by the Open Hearth Foundation (OHF), The International Pagan Pride Project, and members of the regional Pagan community - The Washington · Baltimore · NOVA Pagan Pride Week facilitates community service, education, and worship while recognizing the wonderful diversity of our local Pagan traditions.

This year's events will feature the first-ever NoVa Pagan Pride Day on Saturday, September 8th; an Interpath Service on Sunday, September 9th on the National Mall as part of DC Pagan Pride Day, mid-week events, and close with the Baltimore Pagan Pride Day on Saturday, September 15.

My wonderful circle of women generally flies well below the DC Pagan radar; we're a closed circle and don't do teaching or healing or general outreach, focusing, instead, on intense magical workings devoted to changing our world and ourselves. But we surface once a year to participate in Pagan Pride Week. It's a wonderful opportunity to feel the incredible strength of the Pagan community thriving here in the shadow of the nation's Capitol.

I get a lot of emails asking how to "break into" the Pagan community. Pagan Pride week is a good opportunity to see what different Pagan groups are like without committing to do anything for a "year and a day." You can wear jeans and a t-shirt (rather than go skyclad), come with a friend, or come alone. It's generally free and the events are large enough that you can leave whenever. OTOH, if you see a group that interests you, people are more than willing to chat.

Be sure to check out the chocolate ritual at the Arlington Virginia Unitarian Universalist Church. They will reprise [their] previous PPD Chocolate ritual by calling on the heat of fondue, the blue M&M's, and everything yummy in this family-friendly, humorous, ritual. There will also be a rite to Caffenia, hosted by Cedar Light Grove in Baltimore, and a workshop on drumming in sacred space in Columbia, Maryland.

See you there!

Art found here.

(Almost) First Of The Month Bazooms Blogging

The first (week) of the month is a good time to do a breast self exam (BSE). BSEs are easy to do: here's how. Doing a regular BSE can save your life because it can help you to detect a cancerous lump early. Catching cancer early is, as I am living proof, the best way to fight it and live. So, women, order pizza and slip a movie in the DVD player so that the kids will leave you alone for 15 minutes. Take some time for yourself and give yourself a BSE. When you're done, have some chocolate. Have a green smoothie. Visit the virtual garden. Have tea.

Men, are there any women you'd miss if they were not around? Wife, lover, daughter, friend, granddaughter, neice, co-workers, employees, mothers, grandmothers? Why not offer to take the kids to the park, pick up dinner, get the oil changed so that they'll have time to do a BSE?

Sunday Relevant Poetry Blogging

In Despair

He's lost him completely. And he now tries to find
his lips in the lips of each new lover,
he tries in the embrace of each new lover
to convince himself that it's the same young man,
that it's to him he gives himself.

He's lost him completely, as though he never existed.
He wanted, his lover said, to save himself
from the tainted, sick form of sexual pleasure,
the tainted, shameful form of sexual pleasure.
There was still time, he said, to save himself.

He's lost him completely, as though he never existed.
Through fantasy, through hallucination,
he tries to find his lips in the lips of other young men,
he longs to feel his kind of love once more.

Constantine P. Cavafy