A Plum of a Lammas

The fruit hang heavy on the old plum tree in the back yard. Tomorrow morning I will pick a bucketful to share. I’ll be spending the weekend in Sonoma with friends, planning the restorative we are offering at fall equinox – A Fool’s Journey.

Tomorrow is Lammas, a cross-quarter marker in the turning of the seasons that Witches and Pagans hold sacred. A year ago I was grieving an old friend’s death and feeling the harbingers of the increasing dark. This year Lammas finds me harvesting fruit, celebrating good work done, and tending the planting for a further harvest.

Just this week, a project/revolution I envisioned well over a year ago was finally fully manifested. The Reclaiming web page now has in it’s resource section a huge list of blogs and webpages. Furthermore, there is even a widget we can add to our blogs that streams in new entries.

Taking this juicy success, along with my plums, to the retreat this weekend is satisfying beyond words. I am hopeful I can sustain that feeling throughout and beyond the weekend.

After years of teaching “intensives”, I am looking forward to being part of creating a “restorative”. Teaching Witchcamp intensives has historically involved meeting for a few days before the camp. Holed up in someone’s living room or basement, teachers meet for hours and hours upon end, breaking only to eat and minimally stretch, than back to meeting. Oh, and usually at least two of the people are completely jet lagged. Out of this comes an overview of the week’s rituals, most usually scrapped by day two or three when the magic takes a different turn. However, the intensity of the meetings does forge a bond between the teachers that at best creates a solid team. At worst, all the irritations and power struggles between the teachers creates a template for that week’s interpersonal drama.

I’m hopeful that the planning of this restorative in itself follows a different pattern than planning an intensive. No one will be jet lagged. We don't have the crunch of planning for a camp that starts in three days. We will be talking around and in a pool, modeling the sacred lounging I hope to invoke at the restorative. No doubt there will be some interpersonal struggles and/or small irritations, but we all know each other pretty well and nobody in the group tends to run with scissors. And...what's the problem with community? People. We are the fly in our own ointment. That's a given.

There’s so many ways to practice magic.

One of them is by growing, harvesting, sharing and eating plums.

The Internet Dances in the Aquarian Age

As Bowie sung, "Let's Dance."

Yes, across this green globe, let's dance.

Thank you, Matt Harding and friends. You know that heaven is under your feet and it is here and here and here.

the spell of the staycation

This past weekend I embarked on what hopefully will be the beginning of an annual tradition. I went on a staycation; staying close to home but experiencing it from a different angle. Traveling a few short miles across the Golden Gate, I took the first turnoff, and checked in at the newly restored Fort Baker, now called “Cavallo Point”.

What better way to spend the fourth of July than at the transformed army base in my backyard? For three blissful days I inhabited a world where soldier housing and marching grounds have morphed into a restorative retreat center, complete with a healing center, spa, and basking pool. What was once a new military base in 1905 is now a new luxurious eco hotel in 2008. I spent the weekend living and envisioning a world in which military bases become obsolete and are converted into retreat and educational centers.

I went on my staycation with my girlfriend and two other queer San Francisco couples. This, too, was part of the magic. Three years ago, three of us were becoming friends, and all of us were single. This staycation was the first outing for us together as couples. The ghosts and spirits of place seemed happy to welcome us, and I felt the power of three in the relaxed way that conversation flowed, laughter erupted, and we eased into time alone and together.

On the Fourth of July, we walked up the hill as the night fell to find a place to watch the fireworks and happened on a spot where we could see them from Sausalito, Napa, Marin, Berkeley, Oakland, and just barely over the fog of San Francisco. Fireworks behind fog look and sound like a city under siege…like bombs bursting in air. Watching my beloved city across the water being eerily lit in red and fog, like smoke, swirling with each boom was an experience I won’t soon forget. Especially given that I was watching this while so much of our state is still burning.

Usually I spend the fourth of July at home, where the Mission district looks and sounds like a war zone. My guess is my neighborhood would win hands down in the contest for most illegal and dodgy number of fireworks going off per block. I watch anxiously from my deck, hoping and praying that sparks don’t fall and catch my roof on fire, making sure the hose is within easy reach. Meanwhile, the sound and light of explosions is constant in the night sky as well as the sound of police sirens going this way and that.

Standing on the hill across the bay, flowers of fire blooming above the hills across the bay in all directions, explosions lighting the city behind a dark fog bank, I wasn’t worried about where the hose was and I wasn’t on edge hearing howls of terrified neighborhood dogs. From across the bay, I was awestruck. We entertain others for miles with brilliant and inventive fireworks. We remodel forts into hotels serving up organic fare from local farms. Our creativity seems limitless. Breathing into that night sky, I prayed for peace and I prayed for transformations of all kinds, beyond my imagining.

Three lesbian couples go a few miles from home, with the tip of the Golden Gate always in sight and the city shimmering in view according to the whim of the moving curtains of fog. At least once an hour there is an exclamation of gratitude from somebody for the beauty we surrounded by, and by the incredible feeling of peace that emanates from this renovated fort. We watch fireworks together, imagining a future where fireworks are the only man-made explosions that light up the sky of cities and towns around the world. We laugh, feast, throw the tarot, take hikes and bask around the pool. We love.

There’s many ways to do spell work. The best is living it.

Life is a Bridge

It’s been an action packed solstice season. After spending that evening contentedly feasting and conversing with some of my magical family, I crossed the Bay Bridge to go back home. Right after Treasure Island, the traffic slowed down and soon after my car became engulfed in noxious fumes. Several motorists started yelling “Lady, your car is on fire!” The moon was bright and full above the bridge, and the night was unusually warm. Everything was beautiful, except of course that my car was smoking to high heavens in the middle of a traffic jam. We all survived, the car included, but it was hard on both the nerves and the bank account. What I remember most vividly that night, besides the smell of my burning car, is just how exquisitely breathtaking the moon was above the city and how the bay was sparkling with light.

I was going to write so much more, but I think I’ll stop with what happened that night, because, really, what more needs to be said? Pretty much everything that has happened before and since could be encoded into the living dream of my solstice night. I have pleasant encounters with people I love, I've gone forward and gotten stuck, something dramatic happens, it costs me, and somehow, eventually, I go forward again, with plenty of slowing down and breaking/braking to eat good food and enjoy the company of those I love. And, through it all, the sun or moon is high above, and there’s beauty all around.