Recent work (February con't: OLOTEAS)

Last Saturday, I presented a one-hour session of Singing the Goddess at Our Lady of the Earth and Sky's annual Community Festival.

Late in the week, I'd had a serious attack of introversion. I've been to several OLOTEAS events since moving to Seattle; a local F/friend of mine asked me to sing in the chorus for their August ritual before I even arrived. :) But all of a sudden, I was just certain I'd be spending the day with a bunch of people I barely know and would feel left out, lonely, and weird the whole time. So, I asked for help, and folks held me in the Light, held me in the Goddess, thought of me, and prayed for me. And it did help.

So by Saturday, I felt both well-prepared and back in my groove, if still a little shy.

I arrived and checked in, set up my stuff - crocheted items, books, and cds - and then went to a workshop.

It was a really neat workshop called "The Goddess Mama in YOU!," which has given me some neat stuff to work on personally. It'll be interesting to see how all that settles: my relationship with the Goddess as Mother; how I manifest the Mother; how I see the women who have mothered me - well or poorly - as the Goddess incarnate; how I see myself as the Mother incarnate; how I experience the Earth as Mother; how I experience the larger Goddess as Mother... and I can tell there's a lot that's not in words yet, but busily working away beneath the surface.

I spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out with folks... the dreaded introvert-among-people-I-barely-know-(all-of-whom-must-know-each-other-well) time. Which it was so not. I had a lovely conversation with someone there for the first time, another conversation getting to know someone else a little better, got cheerful suggestions from folks just hanging out about how to get people to respect my taped finger where I've strained a ligament. (This included a winning suggestion from a vet tech, who was musing about the brightly-colored wrap they use on injured animals. We still have some shockingly-bright wrap material from when one of our cats had a tail injury that had to be kept taped... That ought to help get people to stop squeezing!)

I also connected with a few other folks who'd grown up among Friends, which was both really neat and has gotten me thinking. More on that in a future post.

My workshop was the first after dinner. We had a larger group than I expected, mixed grown-ups and kids, women and men, with a wide range of comfort levels and musical abilities... who just jumped in and were willing to try whatever I thought might be fun. It was great! They also tackled some harder stuff, although I really wanted to make sure I provided them with some easy songs and chants they could use in their own rituals. And it was very cool having kids dancing during the workshop.

I also made some lovely connections with other folks in the area around song circles and Bardic circles and intervisitation. Excellent.

So, happy Stasa.

And then I went to a Discordian Ritual of Discord and Jelly Donuts. Hooray! It had been much too long. Besides being lots of fun, and a reminder of one of the core values of Roses! Too Tradition (and one of our occasional matron Goddesses), it was good to feel spiritually back in touch with dear friends back home like Fedor, The Mad One. And did I mention there were jelly donuts? Yes!

(Hmmm. I think there need to be jelly donuts at my Spring Equinox potluck.)

Hail Eris!

So it was a good experience and a good day.