Snow

It's a beautiful early spring day here in my neighbhorhood. The trees outside my apartment are starting to bud, and I anticipate an explosion of pink flowers within days.

However I'm aware that more than a few folks on my friends list are still dealing with snow. So I offer this in empathy:


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From the Files

I was sifting through some not-in-file-folders miscellany a few minutes ago and found this magazine image. Something about it caught and held my attention, and I studied it for a long time, sifting through and analyzing my feelings. Finally a realization hit home harder than it ever has before.

I didn't tear this page from the magazine because I could imagine myself looking or dressing like this woman someday, or embodying the less obvious qualities she and her star pendant expressed to me. I tore it out because I thought she looked like my heroine alter ego.

I never had any expectation that I would -- or could -- be any part of the life my alter ego lived. I didn't even try, because the context of that fantasy was so far removed from real life there was no point.

And so I grew up without the slightest genuine investment in my own future. I looked out for my immediate needs: getting the expected education, holding jobs that would keep me in food and shelter and books, and never thought about what the consequences of those choices (and non-choices) would be in the years ahead.

I never tore pictures from magazines because they looked like how *I* wanted to look, or to give me ideas about what *I* could do or be in this life. It was always about her, the other me who had the life I wanted -- but which was so safely removed from reality I never had to risk anything to try to achieve it.

Maybe that's too hard on myself. Maybe I truly did not see any options before me that ignited my passions, and so I imagined a passionate life in a place where those options did exist. The end result is the same: my current life, which is only just beginning to become something that I can be proud of, someplace where my true self is beginning to be expressed outwardly instead of hidden in code in secret notebooks.

I realized recently that one of the things I need to surrender is my heroine alter ego. I don't think about her much anymore, but she is the product of my fundamental belief that I could not do or be who I truly wanted to be in this lifetime. She has to go, to make room for the authentic self which I am finally daring to express.

More Clearing and Releasing

I've found something else I need to release to Ereshkigal. . .

( Behind a cut for those who read this in my primary journal. )

Descent: Intention

I didn't do my descent ritual last night. When I finally realized what time it was, not only was it too late, I knew in my gut that I wasn't ready.

I'm ready now.

I know why I'm doing this. I know what I'm going to leave behind.

When Inanna went down, the seven gatekeepers of the underworld took her regalia from her piece by piece. That's not how I'm going down. I'm not going down as an invader. I'm going down as a daughter of Ereshkigal, one who aspires to Her priesthood. I'm not going to be humbled by the gatekeepers. I get to walk into the throne room and submit myself directly to Her.

I know what I need to give up, what I need to surrender -- and it's not going to be as easy as removing a crown or a gown. I'm giving up things that have been deeply a part of myself. And because it must be a voluntary sacrifice, I essentially get to perform surgery on myself.

As I was writing out what I needed to do, I wished fervently for an ordeal master or mistress to preside over this process, to set and hold the space, to challenge, to confront, to urge me deeper. There is no such person here. Only me. I aspire to such a role, and it looks like I get to start by doing it for myself.

I'm going down alone. I can feel LM behind me, nuzzling my neck, assuring me that all will be well, that I'm ready for this and that doing it alone is necessary. He can't go with me, can't help. None of my allies can go with me.

This is between me and Her.

I once was privileged to be the drummer for a shamanic healing session in which the shamanka used a bird claw as a tool to dig out and remove old pain trapped in the client. I feel like I need something like that this afternoon: some kind of pronged device which can cut into my self and help me expose and excise what needs to be released.

Like I said: surgery on myself. . . .

Another QoS

While sorting through boxes, I found my Housewife's Tarot.

( This lady does seem more than a bit familiar. . . . )