Kayote in Wonderland

Last month I posted about my grandfather being in his last days. Today around 1pm PST he crossed the veil. He's not suffering anymore, trapped in a body that doesn't work and unable to communicate with the rest of the world. He is now at peace. I grieve because I loved him but I celebrate that he is now free and that his dash was well lived, well lived indeed.

Goodbye Grandpa Frank, you'll always be in my heart.

Frank Charles Ashby Jr.
March 22, 1932 - February 16, 2009

The Dash
copyright 1996 Linda Ellis

I read of a man who stood to speak
at the funeral of a friend.
He referred to the dates on her tombstone
from the beginning...to the end.

He noted that first came the date of her birth
and spoke of the following date with tears,
but he said what mattered most of all
was the dash between those years.

For that dash represents all the time
that she spent alive on earth...
and now only those who loved her
know what that little line is worth.

For it matters not, how much we own;
the cars....the house...the cash.
What matters is how we live and love
and how we spend our dash.

So think about this long and hard...
are there things you'd like to change?
For you never know how much time is left
that can still be rearranged.

If we could just slow down enough
to consider what's true and real,
and always try to understand
the way other people feel.

And be less quick to anger,
and show appreciation more
and love the people in our lives
like we've never loved before.

If we treat each other with respect,
and more often wear a smile...
remembering that this special dash
might only last a little while.

So, when your eulogy is being read
with your life's actions to rehash...
would you be proud of the things they
say about how you spend your dash?

I'm still in Vegas :D and loving my extended visit with my Aunt. Do not miss the snow at all. :p

A few things are going on right now that are a bit stressful.

I'm trying to get my oldest daughter to transfer out to Vegas to finish up school. She would be somewhere that her dad and I could come see her every so often or vice versa and we wouldn't worry as much about her.

My last grandfather is about to die. He has alzheimers and is in the last stages where he is doesn't want to eat much. In this stage they start losing the ability to swallow so they start refusing food. He is long past the point to where he even knows who anyone is. Very sad and very heartbreaking. My Aunt is dealing with letting go now. It's hard, really hard. He may last another month, six weeks at best. I'm very thankful that I can be here at this time and that I got to see him one last time as well. The man lived a very vibrant life. He knew Roy Orbison, they were friends growing up. That man had some good stories.

It's tax time...

This is the transcript of Keith Olbermann's special comment tonight on the passage of proposition 8 in California. This one literally brought me to tears as I watched.

SPECIAL COMMENT
By Keith Olbermann
Anchor, 'Countdown'
msnbc.com

Finally tonight as promised, a Special Comment on the passage, last week, of Proposition Eight in California, which rescinded the right of same-sex couples to marry, and tilted the balance on this issue, from coast to coast.

Some parameters, as preface. This isn't about yelling, and this isn't about politics, and this isn't really just about Prop-8. And I don't have a personal investment in this: I'm not gay, I had to strain to think of one member of even my very extended family who is, I have no personal stories of close friends or colleagues fighting the prejudice that still pervades their lives.

And yet to me this vote is horrible. Horrible. Because this isn't about yelling, and this isn't about politics. This is about the human heart, and if that sounds corny, so be it.

If you voted for this Proposition or support those who did or the sentiment they expressed, I have some questions, because, truly, I do not understand. Why does this matter to you? What is it to you? In a time of impermanence and fly-by-night relationships, these people over here want the same chance at permanence and happiness that is your option. They don't want to deny you yours. They don't want to take anything away from you. They want what you want—a chance to be a little less alone in the world.

Only now you are saying to them—no. You can't have it on these terms. Maybe something similar. If they behave. If they don't cause too much trouble. You'll even give them all the same legal rights—even as you're taking away the legal right, which they already had. A world around them, still anchored in love and marriage, and you are saying, no, you can't marry. What if somebody passed a law that said you couldn't marry?

I keep hearing this term "re-defining" marriage. If this country hadn't re-defined marriage, black people still couldn't marry white people. Sixteen states had laws on the books which made that illegal in 1967. 1967.

The parents of the President-Elect of the United States couldn't have married in nearly one third of the states of the country their son grew up to lead. But it's worse than that. If this country had not "re-defined" marriage, some black people still couldn't marry black people. It is one of the most overlooked and cruelest parts of our sad story of slavery. Marriages were not legally recognized, if the people were slaves. Since slaves were property, they could not legally be husband and wife, or mother and child. Their marriage vows were different: not "Until Death, Do You Part," but "Until Death or Distance, Do You Part." Marriages among slaves were not legally recognized.

You know, just like marriages today in California are not legally recognized, if the people are gay.

And uncountable in our history are the number of men and women, forced by society into marrying the opposite sex, in sham marriages, or marriages of convenience, or just marriages of not knowing, centuries of men and women who have lived their lives in shame and unhappiness, and who have, through a lie to themselves or others, broken countless other lives, of spouses and children, all because we said a man couldn't marry another man, or a woman couldn't marry another woman. The sanctity of marriage.

How many marriages like that have there been and how on earth do they increase the "sanctity" of marriage rather than render the term, meaningless?

What is this, to you? Nobody is asking you to embrace their expression of love. But don't you, as human beings, have to embrace... that love? The world is barren enough.

It is stacked against love, and against hope, and against those very few and precious emotions that enable us to go forward. Your marriage only stands a 50-50 chance of lasting, no matter how much you feel and how hard you work.

And here are people overjoyed at the prospect of just that chance, and that work, just for the hope of having that feeling. With so much hate in the world, with so much meaningless division, and people pitted against people for no good reason, this is what your religion tells you to do? With your experience of life and this world and all its sadnesses, this is what your conscience tells you to do?

With your knowledge that life, with endless vigor, seems to tilt the playing field on which we all live, in favor of unhappiness and hate... this is what your heart tells you to do? You want to sanctify marriage? You want to honor your God and the universal love you believe he represents? Then Spread happiness—this tiny, symbolic, semantical grain of happiness—share it with all those who seek it. Quote me anything from your religious leader or book of choice telling you to stand against this. And then tell me how you can believe both that statement and another statement, another one which reads only "do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

You are asked now, by your country, and perhaps by your creator, to stand on one side or another. You are asked now to stand, not on a question of politics, not on a question of religion, not on a question of gay or straight. You are asked now to stand, on a question of love. All you need do is stand, and let the tiny ember of love meet its own fate.

You don't have to help it, you don't have it applaud it, you don't have to fight for it. Just don't put it out. Just don't extinguish it. Because while it may at first look like that love is between two people you don't know and you don't understand and maybe you don't even want to know. It is, in fact, the ember of your love, for your fellow person just because this is the only world we have. And the other guy counts, too.

This is the second time in ten days I find myself concluding by turning to, of all things, the closing plea for mercy by Clarence Darrow in a murder trial.

But what he said, fits what is really at the heart of this:

"I was reading last night of the aspiration of the old Persian poet, Omar-Khayyam," he told the judge. It appealed to me as the highest that I can vision. I wish it was in my heart, and I wish it was in the hearts of all: So I be written in the Book of Love; I do not care about that Book above. Erase my name, or write it as you will, So I be written in the Book of Love."

I exercised my civil right to vote today and was privileged to witness my 19 year old daughter register and cast her first vote today.

I woke up this morning with only a few hours of sleep and threw on some clothes. I then called my son-in-law so he and my daughter could ride with Parker and I down to the polling location. They both had to register so they could vote and I'm happy this state is one that allows registering at the polling location on election day.

So even though I do not at all expect Wyoming's 3 electoral votes to go to Obama all four of us did cast our votes for Obama... and every other democrat on the ballot. I left the one where only republicans were on there blank just to make a statement.

Remember, voting is a RIGHT so if you haven't voted yet please do.

Witch?
Yes, I'm a witch. I've stood before
The Lord of Death and found him not unkind.
I've practiced well the sacred hidden lore
The words of power and the spells that bind
And loosen; culled from nature's trove
The herbs that heal - But most of all have I
Danced naked, free and proud beneath the sky
Unto the Goddess, She who shines above.

Witch?
Yes, I'm a witch for I am free
From hope of Heaven and the fear of Hell.
No solemn vale of tears is this to me.
Earth is my cup of joy. I love her well.
Seek not to turn me from my destined fate.
Earth is enough for me, and if I burn
I shall not leave her but to earth return
To live again a witch -- Re-in-carnate.

For 'tis our promise and our firm belief
That She who loves us brings us back again
As seeds once buried rise again in leaf,
Stem, branch an blossom in the Summer rain.
And are we less than seeds? But should it be
That one life only was our metered span
And Power comes but once to any man
I'll live it lusty, joyfully and free
And be a Witch!

Author -- Sea, of the Gardnerian Coven of Deepstar- October 27, 1971

Today was The Utah Black Hat Society's Third Annual Witches High Tea event. It was held at the Grand America Hotel in down town Salt Lake City this afternoon from 2pm till 5pm. Don't ever tell any of the fifty attendees that real witches don't wear pointy hats because obviously, they do.

The Black Hat Society is a pagan social group founded in 2006 by Chrissy Johnson, a Salt Lake City denizen. The high tea event held each year in October is the pinnacle event for the society where one gets to dress to the nines in their finest witch attire, don their best pointy hat and enjoy a grand afternoon of tea and conversation. The society also hosts an afternoon tea in the spring and have been seen caroling on the streets of Salt Lake in December for the annual Witches Wassail. Chrissy, along with TaMara and Kayote, the organizers of the society's events, have stated that early next summer they intend to add another exciting event to the society's calendar.

If you do not live in the Salt Lake area and think The Black Hat Society sounds like your kind of party please do consider starting up a Black Hat Society in your area.

The Salt Lake NBC affiliate, KSL5, covered the event held today and ran the following clip on the six o'clock news:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yekJcWZwxLQ

It has taken me most of a week to get to a point where I feel like typing. This is when having fibro gets on my last nerve. I also over do it at PPD. I like to take photos which means I'm not going to sit around and just take it easy. I'm up all day wandering around taking pictures the whole day. I do this to myself and then pay for it after. Will do it again next year too. lol

This year we decided to try something a little different. We took it back to the roots and decided to not have vendors. We did have a food booth run by SLCPP and that was a phenomenal success. Not having vendors turned out to be a good thing too. People actually congregated at the information tables and all the workshops were very well attended. The day flowed well.

Our workshops this year were:
Paganism 101 by Parker J. Torrence Draig Sidhe priest and author of Sea, Land, Sky: a Dragon Magick Grimoire.
Queer Mysteries by Duirin High Priest of Draco Lupa Luna.
Myths and Legends by Daniel Halacy.
Essences of Magick by Talea.
The Circle and the Staff by Aisling DreamRange High Priestess of DreamRange Dynamic.
Pagan Drumming by Panthea.

The Kids Zone this year was a hit and there were children there all day long except for the two times that they were all sitting around Mother Goose listening to her spin tales of wonder and delight. The children just adore Mother Goose.

Altarscapes was beautiful. I hope next year we get more people volunteering to display an altar. The year we had seven and each was just beautiful and inspiring.

We also had a concert by a local duo called Hidden Truth. They are an acoustic band of a guitar and a wooden flute. Their music is just beautiful. Visit their myspace: http://www.myspace.com/hiddentruth5040

Our closing ritual this year was presented by The Mountain Shadow Clan of the Toteg Tribe sponsored by Aspen Grove. There was a great litany involved in the ritual where all the groups past and present in the valley were named and honored. We truly did Celebrate our Roots this year.

Over all we had 370 attendees, collected 412 pounds of food for the Utah Aids Foundation, raised enough money to pay for our space for NEXT year and educated some people about what Pagans are.

This is the new puppy that we've named GingerSnap. She's ten weeks old in this picture which I took a few hours ago.

I'm home from fest!! It was awesome!! Now that I've been to both Heartland and Dragonfest I can report that Dragonfest is the one I prefer. More of everything. Of course Heartland does have the coed shower thing going on... but Dfest is closer to me and I know people there. ;) Next time I'll be camping closer to where I would like to be.

and the stairs win... ouch!

I'm ok... mostly... nothing is broke... my back will have a nice bruise though... :(