the opening and closing of various gates...

...and so another year ends, in sickness and in health...good fortunes to perfectly balance the bad...a year that canceled itself out, more or less...I let it go out quietly, hoping for a louder season, a much much brighter, louder season this next circling of the sun...sometimes we relish the quiet...but may we not go gently this time around...life being for the living and all of that...Happy Janus' Day...

Myth of the day: Cingaya the Beautiful, Virgin of the 5 Towns (A Basque Legend)

This is a Basque tale that echoes the tale of Dante and Beatrice somewhat, albeit with a much happier ending...

http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/basque/lbp/lbp11.htm

Return of the Reverend Adam...

Good news for a new year...Reverend Glasseye is officially back together! One hopes this means they will be touring. One of the best shows I ever saw on the tiny stage at Vaudeville...

Gwenhwyfar lived to be old, Elaine did not...

...and the girls we once were float down the River to time and go under. Drowned, we all assume.

But then again...lots of unexplained, feminine looking, sword brandishing hands emerging from the misty waters in these stories...had to have come from somewhere, originally...it's not as though they ever found the bodies...dead is not always so very dead in faery tales...

Strange dreams and disrupted R.E.M. Sleep as a direct result of bizarre Jungian reading material...

Found a copy of a book I read when I was 17 or thereabouts. I remember the gist of it, but none of the actual story.

Forgot what an esoteric MythoLiterary Geek I used to be...

I asked for an Oxford Unabridged dictionary for Christmas when I was 15 and improvised a TV Tray podium for it and the purloined single volume patent leather bound Complete Works of Shakespeare that I had snuck off the family reference shelf to read for fun in moments of idle brooding.

I used to keep a photocopied black and white portrait of Percy Shelley in my notebook the way most teenage girls pin up bubblegum idols. Ask Lizzie. Lizzie was way more Lord Byron. Coincidentally, or maybe notsomuch, Bowie around that time did a short film for the "Blue Jean" extended video in which he played a character called "Screaming Lord Byron."

The fish ate Shelley's face. That's how he died, or rather he drowned in Italy, but by the time they found his body the fish had eaten his face. It seemed important to us at the time, but of course by then he'd have been long dead anyway...

Gratefulness: 7 things on a Sunday Morning

1)Listening to our local "pirate" radio station run by baby Anarchists:www.freeradiochukshon.org

2)Breakfast is hostess cupcakes and mexican dark coffee with cream on the porch with candles and incense and the Sunday paper. Dishes can wait...

3)We won, we won, we fucking won...I volunteered my time and $5 I couldn't afford to a candidate that actually won! I kind of feel like a Timequake has occurred (apologies to K. Vonnegut) and the spiritual resurgence of Clinton era ideals actually makes me 19 again somehow. I feel like it's finally safe to start my life over again and do things right this time.

4)Time is tight and money's even tighter, but I am getting more resourceful by the minute. This morning, for instance, I have thrown a pot of beef stew in the oven for lunch,simultaneously lowering our heating bill and preventing wasteful takeout food spending. If it ever came down to it, I know how to make vinegar out of raw apple cider, for fuck's sake, I got pioneer survival skills, I can certainly live without ordering pizza on a Friday night or two...

5)Spent this Friday night watching Jimmy Stewart movies with my 6 year old and eating white cheddar popcorn and leftover Halloween candy while my 11 year old wrote "littlest pet shop" screenplays in MS Notepad to be acted out with her sister later.

6)Got enough sleep for a change. I could have slept for years. I love it when the seasons change because in summer the daylight and the heat start seeping in early in the morning on weekends and you can never get back to sleep. The downside of our Arizona existence.

7)The depression I didn't know I was in is slowly lifting. My mind is not blocked and I can write again. I feel like I can stand the company of other people again. My thoughts have time to drift again and it feels like the world will not suffer and drown for their drifting.

Election MySpace digest...

Wednesday, November 05, 2008 We can be Heroes (forever and ever) Current mood: luminous Category: Life I watched the race called for Obama at 9pm last night on CNN at the Red Garter - somebody had put "Heroes" on the jukebox. It could not have been more perfect. I feel joy. Pure and simple joy. Maybe, just maybe, the world will be a better place again. Happy Guy Fawkes Day, by the way. And Happy Birthday to Tina, could you ask for a better present? Peace. Currently listening : Imagine By John Lennon Release date: 2000-04-11 7:39 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment - Edit - Remove

Monday, November 03, 2008 Kilgore Trout Said It Best... Current mood: anxious "You were sick, but now you are well again. And there's work to be done." Happy Election Day. Do The Right Thing. You know what it is... Currently listening : The Clash (U.S. Version) By The Clash Release date: 2000-01-25 11:02 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment - Edit - Remove

Wednesday, October 15, 2008 The "Autism Vote" is not up for grabs... Category: News and Politics I am offended at John McCain's attempts to use his VP pick as a basis to court the "autism vote" throughout the debate tonight. My very bright but autistic child needs healthcare and educational opportunities and a brighter economic future, not just sympathy. Do not insult me by courting me as part of a demographic but failing to address the actual needs of that demographic. How are you going to help children with autism? By nominating a woman with an autistic niece? Well, if that's your plan you have still not answered my question. If your really want to court my vote as an "autism mom" either offer up actual policies that give me hope or nominate a neuroscientist but don't insult me with vague intimations that I will have some sort of "friend in the White House" because your running mate has a disabled child. Being related to an autistic child does not make you an autism expert. And while choosing to have a Down's Syndrome child may be as hard or harder than raising an autistic child, this is again not a qualification to influence public policy.This does not make her any more of an expert on childhood disability than I am. Hell, my kid is older than hers, so I have seniority in that regard, frankly... 7:38 PM - 5 Comments - 8 Kudos - Add Comment - Edit - Remove

Still struggling to find my lost voice. Perhaps I should post a flyer on a telephone pole. My gutlessness is a daily disappointment to the carrion birds.

Contents Under Pressure May Explode...

Inarticulation has reached critical mass. I have always been so good at holding things together even when I don't hold things together. Pathologically even tempered. Lately though I feel like I am on 24 hour permanent on call status for everyone. I have so much I am responsible for everywhere that I cannot get anything done anywhere. I have reached the proverbial breaking point. One thing on the pile too many. I am a raw and aching nerve. I am irrationally, inexpressably angry and anxious and unable to cope. I know a lot of this is hormone related. The timing is not coincidental - I a bleeding and raging and I am a pathetic disintegrative mess. I think I used to feel this way more often, it's just foreign to me know and I can't process the anger that comes with it, other than to hole up in my room or in a corner and neglect everything I should be doing rather than risk snapping at someone or something. My house is a wreck. There are no clean dishes left. I have to work tomorrow. I can't sleep. My escape the house for the evening plans got cancelled at the last minute. I want to scream and break things or just give up but Ibut I know this will all seem trite and silly in the morning or in a day or whenever it stops.

La Loteria...

I've just randomly discovered that those eerie images one sees on Downtown area folkart matchbooks and wooden ladder games does indeed have a history...You know, the images of "The Mermaid" and "El Diablo" and "El Corazon?" The official name is Loteria and it's yet another example of wild and uncultivated mythology echoing Appalachian English Folk Songs or the African pantheons in Santeria

Loteria is one among many semi-ancient traditions still alive in Mexico by way of long journeys through history, migration and traditional lore. It is part Tarot, part "bingo" game and part esoteric mystery cult. The cards are the symbolic answers to riddles or rather the question to each answer, like a Jeapordy game hosted by the Sphynx...

A guide to Loteria Riddles
Examples:
"The Blanket of the Poor" equals The Sun
"He that sang to St. Peter will not return to sing again" is The Rooster

There's not a lot out on the web re the deeper meaning of all this, but being who I am I am of course about to go all Robert Graves on it and traverse the wilds of the electronic frontier to delve into the history and meaning of it all. Armchair Mythologists of the world unite and take over...

..

Currently listening : In the Aeroplane Over the Sea By Neutral Milk Hotel Release date: 1998-02-10

Cliffhanger

I am inexplicably queasy this morning. End of summer migraine weirdness. It is a Monday in August of a year in which our cultural and societal debt is being referred to third party collections and our planet is on the verge of being repossessed by the forces of nature. It's a scary time to be alive, I guess. Yet somehow we persist. Maybe out of a desire to see what happens next. How can we possibly get ourselves out of this mess. Tune in next week to see...

William Blake Tarot reading of the day...

	The left card represents an important element of the past. Sun: Being illuminated by imagination and inspiration. Liberation from old patterns. Realization of your personal goals. Radiating joy, finding delight in life. A feeling of Returning to the Source. Angels on your shoulders. Things flowing smoothly. Dawning consciousness. Cutting away from the past. Feeling welcomed and at ease.
	The middle card represents a deciding element of the present. Eight of Music (Discontent): "Clouded with discontent & brooding in their minds terrible things". Disappointment or dissatisfaction. Troubled emotions below the surface. Feeling at the mercy of circumstances. Possibility of emotional breakdown. Fears of what may happen. Apprehensions about the unknown. Paranoia. Feelings of missing out on something. Former values and friends no longer interest you. Wanting to escape the situation. In the creative process: Psychodrama and emotional torments can serve as imaginative stimulants. Expressing and documenting what you feel can be artful as well as healing.
	The right card represents a critical element of the future. Union: The successful coming-together of something vitally important to you. Getting your act together at last. The joining of male and female forces, or unification or inner and outer life. Not holding anything back. Being at the center. Completion. Spiritual