Book review

I like kids books sometimes, what can I say. Rick Riordan books are typically a fun ride, especially when you're not overly serious about your lore and mythology. I really liked the Percy Jackson series of books (the movie was horrible, but that wasn't Rick's fault!). Since I'm a big fan of Greek lore, I saw the twists and turns coming in the Percy series, not so much in the Kane Chronicles. It's a bit like the Percy series (young teenage Heroes/Demigods and the adventures they go on encountering deities and artifacts, both popular and obscure). Since I'm not as adept at Egyptian lore, I've enjoyed following along, looking up deities when they're mentioned. He oversimplifies a lot of the lore, but that's to be expected, especially for a kid's book.

I like that they don't make out Isis to be all sunshine and lollipops and fairy dust. There is a power hungry dark side to her as well. Again, the whole thing is oversimplified, but still. After reading an email thread tonight about discounting lore about deities that doesn't jive with what you want and only accepting the lore that does, it was refreshing to be reminded of the example of this book: There is always more to the story and some of it won't fit into your current worldview. Thing is, in this book, the view expands instead of the kids sticking fingers in their ears like if they ignore the "bad stuff" will go away.

If you haven't read the Red Pyramid, I highly recommend it for a fun escape. If you have read it, you check out the first chapter of The Throne of Fire here. 

SPOILER ALERT:  I did enjoy the scene where they encounter a Roman burial site in Egypt which had been part of a Roman colony/defense. The mummies were prepared for the Egyptian afterlife, but none of the spells were done to properly send them off. 

Egyptian Italy part 1 (quickie)

Egypt is right next door to Sicily, so it's not too surprising that there were cults of Isis and Osiris found there. What might surprise you is that Pyramids were found there too. This page has pictures of pyramids there as well as their angles to constellations.
I've also been perusing The cult of Isis among women in the Graeco-Roman world  By Sharon Kelly Heyob.

Here's a picture of an Isis statue from pompeii:

 

 

Revenge

I'm sure most of you saw the misquoted MLK jr speech or the cheers and virtual grave dancing all over the internet the past few days. I was terribly annoyed. I say, if you're not a New Yorker, STFU, but that's my opinion and I'm a New Yorker :) What bothered me most is that people were telling each other how to feel or shaming others who didn't react "correctly" in their eyes. Bullshit. You feel how you feel and that's that. I'm sure most of us feel a mix of emotions.

My answer to all of the posts? A correct Martin Luther King Jr. quote: "the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends towards justice." Take that as you will. Everyone gets to define "moral" and "justice" per their own life and associations.

I'm here tonight to chat a bit about revenge. Tho the phrase existed earlier, The Godfather further popularized "Revenge is a dish best served cold." There are a few old Italian proverbs of a similar vein:

"He who cannot revenge himself is weak, he who will not is contemptible."
"Revenge a hundred years old has still its milk (baby) teeth."
"Who has patience sees his revenge."
"In revenge, haste is criminal."

From a speech recorded by Livy:

     “The Romans are a race who know not how to sit down quiet under defeat;              
any scar, which the present necessity shall imprint in their breasts will rankle
there forever, and will not suffer them to rest until they have wreaked manifold
vengeance on your heads.”

This is the quote which leads off this paper (a pdf which downloads when you click the link) on revenge and justice as seen by ancient Romans. It's long but very well written, research is cited (there are footnotes! <3) and it touches upon many things we've mentioned in this blog including Roman founding myths, Octavian, Lucrece, Etruscans, and the Latin wars (where Rome decided to conquer their neighbors and take over. Kinda like NYC invading NJ for the farmland. Not that I'd mind Cuomo as governor, but anyway...). It's something to read when you have time to sit down and take it in and to pull up the original texts cited.

We've talked briefly about defixiones tables before, mostly in relation to fertility. There were several categories of curses, from winning competitions, to politics, to court cases, to sex and love, to business to straight up revenge. Actually, many of the tables involved a plea for revenge or justice, as the writer saw it.

Hekate, Persephone, Pluto, Hermes were all invoked, as were others. The cthonic deities were involved in this magickal letter asking for help. The letter, scribed in lead or some other thin metal, invoked a deity, stated what they wanted done, then it was folded over, pierced with a nail and either buried or tossed in the water.

Revenge and vengeance have been personified as deities by both the Romans and Greeks who called to Invidia and Nemesis respectively. Nemesis was originally one who distributed balanced, justified fortune in due measure without any "good or "bad" connotations. She became an avenger figure later on.

So why am I going on about this? Revenge runs deep. Thousands of years deep. The paper I linked to above makes a distinction between revenge and justice. Revenge is thought to be emotional, a primal kind of if you get hit, you hit back for survival, lest you be shown as weak. Is there a difference? It's a matter of perception. YOUR perception, and whichever side of the quotes you were on this week, how you take it is up to you and no one else.

Punch and Pie

Actually it was fruit punch and everything bagels. That was the Hecate supper I left at the crossroads tonight. I feel like the irony was appreciated: Grain plus poppy seeds plus onion and garlic... Yeah. lol There was more traffic than usual. I'm not just saying that because I was paranoid, it felt like there were more people out because it was still light outside.

I went home right after and launched into a group visit to an astral temple. It was an interesting experience and I have to say that I prefer doing it in my own space rather than have everyone together in the same space. It's easier to bend time, to pause, to see what you need without one person's voice guiding you specifically. I'm going to talk more about time in the future and the tools you can cultivate to access different times.

I feel like I've always had an affinity for the subject in the same way I've always understood astrology. As a child I just knew what the planets were about and their relationships to each other the same way I understood Greek mythology without having ever been taught it. I believe we recall more from past lives than we realize, it's just a matter of personality and will and the environment in which you grow up that determines how much of it continues to blossom. I just plain knew astrology 101 when I popped out lol Astrology is a measurement of time and the possibilities of each moment. We are walking moments in time. When you were born, the stars were aligned in such a way that they will never be again. You are full of possibilities, as is every moment and every person. Your natal chart is a picture of you, as seen through the planets. So why can't we access other moments in time? Who says we can't?

You've heard a song that brings the memories flooding back, You've smelled something that transports you... and it can transport you. I'm not talking matrix or inception type stuff here, but more is possible on the astral and on other planes than we are willing to realize.

Time for me to get to bed to digest the work done tonight. We'll talk more about astrology in the weeks to come and how Italians invented and perfected it ;)

Dark Moon in Taurus

Tonight's post is a quickie. I'm off to do some Dark Moon work. Well, it's true dark after 2:30 am so technically I'll be doing waning moon work. The sabian symbol for this dark moon at 13 degrees Taurus, is a porter carrying baggage. I'll that that to mean it's time to shed the baggage that no longer serves us, or at least a good opportunity to do so. 


I don't feel right doing my Hekate ritual tonight, mostly because I didn't get out to leave the offerings in the place I wanted to. It's not right to show up to a party without bringing something, know what I mean? I'll do that tomorrow night, when the moon is officially dark, but before the first crescent appears.

It's hard to do inner work yet come here and blog every night without going into TMI. I suppose it only feels TMI to me because it is so personal and I keep it close to the vest.

I started down a research path and looked up and an hour had passed. That means I'm calling this blog done for the night and I'm off to my work

Petals off the Rose

Today I participated in a ritual that was steeped in kabbalah. Spheres were equated with quarters, the name of each sphere was intoned and there were other references as well. That's all beside the point. I realized, while driving home, why I don't "feel" kabbalah.

When introducing a friend, I say: This is John.

I don't say: These are cells and these cells make up tissues and these tissues make up organs and these organs make up a body and this body is paired with this mind and this soul and this personality, and so on.

That's what kabbalah feels like to me. You're picking at something, trying to break it all down into its contingent parts when the whole is the point. I was searching the interwebs and various books trying to find a connection between Pythagoras or Plato or the Babylonians and their take on it, figuring if I come at it from another angle then I might find more of an affinity for it. Nothing yet. I just plain don't care for it. I get it conceptually, but I just don't feel it. I have no use for it as a system by which one can categorize the universe.That might change someday, and I'm willing to work on it because like my Ancestors, I'm willing to use what works. For example: In Leland's Aradia, he talks about a lemon spell. Lemons allegedly weren't cultivated in Italy until brought there from the middle east. We found something that works, we used it. Allegedly Pythagorean theory works nicely with Kabbalah, wot with the Pythagorean love of the number 10 and there being 10 spheres. Were they explaining the same thing? Am I that willing to get that deep into Pythagorean theiry and Magic to find out? Nah. He was Greek. ;)

Hope everyone had a lovely Floralia!

Hooray! Hooray!

The first of May! Outdoor F-ing starts today! \o/

This is an adult-oriented post. Keep the kiddies away from this one :)

In Italy, it's called piantarmaggio, the Planting of May. winkwink-nudgenudge! A giant pole made from a tree is planted into a hole in the wet, fertile ground. The entire celebration is "the great rite" but done on a grand scale. Two poplar trees are cut down one for the shaft and one for the tip. The trees are stripped of leaves and bark and branches and are then strapped together and brought to the town square/center of town where the hole was dug. On May eve, the pole is erected (heh) and slid into the hole (heh heh) where it stays for the whole month of May as a symbol of fertility.

Here is one of the many videos to be found on youtube of this wonderful festival. I've even come across news stories about the trip to pick the trees and have seen different regional variations where cows are driven through the town carrying the trees to plant. This one covers the whole event, including one town's "cover story" invented over 1,000 years go to make the tradition acceptable to the church so they could keep it going.




In honor of "Planting May" here is a list of euphemisms for sex: Bang, boom-boom, bonk, bump and grind, dip the wick, do the nasty, fornicate, get a home run, get it on, get laid, get your rocks off,  glaze the donut, hit it, hide the salami, jump your bones, knock boots, Lay pipe, make whoopee, mattress mambo. nookie, the nasty!, nailed, pork, poke, rocking the casbah, roll in the hay, score, screw, shag, sink the sub, thread the needle...

Hey! Wait! This is a blog about Italians, so where are those euphemisms? Where's the Italian slang? ok, quick lesson!

horny: arrapato, assatanto,
sex: chiavata, fottere, scopare, trombare (as in trombone haha)
quickie: cosina veloce, sveltina
penis: minchia (this one has always been a fave of mine lol), uccello
orgasm: sbrodare
masturbate: raspare, sega (told you video games are just playing with yourself...)