ADF·Dedicant·Journal

The little garden finished producing its load of yellow bush beans so they have been pulled out. The Kale is still going strong and I hope to keep harvesting that into the winter months. I've found the entire episode to be very fruitful in regards to the druid program. The attention that I've paid to this garden has increased my awareness of the weather and the season.

I am moving forward on another project inspired by druidism training - getting my weight under a normal level. There is a virtue of moderation that leads me to believe that if one was truly living a life of moderation then one wouldn't be overwieght. This is also proving to be another educational experience.

I've still neglected the mental discipline side of druidism to this point. I'm finding that the physical aspects are new to me and require more attention at this time. As in most things with this program I seem to be mulling over the idea of daily devotions in the back of my mind which is good.

I've also decided to go back to work in an old career of mine. This is proving to be an area that cries out for some mental discipline as I am feeling myself pulled into my old stressful habits. I removed myself from the field years ago as I was unable to keep myself from becoming overly stressed and completely out of touch with the real world and certainly anything spiritual wouldn't have been given any priority. Balance is being maintained and I strongly suspect having the structure of druidism even as fragile as it is at this point, is proving to be an important aspect of that.

On the deity front am I still drawing a blank. I have a side that is deeply sceptical around the idea of gods and it may have something to do with it. I am not a big fan of a higher power - to vague. The idea of multiple gods and other beings is certainly more appealing to me and I do enjoy the idea of ancestor worship so perhaps some time spent there is a good starting point.

So its been a while since I last posted. I'm having a great time with the program and feel I am learning lots. Much is changing in my life. Its good.

For the nature aspect of the dedicant program I have undertaken a project involving planting the front flower bed with a mixture of flowers and veggies. The thing has provided me with great learning experiences...and I think that must the benefit of taking on a project when you're not sure of the point or the chances of success.

I wasn't prepared to enjoy the job so much. For a year I've stared at the hardened area of dirt that once contained an enormously wide and short shrub and many weeds. I knew the 'soil' needed to be turned over and it also needed something else added to it so it was more like soil and less like whatever it was. It took me days to rework that dirt. I became almost obsessed with the work, continuing to work it even through the incredible rain that we had that weekend. I thoroughly enjoyed doing it, although people were staring at the muddy woman sitting in a hole breaking dirt clumps up with her hands.

It has been about 6 weeks and the flower bed is lush. I have beans, kale, tomatoes and strawberries for veggies. I also recently added sage, oregano and basil. The rest it is over flowing with orange, yellow, purple and white flowers.

So what have I learned? I learned that I don't value nylons as much as I value my cherry tomatoes. You see I had one of those moments where you realize something you always knew but just never acknowledged.

My 2 cherry tomatoes grew to the point where yesterday I decided I needed to stake them up. In this area of Canada if the tomatoes get rained on then they go all moldy. So they had to be hoisted back under the overhang of the house. Now being involved in this druid stuff for a few months has me thinking about many new things like not buying things I don't need, trying to figure out recycling, changing what I buy to be more environmentally intelligent. So all these things swirl in my head as I go into the house to look for something soft to hold up my tomato plants. In the back of my mind I'm looking for an old pair of nylons because they are perfect for this kind of thing. In the other parts I'm pondering druid things and how they fit into my crazy life.

I open the top drawer in my dresser. I don't have old nylons. I don't like wearing nylons. I have a new pair. I pick up the new pair and remove them from the package. I stand there for a minute staring at them...stretching them. Meanwhile there is a mini-war going on involving ego, fashion, recycling, tomatoes and even my mother. This is what it is like for me in this program. I just pour in more druid information and listen to the constant internal bickering between a loose collection of characters. But alas they are merely noise as I've learned to just follow this other part that just knows what to do.

So the nylons are cut up the middle and I'm back outside laughing to myself about hoping I don't get any runs as I tie up the tomotoes. The tomatoes look great today.

I have become the crazy lady...or perhaps always was.

I've been taking the bus each day...which is something I was very against pre-dedicant. It is interesting the way we can distort reality to suit our wants. In the end it takes me the same amount of time, allows me to travel during rush hour times rather then avoid them, consistently arrive at work according to a set schedule rather then hoping there are no accidents and my personal favorite, I get to sip coffee and read a paper while I'm being driven to my job. I absolutely love it.

I'm a little shocked in the little changes that are occuring around environmental issues. PD I was almost anti-environmental. I realized that I do want to live in a more sustainable manner but I don't want to do things that don't really make a difference - like buying organic food from Brazil. I knew that I needed to do some research in order to find what made sense to me.

The idea of buying locally grown produce and also growing it myself is a great idea. So I'm making more of my own lunches and I've planted beans, kale, tomatoes and strawberries in my flowerbeds. I spent 3 days in the dirt of those beds making the soil better. It has immediately paid off in a lot of bush beans sprouting up. I think I could hide a lot of veggies and fruit in my front yard and no one would be the wiser.

Today is a beautiful sunny day. I completed my beltaine ritual without a hitch...unless you call the husband attempting to steal offerings a hitch. It was quite involved and sort of fun.

This was the first ritual I did with my husband walking around. Normally I do them when he's out. It seemed not such a big deal to have him witness it. I dealt with the eckel cake envy by negotiating to give him half of one of the sacred cakes after the ritual was complete. He took it to work the next day. Somehow this ADF stuff seems not so weird and flakey. Maybe I'm starting to feel comfortable with it.

I began carving my next alter piece. This one is a 50 pound piece of light green soapstone. So far I've worked on it twice and stared at it many times trying to see whats supposed to be made. Today was amazing as I almost starting to cry because I was filled with so much joy while working on it. I can only stand about an hour at a time...a mixture of too much bliss, dust and sore back muscles. LOL.

It's Beltaine tonight and I've gathered together all the elements for the ritual. This time I downloaded a norse ritual from the ADF website. For offerings I have an apple, 2 eckel cakes, some dried fruit, seeds and some animal shapes made out of beeswax. Instead of using nine different woods to make the fire I'm trying nine pieces of birch bark with the names of the woods written in ogham. Let's hope this goes well. Last time I didn't have enough offerings but I think the gods cut me some slack because I'm new.

I've carved up one piece of my alter and I like it. It's polished soapstone with a triple spiral carved in it.

Other then that I'm still working on the virtue of piety. There seems to be a lot for me to learn on that one virtue. I'll stick with it until I feel I've got it figured out and then move on.

I had a bit of a panic about all the gods, picking the right gods, picking the right group. I sat down with the dedicants manual and calmed down a bit. I seem to be on track with all the items in there, I probably right where I need to be.

I managed to scrape together some kind of ostara high day ritual even though I have no idea who the gods are or whether any are out there. It was roughly in the ADF style - although a little on the light side. I ended up with not enough for offerings. I really need to attend a full ADF ritual so I can wrap my brain around it more.

So I finally finished the book. I feel like I have walked a hundred miles across rocks with only socks on. But it is done. I've roughed in the book report and will leave that for a few days as I reflect. The longer I'm away from that book the more difficult it is to remember the pain and I'm amazed that some of the content stuck even though I felt like I was just dragging my eyes across the pages.

When people ask me, what did you do to call yourself a druid, I will proudly say, "I read that damn book over there." Nothing more will need to be said.

First book I'm reading is A History of Pagan Europe. What kind of book is it? Well the last 42 pages are index, bibliography, etc and why am I mentioning that? Because it means I don't have to read that part. It means I've reached the halfway point. This book is dry. It gives a blow by blow history of...well, pagan Europe. Not sure what I was expecting, but this is killer dry.

I think its a good thing to read, especially in the context of ADF. Its good to know the background of a religion. I've learned many things. For instance, I learned that The DaVinci Code wasn't annoying enough with its shake down of the church. After reading half this book I say to Dan Brown - who cares who JC got it on with - the entire basis of the church has very little to do with Jesus. Plus Europe's history involves one people occupying another people's land continuously. Its like thats what human beings do is gather together with their friends and take over some person's land for awhile.

The only difference with Christianity is that Rome really took to the structure of it, and not so much the ideals of it, and used it to suppress a lot of people's culture. This is a huge complaint here in Canada where the government and the catholic church tag teamed together and separated native children from their parents in order to educate them and give them a "chance." I see it was just another chalk mark on the wall of cultures that were suppressed.

I found I had to put this book down often as I find it not only painfully boring to shift my eyes from one side of the page to the other but also because it caused me to rage around the house. One thought that irritating me was what if you took everything that was pagan out of Christianity? Are we still interested? No Xmas, no chocolate bunnies, no singing in church, no good partying holidays, no dancing, no making a wish and tossing a coin in a well. Life without paganism is pretty much bland. No wonder the church incorporated pagan things back into their rituals. Hell, I wouldn't go to church unless you supplied some wine and huge parties and then sealed the deal with fire and brimstone. Its similar to the way pimps lure young girls into prostitution. Okay maybe I crossed the line with that analogy.

As you may notice I'm a little short fused on this topic. I'm not the least bit against Christians. They can enjoy Jesus, their Bible and the Church all they want. More power to them. And they don't corner the market on oppression nor did they invent it. I'm just feeling a little peeved that I didn't learn this history lesson in school, instead I was listening to Canada's history which involved beaver pelts, rivers and cod. I've also had a sore spot for years that I was born into a culture that doesn't appeal to me. Also, as I read this book I am also reading books on behavior, genes, and debunking myths so I'm all hopped up on intellectual bs and I have no way of letting off steam - except through this blog.

So I'll go back to reading a few pages of dryness and see where this book leads. I already started reading the next book on the list but I had to stop as it was far to exciting and threatens to draw me away. But so far I think its a good foundation. I've noticed I've increased my wine consumption.