Blog o' Gnosis

I wrote this piece shortly after Victor Anderson’s death, in October 2001. I am reprinting it here because Victor’s name came up in conversation with a friend this morning, and I realized that I want the story of my experience at his memorial to be available to readers here as well.

Things just hadn’t been smooth ever since September 11^th. Schedules were thrown into a whirlwind, individual intentions and goals suddenly disappeared into an abyss as larger issues came into sharp focus. So I wasn’t really surprised when, just as I thought I had a free Monday to start picking up the scattered threads of my work, I got Max’s email announcing plans for his memorial on my first unencumbered work day.

Though I had only met Victor twice, I knew it was important to pay my respects on his passing. When my circle had gone down to spend afternoons with Victor and Cora, I had been captivated by his enigmatic presence, and understood the stature he had achieved as a teacher and a shaman. At the same time, he rubbed me the wrong way, and eventually I found myself getting up to help Cora in the kitchen as Victor went on weaving his sorcerer’s threads of world history, comparative religion, past lives, and magic in the living room. Still, he was too important a figure in the Feri tradition of the Bay Area, and also in the Reclaiming community, which had been my community for nearly 20 years, for me not to go if I was able.

I drove down from Sebastopol, worrying about traffic and whether I’d make it to Hayward on time. Then I reminded myself that the whole day was given over to ritual time, and the only thing to do was relax and let things happen. Macha and Anna Korn helped by coming along for the ride, so I could catch up with friends during the drive. We pulled into the Chapel of the Chimes in good time, as a light rain spattered the windshield.

There is something very magical, and primal, about memorial services. More than anything else the memorial helps us make the transition between thinking of a person as living and thinking of them as dead. But to me the distinction is not as clear cut: there is death in being alive, and a life after death that is longed for like a release from an arduous task. At the same time, the presence of a once living body that is now disintegrating  is an unassailable fact that demands from each of us a transformation of our relationship to the person who is no longer there.

Memorials also help the departing soul orient to the spirit world, and make the final break from its body. My experience that day was that Victor was completely conscious and aware of everything that went on at his memorial. I felt a deep sense of rightness when his son bowed before the casket, acknowledging the living presence of his father. Perhaps Victor was so strongly present in the room because even as a man he dwelled in the spirit world more often than not. My heart went out to Cora, who looked so frail and grief-stricken, and for whom the occasion was clearly far more than a time to philosophize.

Victor’s spirit was so powerful, and palpable, that I wondered whether the memorial would actually help him depart in any way. Then the bagpipes began playing Amazing Grace, and anyone in the room who was not yet close to tears soon got there. The energy in the room shifted, as the sound of the pipes seemed to infuse every molecule with a more intense vibration. Riding the waves of power being generated as the piper walked to the altar and back, Victor’s spirit washed over us as he began to separate from all the material objects in the room—his body, the flowers, the candles, the people—and fly out the open door, into the world beyond.

There is no easy transition between being witness to such and event and finding oneself in a parking lot in Hayward, amongst probably the largest crowd of Feri folk ever peaceably assembled. There were people there I knew and loved, many I didn’t know, and some people I’d only known through email. Conscious of the long ride home through the gathering rush hour, and partly because of the awkwardness of the occasion, I didn’t want to stay long.

It was on the drive north that the storm really got started. An occasional sprinkling gave way to darker clouds and distant rumblings. Heading across the bridge to San Rafael, it was raining steadily, and bolts of lightning crackled from the clouds to the dry earth. In California, the first rain of the season is always an important event, but this was no ordinary storm. We don’t get thunderstorms that often, particularly ones that cover as vast an area as this one did. The clouds were high and dark, and the sky for miles around looked like a giant blackboard. The sun was sinking behind the hills, but here and there it shone through and bathed us in light, as the rain came down and lightning struck all around. The bolts were clearly visible streaks like hieroglyphs against the sky, sometimes in rapid succession in the exact same shape, sometimes dancing all across the horizon.

I remembered someone that day mentioning that Victor had been born in a storm. As I drove through Petaluma, thinking about his teachings and my conflicted feelings over them, the setting sun came through under the edge of the clouds, right on the horizon. Sandwiched between dark hills and dark sky, it looked for all the world like an eye in the storm. I thought it was Victor, sight returned on a greater scale, checking to see who was paying attention. Since I apparently was, I started talking to him, acknowledging his prowess in leaving in so strong a storm.

I wished him well on his journey, and also prayed that the days of vengeance and vendetta in the name of religion were passing away just like his life, just like the storm. That is the place where I have to part company with Victor’s teachings, and I told him so. Many at his memorial said that he chose this time to cross over in order to work his influence on the other side. Given the opportunity to speak to him in that final moment, it was important for me to put in a plug for non-violence, which I believe to be the highest spiritual calling. I have no idea how his power will be felt now that he has passed on, but that day I prayed it would be for the greatest good.

Finally, as I climbed out of the Petaluma valley and the horizon receded from my sight, I found myself reciting the Buddhist prayer over and over: may all beings be happy, may all beings be happy. I feel privileged to have known him and Cora, however briefly, and am very glad to have made it to his memorial. I won’t soon forget how that bagpipe gathered Victor’s spirit and all our prayers and hurled them out beyond the veil, nor will I forget meeting him eye to eye, and heart to heart, as he left on the rays of the setting sun.

How did that happen? How has it been seven years since we started doing a Silent Poetry Reading for the Goddess Brigid (patron of poets, healers and midwives) on our blogs?

The answer to this question is generally uninteresting to anyone save the questioner, so I will spare you my thoughts about the passage of time, etc. Suffice to say that it is time to celebrate the return of the light, and the Feast of St. Brigid, with offerings of poetry. For anyone just tuning in, the festival has a Facebook page where anyone can post their poem. It is a lovely way to spend the afternoon, scrolling through all the postings and immersing yourself in the beauty of language.

If you are not on Facebook, feel free to post a poem below in the comments, as I will link to this post on Facebook so people can find your poem. And to start the ball rolling, here is a poem of mine I just found this morning and can’t believe I haven’t posted before now. It is an invocation of the ancestors that I did one year at Samhain, broom in hand. Very effective! Use with caution.

Ancestor Invocation

Broom on the moor,
Broom on the floor
The ancestors wait
We open the door

Inside and out
Behind and about
Dust of the ancients,
We call you out!

Out of the past,
out of the ash
Out from the ceiling,
Floor and sash

We trace the sacred steps of old
We stand upon the year’s threshold

Now join us in this dance tonight
As darkness gives to us our sight

Of teeming life in hidden deeps
Come! Be our candle while all else sleeps.

Anne Hill
Samhain, 1999

It feels like it’s time to take down the Day of the Dead altar. I am not aware of any hard and fast rule about this, but just last night as I added more wood to the fire and glanced up at the mantle, I had the distinct impression that things had to change.

The novenas that Deborah made need to be put away, those with pictures of George Carlin and Abbie Hoffman packed side by side with the ones honoring my father and uncle. The ancestor shrine I constructed from bits and pieces of Raven Moonshadow’s belongings will be as well, along with pictures of my beloved nephew Alex, my old boyfriend Steve, my good friend Barbara, and so many others.

Maybe there is no clear dividing line in home decor, when the colors of Samhain pass away and those of Winter Solstice deck the halls. Maybe I am simply reacting against the emotional burden of having my nephew’s picture prominent in the living room, a daily reminder that I will no longer see him change and grow with the seasons. Maybe I need to bring my thoughts back to the living: my niece’s baby who has had a tumultuous year; my daughter the newly-minted college freshman; my ailing mother.

Whatever the reason, I find myself looking forward to decorating with colored lights, bringing in fragrant fir boughs and branches of bright red berries, laying out a runner of rich jewel tones across the dining room table. This will not be a year when I procrastinate and keep the house bare until minutes before the Solstice. I may even get out the colored lights to hang the moment I return from Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow in Oakland.

I have written before about the evocative beauty of the winter sky here on the coast. The night is an echo chamber for the sea, carrying the thundering sound of surf and a fine salty mist over the dunes and into the village. It is a stillness that quivers with moisture, a silence that cradles sound.

For the last six years, this vast hall of night has cradled me as well. I love it here more than anywhere else I have ever lived, particularly in the winter months. I love how we can see the storms swirl in from across the Pacific, and how we are also the first ones in the sun after the storms have passed. I see the light break through low on the horizon well before the rain stops, and hours before those living inland ever feel its rays.

My friends have been taking turns this fall, gingerly asking me how I’m coping with an empty nest. I hope they are surprised rather than alarmed when I break out into a wide grin and tell them I love it. Emptiness does not equal sadness to me but rather spaciousness, clarity, calm. I love my children fiercely, look forward to their visits, and thoroughly enjoy them while they’re here. And then they leave, the house reverts to stillness, and I can see again the headlands to the west, the crisp blue outline of Pt. Reyes to the south, and above and all around me, the endless sky.

During a break-up, it is natural to sift through your memories to see if there were early warning signs that the marriage was in trouble. This is an understandable process, as our minds try through hindsight to make logical sense of things. It is a way to deal with the pain of having something so central to your life no longer exist in quite the same way. Of course the relationship still exists, just as a brown dwarf star skulking around the galaxy can still technically be considered a continuation of the once-glorious star that got too hot and exploded all over everything, leaving only a hollowed-out flickering remnant of its former self. Unfortunately we now have to count on the brown dwarf star for financial help with our daughter’s college, though now that he has been exposed as a fading ember of the man he once was, the chances of him being true to his word are fading just as rapidly.

Searching posthumously for the early signs of collapse is tricky, because in any relationship there are difficult spots right from the start, disagreements, misunderstandings, and simple events that in retrospect can seem fraught with meaning. What is more, the defining moments that stand out in one person’s mind as a perfect crystallization of all that was to come are going to be very different from the moments that occur to the other person. But since you are now separate people and don’t have to put up with the other person’s clearly erroneous and narcissistic view of your former marriage, this should not trouble you.

There is a difference, however, between moments which exemplify a particular character trait and moments which warn of impending collapse. Just because a single moment teaches us something profound about our partner doesn’t mean that revelation will lead to the break-up of the marriage. As it happens, I have an example of each of these from the early days of my relationship to share with you now. Read the rest of this entry �

I am flummoxed, having just read the New York Times article about Amy Winehouse’s recent death. The end of the article states,

Ms. Winehouse is not the first singer who died at the age of 27. Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain and Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones were the same age.

Are you kidding me? They all died at 27? That fact startles and disturbs me, and adds to my low-level sadness this weekend. Tomorrow my nephew Alex would be turning 28, if he hadn’t followed the template of tragic deaths at age 27.

Alex was a gifted musician too, and spent a few years getting good on the drums as well as guitar when he lived with us. One of my favorite memories of Alex was at a Rock ‘n’ Roll Summer Camp the year he turned 14. He was Mr. Cool on the drum kit for most of the bands that formed there, taking pride in being a kind of wild big brother to the younger kids. They all looked up to him, and it seemed like he had found the perfect outlet for his energy and his desire to lead.

The first year after somebody dies is full of “firsts,” and getting past the birthday is a big one. I don’t know what I will do tomorrow to commemorate the day, but it may involve playing lots of Janis, Jimi, Kurt, and Jim.

June may have been Pagan Values Month for some bloggers, but for me it was the Month of Random Shit Breaking. Among the random items breaking down all month: various car parts, household goods and appliances, and worst of all, my laptop.

It was a 7-year-old laptop, so old that it barely talked to other, newer pieces of hardware, or even rendered web pages reliably. But I didn’t really care since I used it mostly for writing. Not work-associated writing, though. The laptop was what I used for lying back on the sofa at the end of the day and reflecting, churning through feelings and impressions to come up with blog posts that answered some question I had been asking myself.

In its absence I realize that it is hard for me to get that same receptive state of mind while sitting up at my desk in my office, writing with a desktop computer. My analytic mind dominates in the office, while my poetic mind perches on the couch. And so here I sit tonight, weirdly upright and with too many papers spread out around me, trying to re-enter the musing frame of mind I just had on the couch before coming in here to write. Nope, not really happening.

One thing I have learned in the last few years is that even if I can’t see the way forward, things come through when I really need them to. So while I feel stymied by not having a working laptop I also feel weirdly serene about it, and kind of curious as to what will happen next. I have had to find serenity with a lot of things this year, mostly with my nephew’s death which is still very much an open wound. I don’t have as much energy for taking care of things as I used to have, so when stuff breaks unless it’s essential to my livelihood I tend to just leave it.

If it were my desktop computer that broke (God forbid) I would be all over the internet finding a replacement asap. But it’s my laptop, an almost ethereal companion that helps me dive deep and surface with something to say. Its loss I am taking more as a conversation with the Universe about what to do and how to do it right now. Maybe I need to bring that poetic mind into my office more. Who knows? At least I was able to write this tonight, and hopefully I’ll be back with more to say in the weeks to come. Meanwhile I’ve been writing a column for SageWoman Magazine the past three issues, so if you’re looking for longer musing pieces there is at least one other place to turn.

It’s early in the morning and you’re busy getting your children ready for school. They are mostly cooperative, but one of them is moving very slowly and instead really wants to tell you about her dream. What do you do?

Maybe you’re a teacher, working with a small group of students who are writing stories. One of them proceeds to tell you his dream, and asks whether he could write that as a story. How do you respond?

If you have children in your life, eventually you will be faced with questions like these. Most adults these days want to encourage children’s creativity and avoid making them feel somehow “different” because of what they feel or experience. Talking about dreams with children is a great way to achieve both these goals, and many others besides.

I joined a dream group right after my third child was born, so by the time she was able to talk and tell me her dreams I had a little bit of knowledge about how to handle that conversation. The other ideas in the video below I figured out on my own, and I offer them here to help a new generation of parents become more comfortable talking with children about dreams.

My main requirement as a parent was that any dream activity or conversation had to be something I could do on the fly, without a lot of set-up, and whenever the moment felt right. There was just too much to do in our daily routine for me to stuff in one more must-do activity. Plus, I didn’t want dreams to feel like math homework—it had to be fun and non-stressful. Of course there are countless other ways you can bring dreams into the family (or school) conversation, but these will at least get you started. The basic idea is to expand our awareness of what is possible by bringing our dreaming creativity more fully into our waking lives.

This video presents seven great ideas for bringing dreams into routine family conversations, from keeping a dream map on the wall to making up dream stories in the car. It is the first in a series of “Essential Guides to Dreams” I have in the works, to share the most useful information on a number of common dream topics. Future episodes will cover nightmares, creating healthy sleep habits, and other topics of interest to parents and the general public. If you want to be notified about them as soon as they are up, you can subscribe to my YouTube channel. Be sure and leave a comment if you have any suggestions for future videos!

Last Thursday marked a milestone for my radio show, Dream Talk Radio, when I broadcast my last live show from the KOWS-fm studio in Occidental. For over three years, I have spent every Thursday from 9-10 am on the air, talking about dreams and sleep health, culture, creativity, and broader social issues. But from now on I will take my show to the cloud, so to speak, broadcasting on podcasts exclusively.

I spent the first ten minutes of last week’s show talking about how Dream Talk Radio came about and how it has evolved since that first live show in January, 2008. Then I aired a really interesting conversation I had just a week earlier with Leo Laporte, whose internet TV network, TWiT-TV, is based just a few miles away in Petaluma. TWiT (This Week in Tech) is currently building a 10,000 sq ft studio in the heart of Petaluma to house its growing broadcast operation, which now includes 40+ hours per week of live streaming video. I talked to Leo about how he built his network, and whether he sees its role in the community changing now that it will have a much bigger physical presence.

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If you are at all interested in where broadcasting is heading in the years to come, I encourage you to listen to the full show (it’s only 25 minutes long). At this point TWiT-TV has millions of viewers every month, and during each live show there can be over a thousand people commenting through an IRC chat. You’ll often see the show host peering down at the computer screen to bring up a point made by someone on the chat in real time, which makes it a very different viewing experience than watching regular TV, but also fascinating in its newness.

As for Dream Talk Radio, I now have up to 1,000 listeners for most of my podcasts, and have many recordings of past shows ready for upload in the near future. I also have several interviews in the works over the next couple months, including an update from Rev. Patrick McCollum about his religious freedom court case.

Not being on the air every week will allow me more freedom in scheduling my shows, but I couldn’t have arrived at this point without the amazing opportunity of having a show on local, low-power FM radio. If you’d like to support my former community radio home, KOWS gladly accepts donations. And if you want to find out about my upcoming shows, I post them on the Dream Talk Radio Facebook page and also on Twitter. It’s a whole new world of radio, people—I hope to see you there!

I love my work as a consultant on digital publishing and social media. It’s fun, I’m good at it, and it allows me time to write and keep up my radio show. Still, I was wondering when I’d get back into teaching, my other love. Now, it seems, is the time.

In 1999 I went back to school for a Doctor of Ministry degree, as a way to step back from all the teaching I’d been doing and reflect on what I’d learned and what I still believed. My dissertation was about women, power and leadership, with insights gleaned from dreamwork, Goddess spirituality, and the principles I’d learned while earning a black belt in aikido. I had seen a lot of examples of how not to hold power, and was convinced that it was possible to do it better, or at least avoid the most egregious errors I’d seen. In my dissertation, I started developing ideas on how to get there.

After graduating in 2003 I wrote a book proposal based on that material, and tried for several years to get it published. (I hope to publish it as an ebook this year.) Meanwhile, a friend asked me if I could teach what I was writing about—namely, how to stay relatively centered while holding authority and working well with others. The outcome was Standing in Spirit, a year-long training and transformative process to deepen personal presence while increasing outward effectiveness.

Leading the Standing in Spirit training for the first time was an amazing experience, and made me feel enthusiastic about teaching again. Then my father died, the economy tanked, and I had to stay focused on other things for a while.

But now it’s a new day, and it feels like a good time to start teaching again. I will be doing dreamwork in Chicago in May, teaching in Portland in July, and in June I am offering a daylong version of Standing in Spirit here in Bodega Bay, for anyone who might be interested. The full day is $50, and will only be open to 10 people.

You can see my full calendar of events here, sign up at the Standing in Spirit Facebook page, and even join my monthly dream group. Getting back into teaching feels great. But having something I’m really excited to teach—that’s the best.