Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-changes....

Does a caravan turn back from a journey because 

of the barking and clamour of dogs? 

On a luminous night, does the outcry of dogs 

delay the full moon in its course? 

The moon sheds light and 

the dog barks. 

Everyone proceeds according to their Nature. -Rumi

Bike friendly Portland will allow us to be car-free.
The transit is also so much better than Columbus.

So my family has been doing lots of thinking lately. And we have made some major decisions. We moved to Ohio because it was good for our small family to be near extended family and a support network. We moved here because it was cheaper than our beloved Bay Area and we needed to regroup and get back on our feet financially. But it is NOT home. We have met amazing people here, and Columbus is pretty neat. It just doesn't fit all our needs.

So, here's our plan:
My partner is currently getting out of student loan default. Ohio, with its cheap cost of living is allowing us to do that. He will be able to return to school very soon and will be getting degrees all the way to PhD (to be a therapist, among other things). He will make a great therapist.

I love being near water. Not only does Portland have
the river, it also is an hour from my beloved ocean.

I am in grad school and soon will be switching tracks radically. I have been in seminary part time since 2009 and have decided it is time to move on. I gotten some great things out of SKSM, but it is not the path for me. After serving a UU congregation and finding out first hand what it is like, I have decided this is not what I want to do with the rest of my life.

I have been a healer in between other gigs for quite some time. I went to herb school (and continue a lifetime of that herbal education on my own), and am a Reiki master. I have found the call to heal to be steady and patient in the background- all while I tried on many other hats. I have decided to switch schools and prospective careers. In the fall, I will be attending a master's program in acupuncture and TCM. I will get certified and licensed and start to practice while my partner continues on with his school.

Gorgeous.

We have also decided that after my partner gets his BA and I get my acupuncture MA, we are moving... again. We have decided to move to Portland, Oregon. We have amazing friends there, it is more affordable than the Bay Area, and still has many of the things we love about Oakland, CA. It is beautiful, progressive, and clean. It is close to the radical faerie sanctuary that is near and dear to our hearts. It's a day's journey to see the Bay if we so desire. It is near some fantastic Witches we know. It is also charming in its own right- I have been several times and we have many friends there that tell us- "Come here! It is home!"

It is in Portland that we will settle, raise bees, and homestead further. It is in Portland that I will heal my community through Reiki, herbalism, and acupuncture. We just have to bide our time here a while longer.

Portland is weird enough for us. We need more weird.

So thank you, Ohio. You are good to us, allowing us to regroup and revel in family, good friends and interests, and a decent standard of living while we are here. We got to meet amazing people, and I picked up a student of the Craft while here who needed me. Don't think we are not appreciative of you, Ohio! We know what a struggle life could be- we had that constant struggle in California. While we are still considered "poor" on paper, Ohio is relatively easy and we are grateful for a few years of ease, particularly while Rowan is in these critical developmental years. We get to spend lots of quality time with him now, and that is such a gift.

"The Erotic"

One of my favorite quotes from poet and warrior Audre Lorde is, "In touch with the erotic, I become less willing to accept powerlessness, or those other supplied states of being which are not native to me, such as resignation, despair, self-effacement, depression, self-denial."

What Audre labels "the erotic", my religion simply calls Sex. To Witches in my tradition, Sex is the unifying force- not just of two (or more) people's genitals coming together in the moment- it is the unifying force that created the universe, perpetuates the universe, and affects the universe.

Sex is something that all vibrant living beings must tap into in order to thrive and be connected to everything else. While I have heard some teachers downplay genital sex as part of this concept ("you can pet a dog, paint a painting, give hugs!"), those genital sexual expressions are a hugely important part of the Craft and should never be dismissed or downplayed as non-essential to this religious view. Anyone who tells you otherwise isn't teaching the Craft, they are marketing feel-good, new-age inspired self-help to the largest possible audience.Sex, in all its forms, is celebrated and held in high regard in the Craft.

I love also that Ms. Lorde talks about "supplied states of being which are not native" to her. (Powerlessness being the first state she cites.) I could not agree more. In the course of my life, I have run into people who feel powerless or they feel like they have no choices. They feel that no matter what they do, they cannot affect change in their own life. They, in essence, hand over their power to others.

I know that not everyone starts with the same societal privileges. I know that there is a fine line between holding people accountable for their words and deeds and blaming the victim. However, there is truth in what Eleanor Roosevelt said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent."When you are feeling powerless, you must take a step back and look at the situation more clearly. There are always choices- which one will lead to more freedom for you?

Everyday choices of your past create the world in which you live- in the present. Starting to make choices that are beneficial to yourself now affects your future. Witches know this truth without a doubt. If a Witch has had decent training, they not only know how to make their lives work, they know how to work their Will in this world and others.

When you recognize these truths, you are no longer willing to accept "resignation, despair, self-effacement, depression, self-denial". You are in touch with Life/Flow/Sex. You are connected to all there is.

Finding the Flow

In my religion, we work on soul alignment a lot. It's the state of having all three of our souls working in concert with one another and the Divine. Far from a constant state, it is something you must keep doing, and something of which you must always be aware. When we are aligned, we can tap into "the flow" to do our Work and make things easier. Former Grandmaster Cora Anderson used to say that if you souls "were straight within you", you could ask for anything- and get it. One of the reasons for this is because when a witch's will is aligned with God Herself, what you ask for will be in the flow and come easily.

Finding the flow isn't always easy, especially as an adult. We get caught up in "shoulds" and deadlines and other people's expectations of us and it is then that we lose the flow. It's when we think that our created human world trumps nature and its natural patterns and cycles that we lose it. And often when we think we are in it, it is our ego telling us what we want to hear. It's easy to be fooled about flow once we lose the ability to feel it so naturally as children do.

Children naturally follow the flow- they exist in that timeless state that mystics and physicists all talk about- they innately know what flow is deep in their bones. They follow their own patterns and time lines and when we work to speed them up  or slow them down, children naturally resist. Even as babies- I keep hearing from my mama friends from birth class "The baby only takes a long nap when we have somewhere to go!" or "It takes forever to get out of the house now- I'm always late!" It's been the same here, with my child: I always hated those people who ran late, and now I am one of them. When we first brought Rowan home, we were amazed at the passage of time. The days zipped by as we cuddled in our blissful cocoon and we lost track of what day it was. My partner wrote as his Facebook status then, "Babies EAT time."

And they do eat the false measured time that we adults adhere to, that much is sure (That's their superpower!). But I think that a more accurate thing to say would be that babies refuse to pledge allegiance to such a silly concept as linear time and listen to their own inner clock- the very same ones that we were taught to ignore and distrust as children by well meaning adults.

Because after all, we don't live in that kind of world do we? I'm talking about a world where we can trust and listen to our own bodies as the final arbiter of what is right for us personally. We do not live there! Most of us base when we eat and sleep (the two main things that determine our bodies rhythms) on an outside influence- such as when we have to be at work or when someone else gives us permission to do so.

We live in such a state of disconnection to the flow as the norm, that we get angry when our children follow it! "They are being disruptive to a 'normal' and/or 'productive' life", we think to ourselves. To which Zen Master Mary Jaksch and I reply, "What could be more 'productive' than producing another human being?" What could be more normal, more mindful, than living with your child, in the present?

Photo credit: Nezdoiminoga

Our children have a lot to teach us about finding the flow, about being mindful and present. If only we would stop foisting our agendas onto them ( "Come on! You are going to be late to dance class if you don't stop playing around and get dressed!") and stop and listen for a while.