Happy...Yulithia?
Wherein our narrator describes various highs and
lows around the Solstice.
Today is Lithia. At least, I think it is.
According to the various websites I've consulted, the solar maximum should occur
in Sydney in just about 90 minutes time, around 6:07 PM this evening. Unless
daylight savings time has queered that figure. In that case, it's about 28
minutes away. Ah well, perfect accuracy is only required in astronomy, not in
witchcraft. (Excepting, of course, for eclipses.) So today is Lithia...I
think. Only I've gone from Lithia to Lughnasa to Mabon to Beltane to Lithia.
It's all a bit confusing for a witch like me, who practices a very essential
Earth magick. It's as if the Sun dipped down a bit, thought the better of it,
and came back up again.
Meanwhile, on
the other side of the world, today is Yule, the shortest day of the year, made
doubly short because it is "Long Night", as the Winter Solstice and the New Moon
coincide nearly perfectly. I wrote a Long Night ritual in 1994, just after
David died, and poured into it all of the mystery of death and rebirth that I
understood at that time. I would, at some point, like to perform it, as I did
back in 1994, with a willing coven of participants. Perhaps I will, in this
part of the world. We'll see.
But
there are other things going on, other lessons learned. One of these came -
hard - on Saturday. I was callled by Bernard's rental agent last Monday. They
want to start showing the apartment for rental. Great, when? Thursday night or
Saturday morning? Knowing I'd have to clean the place spic-and-span, I opted
for Saturday morning. Great. Ten AM, the agent said. Fine. Do you need me
here? Yes, she replied. And that was pretty much
that.
So Saturday morning rolls around,
and the buzzer rings. Only it's not the agent, it's people come by to look at
the place. Fine, I let them up. Buzzer again - this must be the agent. Only
it's not, it's a cute queer couple, also looking for a place. Hmm. Everyone
looks around, I answer a few questions, and they leave. It's 10:20, no sign of
the agent, the prospective tenants have gone, so I leave, too, off to shop at
Paddy's Market.
Just before I enter
Paddy's Market, I get VM from the agent. Where was I? she asks. I was supposed
to be there from 10 to 10:30. So I return her call. I waited for you, but you
didn't show up. So I just let them see the apartment and left. Oh, no, she
says, we're all busy
today.
Huh?
Wait,
I say. You mean you wanted
me to
show the apartment? Silence.
I'm
not doing your
job. OK, she says. And rings
off.
Just writing these words brings
back the a shadow of the intense anger I felt as I uttered these words. Now
let's be brutally honest here: I have a terrible, terrible, terrible temper. A
temper so horrible that much of my daily psychic effort in yoga is spent just
keeping it under control. And it has worked - I've not yet lost my cool in
Australia. And I'd prefer no to. But when I realized I'd been used like that,
well, you can imagine I was pretty upset, and moving on to
enraged.
And my temper is an instrument
of power. People feel my anger, viscerally. While that means I do occasionally
get my way, it also leaves a horrible stain on my soul. I can't just trot out
my temper and leave it go, and, in fact, ever since then, I've been aware of my
emotional responses, and some of them have definitely been out of balance. I'm
easier to anger, and more judgmental. Less patient. None of this is good, and
all of these are the side-effects of my rage
attack.
I was pondering and pondering -
what to do? How do you heal after a rage attack? It came to me finally: Love
is the only cure for rage. It doesn't soothe the bruised ego (imagine someone
using
me!) it doesn't calm the stirred beast within my breast. Its action is somewhat
different, along a different channel of being. Love is patient. Love is
gentle. Love is forgiving. All the things that I needed to be, and wasn't.
So I've worked a bit on finding my love - in my yoga meditations. With luck,
it'll work, and I'll have at least one possible solution to this incredible rage
problem of mine.
But I've been burying
the lead: today Peter informed me that AFTRS will be extending me a six-month
offer to come and work at AFTRS, effective January 26th. YIPPPEEEE! So now I
can afford the apartment I've rented, the appliances I bought this weekend
(front-loading washer and refrigerator, both used, $600, good deal) and will
even be able to invest the AUD $2600 it may cost to buy me a plane ticket back
to Australia. (Ticket prices are ghastly this time of year, because of high
season.) It's all coming together, and, even if the precise details are yet to
be worked out (I have no idea what my salary will be) I am now confident that
when I leave I shall return.
YAY!
HAPPY LITHIA! THE SUN IS SHINING, THE WORLD IS FULL OF LOVE, AND IT'S ALL
GOOD!
Posted: Mon - December
22, 2003 at 04:58 PM