Twilight's Edge

Hi! You've reached what used to be my spirituality journal. You can still see those entries below; I've left them up and open in case anyone's interested. Since I wasn't actively using this account, I've decided to rename and repurpose it, and this post marks the transition to a friends-locked, invite-only writing journal. (If anyone on the writing f-list is reading back, feel free to keep going, but there's pretty much no writing-related material beyond this point.)

FYI, I'm switching over to a new journal: shefytbast. If you're still interested in hearing what I have to say, please add the new account to your f-list.

Thanks!

So I've had my Shemsu naming ceremony, and my shiny new name is Shefytbast. The weekend beforehand, I was lucky enough to actually get a chance to meet Hemet (AUS) and a few other members of the House, which was something I really wanted to do before taking the Shemsu vows. Everyone was lovely, so overall I'm feeling very good about where and how I am on this path.

The pheasant was drumming right under my window this morning. I think he's a good omen. ^_^

( More stuff about the RPD )

In other news, there's been a ring-necked pheasant hanging out around my house. Last weekend I kept hearing this screechy squawk-honk, and I couldn't figure out what it was--it didn't sound like one of the Canada geese. Finally on Sunday evening I saw him walking around out back. (I even got to see him go to bed in one of our pine trees.) He's been screeching and drumming a lot, though I think he's moved across the street now, so I wonder if he's looking for a mate.

Did my yearly planting of pansies last weekend as well. I don't think I'm going to manage more than sporadic gardening efforts this year, but at least I've done that much.

In other, other news, I'm really not happy with the job-thing at the moment. I think this is going to have to end up being another post sometime, but for the moment suffice to say that this is probably going to be a test of my resolution not to worry about making a big mistake.

But for this weekend, I'm pretty much just going to be *thud,* since I'm getting over a cold, and wow am I tired.

Very brief update, basically of the "I'm not dead" variety. I had my Rite of Parental Divination a few days ago, on my birthday (spiritual and physical birthday on the same day! *is so happy* ^_^), and have been divined as a daughter of Bast (big surprise there) and beloved of Nut and Amun-Ra. Nut *was* a surprise--I had a whole long list of Netjeru in my RPD questionnaire, but I'd never thought of her at all--but upon reflection I think I can see places where she was glimmering through in the past. Amun-Ra...it's interesting--in the moment, immediately upon being divined, I was entirely glowy and filled with the rightness of these Gods, but after the fact I find myself wrestling with doubt. Amun-Ra could be my Lord of the Sun/Lord of the Wind duality...but is he really? I'm so paranoid that there might be some kind of usurpation going on that I'm having trouble relaxing and hearing what the Gods themselves have to say on the matter. I think I'm just thinking too much. There're no intimations that anything's wrong--in fact, I had a nice, calm experience outside this morning--so it's probably just my over-fevered brain teaming up with my trust issues. So I'm making a conscious effort to just go along with things and see how they all turn out. I declared my intent to become Shemsu while I was glowy, and I'm still going ahead with that. My Naming ceremony is hopefully on the 27th, which gives me a couple of weeks to beat my nervous twitch into submission. (Or, more accurately, to ponder and journal on it, and try to figure out exactly *why* this is bothering me.)

I kind of stumbled around pointlessly today, which means that I have ten tons of stuff to do tomorrow. Which means that it's not all going to get done, because I really need relaxation on my weekend. I suppose I should mention that our office just moved, which meant packing up right on top of an issue going to press. Very bad scheduling, but what're you going to do? Plus I'm still acclimating to the loss of my friend/co-worker, so lots of stress there. I'm trying hard not to think about whether the package I left out for the messenger on Friday ever got picked up, because if it wasn't, I'm screwed, and there's nothing I can do about it until Monday, so there's no point in angsting and spoiling my weekend.

There seems to be a lot of not-thinking-about going on with me right now. Letting go, just letting go.... *breathes*

May have something to write about the rest of my divination later, but for now I think I need to crash.

Whew. So yeah, it's been a while. I've been going through another low phase, where pretty much all I want to do is vegetate in front of the TV. I seem to be getting back on top of my life now, though--I felt strong this weekend, got a lot of stuff done, and the last couple of weeks have generally been good. So we'll see.

The dynamic at work has changed. My friend/co-worker was let go (for financial reasons), so now there's just the editor and me. On the one hand, *major* stress, because now I have to do all her work on top of my own, plus the editor wants me to do more editing and development as well. On the other hand, I don't have to deal with the emotional fall-out of my co-worker constantly feeling snubbed by the editor and being unhappy about it. (For the last several months I've felt like I was betraying my friend every time I did something that clicked with the editor, so I ended up putting up a wall of apathy and trying not to interact with anybody. Of course, that only added to my own disaffection and unhappiness.) I also do think that having more responsibility may help to break me out of my slump of boredom and burn-out. Either that, or it'll kill me. That which doesn't kill me makes me stronger? Pretty much a textbook case, I guess. But for the moment I've decided to stay and see how things settle.

Went back and read my earlier posts again, and realized that not only have I made no progress with my New Year's resolutions (except for the developing of spiritual practice, which has been slow but not forgotten), but I also haven't managed to get over my block about allowing myself some escapism now and then. (By which I mean good and inspiring escapism, not the mental switch-off of watching reality TV.) *Fun,* dammit! Need more fun!

In other news, I've finished the KO beginners' course and have moved up to remetj status. I'm currently waiting, with all the fidgety impatience that seems to be typical of my class, to get the questionnaire for the Rite of Parent Divination. I'm still doing the "everything's nice but I'm just not sure it's really for me" thing, which I'm starting to think is just some kind of Rum-Tum-Tugger syndrome--if you offer me pheasant, I'd rather have grouse. Or, more accurately: "Oh, no, thanks, I'm fine." "Oh, no, I couldn't possibly." "Really, I'm not hungry at all!" *pounce* *chompchompchomp* My obsession with CLAMP's manga started very similarly. ("Look at this character! He's this big!" *makes teeny-tiny gesture* "And his eyes are huge! Who even looks like that?...oh my god, I have to see more of this.") So I'm putting the whole question of whether or not House of Netjer is my true destiny on the shelf for the moment--I'm here, I'm doing the work, and seriously, after the beginners' course I have a good basic grounding but there's still so much to learn that I can't possibly say that I've penetrated into what Kemetic Reconstructionism is all about. I know that I'm not put off by what I've seen so far, I'm still interested in learning more, and I'm ready to take the next step on the path and see what the view's like from there. And I suspect that worrying so much about finding the perfect slot with my name on it is a straw dog anyway. (Is that even the right term? Bah, too tired at the moment to formulate the thought properly. Was up most of last night worrying about plumbing.)

And I'm still nesting. Will it ever end?

I didn't have work today, and it was beautiful, sunny, and mild, so I went for an awesome walk. It took me a little over two hours, so I guess it was about four or five miles? I'm probably going to be a bit sore tomorrow, but what better way to spend the last day of 2004? Which overall has not been one of my better years, so I really hope 2005 takes off in a new direction.

Speaking of which, I'm toying with the idea of finding a new job. While I still love the magazine itself, I'm starting to feel really burnt out and crunchy, I find the new editor (look, I'm still calling her "new," almost a year later :P) stressful to work with, and I feel like there's such a pattern of negativity that's built up between her and me and my friend/co-worker, and I don't know how to shift it. I'm not sure I want to, anyway--I just feel like I want to break out, take off somewhere, start fresh, and there'll never be a better time. (Plus it'd be really nice not to have the two-hours-each-way commute anymore.) On the other hand, I'm not especially good with decisions and change. So, we'll see. If anybody knows someone who'd like a slightly used editor (twelve years experience), a little crispy around the edges, please let me know. ^_^

Some New Year's resolutions:

- Have fun! Live life a little.
- Continue to develop and deepen my spiritual practice.
- Work toward finishing my epic fanfiction project this year.
- Break various compulsive habits, including:
- obsessive web surfing
- turning the TV on for "noise"
- buying things I don't need

I think that should keep me busy. *g*

Years ago now, I had a dream. It was just a single still image: four red cardinal birds in a cross pattern, surrounded by a circle of black crows, against a backdrop of snow. It was very simple but vivid, and I considered it a kind of personal mandala for a long time.

Last night, I dreamed that I had a cardinal bird in the house. (It wasn't a real cardinal, though--it had a round head with no crest, was kind of blobby-looking, and its color was a washed-out red.) Mom was in the dream, and she was watching the bird in the bathroom to make sure that it didn't hurt itself or get lost or stuck somewhere. I had taken a bunch of pictures of the bird and was planning to Photoshop them together to recreate the mandala from the previous dream, but the pictures were all blurry and none of them were quite the right pose. Also, I needed pictures of crows, so I headed out to take some, only to find myself wandering in the dark by the side of the road.

I guess you can never go back. Or maybe it's that you just can't fake these things, these mysteries that come when they will. Or both.

I dreamed of Dad too, last night. We were in Hungary, and there was a great confusion of miscellaneous relatives coming and going and me mislaying my passport and having to go back to the family's house to get it. I ended up having to take my paperwork to a local office and navigate the bureaucracy by myself; fortunately a woman there spoke English. I think this was probably just a typical mild anxiety dream.

I can't think of anything to say about the tsunami disaster. All words are inadequate.

Whew. So, yeah, it's been a while since I posted here. As mentioned last time, I've been working on getting things together on the RL plane--transferring assets, sorting through belongings, putting some new personal touches on the house, stuff like that. I've pretty much done everything now except the kitchen and the basement, and a few odds and ends in my den. The kitchen I'm thinking I'll tackle on one of the next two weekends, since both of them are long. The basement? Might have to wait until spring.

In metaphysical news, I finally applied for the beginners' class at House of Netjer. We're about halfway through, and so far I'm enjoying it--it's interesting, the Senut rite is really valuable, and I still find the people very warm and likable. I'm not sure if I'm going to stay with Kemetic Orthodoxy after the end of the class, though I'm desperately curious about the parental divination rite, so I think I'm going to have to get that done at least. My main qualm about staying with KO is that I just don't feel a passionate draw toward All Things Egyptian. It's interesting, yeah. A lot of stuff is interesting. It has a number of elements that work for me. So do other paths. I would worry less about my lack of profound identification with Kemet if it weren't a reconstructionist religion--HoN makes a big point about how they're not just a religion but a whole Kemetic culture, and I feel, I don't know, not quite committed enough. On the other hand, maybe this commitment is something that I'm growing into quietly, so quietly that I'm not even noticing it happen. So I'm going to give everything a bit more time. In any case, it's a worthwhile experience.

Here's an amusing little story from the gathering of my shrine materials. ( The Gods have a sense of humor. )

Fandom-wise, I'm very blah right now. But I think I've realized at least part of the problem with my writing, which has been less than satisfactory lately: I've been struggling and straining to output, and I haven't been giving myself enough input. I've barely watched any videos or gone to any movies or done any reading, and most of what I've been watching on TV has been reality fare like The Amazing Race, Animal Cops, and various home decorating shows. (I've really been into the nesting. It must be a bereavement thing.) Weird as it might seem, I think I've been avoiding creative input in the fear that it will suck me in and fling me into a new obsession and I won't get any writing done on my main project--but I'm not getting any writing done anyway, so sheesh! I guess I might as well give in and watch and/or read the stuff. I think there was also some element of fearing escapism--that if I gave into it I'd just retreat into my own little world and not be able to face the demands of my current reality. My psyche is so bizarre sometimes. ^_^ But anyway, I think I need to make that a priority for next year: to have fun, to allow myself some escapism.

I'm also kind of torn because I'd like to make some local Pagan contacts, but I'm shy of getting sucked into drama and weirdness. It's the fear of distractions again. Maybe I'll wait and see how I feel once I've finished the HoN course. I'm also thinking of attending the Ecumenicon conference next year. I've wanted to go for ages, but I could never think of how to explain where I was going to Dad, so it just seemed simpler not to. The only problem now is that it's the weekend before Lunacon, to which I definitely am committed. That's a big double whammy of conventions--though I've done it before, attending Anime Expo and Shoujocon within the space of two weeks. (And that was across the continent, so I should be able to manage traveling between New Jersey and Virginia.) In any case, their pre-reg deadline is coming up, so I have to decide soon.

Holiday-wise? I'm not really feeling it this year. I'm sort of muddling through gifting, and I'm kind of looking forward to getting past it all and on with the new year. But I'm happy in one respect. I was struggling with the idea of decorating--I really didn't want to put up our big artificial tree. (It seemed wrong, like trying to do "life as usual" with a false cheer.) My little tree somehow felt too fake. I thought about buying a potted miniature pine, but I didn't want the responsibility for trying to keep it alive, and I didn't want to buy it just to let it die after the holidays. The thought of buying cut branches depressed me. But on Sunday I was outside puttering around the property after my walk, and I found enough fallen pine branches to garland the mantel. So I feel much better. (I might even get around to stringing a few lights. Maybe.)

And that's about it for my life right now. Oh, just as a final note: on Friday, I had to run a CD up to our designer at the end of the day, so I found myself walking to the 23rd Street PATH station right about at twilight, through an unfamiliar neighborhood of trendy-looking restaurants. And I was thinking about possibilities, all the thousand thousand lives I'll never lead, all those people that I'm not, and how different life must be in all those worlds. And I stopped at the corner of 23rd to look up at the buildings, white and floodlit against a gloaming sky, and I felt something then that must be like the Japanese concept of aware, the ethereal poignancy of things. This moment will never come again. Some kind of change may be coming; I don't know if it's a personal change, or something more world-affecting. Or I could be imagining it--wishful thinking. Nonetheless, the impression persists. Beauty. Impermanence.

I'm actually rather calm, post-election. I think it's because, while I was still hopeful that Kerry would succeed, looking at that giant block of red states in the middle of the country on all those poll-projection maps it seemed like an unfathomably huge obstacle to win against. And the truth is, it's their country too, and how would they feel if this thin rim of liberal states on the east and west coasts (and one or two around the Great Lakes) carried the day? They wouldn't feel very represented. That's majority rule for you; somebody's going to end up unhappy, no matter what. (I do wonder if we're hitting some kind of limit of democracy's effectiveness in this country. Are we getting too big? Too polarized in our differences from each other? Too numbed by information and consumption overload, too uneven in our education and resources? Is there a way to make the system continue to work for us?) And also, as I was walking to the PATH station after work yesterday evening, I stopped on a street corner and looked up at the sky, just darkening toward twilight, with the slow wind drawing darker clouds across it, and I knew then--it wasn't Kerry's wind. It wasn't a time of change.

But it's okay. Because the disappointment of four more years of an administration that I intensely dislike doesn't take away the pure joy of walking out of my polling place last night and feeling my heart soar, knowing that I had done what was mine to do--that I had put my vote down for the candidate of my choice, and let my single voice be heard.

I'm kind of in nesting mode right now, still getting resettled after Dad's death, which is largely involving reorganizing the house and clearing out a bunch of extraneous stuff. Once I've gotten that done more or less to my satisfaction, from a place of order and beauty I plan to move forward, and try to figure out how else I can make a difference.

( Had an interesting dream the other night. )

I've been thinking again about applying to House of Netjer's beginners' class. I'm not entirely sure that Kemetic Orthodoxy is for me, but I'd like to learn more about traditional Kemetic ways of honoring the netjer, and the timing on this seems good. I've got a couple more days on my four-day reflection period, so we'll see how it goes.

I also seem to have managed to turn my mood around regarding work. I'm not sure whether it's because the boss was in the office today and her Jobsian reality-distortion field kicked in, or because I actually took some cold medicine and felt a little less yucky, or because I sat with Bast last night and got myself back into a state of better balance. In any case, it's rather a relief. (The two things I asked for clarity on last night were what to do about being unhappy at work and whether I should go out for the HoN course or not. No glaringly obvious omens yet, but this new calmness probably says something. That a change within me makes as much or more difference than an external change? It's possible.)

Whew. I think I might actually be crawling out from under my rock and back into the light of day. The month before this was a long, hard one, while this month has just been really busy. (It's actually been a much longer haul than just a couple of months, since I'd been living with the reality of Dad's failing health since April, and on a less evident level even before that.) So I haven't really had any mental and emotional space to write, to daydream, to try to figure out what this spirituality thing is really all about. That's fine--a time for everything, after all. But now I'm starting to work on putting together a new life without Dad, a life that's entirely my own. So it seems like I should make a few tentative pokes at these things, to try to figure out where I'm at now, and what I might like to pursue.

I went back and reread the previous entries in this journal, and I actually wasn't as embarrassed by them as I thought I'd be. I'm a little spazzy in some places, but I think not inordinately so. I definitely went through a period of being obsessed with naming and defining whatever it is that I'm doing--the great, straining struggle to find some established and well-blazed path to follow, so that I'd know what I was supposed to be doing, and that I'd be doing it "right"--and I think (or at any rate, I hope) that I'm done with that. If I find a tradition that meshes with what I believe and practice, then great. (As opposed to believing and practicing X because that's what a member of tradition Y is supposed to do. Yes, I know, this is all supremely obvious. As I've probably said before, I am a slooooow kitten. I'm rather surprised Bast hasn't boxed my ears yet in pure frustration.) If not, then I get to string together a sparkly eclectic necklace. And I think I'm okay with that now, in a way that I wasn't able to manage previously.

So now I just have to work on refining what it is that I believe and practice. Heh. But that will probably be the subject of some other post(s).

So I've been sorting and cleaning out and organizing all of the stuff in our house. (Creating order out of chaos soothes me.) I've also been dealing with the acquisition of a new cat. I'd been thinking that maybe I should get a companion for Maiko, since she was used to Dad being home all day while I was at work, and I figured she'd probably be bored and lonely, and then a friend of a friend suddenly needed a home for her cat, so in short order Meera came to live with us. It's the first time I've ever had two cats at once, and for a little while that had me really stressed out, being just one more thing on top of everything else. But Meera has settled in now, I finally got all her vet stuff in order (she had to be spayed, for one thing, and getting her tested for FIV was a real adventure, considering that she's teeny-tiny but insanely fierce at the vet's), and she and Maiko are only spatting a little every now and then. So it's all good.

Work is making me cranky-boots at the moment. I think I might just be burnt out, but I'm feeling really not happy and snarky about various things. I'm not sure what I'm going to do about that. But that's all a whole other post of its own, which maybe I'll do someday.

Fandom-wise I'm nowhere special at the moment. I've sort of been looking sideways at writing, but haven't really felt driven to do anything. I'm starting to get glimmerings of interest in my old ongoing project, though, so I'm planning to make another big push on it in late October. There's no new series that wants to eet my brainz, alas. I'm back to playing my ranger/druid in the weekly D&D game, and that's going to be fun--I've given her a caracal as an animal companion, which I've going to name Meera after my new cat, since I can't find a lexicon of the Dejy language anywhere on the Net. And that, at the moment, is my life.

My father passed away yesterday evening, in his sleep, somewhere between 7 and 8. He's at peace now, at last.

Last Friday Dad chose to end the enteral feedings. He wasn't making any headway with them, they killed what was left of his appetite and he just kept on getting weaker, and he finally felt that his quality of life was just too poor. He's on hospice care now, at home. We've folded out the sofa bed in the living room so he can watch TV if he feels like it, but for the most part he's just sleeping. He's in occasional pain from his bad back, but other than that he's mostly comfortable--a little restless at times, but we have some medication for that, and it actually seems to help him. So now we're just waiting.

I'm pretty calm, all things considered. Mainly because Dad is at peace with his choice, he's happy to be at home, and he's as comfortable as he can be. I'm just glad that I can be with him, and that I can try to do what I can to have his passing be as peaceful and gentle as possible. The grief hits me at times, but I think the main part of it is yet to come; for now I'm still in what I think of as emergency management mode, just taking care of what needs to be done.

Not the violence of the knife in the alley, the stranger in the bedroom, the date or lover or spouse who won't hear "no," the betrayal, the forced silence.

Only an over-fragile land gone sere before anything could have a chance to grow, from something too careless even to be called malice.

The greater part of the violence is self-inflicted: It was so insignificant. Why can't you just get over it? What's the matter with you? Why don't you grow up and get a life?

But still.

No Pity. No Shame. No Silence.

And in the category of major coolness....

I just went out for my walk and to pick berries. (There's a patch by the side of the road not too far from my house that nobody else seems to frequent.) On the way over, I found two perfect crow feathers in the grass, which made me think that it must be coming up on the molting season. Ooh, I thought, I'll have to go for a walk along the brook one of these evenings--maybe I'll find another heron feather! (I've got a couple of found feathers that I think are heron feathers, although I'm not certain. I have a special attraction to our local great blue herons.) Continuing on, I stopped on the bridge to say hello to the stream spirit, as I always do. As I was leaning on the guard wall of the bridge, I heard something splashing underneath the bridge. What the heck? I thought.

The next thing I know, this long, bonelike, clawed leg steps out from under the edge of the bridge and goes splash! in the water. Then there's this gigantic beak, and this pair of staring eyes, and this long, coiling neck. The heron had a fish in its beak--a good-sized one, about 10-12 inches. It put the fish down on the sandbar for a moment to get a better grip on it, then retreated back under the bridge with its dinner. It was only about six feet below me. I was completely blown away. I waited another minute or two in case it might come out again, but all I saw was a couple of ripples, and then I decided that I'd better leave it alone, because if it came out, saw me, and got spooked into flight, it'd probably fly right into the wire fence by the bridge. But even that brief glimpse was just awesome.

Way better than a feather. ^_^

Then, when I got home and was watering the plants, there was this incredible ruckus of jays. I was like, what's up with this, I'm usually able to go out in my backyard without causing hysterics. Then a hawk flew by right overhead and disappeared into the woods, amidst a cloud of smaller birds. Okay, so it wasn't me after all.

Birds, birds, birds seems to be the order of the weekend.

( Cut for more Dad stuff )

In other news I seem to be coming down with a mild cold. Bleargh. This makes the prospect of the forthcoming stressful week of work even more unappealing than it would be otherwise. Stupid last minute cover snafus....

I bought a papyrus plant yesterday. It was sitting there in the floral department of ShopRite, and I just couldn't resist. It, uh, basically looks like a clump of grass. But dude, papyrus. Plus I happen to really like grasses. I'm not sure it works visually with the thicket of African violets that are also in the window, but that's the only window in our house that has lots of flat space and a reasonable amount of light, so most of the plants end up there.

A mourning dove made a nest in the crook of one of our drainpipes, and for the last couple of days a baby dove has hanging around on the ground near the peonies. I think it might be in the process of leaving the nest rather than fallen: it can fly enough to flutter out into the middle of our back field and later come back (assuming it's the same baby dove, but I'm pretty sure it is). It's still coming into its adult feathers--it's all spiky! Very cute.

I guess that's about it for right now, considering that my brain cell is all congested. *snuffles* If I perk up a bit after dinner, maybe I'll go berry picking. It's not summer if I don't get my thimble berries!

I'm oddly restless today. I'm not sure why. It might be because I was toying with the idea of going to AnimeNext, then decided not to because I'd basically be paying $30 for the privilege of shopping, and now I can't decide what to do with myself. Bleah.

Later I'll go for a walk, but it's probably a bit hot outside now. Maybe I'll journal for a while. Or read.

Reemerging briefly with a low squelching sound. Dad's been home for a while. He's on a enteral feeding tube to try to get his weight back up, which has been pretty hard on him. We're giving it the rest of this month with the pump (which Medicare isn't covering, grr), and then another month with syringe feedings, and after that we're going to see how he's doing and reevaluate. I don't think that long-term feeding is going to be workable; he feels that it takes away too much of his quality of life and he doesn't want to drag on endlessly with it. I want him at least to give this treatment a decent chance to help, but in the end, of course, the decision has to be his. It's so hard, though, to tell if what he's been feeling lately is a depression-based morbidity or is a genuine choice of how he wants to end his days. He's on Remeron for his mood now, so maybe we'll see some change soon, or at least some clarity.

It's funny; before he started going downhill I used to be terrified of the prospect that I'd have to take care of him someday. I thought that I wouldn't be able to do it, that it would overwhelm me. But I've actually been managing tolerably well. Even with added work stress (blargh quixotic new editor blargh blargh).

Have been reading Mark Sedgwick's Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century at work. It's interesting, especially since our magazine has a long history of association with Traditionalists (which are not to be confused with Wiccan Traditions, or traditional witchcraft, but are instead something entirely different.) One thing I noticed was that some of these guys were crazy for initiations. One leader of the movement was initiated at least six different times, including one initiation into a "Triad" (a sort of Taoist group), when he was never a practicing Taoist. Point? The book is a good read, though, if a bit dense with foreign names and subject to some really bad typos (including "mature" for "nature" and two different misspellings of "increasingly"--shame on you, Oxford!).

Hmm. Not much else to say tonight. Guess I'll go thud. ^_^