The Ides of March, Hilaria ... and Bizarre Ballgowns

The Ides of March.  A bunch of small errands sandwiched between being nearly run down by insane motorists.  I’m lucky I got home alive ... !

Today is:  Next to Final Packing Day.  Still about 2 weeks left until the remodeling is done in New Hampshire, so my plan this weekend was to get as much packed as humanly possible today, move a chunk of it to the storage facility in Salisbury tomorrow, and another 2 chunks next weekend.  Then, the rest of it can fall to the moving guys.

Every once in a while I get invited to various celebrations, and every once in a while I attend, although it is rather a distance away – and will still be a distance away, even after I move,  Mainly the issue is the time of day they are held – they begin right at the time I’m passing out and going to sleep.  As a result, I have to make a concerted effort to stay awake for it, and I end up oversleeping for days afterwards.

Nonetheless, I’ve received a few invitations that include, “Wear your finest ritual clothes!” or some such set of instructions – which is something of a problem, since I don’t have any.  Never did.  Makes me feel like an adult dressing up for Halloween or something.  I usually end up wearing a nice shirt with jeans and make sure I have the cimaruta around my neck.  I used to think it might be nice to put on make-up and earrings  - (and an attractive fake mole and feathers sticking out of my head) - for a change, but I’m so allergic to the stuff, I end up suffering, so stopped doing that.  I do have a Venetian mask, though, coincidentally enough.

I was reminded of that today when the Real Witches’ Year brought up the issue of cords.  Have no idea why – this being the Ides of March, I would have thought they’d make mention of that instead:  sacred to Rhea (Greek Goddess of the earth, mother of Zeus), and a day to honor river sprites or nymphs. (Well, I would, if I knew any.)  Not to mention that some of us want to begin preparing for the 2-day festival of Dionysus – stocking up on wine! (gulp, gulp, gulp, *hic*!)

So naturally, The Witch’s Book of Days chirps, “As Hilaria begins, celebrate the goddess-given gifts of wit, theatre and comedy.”

The WHAT?

Ah.  No wonder I didn’t pay any attention to this:  “The modern day equivalent to the Ancient Roman Festival of Hilaria, which occurs once in a year in Britain, is Mother's day. This day is said to be the day when the ancient Greeks paid tribute to their very powerful goddess called Rhea.“
http://www.ask.com/question/occuring-once-a-year-in-britain-what-is-the-modern-day-equivalent-of-the-ancient-roman-festival-of-hilaria

Possibly my least favorite event in the entire year.  Since most mothers in the United States wouldn’t recognize “wit, theatre and comedy” if it jumped up and bit them in their collective a**es, I have no idea what the WBD was chirping about.

Oh, Roman Laughing Day!!!  According to the Brooklyn Public Library, “ the Roman festival of Hilaria or "Roman Laughing Day," ... celebrates the resurrection of the god Attis.” Not quite sure why that event was hilarious, but there you go.
(http://brooklynology.brooklynpubliclibrary.org/post/2012/04/02/All-Fools-Day.aspx)

Witches of the Craft handed out correspondences:  The Hilaria (Roman).  Incense:  Violet.  Color: Coral
Have no idea what violet and coral has to do with anything.  Not fond of either one.
http://witchesofthecraft.com/tag/hilaria/

Meanwhile, Brittanica.com has a different version:

“Hilaria,  in Roman religion, day of merriment and rejoicing in the Cybele-Attis cult and in the Isis-Osiris cult, March 25 and November 3, respectively. It was one of several days in the festival of Cybele that honoured Attis, her son and lover: March 15, his finding by Cybele among the reeds on the bank of the River Gallus; March 22, his self-mutilation; March 24, fasting and mourning at his death; and March 25, the Hilaria, rejoicing at his resurrection. Some of the activities on the Hilaria resembled those associated with April Fools’ Day. November 3, the Hilaria of the Isis-Osiris cult, marked the resurrection of Osiris, husband of Isis.”
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/265677/Hilaria

Self-mutilation, eh?  That “son and lover” thing might explain why the guy mutilated himself (ew!), but does it sound like anything worth celebrating?  Uh ....no.

Furthermore, (*sigh*)  “cult”, eh?  Now you know why I make it a point to de-capitalize christian and call THEM “a cult”, and if any pursed-lip church ladies out there have a problem with it – too bad.  Do unto others, isn’t that one of your rules?

Ultimately:  what a strange day.  Betcha Caesar wasn’t all that fond of it, either.

Thanksgiving ... an Overabundance of Earbuds ... and I Merge with a Rock

Ahhh ... a four-and-a-half day weekend … and this time I expect to get my living quarters at least minimally out of the state of packing chaos it’s in, right at the moment.  It seems so much easier to merely make it through the day if I don’t need to pick my way over and around boxes of things.   Arrendersi mai!  Or as they say elsewhere ... like in Italy ... "Never surrender!"

http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com

/2011/11/24/marty-two-bulls-first-thanksgiving

Thanksgiving ... or as the original hosts call it, “No Generous Act of Hospitality Goes Unpunished Day” ... has arrived.

I must confess, over the years, as I’ve moved from one place to the other, I have never really had the opportunity to sort through all of my possessions and decide which ones were worth keeping.  Usually, packing is done at high speed, tossing things into boxes and crates for a frenetic one-day move with the promise that I’ll sort through things as I unpack – which of course I never do, so the collection just builds up.  This is the first time I have taken this long to pack things slowly and carefully.

It’s appalling how much stuff one accumulates without even being aware of it, sometimes duplicates and triplicates of things because you can’t find things when you need them, and end up buying them again.  There are also things I’d completely forgotten that I had, and this is the moment when you think, “I need to pay more attention to the things I accumulate.”  For example, somehow I had accumulated something like 20 separate ear buds ... which is all the more astonishing considering the fact that I never use ear buds – they end up hurting, because (supposedly) my ear canal is smaller than normal.  I always use the over the head “can” earphones – so why do I have 20 ear buds?

And yet, you don’t want to fill up landfills with ridiculous amounts of garbage, either.  I was browsing online for “creative things to do with ear buds”, until I realized that the items I know as Q-tips are now known as “ear buds”!   Ahh, the things you learn trying not to toss the “ear buds” that you stick in your ears to listen to music.  I didn’t want to devote too much time to craft researching so ... out they went.

I also seem to have more electrical cords, computer cords, phone cords, connective cords, printer cords, extension cords, all with various configurations of cord endings ... I’ve seen them called “female” endings and “male endings”, depending on whether they have the hole or the pin ... tucked away, out of use.  I have no idea what components each is meant to connect, and yet I still hesitate to toss them, merely out of a vague sense of “I might need it later.”  I have three plastic boxes filled with them.

As I toss things – lots of things – it really does make me feel somewhat “lighter”, less encumbered and less tied to things I don’t need and will never use.

Meanwhile, the cooking-baking-roasting-mashing extravaganza begins.  I treated myself to some brandy to make the morning more relaxing, and this is another happy circumstance of packing – I had put my parents’ cut glass collection that I remembered growing up with in a cabinet and (again) forgot to use them.  As I pulled them out to wrap in paper and put carefully into a “FRAGILE!  DROP THIS AT YOUR PERIL!” moving box, I have been washing the glasses and decided this was perfect for a morning brandy.  It’s not a brandy snifter (haven’t washed those yet), but it hasn’t detracted from the taste as far as I can tell.  Delicious.  One of the many uses I have devised for the enormous entry room is a home bar in one corner.  I have always wanted to have one of those.

(Completely irrelevant and irreverent observation:  has anyone noticed how much a muddler looks like a sex toy?)  (Yes, I know, you’ll never be able to drink a mojito again after that.  Sorry!)

I spent the day after the giving of thanks day in Seabrook, getting the place measured and picking out bathroom faucets, shower marble tiles, kitchen sinks and garbage disposals.  I will probably be actually moving sometime in January.  I was immediately attracted to two marble tiles that – in my mind’s eye – said “The Universe”.  I’ve never had a bathroom in these colors before; the sales lady thought I was nuts initially, but then came around the more she looked at them.  The shower will be in the marble on the left; the two vanities topped with the marble on the right.  The floor is a groutable linoleum that looks like white marble with soft black veins in it.  All of the fixtures are elegant oil-rubbed bronze.  Personally, I think it’s going to be the most awesome bathroom ever, but then, I tend to like drama.  Only problem:  all my towels are blue.  I think it’s time to buy a few new ones and use the blue towels at the beach.


But back to business.  Lunar phase today is Waning Crescent.  The current moon phase is from 2013-11-25 19:30 to 2013-12-03 00:22.  The moon is in the zodiac sign of Libra.  Coincidentally, Venus rules both Taurus and Libra.  And even more coincidentally, the astrological sign of Cancer is ruled by the Moon.  Three guesses who my all-time favorite tenor born under the sign of Cancer (June 24th) might be.

Second transference of consciousness attempt:  candle:  Shooting Star Scent Beads.  Incense:  Scented Garden – Ocean.  Object:  rock.  Gneiss, I think?  Black and white at any rate, and it reminded me the Fordham Gneiss, 1.1 billion years old, back home in New York.  The same black/grey and white particles in it in any event.  This effort was much more successful.  Time:  about 1:30-2 PM.  Now this rock had some history to it.  I acquired it about two years ago.  Might have even mentioned it when I did.  (Sunday, December 11 – wow, closer to the 2-year mark than I knew!)  This was the rock given to me by my favorite Dogwood (or, really, my only Dogwood) after she’d confiscated it from two idiot boys throwing it at squirrels and birds (luckily for the aforementioned, they missed).  She moved it into my path with the request that I pick it up and remove it from the area lest any more boys get stupid ideas.  I did, and I’ve had it ever since.

Hard to separate the sensations.  I felt we were moving back in time together, this rock and I.  I did get a brief glimpse of the rabbit incident, which offended not only the Dogwood, but apparently had disturbed the rock as well.  The reason was a little strange:  I went through such a powerful transformation event with this rock, way down deep in the earth, and I sensed that it felt party to an overwhelming sense of power; a vital part of the Earth’s transformation; and the power behind its creation was so overwhelming I couldn’t find a comparison.  But the sensation was something akin to, “I was made from forces of incredible power, and am offended that, now at earth’s surface, I was put to such a use!”  Actually, that’s more my interpretation of the sensation.  But I did hear roars and heavy objects cracking and exploding under incredible strain, all of which left me in awe of its creation and birth.  So, it envisioned itself as something born out of the earth’s power, that I should see as as an object of veneration – and not something out of a chapter from “Hey, Beavis, let’s find sometin’ to chuck at a squeerel.  Yuck, yuck!”