And another I'd like to bring on this year - love, love, love. Oh, not just this year but always. But if I state it, from now on, say it, say the words, it shall be!

Last November, we had a poetry reading at Baubo's Garden (www.baubosgarden.com). It was a sexy reading of love, lust and lingerie! Below is a poem written by one of the poets that nite. I love it and thought it is a "bring it on" poem.

Enjoy! And Bring on that Love This Year!!!!!

Love, Like Heavy Equipment
Speak the language of love using the terms your love understands.

You light up my life
Not neon bright
Fluorescent white
No halogen or LEDs tonight
More like a Vector™ twin–beam spotlight
with the 3-million candlepower
of 12V, H3 series halogens
powered by two 12V, 6 Amp per hour rechargeable batteries
armed with a 3–position power selection switch
hands-on or hands–free
cord or cordless
choose the illumination.

You’re hot
Not tropical spot sun hot
or Thai spicy hot
or flaming campfire hot
More like a 750,000 BTU Portable Propane Torch
whose power jet burners melt ice,
incinerate tree stumps
with a 100-lb. propane cylinder
flame-control trigger valve
UL listed gas hose
aluminum extender tube
and instructions.

I feel your power
Not triple-A battery power
Or solar panel power
More like the Dyna™ 20,000 Watt, 35 HP Generator
with a 3600 RPM engine
producing 83 Amps
120/240 volts at home, on the job
and two-year limited warranty.

You push my buttons
Not dainty satin buttons
Or hotline phone buttons
More like buttons on a 2.4 Volt, 2–speed cordless screwdriver,
Model# 6547–1,
6–position adjustable clutch;
3.5 to 26 in. per pound of torque
adjustable for tight spots
forward/reverse
forward/reverse
with battery, charger, bit set and
impact–resistant carrying case.

We fit together
Not just brush-up-against together
Not simply puzzle-piece together
More like Lovejoy™ Standard Half Couplings
that mount your engine to pump
with 11.16 horsepower
synthetic rubber inserts between the coupling halves
one fits the motor
one fits the pump shaft
194 inches per pound: the torque’s max.

And Baby, you’re always “on.”
Emily Thornton Calvo

2010...Bring it on!!!

"In dreams and in love there are no impossibilities." Janos Arnay

That is my goal for 2010. Oh, I know, easier said than done. Or, how the heck does that have any bearing on what is going on and what does that even mean?

I was talking with a friend in the store yesterday. He has been bugging me to create a picture for my website and what I want it to look like. Easier said than done. Firstly, I have no money to create a new website. Secondly, that requires me to to have an idea of where I want to go, which for me means, what do I want to be when I grow up. And in a way, I DO know what I want to be when I grow up, and what I want that place to look like. It's just getting there that has me baffled.

I guess that is a good thing. while my head is still behaving as if it is on crack, all else is quiet. My thoughts are racing but my path is oblivious to me. Being that I like to always be in control of everything in my life, I am so NOT in control right now and I have begun releasing my hold and control on something I never had in my control to begin with. First of all, the recession has left me with no answers for anything. me and all my fellow merchants on the street are struggling just to keep our doors open. I, or they, have done nothing different, haven't behaved in any way that would keep customers away, and yet, we are all baffled as to what has happened, and how to proceed. I thought I had all the answers, but alas, I have NO answers. So.....I have decided that this is a good place to begin for 2010.

I heard myself making all kinds of excuses to my friend yesterday for why I had not made a plan, list, whatever, for where I thought I might want to start. That is definitely NOT me. I make a plan and move forward till the project is done. I always have. So why is now different? Well, nothing at all makes sense anymore so I have decided to just LET GO. No choice but to. "Om Nams Narayani", a mantra I have found that means, "I surrender to the Divine."

It comes to basically thinking happy thoughts and all will be well. In a very very simplistic way that is correct. I just have to know that all will be well, that I will move ahead and be fine, that all the seeds I have planted, if only in my head, will sprout and fruit. I know they will. They always have.

Another friend who is a life coach, gave 4 friends a list to fill out before our meeting with her. it is all based on the laws of attraction. Think about the following and how you would complete the following lists:

Master Dream List - Imagine what you want your life to be, that all your dreams have come true. What does that look like?
Emotional Dream List - How will you feel living in your idea future?
Relationship and Family Dream List - Describe your ideal loving relationship. What qualities are you looking for in all your relationships? How would you live? What would you do with them?
Career and Financial Dream List - What would it feel like working at your ideal career with all your monetary dreams and goals realized?
Social Dream List - What does socially successful mean to you? What contributions would you make to the world.
Physical Dream List - What does it look like to be fit, healthy and totally enjoying being your physical self?
Mental Dream List - What would you like to creatively develop and express? What do you want to learn?
Spiritual Dream List - What spiritual, ethical and evolutionary state do you desire? What inspires you to be the best you can be?

I have just drawn a picture of my website for 2010. It has arrows and dotted lines and lots of text. I have just drawn a map. Rudimentary, yes, but the first step to getting me where I know I will be. I know what it feels like to be there. But I have just began paving the road that will get me where I already am in the deepest part of my soul.

I have created the lists above. They aren't complete, they are just a beginning. Below is a quote I found years ago, that is one of many in a folder I keep and continue to add to. Funny, my son gifted me with the book this quote comes from, just this Christmas. There are no coincidences.

"You will touch mud and it will become a lotus. You will be able to become an alchemist. But it is possible only through great awakening of intelligence, great awakening of the heart." Osho, excerpted from The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha

2010: Can't wait to see what enfolds.....bring it on!

Transition

This whole transition thing has got me all in a tizzy. I wonder sometimes why my lesson seems never to be learned!!! Or does it continue to morph into a new lesson I need to learn. A good friend told me the other day, (when I was fretting over my business and how I was going to make ends meet, la la blah, blah, and all that...) that I must stop fretting and think happy thoughts (not exactly in those words but something like that).

What she was referring to was manifestation. I know all this and am a firm believer in that you plant a seed, water it a bit now and then, and it usally grows. I have seen this first hand, with my businesses. I also know that it is hard to think those happy thoughts when stress has you in its grips!

I mentioned in another post that I had seen an akashic soul reader (they read the life and purpose of your soul in your lifetimes) I had asked her when it would be time to see her again. She said what she read that day had opened it up to the universe and I would know when it was time again to see her.

Hmmmmm, very cryptic! But now I see that the ideas that came forth during that reading have now begun to manifest. I had ideas and plans but no pathway for them to present themselves. Since then, people have come forward and a meager path has been created.

Did I do that by myself? Is it magic? Coincidence? Whatever it is and how it came to be, my ideas are sprouting leaves. I do continue to search for that portal to the next transition, the next phase in my life. I know it is nearby if I keep my eyes and heart open. And all else will fall away that is not necessary. I know it is never easy. Even the outgrown people, ideals, dreams were once my truest companions. But they have grown stale and outgrown their purpose. Or maybe they have transitioned into something new that is right in front of me and I have yet to recognize.

Letting go is always hard. I am the first to admit I hang on till the bitter end, hoping it's not so for any particular "dead or dying" thing in my life. But they have to go. Room has to be made for the new that is trying to sprout under all the debris, like the smallest saplings in the deep forest.

And maybe, just maybe, (because I can't let go of certain outgrown or dying things), just maybe when room is made for the new, that new light that is created can feed that "certain thing" and bring it back to life, in new form, like the phoenix rising from the ashes.

Spiral Symbol

I got my first tattoo a little over a year and a half ago. It includes a picture of the goddess spiral.

A Spiral is one of the ancient Goddess symbols, as a sign of Life. As such, it is also one of the primary Wicca symbols.

A Spiral is a created by a Circle moving forward, so to speak.
As the Wheel turns, you come around again, but not to the same point as before. You arrive at same place, but on a new level. A spiral line uncoiling is "the movement of creation," according to Arthur Avalon in Shakti and Shakta.

The Spiral represents the path of life - from your Essence, outward to the world. Or, depending on your perspective, from worldly existence to spiritual Essence.
As Walker so eloquently phrases it, a Spiral represents "death and rebirth as movement into the disappearing-point of formlessness, and out of it again, to a new world of form."

The Spiral is one of the most common natural shapes, seen in nature from galaxies to sea shells to the pattern of a falcon's dive.

Spirals have been primary Goddess symbols since the late Paleolithic. It is the symbol of the womb, of fertility, the feminine serpent force. It represents continual change and evolution and the interconnectedness of all things.

It has always attracted me and I've come back again and again to the meaning behind the symbol, that I am continuing to evolve, from inner life and soul to outer soul and higher spirit, to become the goddess within. The goddess is the divine that resides in the heart of all wherever there is love, compassion and mercy.

Comedy Tonite!

So I started my women's standup comedy class last nite. Eight women and one teacher. And I learned how to write my first joke. Do I think I'm funny? Well, my friends and family tell me so. I tend to be the prankster, the jokester of the group, the one who is willing to make fun of herself to get a laugh.

I thought about it after class as to how one becomes the class clown, the family comedienne. In my family, I now believe I used it to lessen the darkness that hung over the house. Or maybe it was to decrease the consequences of a punishment. Kind of like, divert the attention to a joke and I might not get in trouble. Or maybe it is used just to get attention.

I was told a long time ago (by a therapist) that people become therapists in order to understand their own dysfunctional families. It that the same with comedians? Laugh your way through the hard times?

All I know is that I have a lifetime of stories to now turn into comic sketches! That is sure to make the rest of my family a bit nervous! So here's to dysfunction! And all the fodder it creates! Let's see how it all fits into the rest of this class. I'm thinking corsets and comedy......

Letting Go, Part 2

To “let go” is to fear less and love more.

Age 50 was a difficult one. 40 didn't do anything to my psyche. But 50 has been a very weird year. Very transitional as well. A new thought process has taken place. What once mattered no longer does. And the worst part is letting go of old thought patterns, dreams way past their prime and relationships that have outlived their usefulness and can't walk with me into the new place that is being forged as I write this. That is the saddest thing to understand. Dreams can be fleeting and can be replaced by new dreams, or refashioned into new versions. But relationships cannot perform in the same way. People don't change, at least not their basic traits and values. I look at people who have been in my life for a very long time who just don't fit anymore. It is sad because as much as I don’t want to let them go, I have no choice. We have no control in our lives anyway, as much as we think we do. And the more we try to control our lives, the more out of control we become.

Then I think of the adage, "Let someone go, if they come back to you it was meant to be". My fear is that they come back and I'm not interested. I read that letting go of someone or something feels like your skin has been removed and you spend a deal of time with it raw and exposed before it starts to heal up again. Letting go of something that has past its expiration date does two things. It opens you up t all sorts of new possibilities. That “thing” was taking up too much space and energy and nothing else could grow. Kind of like thinning out the forest so the new saplings can have light and room to grow. But it does another thing too.

Letting go forces you to look at what you are leaving behind with microscopic eyes. You see all of the flaws that were not visible earlier on. And a great deal of those flaws are your own. It hurts badly. I’ll be the first to admit it. It gives you the opportunity to live with those flaws, change them, let them work out their own issues without intrusions of your views and ideas, and last but not lease, work through the pain. There is always (at least in my world) the question of what I could have done differently to not have to be in this letting go place. Can’t help it – it is an ingrained, learned trait that I will fight with till the end. It also gives me the opportunity to lessen that trait a bit and let myself know that this is a normal pattern of life.

Things, people, change. Nothing is static. Someone told me that relationships are like a figure eight pattern. When you are in a relationship and everything is working fine, you are intersecting at the same place. Then over time or circumstances, one moves faster or slower and you aren’t intersecting at the same place anymore. Then you are out of sync. The question is if you will get in sync again or are permanently on a different course. The more you try to make something happen, the further away you get from it. Same with a dream. I have a dream of what I’d like to see happen but I’ve learned painfully that I must let it find its path (with a small amount of help on my part) and give it the freedom to change and grow. Just like a child, it wants its own freedom to explore.

Life changes course on a regular basis. Who am I to fight where it wants to go? I can put my wishes out in the collective conscious and sit back and wait to see what happens. The more I try to control or fight it, the further away it gets from me. All I can do is let it all go, plant the seeds and see what happens.

So I will try to fear less and love more, love myself more especially. To know that I am on the right path, whichever one it is, and to love where I am, accept the things I cannot change, and cherish the wisdom that comes from the pain as well as joy. For without the pain of change and letting go, one cannot know the joy of what is yet to be.

eden

Baubo's Garden

Vestal Virgins

We were in Italy a few weeks back and visited the remains of the Temple of the Vestal Virgins. I found these women to be very powerful and interesting. Read on.
The priestesses of the goddess Vesta were known as the Vestal Virgins. They were responsible for maintaining the sacred fire within the Temple of Vesta on the Forum Romanum. Other duties included performing rituals in regards to the Goddess Vesta, and baking the sacred salt cake to be used at numerous ceremonies in the year. They were the only female priests within the roman religious system. The head of the college of Vesta was called the Virgo Vestalis Maxima, and she was under the direct authority of the Pontifex Maximus.

The college of Vesta had 18 members, though 6 were considered actual Vestal Virgins at any given time. They were selected from distinguished patrician families at an age from three to ten, and such appointments were considered a top honor for any family to receive. They each served thirty years, the first ten years as novices, then ten years as actual vestal virgins, and finally ten years as supervisors responsible for training the novices. After the thirty years of duty they were released from their duties and could then maintain a private life, including the right to marry.

For men, arranging a marriage with a former vestal virgin was highly prestigious, regardless of age or the ability to have children. The vestals vowed to live in chastity for the thirty years their tenure lasted. In return they were allowed many privileges not given to ordinary Roman women. As one example, the vestals were not subject to the pater potestas of their fathers. Essentially they were allowed to handle their own properties and engage in legal contracts, they were allowed to travel around the city in a carriage and they had special seats in the front row at the various games, where, in contrast women were normally relegated to the back seats. They were considered inviolable and sacred and their blood could not be spilt without fear of terrible repercussion from the gods. So sacred and divine-like were these priestesses, that if a person sentenced to death met a vestal virgin on his way to the execution, he would be automatically pardoned. Of course, special care would be taken to prevent or to make sure this would happen, depending on the circumstances.

While enjoying many benefits, including a rather luxurious life in the House of Vestal Virgins, punishment for breaking the rules were severe. The punishment for breaking the vow of chastity was death by burial alive as this was the adopted to kill a vestal without shedding her blood. Such executions would take place in the "Evil Fields", or Campus Sceleratus, just outside the Servian Wall. Their lover would be flogged to death on the Comitium. While these executions took place several times, it was obviously a rare event that carried all sorts of negative omens with it.

While the Pontifex Maximus continues to the present day as an office of the higher order in the Catholic Church, the order of the vestals was disbanded in 394 AD, when non-Christian cults were banned by Theodosius. The Church, wisely trying to keep the general population with a sense of familiarity, readily adopted the use of convents and position of nuns that held many of the same rules and customs as the Vestals.
eden
Baubo's Garden