Well it's certainly been a while since I've updated this blog. I had promised myself I was going to keep it up to date but I have fallen behind again. Blessed Aphrodite's titties! It's been more than a month since I've posted on here! A lot has been going on so I've got a lot to catch up on. I'll get the book/quest/challenges-related things done before I get onto the fun topics:
1. Meditation - I've been having fun with meditation over the passed month, I haven't kept up with the daily meditations but I do take the time to ground and center before I get out of bed every morning, and I try to meditate throughout the day as I think of it. I've got to get back into doing my daily yoga/t'ai chi routines now that I'm home from Fest for the summer.
2. Aphrodite's Magic - Saturnine and I did the second chord - the eye of beauty - a bit early last month because she was going to be in town and it was kind of one of those things you had to do together, since skype wasn't really a viable option for full-body-viewing and beauty seeking. It was very interesting as far as experiences go - we went to the mall and sat down in the food court and watched women walk by. We noted what beauty we could see outwardly, what we liked about each woman as she was walking by; then we looked for the Goddess in each woman and what type of Goddess energy they were giving off specifically. After we had lunch and did this exercise we went back to my house and did the final part of the ritual, where we looked at each other and found the beauty in each other and ourselves. My second cord (which I still have to buy since I'm slacking here majorly) is going to be a burgundy, wine coloured cord, the word to describe my beauty was, and the name of my cord was, wine. My goddess energy was like that of the sun, bright and happy, but the wine colour and name makes me think of the party goddesses, or if there was a female version of Dionysus.
Anyways, now it is almost time for the third chord so I need to get back on track and buy that 2nd cord before I move on to the third one!
3. The Earth Path - I have been reading this, slowly but surely, and I believe I am on the 5th or 6th chapter of it, in which Starhawk is talking about 'Air', I didn't feel like I had anything to say about the 'Creation' chapter which is where she was discussing evolution and such, so I didn't blog about it, and I got behind on reading it when I started getting ready to go to Fest and completely forgot I owned a purse (which is where my book was) while I was at Fest, so I need to pick that back up and get back into it.
4. Mind/Body/Spirit/Home - Well I started out really strong in this, I was reading a little bit every day for Mind; doing Yoga/T'ai Chi and eating healthily for Body; meditating or contemplating some spiritual thing every day for Spirit; and doing laundry, cleaning my room or cooking dinner for my parents and I for Home. Then I kept forgetting one of the four tasks, or I got sidetracked by packing that I forgot to do yoga, and then I was at fest, where it was all about 'mind, body, spirit', but my tent was a mess so I did horribly at 'home' .... now I'm home and I'm just so exhausted that I have yet to get back into this. But it's only Tuesday and I got home Sunday afternoon, so I will be getting back into this today.
Okay I think that's all I needed for housekeeping on the various challenges, so now on to my experience at Spirits of the Earth Festival 2011!
So first off - BEST YEAR YET! *happy dance* Alright so now that I've gotten that off my chest, it was a really great time. Nick and I went together to Spirits this year, we drove up in 'my' car, all our stuff fit into the car perfectly, since we only had one of everything except for our clothes and shoes. We got along fantastically, no bickering, we were joking and having a good time like the whole week. When we got there, we set up the tent first and then brought everything over to get it all set up in campsite formation. We were camping in this one clearing on the trail to the revel fire, between the two bridges. If you think of it like a quadrant graph, we were in the lower right quadrant of the circle, Momo showed up with a 10-person-tent for himself and took up the entire upper right quadrant; Cally and Ro; Jacqui and Lindsay; Tom; Lisa and Monica; Tovah; Lindsay; and Mike in order around the circle from lower left quadrant up to upper left quadrant took over the other side of the circle with the path running a little closer to the right side than dead center of the graph. ( | ) if you had to draw it out. [*laughs* Gods I'm neurotic sometimes] Anyways, we set up camp and then went off to explore. Still had to cross the rickety-freaking-rope-bridge to get to the revel fire and back to camp, which when you're drunk/baked, is REALLY creepy and it seems to go on forever, like the hallway in The Shining.
The first night, Tuesday, was a big drinking party where they had the 13 Mountain Mystery Brews set up so everyone got to try them and mostly everyone got REALLY drunk! Then there was karaoke! Oh gods it was hilarious and bad at the same time. Nick was in his kilt (actually he pretty much wore the kilt the whole time - it was nice *wink wink*) and was drunkenly dancing around talking in a weird Irish/Scottish accent. It was most hilarious.
Wednesday night was Water Night, which was pretty fun, however the energy wasn't quite as powerful as I remember from previous years, but it was the first night, so it was just getting off it's feet and started to get going.
Thursday was Earth Night, which should've been ridiculously energetic, but they had a Dionysus ritual going on before the revel fire and elemental tribute, so the energy and drummers got divided between rituals and it basically fizzled out as badly as if it had poured down rain again like it did last year.
Friday was Air Night, which in my opinion was the revel with the most energy since it was when the Dragon Ritual Drummers helped us do a voodoo ritual to bless the fire and the festival for another 8 years. Not to mention we also had this amazing band do a concert beforehand, called Frenchy and the Punk (formerly known as The Gypsy Nomads) and they really got the energy in the place going prior to the voodoo blessing ritual. The Air tribute was also really awesome, and Ro started running around and acting like a wood sprite, hiding behind trees staring at people and then running through the crowd to the other side of the circle. It was hilarious to watch and pretty much perfectly described the energy of the night.
Saturday was Fire Night where we had the DRD playing their concert of the night and the Fire elemental tribute, which had lots of dancing (pagan rotisserie dance or you get scorched by the fire!) and drumming and high energy.
It was a lot of fun and having Nick there with me to flirt and dance with, sit in the camp chairs in the afternoon and read books while listening to the open mic workshop come down on the breeze, cuddle up to at night and talk about everything with. It was a blast and I do believe it was my best fest yet, and I've been coming to Spirits of the Earth every summer for 3 years now. I missed having Saturnine with me to be all wisdom and pagan mama-y with me and make me go to the workshops, but I also liked the chilling out and not attending workshops too. I was sad that David Ellis-Barron and Justin Burk were unable to be with us this year due to their passing away, but I swear I saw them out of the corner of my eye around the festival (walking in the woods, dancing and drumming around the fire) throughout the week, and I felt their spirits there with us.
All in all it was a great fest experience, I met a LOT of new friends, had a fun week away from the city and enjoyed myself thoroughly, but I am glad to be home now, as I'm tanned and exhausted from being outside all the time. It was great to get away, but I'm glad to be home now.
Well that's all I have for now, and I will post again when I get further into the Earth Path book, and when Saturnine and I do the third cord later in the week for the full moon.
Blessed Be!
Jade
