Get Lost With Me

  

     I feel like I'm way behind with everything, but I also feel like I've been up to a lot, and some how I'm still accomplishing something.

     Here's what I mean, the beginning of the year (was supposed to have) started with writing poems, tarot, and writing for this blog in general. Shortly there after, I picked up a book, because literally every writer/author says you have to read A LOT to write, and I'm beginning to see the truth to that, while reading tarot cards stopped being for 'me' and became plot ideas, story lines and character backgrounds for something else, a lot of somethings in fact. Guess this is where I point out it's hard for me to stick to one thing. Anyways, not that it sounds like much, I've got a little bit of everything going on, mostly centered around writing, and am close to finishing my third book (which is a lot for me). 

    I guess that's what I've really been focusing on, reading and writing. I can't remember wanting something as badly as I want to be an actual writer. How badly I want to make it a part of my life, to be my life. I'm over wondering if it sounds silly or not. I may not know much about my family history, which I was discussing with a sweet Druid previously, but I know my writing comes from my dad's own passion and I need mine to go somewhere. For the both of us. 

    The current book I'm reading is called "Thunder and Lightning" by Natalie Goldberg. It came highly recommended, and though I'm a few pages from the end, I cannot describe how completely inspiring it has become. I started it with the attitude that she has no idea how hard it is. How hard it is to live in the middle class, to not make enough to even be considered so - to live in poverty, to have the government screw you left and right and every time you think you're getting somewhere, you're kicked right back into a never ending abyss of darkness. It is thanks to my dad though that I can accept all my own faults as my own and that I am the only one that can change them. While I'm completely aware that most companies, schools and hospitals and the lot are out for money and really provide no well being for anyone, I know there are still good people too. People who work hard and love and give a damn about what they do.

    Natalie is one of those people, the ones that really care about what they do, going out and seeking answers, inspiration, the reasons to why and how and connecting with the students she teaches. This was, is, such an uplifting switch from Chuck Palahniuk's book "Diary" about an artist who wanted love and happiness and was doomed to the life of an artistic genius and a terrible cult-like lifestyle. I think I was so out of sorts when I finished the book because I was so attached to the main character, Misty. I saw myself in her, and I broke over and over for her. 

“your handwriting. the way you walk. which china pattern you choose. it's all giving you away. everything you do shows your hand. everything is a self portrait. everything is a diary.” 

-Chuck Palahniuk, Diary

    
     There's a point to that quote, but I'm not going into it, and I have no intentions of forgetting it any time soon.

     A few of the books and comics I manage to have read lately (before the new year) have left me angry, but I guess I cannot always have some happy ending. 

    I don't know if I expect anything out of writing... Natalie starts "Thunder and Lighting" with a warning. The first sentence reads,

                                                           "I have not seen writing lead to happiness in my friend's lives."

    

    She goes on to talk about her life writing, her practice with Zazen... how she spent weeks with his master before she realized she was depressed. Then, she goes on and talks about a friend that she did all sorts of things with to cheer up and it was writing practice that got her back into the groove. I guess what I've taken from this, is that while it's hard to write, to structure a novel and put your heart and soul out there on the marketplace for the literal world (to consume should they want too) is that writing is some sort of beast within us. It tells us when it wants to be let out, either with a loud roar or a hungry growl of some unfulfilled desire, some guttural cry spewing words over pages that may not make sense until later. Eventually, every beast is sated for awhile, full... accomplished. Then we're left with a longing for that high, that wild side again.

    I might not be some artistic genius, and I might not be great at writing, but be damned if I don't try and sit down and get something out every day, if I'm not sneaking scraps of paper used as test tickets for my machine at work because I've got what I think is some amazing idea, or sentence to start something with. I'm constantly looking for inspiration, like that blizzard we had here the other day that once I started writing what I was seeing, I was connecting it to things from when I was younger and growing up. There's that old friend that's suddenly back in my life and a mess of history that has me out of sorts, or the lovely Druid I mentioned before who writes poetry like I've never read before - I like poetry a lot but it's hard for me to feel truly moved by it unless it happens to be something by Edgar Allen Poe.

    I fully believe that one day I will hit my stride, and that everything in the meantime are notes and practice and little diary entries and scribbles on the portrait that is my life. I fully believe that tarot and witchcraft, and reading, and taking in all the small things have really helped me grow in the last year, and with hoping I'm going back to school in the next few months, I can only think it's all uphill from here. 

The Middle and the Poor Class

    While it may sound like the title to some heated debate, I promise I'm not going there. It is more like I'm trying to figure it out for myself, or I'm just mad because I work a dead-end job, have skills that won't be of use anywhere else, and would much rather be writing from home, or at least doing something a little less tedious and a lot more soul-moving if that makes any sense.

    I'm sure the last thing anyone wants to hear is someone who can't get anywhere complain, which yes, is sort of what I'm doing, but I'm trying to fix it too. I have no problem owning up to my own mistakes, my own faults, and while it isn't the easiest trying to do something about it, I'm not completely discouraged.

    It was a post on Twitter that has me writing this, even if it is later useless. It was a post for a job to write for an online community with things that deal with pop culture. Some of the requirements that it wanted were already have a large follower base across multiple social media platforms, and the time to write three to five articles a week. Talk about time being a faster killer than usual... The not so funny thing is that I'm writing this as I count down the seconds until i have to get ready and leave for work.

     Please don't get me wrong though, the fact i even have a job means more than anything. I might complain, I  might hate it a lot of the time, but it DOES pay the bills, it lets me purchase things on my own no one in their right mind would buy for me (eighty crystals, and twenty more Funko Pops please), and when I have some extra I can help out other people as well. They say you the more money you have the more greedy you become, at least, that's what it seems like, and sure there are people who donate a good portion of it, but lets me real, how many are doing it for tax write offs? 

    Okay, enough of that, I said I wasn't going to get into it. 

    Anyways, it's just one of those things where I'd like to believe I'd try to do good by others. 

    The whole point to this is that I am only twenty five and I've watched the world change so much. I know the kinds of responses people think towards this... yes, I know I haven't seen war, or fought for the right to vote, or was held against my will because my race is full of assholes... But I've seen gas shoot up so high that minimum wage barely covered it, I learned how to live from paycheck to paycheck because that's what my parents did, what they do. No one knew how to help me get into college because no one had ever been there themselves, and when I finally made it in, I didn't know anyone to have and sort of 'IN' to land myself a job, even when I was promised work-study benefits. Should I have tried harder? Probably. Was I eighteen and clueless. Hell yes.

     Even now, my last few jobs I had were attained with the help of someone I knew that already worked there. Resumes are words on paper, those tests you take after you fill out an application, they are fake, terrible representations of you. I cannot tell you the anxiety I get when I have to take a test, let alone to give someone what they want to hear and have the test come back with something along the lines of 'you should not hire this person, ever. Do not even consider them.' 

    So yes, while I greatly dislike my job, and it pays the bills, it's also the hardest thing to find another, because stress, anxiety, depression, they're killers too, and right now, I just work my ass off in the hopes of raises and being able to afford to go back to school. There's a reason I don't live on my own anymore, perhaps a few of them and I'm sure they're not hard to figure out. I also know I'm not the only one in such a situation, that there are lots of us out there, and plenty of us worse off. I have so much love and respect for those who fight, who keep going; For those who do have it together and are making it, making something of themselves, and while I'm sure I probably don't have much right to write about any of this, I too am going to keep fighting, and firmly believe that none of us are alone, and we all need one another.

All that is gold does not glitter,

Not all those who wander are lost;

The old that is strong does not wither,

Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

"All That is Gold Does Not Glitter"
J. R. R. Tolkien

Not in the Cards

    Some days I pull one card from my tarot deck(s), some days I pull multiples just because I feel the tug too, then occasionally I become bold, light incense or candles, throw on some meditative themed music and go to town. On top of everything that has been going on this week (we're only two days in...) and last week, I've done such a thing; I found, and or made the time to sit down with my cards to see if I was ready to, I don't know, walk with my deities. 

    This has been an on going fancy of mine, and I suppose for most practicing witches, we all want to make altars to someone, to represent them, call on them for aid and guidance, in those dark places when we're alone or want that extra kick to our spells. I'm the last person who should be talking about spell work, but I do feel I can talk a little about my journey thus far. Besides, keeping track of the lot of this is really for me anyways (though of course i'm always going to hope it appeals to someone else). 

    So yes, this past week that lead into Monday is where I'm at now, trying to figure out of deities work is right for me, or if I'm even ready for them. Well, leave it the cards to tell you what they think you need to know, not what you want to hear, which I kinda wish was the case this time. While I've gathered it's a, you're not ready yet kind of answer, I know they cannot be far, not with the dream that cause me to pull the cards in the first place. 

    

    The picture above is what my bed wound up looking liked Monday morning, tarot, oracles, incense and crystals abound. It had started out as a three card draw. One from each of the three decks I've been working with lately. Two of them were created by lovely Instagram users mysticmoons_tarot and her lovely moon_phases_oracle along with thymewitch and her tarotinthyme oracle. There's something about the love and energy that goes into these, something so different then picking up a deck in the store, and while I don't want to get too involved at the moment, I've had the privilege of following them and their journeys through creating them and I think that's where a lot of the magic is to begin with. More and more I find myself wanting to create my own. 

    

    It's not the clearest picture as the lighting in my room is terrible, it was still something I needed, to catch the moment and to keep to journal about later, plus, now I get to employ it in this blog. Anyways, the first three cards I pulled were the Seven of Swords, Time and the Storm Moon.  I think me and swords have a love hate relationship, and while I feel like a lot of people might, they pop up a lot for me, and the Five of Swords is pretty much my signifier card.

    This is already getting to be long winded and I don't know if anyone really wants all the meanings of the cards, so here's the gist... The seven is like the anti-hero, where you might be the bad guy, but your reasons, your end game, might be for the greater good. Like stealing bread so you don't starve, so someone else doesn't starve, etc. Time is exactly what it sounds like, do I have the time to invest in my current journey, because if I don't I probably shouldn't start as this period could be exhausting, though if I do, if i continue and fight, the moon will always shine through the storm and I could emerge as something more. 

    Time, with my current moods lately, my depression and work in general, is not something I seem to have much of, and if I do, I make poor use of it. That brought in the next card and here we have swords again, this time the two and it is telling me this is a conflict of the mind and the heart, that it's time to pause and take inventory and find a way through the struggle (the storm moon again). The Two of Swords is absolutely true though, this is a struggle of the mind and the heart, because I know with all my heart I want to let the divine in, I've always wanted some powerhouse at my back, someone or something to turn to when I need guidance or feel lost. I often feel alone in this world and my spirit, my soul, it always tends to feel like something is missing. 

    The King of Coins is all about ordered stability, he's not about taking risks or going with innovations, he's old fashioned and lets common sense rule the day. However, he is the kind that if he puts his mind to something he is a powerful ally and whatever he puts his mind to will grow and flourish.  I'm pretty sure he's saying that now might not be the time to take that innovative risk, while the Christmas moon, the last card I pulled, is saying that while things are coming to an end, something beautiful is beginning, that these are precious minutes... 

    I'm tempted to say long story short, but we're past that, I'm past that. Overall, I don't think this is the time for deity work, that I'm still in the process of healing, healing myself. I won't say that was this past years theme, because I didn't realize that's what I was doing until late in the year. I'm constantly being reminded of things from the past that completely throw me off, like a jouster being knocked of their horse and being splintered and bruised and broken, and that's just daily, that's not the anger or jealously that's built up of late, or not having the right kind of people to talk to about any of it. 

    I'm not sure how to end this on a positive note, but I guess knowing I have to keep fighting, keep healing isn't necessarily a bad thing either.

(credit to the artist)