Fall '08

Thank gods, thank gods, the semester is over.

This picture is my favorite drawing from Art 108. It's a pencil sketch of a marble statue of Baldur the Beautiful. Baldur is being good enough to present my GPA for this term.

I'm going to post more of of my art, and some of John's as well. :)

Favorite Carols

Top three, to keep it simple:

"We Three Crones" to the tune of "We Three Kings"
We three crones of magic-past are,
Bearing gifts, we traverse afar,
Fields & fountain, moor & mountain,
Following each our star.
Chorus:

Oh, star of wonder, star of might,
Star of radiant beauty bright,
Inward leading, still proceeding,
Guide us with thy magick light.

Gold I bring, the Earth's hidden gleam,
Guards our Mem'ry, draws forth our dream;
Weary-curing, strong enduring,
Holding time's circling stream.
Chorus

Frankincense I carry with me.
Incense aids the spirit to see;
Analyzing, wise, up-rising,
Sense of the Earth, flow free!
Chorus

Myrrh is mine, it's bitter perfume
Lifts new life, a magical broom;
Praying, flying, purifying,
Away with old lingering gloom.
Chorus

Glorious gifts of magic we praise,
Maiden, Mother, Ancient of Days;
Strength, and sense, and energy; whence
Return to our sacred ways.
Chorus


Next, "Share the Light" to the tune of "The First Noel"

On this Winter holiday, let us stop and recall
That this season is holy to one and to all.
Unto some a Son is born, unto us comes a Sun,
We gather together that all paths are one.
Chorus:

Share the light, share the light!
Share the light, share the Light!
All paths are one on this holy night!

Be it Chanukah or Yule,
Christmas time or Solstice night,
All celebrate the returning light.
Lighted tree or burning log,
Or eight candle flames.
The light is what's holy, whatever their names.

and third, "Gloucester Wassail," with no changes necessary. :)

Wassail, wassail all over the town
Our toast it is white and our ale it is brown
Our bowl it is made of the white maple tree
With the wassailing bowl, we'll drink to thee

So here is to Cherry and to his right cheek
Pray God send our master a good piece of beef
And a good piece of beef that may we all see
With the wassailing bowl, we'll drink to thee

And here is to Dobbin and to his right eye
Pray God send our master a good piece of pie
A good piece of pie that may we all see
With the wassailing bowl, we'll drink to thee

So here is to Broad Mary and to her broad horn
May God send our master a good crop of corn
And a good crop of corn that may we all see
With the wassailing bowl, we'll drink to thee

And here is to Fillpail and to her left ear
Pray God send our master a happy New Year
And a happy New Year as e'er he did see
With the wassailing bowl, we'll drink to thee

And here is to Colly and to her long tail
Pray God send our master he never may fail
A bowl of strong beer! I pray you draw near
And our jolly wassail it's then you shall hear

Come butler, come fill us a bowl of the best
Then we hope that your soul in happiness rest
But if you do draw us a bowl of the small
Then down shall go butler, bowl and all

Then here's to the maid in the lily white smock
Who tripped to the door and slipped back the lock
Who tripped to the door and pulled back the pin
For to let these jolly wassailers in.

I totally love singing these same old songs every year- sometimes with new words, sometimes not. I adore "Do You Hear What I Hear," always have. I'd love to hear anyone else's favorites.

Give Thanks

Fun fact about Meg: a major part of my spiritual practice is gratitude. I use prayers of thanks to ground, center, and remind myself how lucky I am. This season brings this practice to the forefront because I get the unusual opportunity to hear from others on the subject of that which makes them feel most thankful.

A litany, then, of blessings. I am so very blessed.

The elements of life are all around me. I am them, they are me.






The world is full of hungry desperate people and I am lucky enough to live among people who do not go hungry, who do not allow each other to go hungry. I am fed by these people and the Earth every day.




I have a strong, beautiful faith that informs and comforts me. I have a community of like minded people building a future together.


I have an awesome husband. He is my best friend and my equal, and I love him so much.


I have a wonderful family.




I have amazing, intelligent friends who shape my world.







I am privileged to go to school.


My life is not always easy or ever perfect, but it is lovely. I learn something every day, love someone every day, work hard, play hard, and think hard. I am so, so lucky this Thanksgiving.

Tolerance II

It has been brought to my attention that my blog of late has been angry, hateful, and unfair.

I agree with that assessment.

I have been angry, absolutely outraged. I feel almost as bad as if mine were one of those marriages now put in jeopardy. I feel threatened, my beliefs and way of life attacked, and betrayed by people I have come to respect and trust.

However, in my anger, I became blind to the sensibilities of those same people that I do so love and respect. I have been needlessly offensive because I was offended. I have reacted to the actions of a body of people and hurt individuals. I am so sorry for this.

I am old enough to know that it's not going to solve a damned thing. I'm also old enough to have very few outlets for feelings like the absolute disbelief and rage I have felt. I'm not marching on anybody's temple; I find violence and vandalism in the name of any cause abhorrent. I let off my steam here, in my blog, and I crossed the line.

I am so very sorry. I have had a stone tied to my heart since I realized how hurtful some of my posts have been. If I had been on the receiving end of the same, I would have gone absolutely nuclear.

I thank the gods that I have wonderful, courageous people in my life like my mother in law and sister in law who are willing to set me on my ass and tell me they are angry. It takes a lot of guts to do that with family and I am humbled and instructed by it. It is thanks to them that I am able to see this from another angle.

I love my LDS family, without exception or qualification. I have to remember to hold that separate from politics.

I am so, so sorry for any harm I have done here. Please understand it was never my intention, though it may look that way. I just needed to scream and be heard. I'm not excusing myself or justifying what I said, but trying to explain.

I, too, am learning to be tolerant. These are the times that try our souls.

All apologies are rendered with a contrite heart and a sincere wish to make this right.

I am sorry.

Untitled

we're living in the house that the Blues Brothers built
the house of the miracle
of the fool
we are learning to knit from invisible hope
to keep us warm
bake dreams into bread
running from rednecks, from Nazis, Princess Leia
singing our song
on a mission from God
knowing that fortune favors the fool
chasing destiny down highways
over rivers
back home
where we are
living in the house that the Blues Brothers built

M. L. Elison 2008

Tolerance

I have been wrestling of late with a hard idea. Wresting, struggling... these are the words. I am overcome by this issue again and again. Like the guardian at the gate, it refuses to move until I learn the answer, speak the password, guess Rumplestiltskin's name.

I am tolerant. I am exceedingly tolerant and pluralist in all things. I want to welcome everyone, learn from everyone, create a place for everyone. My problem is the specific issue of intolerance. How can I welcome and learn from people who will not welcome or learn from me, or my brother, or my best friend? How can I pry open my heart to people who keep theirs blind, deaf, and dead to the world?

I should feed my enemies. I should invite them to the feast and serve them in any way I can; make my open heart their home and lead by example. These last few weeks I have not been able to get there. All I can think about is marching on temples, creating fear to match the fear they have set upon our state... In short, all I can think of is revenge and counterstrike.

Intellectually, I know this is folly and worse than folly. This is the road to war.

I found myself on this road for the first time this November. The pit of my stomach grows icy with rage, my chest burns, and I want my pain to spread. I trudge up this rocky road, burning and cursing and not thinking. My better nature is the hint of a hint of a faraway drum, but my primal need for vengeance is beating a fever pace up and over this hill into enemy territory. Once there, I can think only of bringing this struggle to hellish fruition. The road I travel is littered with concepts and words and laws and boundaries, all cast aside upon the road to battle. Over the rest of the hill, I find only dead men and women who can no longer see those causes for which they fought and fell. I know this is not my road. I am surprised at myself for walking it. I can leave my weapons here with the dead; I trust them to let no one take them up again. I can turn around and walk home.

I'm not going to say I'm not angry anymore. I am still very angry and that keeps a candle burning on what is yet to be done. But our people need not fight on the other side of that hill.

We have found something to fight for. We don't have to settle for a few small-minded groups to fight against.

We must build a new world. We must not be afraid. And yes, we must serve our enemies, invite them to the feast, and endure their ignorance until they learn. They will learn. Their children will learn. Tolerance for all, equality to all.

Times will change.

We shall overcome.

So mote it be.

Married 17 Months

you smell like sweet wonder
like the brown mouth
of a clean river
exotic spice
and milk at home
combined
so familiar
and yet so foreign
comforting and yet
compelling
deeply known
and confusing as hell
like a book I have read
a thousand times
but sometimes
the ending changes

Copyright Meg Elison 2008

Tagged!

So, my SIL Amy tagged me. I've never been tagged before! Very exciting...

Seven random facts about Meg...

1. There are several types of small foods (M&Ms, Chex, Goldfish) that when I eat them I carefully split the center seam with my bottom teeth and divide them in my mouth. It's almost pathological- I can't seem to stop and have always done it this way.

2. When I can't sleep, I rub my feet together. It's immensely comforting.

3. I'm terrified of crabs. I fear no member of the animal kingdom, but crabs make me rubbery with horror. My darling John recently invited me to hold and touch some washed-up dead crabs on the shore, and that seems to have helped. But live ones give me the absolute creeps. Also, once when I was trying to text my best friend about some crabs I saw, I meant to type "filthy crabs," but my cellphone predicted "filthy arabs." Hilarity ensued.

4. When I am sick in bed, I like to watch "The Neverending Story." It cures what ails me.

5. I re-read books all the time. I've read "Gone With the Wind" so many times I can almost recite it.

6. I learned to speak Klingon from a series of audio tapes when I was in junior high.

7. I lived in the straight-up ghetto for a number of years. I can tell excellent stories about learning to Freak in sixth grade, prostitutes, drug dealers, and how to buy cheap electronics.

Big Box Blog #3- Human Tragedy

I cannot describe the joy my Big Box Job sometimes brings me. People bring in their babies and puppies and bizarre stories and, as my coworker says, "It's so much better than TV." Lately, however, I have had a number of chilling interactions that have left me shaken.

The practice of "receipt shopping" seems to be gaining popularity. For those of you who are outside of the criminal loop, allow me to explain. First, you dig in the trash or haunt a parking lot until you find a receipt for an item purchased with cash. Then, you wander the store nonchalantly, working methodically to match up the number and description with the item on the receipt. You then steal this item and get it out of the store somehow. You walk back into the store with the stolen merchandise and a seemingly legitimate receipt for having bought it. The retailer then has no choice but to pay cash to buy the stolen goods back from you.

The people who are good at this look for small high-value items that fit easily into pockets or bags. The people who are bad at this bring in receipts that are ancient, crumbling, grease-stained, or torn. The less intelligent ones steal the wrong product, or boldly ask someone to find them the product on the receipt. (HINT: This lets EVERYONE know you are a thief.) The less intelligent ones attempt to return the same item multiple times with the same exact receipt. (HINT: We are on to this one. The computer stops us from returning it again.)

These people make me angry, sad, and confused. They make me angry because they are roaming around in the late hours like ghouls, stealing and stealing again to get cash to buy drugs. They make me angry because they are so obvious and I can't do anything about it. They make me sad because they present identification with pictures of themselves one year, two years ago. The smiling face in the shitty DMV picture had a job, a family, and a future. The haggard zombie in front of me bears a resemblance, but he's lost 60 pounds. He's covered in angry open sores. His eyes have lost all soul, all clarity. His hands twitch and his eyes move too fast.

I am so confused by addiction. Physiologically, I understand it. What I don't understand is the choice that's made by anybody who looks at meth and says, "I'm sure I can keep it under control. Where all others have failed, I alone will succeed." Intellectually, I understand why they can't free themselves. Emotionally, I ache for every last one of these poor, night-dwelling, sweat-scented bearers of pain. What drove you here? What could be so good that it's worth the loss of everything else, of your freedom, of your soul?

I've never seen the walking dead. I've never seen a person whose body is possessed by a demon or evil spirit. But I have seen people who don't own themselves anymore, whose eyes are vacant and whose bodies twitch with a painful hunger that makes people on the other side of the wall run in stark terror. I want to make them sandwiches and give them hugs and tell them there's another way. I want to handcuff them to detox cells and let them sweat it out, then send them to farm jobs where no one has a lab and they can see the stars again. I want to step back from their fevered gestures and stuttering insistance of legitimacy, from the smell of failure and decay.

What I don't want to do, I do every day. I hand them just a little more cash for the candyman and send them back into the hell they have made.

I am sorry I have to let people steal. I am sorry my Big Box Job does not want me to Just Say No.

Pentagram

I wear my pentagram around my neck because I know who I am. It's a symbol of my commitment to a vision I am following. It is a symbol of what I believe and my hope for the future.

Lately, it's gotten me a few stares, a handful of tracts, more than a few odd comments, and one very nice New Testament bound in robin's egg blue. Since I'm at work when this happens and I don't have the time or the freedom to say what I otherwise would, here you go:

Wearing my pentagram doesn't mean I'm a "nonbeliever." It is, after all, a symbol of belief. Just because I believe differently than you does not entitle you to use that word.

It doesn't mean I stand against you. I've found something to stand for; I'm not wasting my time just standing against.

The tree of life in my necklace is just as important as the pentagram, if not more so. Look closer, see my dreams of Yggdrasil, of Eden. Look closer.

It doesn't mean I'm in danger. Your tracts will not save me from damnation. The bible was actually a nice gift and is good to have around, and I meant it when I said 'thank you'. Honestly, I felt like we had a mutual kindness; she in bestowing and I in receiving graciously, allowing her the satisfaction of having passed it on to a receptive young heathen.

It doesn't mean I don't want to talk about religion. If I didn't want to talk, I wouldn't advertise. However, I don't want to talk about Satan. I don't want to talk as though your answer is the only right answer. I don't want to talk as though I am uncommonly lucky that it is no longer legal for my kind to be persecuted. My rights are your rights, and I would appreciate polite discourse on the exercise of the same.

Staring angrily at my necklace and speaking in a terse tone of voice is passive aggressive behavior. Be a bigot or don't. This approach worries me the most, I think.

To the gentleman who offered a prayer for my marriage, for my sons and granddaughters, for my personal relationship with Christ... thank you. It seemed heartfelt and I know how you meant it. I didn't have the heart to tell you I'm not one of the fold. Nevertheless, it was kind and offered selflessly. Thank you.

If you want to ask, ask. I answer questions with a smile every time. This is part of my work, to teach people and build bridges.

To my Jewish friends and my friends who think they are well-versed in Judaica: Shalom, but learn to count. I'm one point short of David.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentagram

Sarah Palin is a Book Burner

..but don't take my word for it.

Sarah Palin is NOT a feminist choice.

• http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080912/ap_on_el_pr/palin_librarian

Speaking of feminism, did you know Governor Palin required rape victims to foot the bill for their own rape kits?

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-rapekits12-2008sep12,0,2717050.story?track=rss

Barack Obama and the Dumbest Among Us

Let me be clear: I am sick to death of stupid people. I am rotten to the core with loathing for people who have no idea what they are talking about, but insist on talking. I am done with their misinformation and total lack of reason. It pains me that these people are allowed to vote, and that the dumbest among us have kept our current regime in power for the last eight years. Thank gods, thank gods, the tide is turning against them. Thank gods, thank gods they are beginning to see.

Unfortunately, the dumbest among us have new things to be stupid about.

I'm glad that everybody has the right to vote. I encourage everyone to exercise that right; I would die for your right to vote for George W. Bush, or any other fool you choose. However, I have a request: If you know nothing, if you have never read a book or a newspaper (sports page doesn't count), if you believe everything said in an email or on the internet is true, please SHUT THE FUCK UP.

Ladies and gentlemen of the dumbest among us, allow me to introduce you to a few concepts.

Inductive reasoning is the ability to determine the strength or weakness of an argument based on supporting evidence. Look at these arguments and tell me which is stronger:

1. Barack Obama is probably Christian. He was married in a Christian church, by a Christian minister, to a Christian woman. His children are being raised Christians and attend Christian church with him weekly. He himself has declared his faith to be Christian. He observes Christian holidays.

2. Barack Obama is probably Muslim. I read on the internet that he is. I also saw pictures of him wearing an ethnic costume associated with a Muslim country one time. His middle name is Hussein, and I think it's a Muslim name, but I don't know what it means or where it comes from.

I swear to gods, the next person who insists that Obama is a Muslim in my presence is going to get schooled in logic so hard that they may not be able to watch television ever again.

Even if he were a Muslim, would that make him impossible to vote for? Why do you think that he would hide his faith as though it were something to be ashamed of. Not sure? I'll tell you why: it's because you're a bigot. You think that everyone who isn't like you is WRONG.

Ladies and gentlemen of the dumbest among us, no one is trying to hurt you. The brown people aren't after your land, your guns, or your jobs. Muslims are not trying to take over America by getting a Black Christian American man elected president. You don't have to be afraid of people who don't look like you or don't worship your whitewashed version of Jesus. (FYI, Jesus was a dark-skinned middle eastern hippie, not a white blue-eyed Republican with a Pro-Life bumper sticker on his donkey. Thought you should know.)

Barack Hussein Obama is a brilliant, visionary, Christian man who will most likely be the next president of this great and wounded country. You don't have to like my politics and I don't ever expect to like yours, but please, please, PLEASE, for the love of democracy, LEARN ABOUT YOUR CANDIDATES. Please at least TRY to know what you're talking about before you open your mouth or cast your vote. Don't believe everything people tell you. Don't be a tool.

Will the dumbest among us please shut up?

Sunday Morning

Homeric hymns to summer morning
to the cumulonimbus above the mountain
where the dream haunter
calls us back
the staple prayer
of a Sunday morning
ave Dea
gratia plena
mysterium tecum
exploding into genius
true offering
with the opening chords of
Hey Jude
and suddenly
the sign spinner on the corner
is a Sufi poet
whirling into union with God
a hymn to the hills
to the humid sensual stink of the groves
the heady scented memory
of my lust-torn youth

and wasn't this always the way?
stolen snatches
in the middle of everything
not yawning for hours in church
paying lip service to the divine
but the flashing
immediate
suddenly festive moment
when the truth peels open to reveal
the sublime fruit
of spirit

M.L. Elison, 2008

Paper Planes

Oh, my. I never seem to have any time anymore.

I haven't really had a day off in two weeks. My part-time (HA!) job gave me another forty hour week and the fall semester just started. I am going full time and then some, trying to knock out the least fun part on my undergraduate work. My big box stories aren't as fun this week- bad attitudes in hot weather and entitled people working out their issues on the underpayed.

John is still looking for work, at home and abroad. He had an interview in Boulder, CO last week and a call from a firm in Dubai today. Gods, if ANYONE will hire him I will dance a bloody jig.

School isn't too bad, actually. Anything that isn't work is starting to feel like vacation. Beyond that, I have good teachers, a few interesting classmates, and good work for my head to do.

Also, I have awesome friends. My best, most trusted friends are more valuable to me now than ever. What little time I have to spend with them now feels intensified, more condensed and rich.
So, since I have very little time and not much to talk about, here's some music I really love right now.

Big Box Blog #2

So, a group of kids came in to my store the other day with a busted skateboard. They were patient, courteous, and so helpless. One of them had broken a truck and they knew we could fix things and sold stuff to fix things, so they wandered in. They didn't have the .08 to buy the part they needed, but somebody bought it for them. A super-sweet guy sat with them for twenty minutes, completing the repair with a rubber mallet and some advice.

Today, I was glad I was at my Big Box job.

Later, the funny part.

I have a co-worker who has an unfortunate deep-South twang to his voice that makes him sound like a bumpkin during the best of times. I laugh a little when he says "Hay-low." So, when he retreated to an office and started bawling, I could not contain my gale of giggles. Imagine, in a slow stretch of afternoon, from somewhere offstage you hear shouting. "GawdDAMNIT! Who the HAIL put SAWLT in mah DRANKEN WAWTER?!?!? AGAYIN?!?!?

Even now, I can't stop laughing. He still doesn't know who's doing it. (It's not me. This started before I did.)

Big Box Blog #1

This isn't my first big box job. The big boxes are where the jobs are; they pay for mine and my husband's tuition and I'm not apologizing for where I work. I'm good at my job and I don't let it eat my soul.

That being said, I see over 1000 people every day. I have conversations with the lovely public and HI-larious things happen. This week's highlights are coming at you.

1. A contractor came in with his 10 year old son. The son had kickass Bay City Roller hair and I told him so. His eyes slid away and he mumbled "mmmmkay" like a proud pre-teen. His father leaned across my desk and leered at me and said, "Now son, when a lady like this gives you a compliment like that, you got to pay attention." The he drops me a wink that portends many decades to come of being a dirty old man and they mercifully leave.

2. Three emo-tastic kids came in and bought a small everyday object. I don't know if you've all noticed, but everyday objects are being styled in increasingly individualistic ways. So, this object was hot pink and studded with rhinestones. I asked if that was all he needed and he tossed his dyed black flatironed hair out of his disaffected face, straightened his "I wasn't even born when the lead singer of this band died" tshirt and said, "You know, a lot of guys like pink. Pink is really versatile, it's like something new and different. Pink is the new black." To which I replied, "No, kiddo. Irony is the new black." Punctured, he left the store.

3. Two gentlemen approached my desk. One was short, fat, bald, and old. The other was rail-thin, exceedingly tall, and young. Young Guy said he was buying. Old Guy said, "You always have to pay, 'cause you're the tallest. I get stuff for free because I'm handsome." I studied them both for a second. Then I said, "Hey, Handsome? Your shirt is unbuttoned." He looked down and feigned buttoning it for a moment, then thought better of it and ripped his shirt open to flash me his hairy old fat man belly. I stared in horror. Young Guy looked down, rolled his eyes and said, "Your taco meat is fucking HOT."

WARNING: For those of you who don't live in Hemet, let me break it down for you. Hemet is a desert retirement community full of older folks with varying degrees of mobility issues. Consequently, we see people using scooters as though they are cars, modifying them to look like motorcycles, and generally pimping them out to monstrous proportions. Now, I would never make fun of a person who needs help getting around. It is only when they become a menace to traffic or decent society that I would say a thing. So, ladies and gentlemen, I give you: Scooter as Towtruck.

4. One of my co-workers and I were talking the other day, when suddenly she became preoccupied with something happening behind me. Her face contorted and she said, seemingly out of nowhere, "What the HELL is that??!?!?" I turned around and saw one of our oldest, fattest, meanest customers yelling at a store manager because we don't carry a product line that has NOTHING to do with what we sell. Confused, I continued to watch. When Mean Old Fat Man was done yelling, he turned his power scooter on and executed a U turn. As soon as he turned around, I could see that tied crudely to the back of the scooter was a wagon. Piled into this wagon, with lumps of ass falling out over the sides was a wreck of humanity I could only assume was his wife. I'm not sure what else would convince a woman to ride around tied to the back of a man's scooter besides legal entanglement and holy matrimony.

Ahh, retail...

Congress shall make no law...

Has anybody heard about the new license plates proposed in a handful of southern states? The custom plate features a large cross and the legend, "I Believe."

What's wrong with this picture?

Apparently, other faiths are free to do the same. Floridians might be allowed to order Star of David plates someday. The trouble is, the plates depicting images associated with any other faith would be restricted from using any words in the place of "I Believe." That right, that privilege, like so many in this great land, is reserved only for Christians. If the display cannot be equal, one faith is favored above the others, simple as that. Florida and South Carolina are working to deprive their citizens of their rights.

The part that really bothers me here is that the government officials in favor of this plate becoming available seem to have followed the sterling example of our current President in that they have never bothered to read the constitution. According to CNN, the feeling is merely this:"I think it allows people of faith to profess that they believe in a higher calling, they believe in God," said Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer. Only what the Right people believe is important. Making second-class citizens out of everyone else, making a doily out of the Constitution is not.

Any opposition to this plate is being labeled discrimination. I don't want to get off on a rant here, but Christians in this country seem to scream OPPRESSION faster than Al Sharpton at a lynching contest. Anyone who dares oppose the God-given right of Christians to homogenize this nation and ram their faith down the throats of anyone who has the misfortune to be behind them in traffic is a BIGOT. Christians are such the victims of prejudice. Give me a break.

Christians are not maligned as terrorists or murderers. Christians are not kept out of jobs or housing by a silent majority that fears their interaction. Christians in the middle east are oppressed. Christians in Asia are oppressed. Here, in the land of the two-month long Christmas creche madness, Christian government officials, Christian police, and the Christian standard imposed on the behavior and life events of everyone, they are not. America's Christians, you are safe. Try to act it out gratefully.

Being deprived of the ability to oppress other people is NOT discrimination. Being stopped tooth and nail by the minority from dragging this nation into hegemony is NOT discrimination.

All Americans have the right to believe or not believe. And to say so. It's high time we stopped acting like there's only one game in town.

Forget. Remember.

I'm back in school.

Three weeks ago, I was overjoyed at this. Possibilities opened wide before me and I fantasized about the homework I would have. Oh, the great things that might occur!

Now, as previously mentioned in my blog, I am grateful. I am so grateful that I live in a country where I am allowed and encouraged to pursue my education. I'm grateful that I can almost sort of afford to go to school. I'm grateful that my husband and family and friends fully support this idea.

I stopped going to school seven years ago. I dropped out of the community college where I was majoring in administration of justice and toying with literature and French. I left the country, came home, and got a job. I started a long stint of wasting my youth and teaching myself things from books and Teh Intertubes. Somehow in that seven years, I forgot a lot of things.

I forgot how tiresome it is to be lectured for six weeks on something I could have picked up in eight hours. I forgot how grating it is to have an instructor who posesses neither feeling nor flair for the subject he teaches. I forgot how I used to lose myself in any bit of minutiae in the classroom in my boredom. (Holes in the ceiling tiles, ripples in the carpet.) I forgot how much I appreciated art on the walls of the the classroom to give me something to think about and still look studious. I forgot how unapologetically, vocally ignorant many of my fellow students were and still are. I forgot that my generation forgot how to read, and subsequent generations are out to make us look like ravenous bibliophiles. I forgot that I have not really learned anything new from any teacher since I was 12.*

So, what's different now? Now I'm too old to screw around. That's the long nd the short of it at this point. I'm not 18. I can't give up and fly to Europe and dismiss the idea of ever having a degree. No matter how dull these next few years prove to be, I have to slog through it. I have to do well and in many cases feign interest in order to do well.I have to bide my time, pay my dues, and play the game.

Funny that; in high school those exact phrases made me screech about the purity of the auto-didact and the corruption and bias of the system.

Now, it fills me with a sense of grim, determined dread. I'm back in school.

Now I remember.



*Rich Herold, my art history teacher in 1999-2000 is the notable exception to this rule. I learned more in his class than I ever picked up on my own. His was my favorite class in all of high school and since.

The Spirit of Elijah

The Elison family reunion this weekend was a great success. Amy and Phil came bringing their charming kidlings along with them. Tiana and Ryan brought baby Quin to meet much of the family for the first time. Cousins flew in from far-off states and people we haven't seen in years came out of the woodwork for the event. We all had a great time.
The theme was "The Apple Doesn't Fall Far from the Tree." Amy designed a large apple tree with branches representing the branches of the family. Individual names were written on the apples and arranged in family groups. It was a very cute idea. All the kids got to run like mad through the stake center and play with each other. I met people John is related to that I hadn't met before, and got to see quite a few that I hadn't seen since my wedding.
I had a couple of long moments of Other. John's family is wonderful to me and always has been. They have gone out of their way to include me and I really love them. However, I just never quite belong. I come from a totally different planet than these lovely people. I was really struggling with feeling out of place the first few days, and Amy and Phil were very helpful with that. When we cut out and labeled the apples, I sat thinking that maybe I shouldn't be an apple. I had this image of a lone pineapple sitting on the branch next to John. Different shape, different color, different part of the world. We put my name on an apple anyway, but I felt foreign just the same.
Amy coordinated the whole reunion this year, passing it off to her cousin Sharon for 2011. Amy spoke with tears in her eyes when she described what it had been like to plan this event. She said that the spirit of Elijah had been in her house for a year. Elijah, the Tishbite. Elijah, the prophet. Malachi 4:6 said that Elijah would "turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers." To Amy, this is what Elijah could do. Elijah, the uniter of families.
As a Pagan, the name Elijah doesn't ring this way for me. When I think of Elijah, I think of 1 Kings 18:40: "And Elijah said unto them, Take the prophets of Baal; let not one of them escape. And they took them: and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and slew them there." Elijah had the priests of Baal and the prophets of Asherah put to death for no other reason than they dared to worship their own gods in their own land. Elijah, the murderer. Elijah, the zealot.
I cannot escape my fundamental differences here. I can only seek common ground and love my in-laws. I can only make sense of history and interfaith one moment at a time and enjoy the complexity of the culture into which I've married.
I drew a tarot card on the day of the reunion dinner. I pulled the Apple Branch, one of the fey gift cards in the deck. A gift. The fruit of the Garden, cut it crosswise and it's the fruit of the Goddess. I watched our nieces and nephews eat apples and reach out to one another. I saw my name hanging on the tree.
It is beautiful to be part of this family. It is more than enough.

Author! AUTHOR!

I was inspired recently by my best friend Di. When she truly loves a book, she will often track down the writer and send them a nice email. I resolved to try it the next time I read something that really moved me.

The occasion came sooner than I thought with Wicca's Charm by Catherine Edwards Sanders. I was moved, but not in the happy-fun way. Below is my hastily typed letter to her webmaster. I don't suppose I need to elaborate on my not reccomending this book...

Ms. Sanders-

I borrowed your book this weekend from the Santa Monica Public Library. I am feeling more and more fortunate that I didn't buy it.

In your book, you point out how displeased you are that Pagans stereotype Christians as ignorant, Bible-thumping, Evangelical southern hicks. You then cleverly combat this stereotype by portraying Pagans as drug-addled, ill-educated teenage slackers. You then follow it up with a "Jesus is panacea!" cautionary wail that falls just a little short of original, but hits somewhere near the borders of the Land of Irony.

Your scholarship is poor. Your interviews are badly planned, chosen, and conducted. Your preconceived notions bleed through the book like the smell of library air. Your Christian sense of charity stays your hand before the edge of outright insult, but just. This book is a pathetic attempt at a grass-roots ethnography and a failure.

It fails to inform anyone of what Pagans are truly like. It fails to impress me, a Pagan, that a Christian writer is capable of anything like fairness on the subject of religions not their own. It failed to teach you anything, it seems.

Thank you for continuing to assassinate the collective character of a minority faith. Thank you for ensuring that I will be asked, again and again if I worship the devil or harm children. Thank you for your bigotry and small-minded lack of insight.

It galvanizes smart Pagans like me to do this work ourselves. We need puppet journalists like yourself to remind us how much ignorance is still out there.

Blessed be,

Meghan Elison
Pagan Meghan
youtube.com/pagantv

Right Now

Observations:

1. I think it's hilarious to walk around in my Renaissance Faire clothes while talking on my Bluetooth.

2. I saw Sex and the City the other day. It was wonderful, like a sparkly punch in the gut followed by cocktails and a hug from your best female friend. More than the emotional taffy pull with our beloved characters, I was shocked by how this movie made me crave beauty again. I get along most days quietly noting real Tiffany's from fake, culling out the imposter handbags from the genuine article. I wear approximations of good perfume purchased on the cheap at the drug store down the street. I've been unemployed and broke for a while and I had forgotten how much fun it is to really clean up and feel shiny and new. It was a very girly moment I had with Jennifer Hudson on that screen. (Skinny smoker Carrie I ain't.) She was curvy and self-posessed and lovely and knew what she was worth to the last penny and pound.

3. It costs nothing to dream, but it costs damn near everything not to.

4. I was reading "The Girl with No Shadow" by Joanne Harris at the Barnes and Noble the other day. It's $25 in hardback and they have comfortable chairs; do the math. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end and after a half hour and the first 100 pages we had to leave. Throughout the rest of the day, I had that sudden, jarring feeling that I had forgotten something important like my cell phone or my wallet... or a small child. I so loathe separation from a new book I'm reading. Ask my lovely mother-in-law; she's seen me brave car sickness to tear through Diablo Cody's memoirs on the dusty back roads of Temecula. I am insatiable until that last page is turned.

5. Tomorrow I meet the widow of my husbands best, favorite, most influential seminary teacher. So many occasions when I don't know what to say. (Maybe it's a sign of weakness when I don't know what to say. Maybe I just wouldn't know what to do with my strength, anyway.)

6. John is a dream, the gentlest part of my dreaming. The only one that doesn't fade in the face of reality. Ever mine. Ever thine. Ever ours.

7. Cars are so complicated. Gods bless everyone who understands them- particularly the intrepid souls who have given us advice this week. We have a carburetor! Who knew?

8. I can't find a new diary anywhere. They've stopped my making mine. I'm at a loss when the intertubes fail me... (YOU SHOULD ALL BE KEEPING DIARIES. Yeah, I went there. I used all caps. That's how important it is. Ask me why sometime.)

9. Forget about summer in the desert. By the time you realize it's over 110, the numbers mean nothing. It's like asking what circle of hell you're in. It's so over by noon.

10. Water. My gods, water. Get dehydrated once. I dare you. It will change your consciousness.

I Want

I want to be a postage stamp; to stick tenaciously to te thing I was meant for until I get where I am going.

I want to be a cup of coffee; a custom and a comfort, a meeting ground and a pleasure to all who partake.

I want to be the best book you've
ever read; the one that made you laugh and cry and imagine yourself in another world.

I want to be that sixty-year marriage between best friends who still make each other laugh and give footrubs even though they have arthritis.

I want to be as smart as my husband thinks I am. I want to be the person my best friend holds me to being.

I want to be as good a student as I was in fifth grade; before I figured out that I knew everything and nothing mattered.

I want to remember ever day how privileged I am to go to school; that I don't fear stoning or shunning for being a woman with a book.

I want to remind everyone with whom I interact that they are important, that their contribution is unique and priceless.

Movie Review: Speed Racer

First of all, we saw Iron Man, and nothing can be said about it. It is perfect.

After that, we saw Speed Racer.

Imagine your favorite low-budget Saturday morning cartoon from the 1980's. Now give it a million dollars and a generous hit of acid. Instead of watching it on your parents' nappy rug in your pajamas, imagine watching it trapped inside a kaleidoscope made out of the stained glass from Chartres cathedral. Also, you're wearing a slick vinyl jumpsuit fashioned in the most virulent possible shade of your favorite color, and it's lined with baby-soft fleece.
Speed Racer was as bright and shiny as any plastic toy you wanted with the whole of your child's heart and simply BURST with pleasure when you got it. I've never seen such use of color anywhere before and I think we may have raised the bar on cartoon adaptations. The Wachowski Brothers, in their damn-near infinite wisdom, seem to have postulated on the depressing lack of intensity we all suffer when the wants of childhood wane into less than life-or-death humdrum adulthood. They took this fade and turned up the contrast on it until we are reduced to an open-mouthed stare punctuated by involuntary laughs and cheers. Congratulations, boys, you've made us all eight years old again.

Emile Hirsch is a wonderful Speed, elegantly echoing the performance of Scott Porter as the haunted older brother, Rex. Nicholas Elia as young Speed is the portrait of a cheerfully ADD-addled child of the exact type the movie appears to be made for. Christina Ricci is wide-eyed and fetching as the spitfire Trixie, who in this adaptation drives a racecar as well. Female characters here are remarkably well portrayed, Susan Sarandon is lovely and genuine as always in her role as Mom. John Goodman shows us a depth of chracter undreamed of in his other roles and frankly unexpected in such a film. Comic relief comes to us courtesy of the perrenial Fat Kid. Following in the footsteps of the Goonies' Chunk comes Paulie Litt as little brother Spritle, replete with chimp sidekick and a lust for all things candy. All in all, the cast is well-chosen and well-directed, providing a formidable distraction from the almost non-stop action.

The racing sequences are dizzying, pulse-pounding and wonderful. John remarked as we watched that the racers seemed to be practicing the long lost martial art of Car-Fu. The drivers are wildly out of control and daring, the terrain nightmarish and swooping through the Technicolor skies. The gadgetry is the of the gleefully impossible type only known to the world of animation, and we do not disbelieve it for a second. We are drawn in past the point of grown-up skepticism.

I highly reccomend you take your kids to see this. On the other hand, if you don't have kids yet, or if you sometimes think wistfully that the sky was bluer, the trees were greener, and everything was so much brighter when you were a kid yourself... buy yourself some popcorn, promise to be quiet and sit still, take yourself in hand and go see Speed Racer.

Puerto Rico

John and I just got back from Puerto Rico. We spent 5 days at the Wyndham Rio Mar resort on the beach and had a really great time. We had a few nice dates, one in a fantastic sushi bar. I'm glad I'm married to him. It's been a wonderful anniversary.

Apparently the dominant species of Puerto Rico is iguanas. They even swam in the pool with the tourists. Also, there is an odd species of bird quite prevalent in the skies there that looks alarmingly like pterodactyl. Squint a little between the lizards and profuse foliage: Jurassic Park.

We're back, both cultivating degrees and job offers. Things are looking up, for those of you sick of my pronouncements of doom and gloom. :)

Pictures are on my FaceBook!

Easter Plans and Accidents (from earlier this spring)

I celebrated St. Patrick’s this year in proper Irish green, but stayed sober. I honored the Pagan "snakes" of Ireland with a snake wrapped around my left wrist and told the truth of the story to any who would hear. Ahh, Patricius, you lost after all. We’re back, and we revel drunkenly in your name, sporting the symbols of a liberated Eire. May you understand better, now.

I celebrated Ostara with family for the first time. It was beautiful, the fruit trees are fluttering, their arms full of pink blossoms. Hemet is greener than I remember it ever being. The mountains were clear on the horizon and I did not greet the spring alone. Blessed Ostara, to those of you who would keep or did keep this sabbat. May you hatch from a shell, germinate from a seed, rise with the sun and be reborn! Blessed be!

I will celebrate Easter with family and friends of the Christian persuasion. I’m entrusted with making some of the more important dishes of the day and I honestly look forward to it. Easter is one of the easiest days to see the way our faiths entwine.

This year, these three feasts seem to dog each other’s heels in a way I never perceived before. A Catholic saint’s day, a Pagan day of remembrance, a public spectacle of drunkenness. Corned beef and cabbage, rye bread with the family. A Pagan holiday, the day my nephew came into the world, a beautiful moment of spring. Lamb steaks and asparagus, fresh strawberries and Martinelli’s to taost the babe. The gravest of Christian holidays, the miraculous rising of the slain Christ, celebrated with the Pagan symbols of the egg and the hare. Roast ham and enough eggs to satiate an ovaraptor. All braided together this March, in the windy time, all proving my vision to be true.

It is all one. Bring your faith with you. There is a place set for you at our table if you will choose to join us.

Stuff Making Me Angry Right Now

Patriarchy. Young-Earth Creationists. People who can’t drive. Bad writers. Bad spellers. Ignorance. Self-centeredness. Entitlement. Spoiled kids. People who take what they have for granted. People who won’t listen. Rigid ideology. The distribution of wealth. The price of school. The price of housing. The price of gas. The war. The fact that my car runs on gas. Unemployment. Smugness. Shoes. Rape as warfare. Genital mutilation. The fact that nobody understands that circumsicion IS genital mutilation. The death of the women’s movement. The right-hand ring. Propaganda. Advertising. Big Brother. Wisdom teeth. Hormones. Narrow mindedness. Failure of imagination. Guilt. Lack of lightning-quick inspiration. Apathy. Hopelessness. Toxic chemicals in fucking EVERYTHING. Lactose. Casein. The cost of insurance. The total lack of give-a-damn the uninsured can expect. Contempt for folk healing. Contempt for folk wisdom. Modern medicine. Modern childbirth. Drug culture. Addiction. Side effects. Low expectations. Celebrity cults. Money. Money making the world go around. Money being the only thing that walks, talks, or greases the wheels. Money keeping me up at night. The housing market. The boarded up old places in town that I’d love to pour my heart into, but can’t. Smoking. Kids whose parents let them play Halo when they’re under ten. Kids being raised by GTA3, or Saw IV, or ignored in favor of WoW. Homophobia. Creedism. People who build treehouses with a big "No ____ Allowed!" signs. TV. Wanton stupidity. Prescription drug commercials. Doctors. Retail. Relationships. Family. Life.

The fact that all I can do about any of this is blog.

YouTube.com/PaganTV

My YouTube channel has newly uploaded episodes of Pagan TV. Please come a take a look if you happen to be stumbling here. This is my main project at present. Thanks!

A Day at the Getty

Travertine limestone like the tomb of a pharaoh, piled in gamboling curves toward the misty LA sky. Unlikely rain pounds the slick rock stairs, unlikely children

Gigi Philomena Lara Luca

yuppies

man in the white belt hippack bruno magli, wife in j. crew blackberry in hand

hippies

tall redhead and fuzzy bespectacled s.o. pentagram and hemp shoes

And us. Products of wonder and desire strolling through images of beauty and regret.

Unlikely the Chinese paper art downstairs from Rembrandt van Rijn. Unthinkable the sudden sunlight, the dappled mud of the gardens.

Opulent and beautiful, free to all who come up this hill. The best of three continents assembled in the name of our benefactor, J. Paul.

I have been there with everyone whom I have really loved.

I have kissed all those that mattered; our echoes are embedded in those rough-hewn stones. I embraced her in the muted shine of blonde hallways. I led him while he sniffled to the view of the sea. I felt his arms around me as we walked today. I remembered them all in a Venetian flask, a bronze sphinx, the objects I deposit memories inside like messages in a bottle for my future self to find.

I have always liked it better in the rain.

Tonight I sleep with the echoes of awe, with the images of Fate and Christ and Desire burning behind my eyes. I curl beside the Odalisque and beneath the Chollo in the park in 1986. I am planning already my next foray to Fragonard, my revisit to illuminated manuscripts.

Have you been?