"Boreas, I conjure thee, receive me on thy pinions in the air, as thou didst ravish thine Athenian bride."
Nonnus, Dionysiaca 1. 134 ff (trans. Rouse) (Greek epic C5th A.D.)
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| Boreas, Greek God of the North WInd |
"Boreas, I conjure thee! Receive me on thy pinions in the air – as thou did ravish thine Athenian bride!"
Boreas, lest thee hast forgotten ... eth ... is the Greek God of the North Wind. He of the Purple Wings, the wings on his legs, the bad temper ... I have grown somewhat fond of this guy. Well, except for the small issue of kidnaping and ... what was that euphemism again? Oh yes ... ravishing! ... and ravishing his future wife.
The cad. She’s out dancing next to a river … which girls and women often do, I’m sure, as our favorite past time is dancing on riverbanks for no good reason … Boreas comes along, blows her skirt up, and … wham, bam, she’s pregnant with at least four children. Ravishment, indeed.
As a matter of fact, Boreas was so skilled at the "whoosh!"-"bam!" – "thank you, ma’am" that mares were turned away from the North Wind when he was invoked. In other words, if Boreas could ravish his wife by blowing up her skirts, he was also skilled enough to impregnate a mare the same way. Face the relevant mare lady-parts into the North Wind and let Boreas do his thing. Voila! Foals galore, even without a stallion nearby. This guy is awesome.`
Well, before we get into invoking the four winds – and, while I’m at it, NOT aiming anything impregnateable in his general direction – here goes Test #1.
(sip) (swish, swish) (swallow) Hmmmmmm. Not bad. (Having my first cup of Galangal Root Tea.) Fragrant, earthy, delicious, with a hint of a ginger-y bite. Supposedly, it’s a good tea to take before going to sleep, so why I’m taking it now (1:49 pm, Saturday), I have no iddddeeee .... zzzzzzzzz.
(Blink)
Sorry. Actually, the reason I tested it earlier is because all of the components for Test #2, the Dreaming Tea arrived. This would be Christopher Penczak’s "Dreaming Tea" recipe. (The Plant Spirit Familiar, page 170). And now, I will share with you my official Book of Shadows entry pertaining to "Dreaming Tea". Ahem:"Holy crap."
Well, I didn’t say it was a sedate, cool, calm and collected response; just that I had recorded one.
I do not recall any dreams (which is unfortunate), but I passed out at around 7:00 pm Saturday night and still felt seriously drugged twelve hours later, to the point where, were it a commuting morning instead of a Sunday morning, I would be concerned about trying to drive in that condition.
The tea itself was bitter, so I would like to find something that would make it more palatable – I could only drink about half of it. BUT, I should note that I was also drinking the Galangal Root tea during the day, so it may have been a factor, intensifying the results. I should test that theory.
[Test result: I tried the Galangal Root tea alone the following Thursday night. This was a dangerous test, inasmuch as I had to get up and drive to the railway station the next morning. I slept deeply from 7:00 pm at night until 4:00 am the next morning – nine hours – but did not have the "intensely drugged" sensation I described previously when I woke up. I also don’t recall having any dreams. Now I have to test the Dreaming Tea without the Galangal Root chaser.]
Another issue: Penczak was never clear as to whether it was a decoction or an infusion. I went with the decoction, which may have resulted in a much stronger brew; I might want to try re-creating it via infusion next weekend. It could also be me, and my tendency to physically overreact to most drugs and medications. You know, give me Nyquil, or any antihistamine really, and I pass out and sleep through the entire illness, no matter what it was. Maybe I should have diluted the tea more than I did.
Dionysus! The Pagan Book of Days tells me that this is the start of two days of celebrations in honor of Dionysus (if you’re Greek) and Bacchus (if you’re Roman). Purpose of the celebration? To promote a fruitful grape harvest! The Witch’s Book of Days inexplicably says "Examine both your friendship braid for new additions and removals, and your cobwebs for progress." [Long pause. Assume bewildered expression. Play theme from the "Twilight Zone". HUH?????]
Moving on: was searching for something to read during the morning and evening commute that did NOT require enormous amounts of concentration. Main reason: if the train isn’t packed with women open-mouth coughing like Typhoid Mary all over everyone, it’s packed with women babbling like a pack of shrill baboons on their cellphones. It’s enough to drive you bat shit crazy, and if nothing else, it shatters what little concentration you have left into little shards of half-assed attention.
In any event, I started reading Richard Kaczynski’s, Perdurabo: the Life of Aleister Crowley, and found myself fascinated and paying more attention than I expected. Richly detailed, well documented – so far, the parts I’m enjoying the most is Kaczynski’s explanations of the rites Crowley performs at each OTO level ... and the realization that the spirits he conjures are sometimes deadly accurate ... and sometimes so off-base you have to admit that they’re not only NOT scary, they’re fairly stupid, to boot. Even Crowley gets tired of them, after a point, and begins to suspect that learning to conjure them was relatively pointless. [Musical soundtrack: "Is That All There Is?", the awesome Peggy Lee version.] Some of the other spells he does are so interesting you can’t wait to try them out yourself. The invisibility spell, for one. And no, it doesn’t make you actually invisible. What it does is make you "unnoticeable". My favorite ritual diary entry: he figured it worked when he walked around Mexico City in a red cape and a crown and no one even looked at him. He also teaches you the reasons for the basic "rule" I mentioned earlier: "never invoke anything you can’t banish". Proving that even Aleister Crowley can be incompetent at witchcraft, when he’s impatient and just learning the ropes. Now I don’t feel so clueless.
I’m thinking he would have loved the "Ghost Hunting" era of today. He knew so many spirits and so many so-called "demons" on a first name basis – and could control them without even exerting himself – he could probably walk into one of those places haunted by some sort of annoying what-have-you and toss it out the window without breaking a sweat. And then take a swig of champagne and saunter out the door.
Basically the biography tells you something you probably already knew: fundamentalist christians are idiots, and are practically paralyzed by fear. There were plenty of moments when he was told by an invoked being to do something and because he perceived the request as "black magic" refused to do it. He just didn’t argue when British pinheads in the Church of England labeled him "the most dangerous man alive" – all that accomplished was help him sell his books, and, apparently, to get Mr. Signpost tossed on death row. Of course, Crowley might have also pointed out that it was being born into a fundamentalist christian household that inspired him to seek alternative spiritual paths in the first place, but he didn’t do that, either. Heh! I’m loving this biography.
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