Seven Tears into the ocean

I was laying in a hot tub with an herbal oil that I made thinking about my empty womb and the empty moon. In my mind I saw a naked woman standing on the shore. I saw her under a new moon on the isle of Skye with a peat fire in the distance. We all know this woman even if we don't know her name, she is the Selkie Woman. Every woman is a Selkie Woman and she is empty like we are empty once a month. Here is a version I really like. This folklorist tale puts in details that make the story come alive, but the essence remains exactly the same.

http://www.chalicecentre.net/selkie.htm


I was not raised with this tale. This tale was introduced to me through a book called 'Spinning straw into gold' by Joan Gould. Ms. Gould is a very good author and this book is a good read. The story had a profound impact upon me. In fact from the time of my last post to this one I had a in depth conversation about our Selkie woman with a co worker. My co worker is not of European decent, but the story resonates with all women. This woman is recently married, and 3 months ago gave her new husband a child. She told me she felt as if something was missing in her life and she was going to go to counseling to figure it out. I am not opposed to counseling, and have gone to counseling before. But there are things in life that are so human and in her/our case so feminine there is nothing a counselor could do. I told her this and told her the story of our Selkie woman. This is what I told her:

All women loose a part of themselves when they marry. This is the way. This is how it always has been and always will be. This is what keeps our species alive. Once we bear children again we loose a part of ourselves. Our European story tells us this. Somehow in our modern culture we think there is something wrong with this, but why? Those selkie men do not make good husbands the stories clearly tell us this. And you cannot continue to party under the new/full moon while there is a husband or children at home, but why would you really want to? That is who we were, accept who you are now.

During our conversation we chatted about past loves, and how those men would have been horrid fathers. It was a good conversation and any time I talk about our women's lore is good. As I sit here I cannot really think of how I mourned my maidenhood. I did not tell her goodbye, I did not honor her. That is not something that happens in our culture. The closest thing I can think of is when a bride is carried over the threshold. From one life to the next. But that is not very common anymore as most women think of it as a sexist act. I have to think that not acknowledging the transition somehow we are still left with the lingering thought that something is missing. I will think on this and do more research as this is the first time I have thought about a ritual of sorts to Honor the feminine transitions in life.

Our Selkie woman is so alone. She is empty. This is not a negative as emptiness is a transition into fullness. So honor the empty, honor the barren, honor the Selkie. I have found some interesting theories on the Selkie. When put in the context I am about to write it adds a richness to our stories. If what I write is true or not, know one can really know, but it is quite irrelevant as the lesson is still the same.

For quite some time many believed the Selkie and the Fin people were 2 distinct races of faerie. They most definitely are different now as our myths evolved through the centuries. But what if they are one in the same? If they have the same origin then our Selkie stories make more sense. And what if the Selkie/Fin were Saami fishermen? Sailing south because of the mini ice ages. And what if a northman fisherman rescued a Saami from the shores and they married? Ahh, then we see clarity in our story. Put in context religion. The Saami never really converted to Christianity. So the Christian fisherman marries the pagan Saami. She would have been so different from him she could have been from the ocean or mars.

Our Selkie/Saami woman now alone in a foreign country. She would have been a good mother. She would have loved her children. But she was not with her own kind. Instead of worshiping Skadi in the forest with her people she would be stuffed every Sunday into a church worshiping a god she had no connection to. When her husband is at sea she walks the shoreline to be closer to her gods as she has not given them up although stranded on new soil. When her husband is home during the long winter months she hums the songs of her gods and he sulks by the fire. The chance to worship her gods on her own soil must have been a powerful call. And she will be faced with a decision that will change everything.

Here I would like to point something out. In every version of the story I have read the fisherman is a good man and a good father. He is everything you want in a husband. He is not a drunkard. He has a job. He has a home. When home in the winter he spends it with his family. He loves his children and cares for them. He teaches his children how to fish and thus gives them a skill to sustain their lives. But this story is not about him. It is not a story for men, except maybe a cautionary tale to be careful whom you choose as a bride. But even then who is to know what decision a woman will make when faced with a choice? Some women hear the call so loudly it does not matter if the husband is good.

My mother used to say growing up "women don't just leave. there is always a reason why a woman leaves her family". But that is not a true statement, and years later I see the folly in this kind of thinking. My mother would use this as an excuse to remain unmarried. Every single man she would meet she would say the above statement, as they were all divorced. The truth of the matter is women do just leave. My husband and his first wife were married at 19. I imagine one day she woke up and said this is not the life I want. And she left. There were no children, but if there were I think she would have left them also. She is not a bad person, but when faced with the call of the selkie she made the decision to leave.

And in the context of our story being of the Saami, I imagine another happenstance of a Saami person sailing by as our Selkie woman walked the shore. Her sealskin had returned. Her way home. The story points out the children were almost grown. I wonder if she would have made the same decision if the children were still little. We will never know because that is not how it was told.

Most modern interpretations take the story literally, and I think there is a very literal point to the story like I mentioned with my husbands first wife. But what about the spirit side of the story? I was raised in a apocalyptic fundamentalist christian religion. One of my ex boyfriends broke up with me because he said he was afraid I would go back to the religion. As if the call would be too strong to resist. He was certain he was with a Selkie. If I look deep into my spirit honestly, I see the longing. When I left the religion I lost almost everything. When I say almost everything the only thing I did not loose was my spirit. If I were to listen to the call and return to the 'tribe' I would instantly get it all back. So there I was, empty. Godless, friendless, motherless, fatherless, homeless, and possession less. I would be welcomed back with open arms and I would get my inheritance. I would be the prodigal child. Just like our Selkie. One can never truly know the future or the decisions we are faced to make. So I will not say I would never go back to that religion, but the odds are very unlikely as my previous life was not a life of love, stability or nurturing.

My takeaway from a story like this is honor the inner Selkie woman. If we ignore her she will come and bite us in the ass, and we will feel as if there is no way out except to make the the most drastic of choices. So in this monthly time of emptiness do something that brings her honor. Take a bath with oils, get a massage or drink a hot cup of Skull cap, oat straw & angelica tea!

More info than you could imagine on the stories of the Selkie:
http://www.orkneyjar.com/folklore/selkiefolk/

Hazel Trees and Glass Slippers

Hello and happy full moon! My first real post on my blog to fulfill a boast I made at our Thanksgiving sumbel. I have a lot of things on my mind, but I thought I would start on one of the most famous stories we know in the west. Cinderella. This story is so powerful and filled with an immense amount of wisdom for the Heathen woman we just need to look for it, and think about it.

There are 2 popular versions of the story one from Grimm and one from Perrault. Both contain a similar story, but with changes to minor details. Here are the links to both versions you can read with a good cup of gingerbread spiced coffee which I am drinking now.

http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/perrault06.html
http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/grimm021.html

Being of cinder is more than representing a life of service, but a life of mourning. We can see Cinderella mourning the loss of her mother. She mourns the loss of her station in life. She mourns a father who is unavailable and unloving. Grimm brings this home as he said she ‘wept and prayed’. I think of the times when I was in the ashes. Times when all I could do was weep and pray. Some spend their lives in this state. In the tale Cinderella asks for her father “break off for me the first twig that brushes against your hat on your way home." This action is what sets everything in motion. It is this request that propels her into action. As in life usually it is one simple action or decision that changes the course of our lives. Cinderella takes action by planting the twig, and she changes her life.

When faced with the times of the cinder, the times when life is so overwhelming the story teaches Heathen women we can make a difference. There is nothing too bad that we cannot change. There is nothing so mournful we cannot overcome. If we allow ourselves to sit in the cinder nothing good will ever come to us.

The tree she plants turns out to be the powerful Hazel tree. When I read that for the first time I think my head spun around. Holy crap she planted a Hazel tree!!! A reaffirmation these stories germinated from our own Heathen culture. To Celtic Irish the Hazel & nut were regarded as symbols of wisdom and knowledge. And like other nuts there existed the tradition of procreation and fertility. It is also said hazelnuts are bringers of good luck. I have also read where Irish immigrants immigrating to Vinland carried hazel twigs in their pockets for luck and protection. And it is with this rich back drop we are presented with the Hazel tree in the story.

Cinderella goes to the tree asking for help. For us we recognize exactly what she is doing here. The tree is part of her ancestral worship. And it is this tree that gives her the necessary skills to do what has to be done. The idea of dresses falling from the tree is so magical, but I like to look at things from a pragmatic point of view. If the tree is ancestral knowledge then she would have been shown the way to rise above her current situation. “Borrowing” a dress or as in the movie Ever After it is her rightful dress she puts on again. However she got the dresses, magic, stealing or family inheritance the fact of the mater is the same; she disobeyed her step mother. She was told not do something and that is exactly what she did. That is a powerful lesson for women, following orders is not going to get us what we desire in life. Especially when those orders are against our nature or against our station in life.

For Cinderella to be a capable mother she needed to go through this period in her life. I love when reading commentary about this story sometime we forget this is not a tale of rags to riches. This is a tale of a woman taking her rightful birth place. She takes action when it appears as if no action could be taken. As the cliché is born out we are our deeds.

Moving through the story Grimm gives us a shocking glimpse into the thought process of the family. The shoe is taken and given for the ladies of the household to try on. The first step sister cuts off her big toe as her mother says to her “When you are queen you will no longer have to go on foot." The next sister cuts off her heel and the mother says the same thing to her.

This tale seems shocking at first blush, but the more I thought about it the less shocking it became as I look at what women in our society do to make themselves eligible for marriage. Plastic surgery, cosmetics tested on animals, cosmetics that cause deliberate imbalances to our hormones, starvation and overall plain torture. Cinderella just was. Beautiful inside and out. Perrault shows us this in her kindness in dealing with her stepsisters.

I picked up a copy of Rosemary Gladstar’s book on beauty remedies. The preface of her book is very interesting as she refers to the Greek goddess Cosmeos. I find her description similar to our Idunna. A natural sense of beauty balance and harmony. These goddesses teach us to accept our innate beauty, not changing who we are to fit in. Through the goddesses or our Disir we are can learn how to be beautiful in our own way. We are told in this society you have to look a certain way to be beautiful. These rules we should challenge and look at every woman as holding beauty in her own way.

On the new moon 2 months ago I got an organic facial. The woman giving the facial asked me your pores are so clean what do you use? I am very careful about what I put on my body and in my body. I make my own face wash which is the best I have ever used in my life. Someone randomly told me this recipe at a women’s conference I was at. It is:
1 Part Raw Honey
1 Part Castille soap
1 Part Rose Water
I am about out of my first batch. With the second batch I am going to add some essential oils to make it smell better and provide some additional health benefits to my skin. Here is a good example of how beauty can be simple, joyous and non lethal to our bodies and the earth.

This simple familiar story teaches us so many things I could go on, but won’t. Heathenry is rich with real world examples that are applicable for women today. We need to search them out. These stories are our birth right, love them, live them, cherish them.

welcome

My first post. As the title indicates this blog is about place and what that word means. My bio is not really a bio but an explanation of this site. I want to state I am not a "scholar", but an ordinary person. I read and think about what I read. I might not quote sources in this blog as that is not my intention. This is a personal journey not a scholarly research paper.

I am a student of herbs. As a boast I have spent thousands of dollars on herbal education, and plan to spend much more in the upcoming years. Currently I am apprenticing under herbalists in the Appalachian Mt's. As a yule gift my husband has gifted me a wise woman retreat in the summer in Ashville. I am looking forward to this.

That is me. Wise woman, herbal apprentice, wife, engineer, and Disir willing mother soon.