Visiting ancestors

 Having invited them...they showed up!

I start my morning meditations with imagining myself in a secluded place (as many meditation leaders suggest for a beginning.)

This was a new place...maybe because I have another hour...daylight savings time is finally over! So at 7:30 am the sun was just lightening the sky..and I was ready to start the day.

Part of how I manage to have this time to meditate is having already poured myself a nice hot cup of coffee, which sits under a tiny saucer to keep it warm on my bedside table. And yes, I allow myself a few sips before I settle under the covers sitting at the head of my bed.

Today I took myself to a clearing in a woods...where I saw a circle of stumps with a fire pit in the middle. I imagined someone bringing wood to the fire pit and starting a fire. It was very welcoming, and helped me center myself.

Then I looked at each of the tree stumps in the circle...and each held the spirit of one of my ancestors. I slowly looked at Spritiualist William Booth, and his daughter-in-law Eugenia Booth Miller with her husband Charlie by her. I saw her daughter, Mozelle, and my grandfather who I never knew...and then my mother and father. Next to them was my sister and her son. Then my other grandmother Ada, and her sons, my uncles Rogers. And then her father and mother Swasey. And finally the two who have recently passed this week, Millie and Ronni (a blogging friend.) Behind me stood my imagined own three sons and their children who I've given the same blood to.

I thanked all these spirits for sharing their DNA, and the lives they led with adventures galore. And I wished them all well as they continue to have presence wherever they might be. I asked them if they had any messages for me (of course! what's contacting spirits if you don't ask that question?) 

I won't tell you the answers however, as they are private and for myself only.

I then got up and danced a bit around the imaginary fire...so glad I could still move and listen to music and dance. Having this body is certainly a gift, and my sense of appreciation woke me to the being of here and now.

As I sipped my coffee, I patted my head and face, which somehow helps me come back to today. I will continue celebrating the lives of ancestors. And I will work on this life in ways that I need to.

Happy All Souls Day (or All Saints Day)

Happy Samhain, Halloween

 

Saying goodbye to a woman I never knew well, but who was loved by my ex-husband. I don't know what kind of relationship definition that is...I was first wife to him, she was third. Millie spent more years with him than either of his first 2 wives. I think they were happy.

We didn't spend much of our lives together.

But as I knew she had been hospitalized this week, I felt her and my ex's presence in my mediations.

May her spirit find it's way to the summer-land, and those who loved her have peace in their hearts.

Talking with the ancestors

 

Now that Hallow-een is near, also known as Samhain, us Pagans believe that the spirits on the other side can communicate with us, as the veil between the worlds is thinner now. And I'm ready to send my love to these spirits that offer nothing but good to my life. The others can just take their hate and find it's only reflected back to them.

I'll share a little about my altar, which will show my ancestors who have recently passed through the veil, as well as some important earlier ones for this time in my life.

My grandmother, Ada, was a Christian Science Practioner. She helped people heal, and I figure she would be good to have around as we continue in Phase 3 of North Carolina's COVID-19 pandemic steps. Her approach to healing was to call upon the same powers that Jesus used to heal the sick. I'm pretty sure that energy or power is still available today.

And of course on my altar stand two goddesses, or figures that remind me of the values for which they stand.

Themis, a young wise woman, holds her hands out to weigh the actions of people against the laws of nature...as her mother Gaia set forth. A lot of these laws have been violated recently, and the justice that mother nature provides will continue to strike humanity with many environmental issues including global warming.

Hecate, the crone, stands at the crossroads of life, helping with decisions as to which direction will take us to our destination, answering questions that we may not know we have. Again, her wisdom offers assistance, and knowledge that we need. She is also connected with the underworld of death. She is a strong ally to have at this time.

The stone circles were all built before Christianity came to Western Europe...so are surmised to have been locations of religious significance to earlier civilizations. Most Pagans are interested in them as links to practices long forgotten. The solstices and equinoxes are recognized as part of the meaning of stone circles, and many early sites of significance for these earlier cultures.

Just a note quickly to my conservative friends and relatives. Pagans are a group of people who believe in the laws of nature, the significance of older cultures' anthropologies, and living to support our one home, the earth. All life has equal standing to Pagans. We do not hurt any living thing if possible. There is no wish for power over another living thing. A Pagan doesn't have weird sexual practices, nor does he eat babies. The do not put a hex on other people. That would be our sisters, the Wiccans...another recognized religious group where hexes may be made to heal negative energies.

Asking the ancestors for help

At the holy time when ancestors' spirits may contact the living, Hallow-een, I have upon my little altar placed images of the ones who have gone before, and will be asking them for specific help at this time...a pandemic and election and full-moon Halloween.

Margaret on the right, in the 1920-30s.

For political stability to be realized through this election, I will bring my Great Aunt Margaret, who was a early voter when women first acquired the vote. She taught high school math, and I thought the world of her. 

Grandmommy (Mozelle) before I knew her...when she was about 38. Her second husband died when she was just 29. 

 Of course my grandmother, Mozelle will be invited, as she represents so well how a single woman raised a child without a man to support her, (after her two husbands had died within a few years of their marriages in successioin) Her family and good friends continued to help her when our government didn't have any of the programs that it has today to help single working mothers. Her death from breast cancer at the same time I graduated from high school, reminds me of how many women still suffer from the pain of that disease today.

Rosie (in hat) and myself...before she helped me move to NC when I retired and before her breast cancer.

Rosie and her husband George after they moved to Washington state.

My dear friend who also died from breast cancer a couple of years ago, will definitely be honored on my altar. Rosemary gave me so many positive emails as we continued to communicate only in that way...and I loved her positive lifestyle as a vegan.

I will invite my great grandmother Eugenia (mother of Margaret and Mozelle) as a Texas woman who ended up in the position of being married to a German immigrant through WW I and at the beginning of WW II. 

Great grandpa Charles...

I also invite her husband, Charles, as they raised their 4 girls through the early 20th century, and I'm pretty sure they would know just what American Germans thought of Hitler and racial anti-semetic Natzis. Eugenia died in 1936, and Charles lived until 1946. Charles finally obtained US citizenship in 1939, after repeated attempts and affidavits declaring his patriotism to America. I invite their spirits as influence is needed to fight the etheric and political battle that has allowed many dark forces in America to again raise their ugly racist heads.

I am going to look for more of my ancestors to try to have their influence available as we look toward this important election...and to keep the democracy our America was founded upon safe from so many negative energies that are full of hatred and divisiveness.