The Lammas Queen

Come to me now, in the first hour of harvest,
Hour of falling wind and sun,
And the sweet rushing in of the salt sea tide.
Now I am fruit, moist and heavy before it falls.
Mine is the milk that lets down and flows
To the sound of a hungry cry.
I claim as sacrifice the first fruit of your labor,
And return to you from my golden store,
The fruit of your labors in seasons past.
I bare my breast and the world spills forth;
Joy and loss and flame and shadow.
Drink and be whole, for the joy will last

Thunder Moon

The hot, humid days jostle and bump up against each other until, every few days, there is a small eruption of thunder, lightning and rain. The weather seers always predict a wilder storm than ever occurs. We hope for the storm to break the heat, but it doesn't much, or for long.

The old idea was to pray to the Thunder God for mercy and safety in the storm.

But at the moment I'm praying rather for a great breaking storm to relieve the tedium and lighten the heavy air.

The Time of Ripening

(The ebbing Air Tide, between Midsummer and Lammas)

This is a time, most of all, for attention and care. Things are growing close to fruition, and the only thing to worry about is that ill luck and carelessness may be the ruin of all you have gained. There is little to be done now in the way of strenuous work, but much need for watchfulness.

Take reasonable precautions against accidents and natural disasters. Trust your own wisdom and intuition, but also seek out the advice of those wiser and more knowledgeable than you.

Take stock of uncompleted jobs and unfinished business in your life, and give yourself to the possibly tedious or emotionally demanding tasks of wrapping things up, bringing things to closure, or polishing and perfecting.

Set yourself the exercise of striving for perfection in some piece of work. Seek also to perfect knowledge, skills, and relationships. Marshall your energy and organize your resources for the busy and demanding Harvest Time to come.

The Goddess and God at this time are the mature Mother and Father of creation, crowned Queen and King. They are Titania and Oberon, recovered from their Midsummer mischief and confusion, ruling together reconciled and fulfilled. Let their joy and playfulness lighten the mood of a serious time

Heat Wave

Let's hope it's a heat wave, anyway, and not the new summer.

Mrs. Drinkwalter and Bobby are not North of Berkeley for the summer, but way way to the east of Berkeley. Every summer, they leave one of the few parts of the U.S. that is comfortable in July. Mrs. Drinkwalter does this because blood is thicker than water. Bobby goes along because he is a very small dog who is zipped into a mesh and canvas carry-on bag and given little choice in the matter.

When the temperature is slightly above 100 and the humidity slightly below 100, lassitude and depression take over.

My friends in Texas deal with similar weather, but live with high-powered air conditioning that is always ready at the flick of a switch. Here in New England we endlessly fiddle with fans and cranky window AC units that have to be hauled out of closets. We experiment with, and argue about, when to open or close which windows and doors, when to draw the curtains, how much time can reasonably be spent in the town pond.

Everybody's weak points get wobblier. Sad people get sadder, crazy people get crazier, the kids squabble, the dogs behave badly.

Nothing much is accomplished.

The Case Against Healthy Living

My mom, at 90, (that's microsoft clip art on the left, I do respect her privacy), has more or less lost her mind. She has gone from crabby and forgetful, to nasty and clueless, to weirdly paranoid. She believes that there is a conspiracy afoot to use her for medical experiments and collect her money. We, her children, are required to answer trick questions to prove that we are who we say we are, and not part of this plot. My sister flunked because she couldn't remember her birth weight.

My parents are cousins, and the traits they share emerge in all their offspring. Many of these traits are actually kind of cool. Good skin. High HDL. Verbal intelligence. A sense of humor. One of the not-cool traits, it now appears, is a decline into disabling dementia in the late 80's. My dad suffered only a year of or two of vagueness before he died of a stroke at 87. My mom, who has lived the healthiest life imaginable in every way, still has nothing life-threatening wrong with her at all. Her heart is fine, her lungs are fine, no diabetes. She has the blood pressure and lab results of a 30-year-old. She has arthritis, and she is mad as a coot. People in her family have made it past 100. This could go on for years.

I hope very much to follow my father's model. I am revising my ideas about healthy living. I want that stroke or heart attack that will finish me off before the paranoid delusions set in. I figure that by eating enough doughnuts and not exercising too much, I might be able to time it about right.

Honey Moon

This full moon, the one following the Summer Solstice, was the auspicious time to collect honey for mead.

And because June is traditional for marriages-- a prudent necessity given the way Beltane was celebrated--the period following was the time of the Honey Moon.

It's a warm and beautiful time. Enjoy.

The Turning of the Tide at Midsummer

Midsummer marks the time when the Air Tide turns and begins to ebb. The Air Tide began to flow at Beltane. The past season has been one of change; things have been in transition, and there has been an element of chance in everything, as some seedlings took root and others were stillborn.

With the turning of the Air Tide, the season of ripening begins. Now we know which of the seeds of time have taken root and will grow. It is a time for dedication, patience and awareness. The work of the coming season will be watering and weeding, watching and protecting that which has taken root.