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valarltdI have a new icon. And She may be showing up a lot. This will mark posts where I talk about the geasa and other things.
I had an idea--revelation being much too grand a word--last night as I was counting the Christian Life section at B&N. There are endless devotional and marriage books for Christians. I wonder if compiling one for pagans would work at all. Maybe, maybe not. But I can write about my journey. And it's a strange one.
I'm a pantheist, and nondeistic. I treat deities as ways we channel the energy of the universe. This said, I have an image of Hera on my household altar. It's a Avon bottle that originally held Skin-So-Soft bath oil. She dates to about 1970 and belonged to my grandmother.
So yes, I am saying prayers at the feet of a bath-oil bottle. And yes, it strikes me as ridiculous but, on the other hand (given the myriad uses of Skin-So-Soft} absolutely right. All I know is when I unpacked the knick-nack box, I held her in my hands and my arms tingled. I have channeled Hera once, and the bottle felt the same way to me. So she went in the middle of my mantle, next to the candle consecrated to Hera and I thought no more of it.
Until Imbolc.
I took on a geasa at Imbolc. Appropriate as it also falls near the Theogamia, aka Wedding of the Gods. It was celebrated by the women on the 27 of Gamelion, which doesn't really translate to modern calendars except "Sometime in early February."
This is the time when Zeus and Hera married and fled their parents' house to save Zeus from being eaten by Cronos as most of his siblings were. They were so enrapotured of each other that the honeymoon lasted three hundred years.
"With that the son of Cronus caught his wife in his arms
and under them now the holy earth burst with fresh green grass,
crocus and hyacinth, clover soaked with dew, so thick and soft
it lifted their bodies off the hard, packed ground…
Folded deep in that bed they lay and round them wrapped
a marvelous cloud of gold, and glistening showers of dew
rained down around them both. And so, deep in peace,
the Father slept on Gargaron peak, conquered by Sleep
And strong assaults of Love, his wife locked in his arms.”
--Iliad, 14.413-421, translated by Robert Fagles
One of the vows I made was to love and honor my husband.
I have been married to Mudd for 23 years, 24 come August.
At time, it has bveen downright difficult.
At times, the only reason we stayed together was that we couldn't afford a divorce.
I am not an easy person to live with, by any stretch of the imagination, and a difficult one to love.
Yet, we are still together. And I have slept locked in his arms for the majority of our 27 years together. (To the point that the nightly weight of his arm cradling me has dislocated two of my ribs. Now that's locked in your husband's arms!)
Part of this month's journey is all about being more loving and more loveable.
The acts are simple enough:
Pay attention to him as soon as he comes home. Give him a "whole-face listen." He doesn't mind if I'm cooking while he talks about his day later, but those first few minutes, he wants the whole face and whole attention.
Go to bed with him. I've been bad about staying up too late to work. Not having a regular job schedule means I tend to not keep regular hours. But when I go to bed with him, I get cuddles. I get funny. I get sweet time just for us. And I'd forgotten, over several years of going to bed several hours before he did because of my job, how much I like that. It's not always possible, since I work nights, but when it is, I need to.
Get up and see him in the morning. I'm working on this. It may not be possible next week, since I'm working five nights in a row. And I am no good on 2-4 hours of sleep.
Tempering my tongue and tone. He says he doesn't notice my tone. It doesn't matter. I notice my tone. And if I'm talking to him like he's an annoying child, I don't like him all that much. When I remember he is Aspie, and needs it laid out, step by step, and do so patiently and gently, I like him and me much better.
Three hundred years may be more of a honeymoon than most get, and we may not get the Golden Apples as a wedding gift from our mother. But there is no reason no celebrate the Theogamia by shopwing our spouses a little extra love.
From Hesiod: "Lastly, he [Zeus] made Hera his blooming wife : and she was joined in love with the king of gods and men, and brought forth Hebe and Ares and Eileithyia."
I had an idea--revelation being much too grand a word--last night as I was counting the Christian Life section at B&N. There are endless devotional and marriage books for Christians. I wonder if compiling one for pagans would work at all. Maybe, maybe not. But I can write about my journey. And it's a strange one.
I'm a pantheist, and nondeistic. I treat deities as ways we channel the energy of the universe. This said, I have an image of Hera on my household altar. It's a Avon bottle that originally held Skin-So-Soft bath oil. She dates to about 1970 and belonged to my grandmother.
So yes, I am saying prayers at the feet of a bath-oil bottle. And yes, it strikes me as ridiculous but, on the other hand (given the myriad uses of Skin-So-Soft} absolutely right. All I know is when I unpacked the knick-nack box, I held her in my hands and my arms tingled. I have channeled Hera once, and the bottle felt the same way to me. So she went in the middle of my mantle, next to the candle consecrated to Hera and I thought no more of it.
Until Imbolc.
I took on a geasa at Imbolc. Appropriate as it also falls near the Theogamia, aka Wedding of the Gods. It was celebrated by the women on the 27 of Gamelion, which doesn't really translate to modern calendars except "Sometime in early February."
This is the time when Zeus and Hera married and fled their parents' house to save Zeus from being eaten by Cronos as most of his siblings were. They were so enrapotured of each other that the honeymoon lasted three hundred years.
"With that the son of Cronus caught his wife in his arms
and under them now the holy earth burst with fresh green grass,
crocus and hyacinth, clover soaked with dew, so thick and soft
it lifted their bodies off the hard, packed ground…
Folded deep in that bed they lay and round them wrapped
a marvelous cloud of gold, and glistening showers of dew
rained down around them both. And so, deep in peace,
the Father slept on Gargaron peak, conquered by Sleep
And strong assaults of Love, his wife locked in his arms.”
--Iliad, 14.413-421, translated by Robert Fagles
One of the vows I made was to love and honor my husband.
I have been married to Mudd for 23 years, 24 come August.
At time, it has bveen downright difficult.
At times, the only reason we stayed together was that we couldn't afford a divorce.
I am not an easy person to live with, by any stretch of the imagination, and a difficult one to love.
Yet, we are still together. And I have slept locked in his arms for the majority of our 27 years together. (To the point that the nightly weight of his arm cradling me has dislocated two of my ribs. Now that's locked in your husband's arms!)
Part of this month's journey is all about being more loving and more loveable.
The acts are simple enough:
Pay attention to him as soon as he comes home. Give him a "whole-face listen." He doesn't mind if I'm cooking while he talks about his day later, but those first few minutes, he wants the whole face and whole attention.
Go to bed with him. I've been bad about staying up too late to work. Not having a regular job schedule means I tend to not keep regular hours. But when I go to bed with him, I get cuddles. I get funny. I get sweet time just for us. And I'd forgotten, over several years of going to bed several hours before he did because of my job, how much I like that. It's not always possible, since I work nights, but when it is, I need to.
Get up and see him in the morning. I'm working on this. It may not be possible next week, since I'm working five nights in a row. And I am no good on 2-4 hours of sleep.
Tempering my tongue and tone. He says he doesn't notice my tone. It doesn't matter. I notice my tone. And if I'm talking to him like he's an annoying child, I don't like him all that much. When I remember he is Aspie, and needs it laid out, step by step, and do so patiently and gently, I like him and me much better.
Three hundred years may be more of a honeymoon than most get, and we may not get the Golden Apples as a wedding gift from our mother. But there is no reason no celebrate the Theogamia by shopwing our spouses a little extra love.
From Hesiod: "Lastly, he [Zeus] made Hera his blooming wife : and she was joined in love with the king of gods and men, and brought forth Hebe and Ares and Eileithyia."
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no subject
Date: 2013-02-07 07:44 pm (UTC)Ok, the Poly one might need a bunch of sub-sections, depending if the relationship is open or closed-among-certain-people.