Solstice

It was a good holiday - calm, pleasant, the best I can remember in a long, long time. There is nothing especially profound or exciting to report except the above, which is enough, I think. 

The Year Of Dreaming Dangerously

Okay, that's a wee bit of an exaggeration. It hasn't been dangerous at all. But it has been interesting, 

When I decided to give the twelvetide fortune-telling method a shot last year, it was mainly as a lark, to try a different form of divination and bring old folklore into modern practice. I hadn't the foggiest notion what the results might be. Now that a year has come and gone, it's time to review. What came to pass? What was a bust? Let's have a look, shall we?

The original post is here

Prediction for January:

Aside from China's landing of a probe on the dark side of the moon and running various tests (as mentioned in the original post) at the same time, I also became acquainted with Before The Moon Falls, by The Fall, a band that had only vaguely entered my awareness before. 

These two items I consider to be predictive hits. As for ballerinas and plunging to my death, nada. 

Prediction for February:

Aside from Trump's plan that didn't work (does anyone even remember which one it was? ) this one was a bust. No hair accident, no driving the old men crazy, not even anything particularly amber colored. The closest anything came to this at all was discovering an odd shade of lips gloss (Pac-Man Pinky pink ) that seems extremely appealing to men of a certain age. But this is pretty wide of the mark, and what's more, it happened in December. So yeah, I'm calling it a bust.

Prediction for March:

 Yeah, no.

Prediction for April:

Big hit with this one re: Bobo being our mail carrier, which I wrote about here. The catch is that it happened in March, not April. Aside from that, it's interesting to see how such dream imagery translated to real life (provided you believe in such things.)

Alas, still no word from Robert Reich about his feelings for me.

Prediction for May:

This was my favorite dream out of the bunch, and the one I was most hoping would come true. And it did come true, though it wasn't immediately obvious, as it turned out to be quite metaphorical, even for a dream. The key here is in remembering what a monstrance is made to hold.

It happened in two parts, the first in April (so again, a month ahead of time). I was unexpectedly sent something which was very meaningful to me, and I wondered how I'd got so lucky. The second part came in August, and fits in with the rare recording aspect of the dream (though neither Berber nor Moroccan). They were two parts of the same thing.

If it seems I'm being cagey about this, it's because it's one of those things that instinctively feels private and not for public display, so you'll have to take my word for it. This dream also gives me a hint of what the recurring motif of silver might indicate.

The carnival represents social media, of course.

Prediction for June:

A hit in my estimation, described here. Again, slightly early, but a little closer to being on time.
The bit about the tea, though, is still a mystery.

Prediction for July:

Not a darned thing. Sorry.

There were no real workable dreams for August or September, as one was an OBE and the other was more or less a blank. There was some imagery of farm houses in the OBE which I think I found when out in that direction recently, though. For whatever that's worth.

Prediction for October:

This one came to pass while running our little shop at the street market during the summer. Again it came early, in July, or maybe August. We went to eat at a pastry shop, and when going to wash up, I discovered a room much like the one in the dream, with velvet curtains on rings. However, it was not a dressing room behind the curtains, but a storage room. The restroom, quite unusually, had no mirror.

Despite things not fitting exactly, it did give me a dizzying moment of deja vu.

Prediction for November:

It's so hard to know what to say about this one. I did not meet a man or a girl of this description, I did not come upon a box of fire. Did I participate in casting a spell on myself? This is much harder to say. But, having thought it over at length, I realize how much this dream is interwoven with the next one...

Prediction for December:

Again, this one took shape in a way that diverged significantly from the dream imagery. While the aforementioned forum member has been mercifully absent from my waking life, the theme of following clues and searching for hidden things has been very present. Also, frustration with/ losing interest in a game and finding a key (though not a literal one) were strong elements this month as well.

This being the case, I would call it a predictive hit, but in such an allegorical way that it would make no sense to anyone not aware of all the details. In short, I couldn't have seen it coming, but in retrospect the story is there. Not sure this is much help as far knowing the future, though.

And because the twelve days of Christmas has only eleven nights, I threw in one more for good measure:

Prediction for January 2020:

There has been no sign of Christopher Eccleston or anyone else to save the world as yet. So, nope. Unfortunately.
 
All in all, the twelvetide fortune telling method was fairly good, as these things go, and certainly a fun and mystical activity for the holidays.

Next post, I'll lay out my dream predictions for 2020, and if they're anything like right this time, it's going to be a weird year.

Walking In A Hippie Wonderland

For the Easter holiday, we took the kids to a renaissance faire, which is exactly like the renaissance, if it had been exclusively populated by hippie wizards and the occasional elf.

 

The kids had a great time and enjoyed the music and middle-eastern food. It also gave us the chance to shop for their dad's Walpurgis-birthday.

(and to buy this lovely green nd rust colored silk for myself.)

The youngest enjoyed the faery courtyard and the jousting especially. He made us play pretend jousting for the rest of the day.

All in all it was a happy, if non-traditional, holiday.

Now it's time to get ready for Walpurgisnacht and then, I think, to finally write my post about the Sad Cheese Sandwich (see number 8 here) Like so many things lately, seven years of waiting seems long enough.

Winter On The Edge Of Town

It's a day late owing to computer problems, but happy solstice to all.

Certainly, it's been an uncharacteristically sunny week for it. The clouds have only been rolling in at twilight, leading to some especially colorful skies.

At 4:23 PM, I was sitting with my little ceremonial fire (as you do) quietly waiting for a sign of what to expect in the coming season. I was just wondering if one would come when a crane flew over. At the same time, another bird dropped a heap of juniper berries on my head. A happy confluence of events.

It may seem strange, predicting good fortune at a time when the country seems to have gone mad and life expectancy is dropping (these things are not unconnected, IMO) but you see, I am determined to survive.

Someone once told me that so many people give up upon reaching an obstacle that by just refusing to quit, you end up much further ahead than you realize. This is my game plan. I am not strong, nor particularly stable, but I am exceptionally stubborn.

In that spirit, today I dragged myself from the haze of migraine and fibromyalgia torment to buy gifts for my children. My reward (aside from making the children happy, of course) was being there to see the winter sunset, this swirling configuration on the edge of town.

These moments pass, yes, but for me, the moment is enough, and for that I am extremely grateful. You forget pain, eventually, but transcendent moments can stay with you forever.

Here's wishing all of us a transcendent winter holiday.