Lughnasah Rememberances as Seasons Change

It is a cool and grey day nearing Equinox, the eve of the new moon before.

Then, it was still high summer, garden full of colors of flowers and butterflies.
I don't think we have seen the last of the hummingbirds, but soon.
Soon, too, will our fruit ripen and then leaves will change.
But at Lughnasah, all this seemed far away.

It is totally dark now at 5:30 in the morning and the days rapidly grow shorter.
This crispness brings apples and memories and a desire to gather in.
It had just started then.

For me, Lughnasah was the first coming back after going through so much
and I set up a weekend of celebration.

Which was kind of overload but important and seasonally appropriate.
And also so fun.

It is great to be alive and full and to be hot and languid in the summer,
just as we welcome sweaters and stews as we inch towards autumn.

But back then, there was much plenty and plenty to do.                       

 

There was lots of food and color and flowers
and also lots of love.

Artists and Musicians and Astronomers

and Recent and Long-Time Friends,

creatively gathering in the damp mist and near the fire or inside in the cool room.

 

 

 and then we rested and then it was Lughnasah ritual day and we started again.

 

We were us 3, her and her and the two of them,

them and 3 or 4 friends of theirs, and her friends who came just as we began. 

More people is cool but also more and sometimes hard to keep whole,

but the fire always keeps us focused.

 

I can't really remember our Lughnasah ritual all that much, I have been trying to just be more present and taking less pictures and letting the afterglow of the day wash over me

without feeling like I need to take notes for this blog.

Even though the notes, like the photos, are always helpful to remember.
Historical poetry of trans-dimensional time.

We have started the ritual of lighting the fire before ritual,
Our Whole Grovemates together.

But sometimes that doesn't happen and that is ok too. 

I know we had a fire the day before and into the cool night and then we continued it again, 

first a small fire and then the pyrotechnical shape-shifting sacrifice that Bryan crafts.

I know I honored the directions and I am sure I brought out the outsiders offering,
and I believe I was offering sacrifice to our Kindred as Bryan called upon them
and then of course there is always his final sacrifice. 

 There are often bird calls.
The smoke was powerful and spoke volumes.

 

All kinds of sacrifice and prayers from all around the circle.

Digging deep into my pockets with gratitude

for endings and new beginnings. 

 

This season has been a transitional time of great change.

I remember that it had been high-summer hot and had cooled down to perfect

and then back up to heat advisory days and now we welcome fuzzy socks.

I remember that after much dry weather we had a week or more of rain,

a mostly gentle ongoing rain keeping our newly planted trees watered.
The thunderstorms of Lughnasah came and now we await hurricanes.

I remember time rolling fast like a wheel downhill

with us trying to keep up.

I remember rising to many challenges,
whether too hot or too tired to too sad or too hard,

grateful each day and for each other.

Crying a lot like the storms.

Laughing a lot like the sun.

Our Omens

from our Honored Dead: Wunjo or Joy, the good company of people, the heart uplifting feeling and the sharing of the joy of being together. Everybody has a tough time of being a human but apparently we all get to have some happiness too. And it is nice to be reminded of this by our Ancestors.
And joy is always a good place to start from.

from the Spirits of Nature & Place: Fehu or Fee, mobile wealth or fluid capital, the whole cash movement and circulation thing, it also has associations with cost, the notion of cost and care. The exchange that we have with the Nature Spirits, the ties between us. Expectations and investment and interrelationships.
I think the garden is reminding us of the cost of it's harvest and beauty.

from the Gods & Goddesses: Isa or Ice, so here is Bryan's Isa rant- as much as he avoids the polarities of things, with the portals of the fire, well and tree we are playing with the vertical aspect and the well and the fire as being opposites. If the well is taken to the extreme it becomes ice in the sense that it becomes cold. It is the opposite of the bright, it is the cold, wet, dark that has been made solid. But it is also pretty and has been made transparent with its solidness. So there is a clarity there. And in that way it is the opposite of the radiant, the bright and warm thing. It is about a contraction. Again it does not suggest a flexibility or a fluidity, nor is it about the stormy disposition of atmospheric water. Ice is locked up and is static, it is hard.
And in the heat,ice refreshes, maybe the Gods are trying to cool us down.

for the Season: Sowehlu or the Sun, that dynamic outward expansive energy and it is also about the regularity of each sunrise, it is the symbol of the new day and the day is when you get all of your work done. It represents the non-terrestrial energetic distant ability to touch and change.
The sun brightens all around it and reminds me of Lugh.

Drinking the cool waters and taking in the blessing is easy.

Offering our thanks is easy.

Grounding is sometimes easy.

Loving is always easy.

So much life has happened this season.
Maybe that is always how it is.

Cold Light of Imbolc

This light rushes toward equal time with a blinding yet calming strength.

Bridget as muse and guidance supports us with love and wisdom.

It's been a frozen then oddly warm then bitterly cold season.

A real Winter is good and the longer until late Spring weather the better.

 This holiday is always special and joyful .
Birds sing, the stream flows through ice and the sun rises higher.
We indulge in gratitude for this life and its renewal.
Gathering in the warmth of the kitchen,
we open champagne and toast each other, Our Whole Grove and our blessed Grove Goddess, Bridget

2 Bridgets in the center as the table fills with food

a yummy and mostly gluten free brunch for Bridget!

 

us 4 adults go outside to begin,
teenager stays inside working on a paper for school,

inspiration calls in many ways.

Sharing ritual tasks is powerful.

Planning ahead spontaneous honoring as a dance of us with spirit.

Our dear long-time grove mate invokes the directions,

 I sit by the center and listen.

Our Whole (proto)Grove.

A good and easy fire burning in the snow.

 Right at the end of the meditation, they appear, all in black and smiling broadly.

"I felt like I was laying flat on the earth."

Young adults grown so much since back then,

she has a small heart drawn under her eye.

  Heartfelt sacrifice for our dear dear Bridget.

burning away Yuletide greens

 

 bacon and salami and smoked trout,
rose petals and tea and spirits and sweet grass and garlic,
last year's calendar and more

 it felt lighthearted and we welcomed an optimism

our Omens:

from the Ancestors: Fehu or fee or Cattle- our mobile wealth and property, whether debt or cost or inheritance.
I reach in my pocket and there is an old worn Bridget's cloth from Imbolc years ago .

from the Spirits of Nature & Place: Ingwaz- the seed growing, expanding, connecting.
Ing- like a verb, like doing or being, like Yngvi, like "Harmony & Unity"

from the Gods & Goddesses: Berkanu or birth, birch, beginnings.

Blessed Bridget, with your midwifery and healing skills, with your keening cry for our dead,
with your kindness and vision and inspiration and craft, lead us forward. 

for the Season: Algiz- posture of attention and caution and alertness and listening and being on guard. Stay alert, the world needs more lerts.

He took a homework break and came down for the waters, 

shuffling on the snow with old friends,
doing the magick work
of passing thru Bridget's girdle thrice.

Bringing Bridget to our Hearth

More food. So much food. Enough food.

 transdimensional resting