one surprised carrot!

In the past year I’ve been combing thru the teachings of both Feri and Reclaiming, questioning what still works for me and what needs refinement, if not downright jettisoning. In the last few days I’ve been thinking about what Victor Anderson, the founder of Feri, had to say about birthdays. Victor stated that our birthday is the most important pagan holiday. The day of our birth, and the birthdays of those we love, is certainly worth holding in high spiritual regard. It’s a miracle, this gift of birth, this gift of life. It makes sense that we honor and celebrate it, remembering that our own personal journey thru the lifecycle reverberates with the stories of the god/desses, is in fact the story of one divinity within a pantheon of other divine beings.

However, I don’t believe that the day of our birth is the most important holiday; I think it’s here that Victor’s weakness for the grand pronouncement shows, and the “I” ness of Feri reveals itself. Holding the celebration of our birth above celebrating the sacredness of the turning of the wheel, creates a linear model of reality, as opposed to embracing the interconnectivity of all things. What’s more important, the soup or the carrot? I’m for worshipping both, and scoffing at the concept that underlies that question. However, I’m grateful for Victor pointing out the importance of birthdays. Placing the date of our birth on the calendar of sacred celebrations is an important addition to pagan theology, one that places our divinity within the seasonal celebrations of the turning of the wheel, and one that helps restore immanence of the sacred to the human experience. In celebrating the seasons of the year, we celebrate and honor the soup of life. Honoring our birthday, we celebrate the sacredness of the particular spice and flavor that we add to it. (thank you, Magda, for your soup and carrot analogy!)

Last year, on Febuary 9^th, I turned fifty. That weekend I had a huge party. It turned out to be a party at which almost every one of my friends and family participated in….even if they couldn’t make it. A huge extravagant bouquet of flowers, with a raven in the mix, was hand-delivered at midnight from my friends in D.C. People went all out. That party strengthened my belief that some of the most powerful rituals we have as human beings is a good party. Connections are made, bonds strengthened, and energy raised, with the intent of the party shaping the magic. My birthday party was a real act of magic, events of that night rippled out in the following months in all sorts of unexpected ways, and I started my 50’s feeling loved, rich in friends, a goddess among many.

I’ve had my years feeling the shadow side of birthdays, feeling disappointed or let down. During my marriage, more than twice my husband walked out of expensive restaurants, leaving me to pay the tab. Celebrating your own divinity and specialness is challenging, but it can also be challenging for those close to you as well. Like all the other holidays, birthdays bring up “issues”. An ex-lover of mine had major issues with the fact that she shared the same birthday with my son. Sharing birthdays, it’s just not good. My housemates share theirs, and it’s challenging, to say the least. Celebrating the specialness of the carrot in the soup gets messed up when the onion is celebrated at the same time.

Given the blowout of last year, I’d decided against any house celebration, and made a date to go out for drinks and dinner on Thursday, the day of my birth . Birthday week started this past Friday, when the shadow hit hard in the form of my feelings getting hurt by someone I love who’d taken a powder during my birthday last year. I went into the weekend with old demons flying around my head, feeling the loss of my hopes for both that relationship, and loss of connection or meaning in regards to the public rituals of local Reclaiming.

Sunday morning, my housemates were taking me to brunch. We’d planned this weeks in advance, given we all have busy lives, and mindful that I didn’t want celebrations at the house this year. On Saturday I had a blowout argument with one of them over white lies. I felt triggered for some reason about being lied to, and I accused her of being way too facile with white lying. An hour later, I blamed menopause.

By Sunday morning, our argument was repaired, and I got in the car with the two of them. I quickly felt my blood pressure rising, as our reservation was at a restaurant that is popular and won’t hold on to tables for long, and we had to retrieve a wallet left at another restaurant, and then the other housemate wanted to go in to use the bathroom, and parking was a bitch. Grumpily, my birthday demons flying around (not loved, not special, nobody really trying to get us to the restaurant on time) I followed them into the restaurant.

Then….paradigm shift, moment of revelation. There it was, a huge set table, surrounded by twenty some beautiful women friends, all beaming their love at me. I was surprised. Completely. My housemate had been telling all sorts of white lies, but they had been about this. Sometimes being psychic is just not enough. I’d been glimpsing things thru the glasses of the birthday demons, the ones that say we are doomed and fucked, unloved, and unlovable, alone and unappreciated in the cold soup of life. Those glasses I’m hoping are permanently retired, replaced by the clear vision of what I’ve made of this life, what a fabulous mixture I’m integral to. I’m surprised. Really, I am. I realized I’d never in my life had a surprise party, and I now understand the power of this, the potency. That party shocked me, it was a direct plunge from the forge into Brigid’s well. Victor was certainly right that birthdays matter, that they demand celebration. Tempered by the importance and sacredness of the turning wheel of the seasons, this is quite a tasty dish, this life!