Graveyard Dirt: Two Worlds and In-between

Altar Building Gremlins

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Altar building gremlins? Still here. (I've learned if you just close the door to the backroom you can keep them restrained and give the superficial impression that you've exorcised the last room.)

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2009 Harvest

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THE GAME: 2009 Harvest. THE OBJECTIVE: Get in as much shit as you can before it gets dark. THE CONFLICT: Waking up just after FIVE IN THE FUCKING AFTERNOON, thus giving you only an hour or two to successfully complete the game. THE PRIMARY FRUSTRATION: Lack of natural light forcing the use of flash indoors creating shitty, blurred pictures. (OH, FLASH, WHY MUST YOU BE MY ONLY NATURAL ENEMY?)

Everything pictured above is what we managed to gather before night fell completely. Italics woke up just after six in the evening and immediately clambered up a ladder to help pick the plums out of my reach and dutifully pulled down branches of the rowan trees so I could cut down the berries.

(I WASN'T ALLOWED ON THE LADDER DUE TO MY TINY GODDESS FEET. <- TINY GODDESS FEET DON'T EASILY SUPPORT HUGE ASS GHETTO GODDESS ASSES. MY BALANCE? COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY FUCKED UP BEYOND BELIEF. THAT'S THE PRICE OF MY HOURGLASS FIGURE.)

Half-naked in Summer's waning warmth (NAKED WITCH ENJOYS BEING NAKED BUT ALSO UNDERSTANDS THAT SOMETIMES THERE IS A NEED FOR MINIMAL AMOUNTS OF CLOTHING, LIKE WHEN HUGGING PRICKLY PLANTS AND MOVING SHARP, BONE DRY TWIGS) I pottered around in the garden barefoot, my toes sinking into the cold grass as the scent of Frankincense wafted in the air.

(I had to test if a roofing slate would take the direct heat of a charcoal block so I set up a tiny altar on one of the patio's small columns - the one where I normally leave offerings for the crows - and burned dusty chunks of resin during the act of harvesting, bathing my ritual scissors and gathered fruits, vegetables and herbs in the fragrant, sanctifying smoke.)

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Way, way in the back in the plastic terracotta colored container is my sad looking wheat which looked so pitiful and pathetic that I attempted to cheat out on my wheat growing, harvesting and displaying responsibilities by cruising local wheat fields to see if there were any patches of field left unharvested. (The answer? NO. (NATURALLY OF COURSE!))

With no other option I sat down at one in the fucking morning and cut down my wheat, and sitting on the floor I gathering each stalk - sheaf by sheaf - tightly in my left hand until I created a mace-like scepter. Didukh? Done, and not nearly as awful as I envisioned it'd be. (Last year when we ritually Reaped I cut the wheat down when it was still green and straight in the field so it naturally dried in a desirable shape, this time around I waited too damn long and the majority of the VERY dry wheat slumped over itself in a cascade of honey gold. DESPITE THE USE OF FLATTERING ADJECTIVES IT WASN'T A HOT LOOK, YO.)

The huge yellow-white-green leaves next to the wheat are Papa's tobacco, and the bundle of long, tall stalks resting on top of the leaves is the very last of our dill. The orange-red berries are just a fraction of what's still left on our dirtyard rowan tree, and there were so many goddamn plums that I began running out of containers to keep them in. In the bottom right corner you can see some of the parsley that was cut down, but the majority of the herb got shoved in a giant orange bucket filled with water (CLASSY, I KNOW).

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HERB TRAY, AHOY! (Actually, it's a roasting pan so I guess it should be "HERB ROASTING PAN, AHOY!".) This is the very last of my beloved herbs, cut down deliberately (AND OH, HOW IT PAINED ME TO DO SO!) to offer to the Old Woman. (She gets a portion of EVERYTHING, including all of my culinary herbs.) In the mess you can sort've kind've see parsley, thyme, rosemary, mint, marjoram, oregano, bay and our last cucumber.

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PLUMS, PLUMS, GLORIOUS PLUMS! I waited YEARS for the plum trees in back to bear fruit, and the second I saw masses of white flowers around Beltane I guarded the trees with a crazy insane she-bitch ferocity. ("I'LL TELL YOU SOMETHING, HE [MY FATHER-IN-LAW] BETTER NOT EVEN FUCKING //LOOK// AT THE TREES, OR ELSE, DAMMIT! MARK MY WORDS - //OR ELSE//!")

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That effing basket is quickly climbing "MS. GRAVEYARD DIRT'S TOP FIVE RITUAL ITEMS" list. It was originally bought to transport our Easter/Great Rite ritual meal to church to be blessed (BECAUSE I'M SPECIAL AND DIFFERENT AND A PAIN IN THE FUCKING ASS I COMBINE BOTH SLAVIC CATHOLICISM - EASTERN ORTHODOX PRACTICES I GREW UP WITH - AND VARIOUS PAGAN TRADITIONS WHEN CELEBRATING EASTER / SPRING / THE GREAT RITE / HIEROS GAMOS), but it's since been used for all forms of wildcrafting, carrying fresh roadkill home, moving my witchcraft junk from one room to another (i.e., BOTTLES, MILLIONS AND BILLIONS OF LITTLE BOTTLES AND JARS) and, more recently, gathering the fruits (vegetables and herbs) of this year's harvest.

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A close-up shot of Papa's tobacco, dill, some of the plums picked and the top sprigs of a parsley plant.

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It was nothing short of STUPIDLY BLISSFUL JOY when tugging on the soft, swollen fruits and feeling them separate from the tree straight into my hand. I grew up partially feral in my Ukrainian grandparents' orchard (two acres of oaks, apples, pears, plums, cherries, grapes and vast flower and vegetable gardens), but as kids we never took part in mass harvesting. The only time I picked fruit was for instant consumption, so it was something of a novelty to collect all of the plums off the trees and gently drop them in my basket.

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The Old Woman's portion of my herbs were gathered together in neat little bundles and banded together (YAY FOR RUBBERBANDS! THEY SECURE CLING FILM OVER PITCHERS OF STOCK, OPEN PAIN IN THE FUCKING ASS STUCK JARS AND BUNDLE FRESH HERBS TOGETHER!) to create an herbal posy. This bouquet (GARNI! HAH HAH HAH, GET IT? GET IT? BECAUSE IT'S BAY AND PARSLEY AND THYME AND...oh God, never mind, it's a lame cooking joke) was placed on a miniature altar adjacent to our main Harvest Home altar next to even more parsley, my basil plant and a few bulbs of garlic.

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Fresh, organic herbs! (OH, GOD, HERBS, I WILL MISS YOU V. MUCH DURING THE DARK YEAR AND LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU AGAIN DURING THE LIGHT YEAR.) The last - the best - for Her. (OH, THE SACRIFICES I MAKE TO - AND FOR - MYSELF! <- WHEN YOU WORSHIP YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS AS A DEITY YOU GET THE BEST OF //BOTH// WORLDS!)

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I struck a deal with the Old Woman - anything that touched the earth belonged to Her. So all of the windfall fruit - no matter how viable they were - were instantly turned over to Her and placed in Her offering bowl. And anything that fell out of my hands or basket when I was collecting, cutting and gathering shared a similar fate.

And that system was great and fine and She cheekily stole one or two plums off the branches while I was plucking their siblings, but the super major LOLOLOLOLOL! from the Universe came when there wasn't enough ladder (or Italics) to reach the plums at the very top of the tree and he was forced to shake the trunk to dislodge the last of the fruit. My job? My job was running back and forth at the foot of the ladder like a retard trying to catch every goddamn plum as they came crashing down so they wouldn't touch the ground.

(OI FUCKING VEY.)

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Moroccan mint! (A lot of it!) When bundling up the mint I actually GOT SICK just from the scent clinging to my hands. (Long story short? I have a broken stomach. There's a long list of UH OH! foods that set off my symptoms, and any sort of "mint" is RIGHT THE FUCK UP THERE. Even the perfumed fragrance of fresh mint is enough to get my lame ass stomach worked up.)

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My bucket'o'parsley! I grew a ring of parsley around one of my sweet corn plants to be able to dig them up later - roots and all. The rest of the parsley was planted in the raised dirt bed at the base of the Shango (Bone) Tree and grown exclusively for their leaves. (IF I PROMISED YOU ANY SORT OF WITCH PACKAGE YOU BETTER BELIEVE YOU'LL BE GETTING SOME HOMEGROWN SHANGO (BONE) TREE/PHALLIC WORSHIPING ALTAR PARSLEY.)

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These plums got some crazy love this past year. From Beltane to Mabon I was outside whispering, stroking, murmuring, kissing and affectionately touching the growing fruits. My day wasn't complete unless I went outside to inspect my plants and leave a little bit of love on clusters of ripening plums.

To give something back to the trees that brought me endless amounts of happiness during this year's growing season I'm going to give them an offering of my grandfather's beer (a 40oz Heineken that's been sitting in the graveyard since last year, diluted in a bucket of water), and I'm going to begin burying the carcasses of roadkill in the raised dirt bed that makes up the outside altar.

(That way the tree gets the nutrients from the decomposing bodies, I can grow magic herbs over the flesh and bones of ritually butchered roadkill and, once stripped by insects, I can go back and dig out the bare bones for personal use. <- WASTE NOT, WANT NOT!)

Harvest Home Offering

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Is it criminal that we haven't been back to the semi-local standing stones since walking to them for the first time earlier in June? (YES, PROBABLY.) In June it was effort - it was a fucking EXPEDITION - that had us cutting through sopping wet cow fields, hugging the linear trail of dashes along the sides of country lanes, receiving shocks from electrified fences and cutting through fields of growing wheat as summer's morning sun beat down on us with a crazy amount of ferocity for six in the fucking morning.

But now? But now we have a car - A CAR! AFTER NEARLY TEN YEARS! A FOR REAL CAR WITH FOR REAL WHEELS AND A FOR REAL ENGINE AND A FOR REAL GAS TANK - and the Scottish countryside is my oyster. (<- Hence the lack of quality posting recently. First we were sick, then we were having country sex in historical settings (OH, NEOLITHIC MONUMENTS AND ANCIENT CEMETERIES AND IMPOSING SCOTTISH CASTLES) and THEN Harvest Home hit and I've been scrambling madly to try and retain a quickened pace of urgency to ensure all of my proposed activities, celebrations and rituals come to fruition.)

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When I picked up the fox roadkill on Lammas (I haven't yet written an entry about it, but there are pictures of me processing the body nearly step by step in LAMMAS 2009) I didn't waste ANYTHING. The majority of its vital organs were gone (the stomach cavity must've exploded on impact leaving nothing noteworthy except a friction burned heart) so what remained was carefully extracted and frozen - the hide was gently peeled from the mangled carcass, the feet cut and bundled together, the windpipe, eyes, tongue and teeth meticulously removed and muscles from the mostly undisturbed haunches were stripped off and frozen into little fox steaks.

What I couldn't salvage and use I carefully wrapped in plastic and froze as well, packing it alongside the rabbit, crow and female blackbird in the outside freezer. (LOL @ THAT GODDAMN FREEZER TURNING INTO MY CREEPY GIRL ROADKILL MORGUE. IF ONLY MY IN-LAWS KNEW THEY WERE PAYING EXTRA FOR ME TO RUN AN EFFING FREEZER FOR WILD ANIMALS AND THEIR BUTCHERED PARTS.) I wanted to give those remains as an offering, but I couldn't make up my mind WHERE I wanted to leave them. (The standing stones were the first place I thought of, but I was afraid if people found the pile of gruesome leftovers there'd be some SATANIC PANIC in the air. <- POOR LITTLE MISUNDERSTOOD DEVIL-WORSHIPING WITCH!)

In the end, though, the idea came full circle and the fox remnants were left at the foot of the original standing stone (the other two in the background were later added - they seem to be proper standing stones, although probably not part of the original circle). And to combat any SATANIC PANIC I naturally went overboard making the offering look EVEN MORE SUSPICIOUSLY LIKE DELIBERATE WITCHCRAFT. (Although how BLACK MAGIC can it be if I'm also leaving plums, rowan berries and a small loaf of bread? <- CLEARLY, I AM IN LEAGUE WITH SATAN HIMSELF.)

This is my offering to the Old Woman, the Cailleach, my "darker" self (as opposed to the Virginal Spring Bride, my "lighter" self). With this offering I'm effectively giving thanks for what I received during my reign as the Bride and passing on a portion of my gifts and bounty to my other self. I've sowed, I've nurtured, I've reaped, harvested and learned, and by giving a portion to myself I'm also accepting the experience, wisdom and riches that comes from work. (LOOK, I NEVER SAID IT WAS GOING TO MAKE PERFECT SENSE, DID I? Although it makes PERFECT sense to me...)

The magenta pile of raw meat are the remains of my beloved fox (I DID EVERYTHING BUT STRIP NAKED AND FLING THE BLOODIED AND FLAYED PELT ON MY BARE BODY) and behind it is a huge ass soup bone that I picked up for Chippy, our live-in demon who's been house trained like a dog. (<- WHAT DOES AN AUTISTIC GIRL DO WHEN AN ANCIENT SUMERIAN DEMON COMES KNOCKING? SHE PUTS A DOG COLLAR ON IT, GIVES IT LOVES AND HUGS AND FLIES KITES WITH IT.)(HE HAPPENS TO LOVE FLYING KITES V. MUCH, THANK YOU.)

The round loaf of bread is a traditional Ukrainian bread called babka (it's sort've like a cake bread; rich, sweet and fragrant like brioche) that I normally bake during our Easter/Hieros Gamos celebrations. Normally I only bake babka (or paska) in Spring, but I found a recipe for a pumpkin version and after THAT I wouldn't consider anything else. Thanks to me being me the bread wasn't gloriously orange-gold like it was supposed to since I opted to substitute sweet potatoes for pumpkin (I think they have a better, more rounded flavor) and the tres swish potatoes I used were more corn silk gold than pumpkin orange. (SIGH.)

The babka is sitting on a jellied stack of bones from the three different birds consumed during our Harvest Home celebrations. (Long story short? Because I identify the Cailleach as my MONSTER HAG BABA YAGA SELF I offer Her/Me/Us primitive witch food - booze, bread and bones. <- THREE THINGS, LOLTASTICALLY ENOUGH, UKRAINIANS ARE VERY FOND OF.) I made a stock using the frozen bones and gizzards of last year's Christmas goose (I always offer the carcass of the body to the Woman, but keep the shit trimmed away prior to roasting for stock making) and then added leftover roast duck to the soup. The last set of bones comes from our ROADKILL PHEASANT which I butchered, tidied up and then casseroled with venison.

The plums are windfall fruits from the two plum trees that I've been babying for the past couple of years. (It's taken A LOT of effing work to get those fuckers to flower and bear fruit. Like NEARLY THREE YEARS WORTH OF EFFORT AND WORK AND CAJOLING, PLEADING, DEMANDING AND THREATENING.) I promised any fruit, vegetable or herb that touched the ground to the Old Woman which made plum picking V. interesting when Italics was forced to shake branches way above me because he couldn't reach the ones at the very top. (OH, BUT IF ONLY YOU ALL COULD'VE SEEN ME HALF-NAKED AND RUNNING BACK AND FORTH WITH A HUGE ASS BASKET OVER MY HEAD TRYING TO CATCH EVERY PLUM PLUMMETING TO THE GREEDY GROUND BELOW.)

Last are a huge handful of fresh rowan berries from our overloaded tree in the dirtyard which sits at one of the perpendicular angles of the crossroad we're situated on. (I've been meaning to sit down and string the fuckers up into necklaces and garlands and shit BUT I JUST HAVEN'T HAD THE TIME. Currently I have bunches of rowan berries liberally scattered throughout our altar and in various ceramic bowls throughout the house.) Italics said that it was the berries that finally pushed the Harvest Home offering into OBVIOUS WITCHCRAFT TERRITORY. (BECAUSE, LIKE, PILES OF ROTTING MEAT, PLUMS AND A LOAF OF BREAD ARE CLEARLY AMBIGUOUS UNTIL YOU ADD ROWAN BERRIES.)

OH WAIT ALSO! I also offered water at the stone, pouring it over the very tip of the stone and letting it race down to the earth below. (You can kind've sort've see the streaks in the first picture, especially if you view it in a larger size.) As we departed I managed to unearth an oddly shaped stone - really reminiscent of the one we were just at - from the soil and I took it home with us in the hopes I can create a miniature recumbent circle at the base of the Shango (Bone) Tree's altar next year.

(I'm just going to let the next few pictures speak for themselves. ME? RUIN THE THE PERVASIVE ATMOSPHERE? SURELY NOT!)

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The nipple peak tentatively emerging from the dense morning mist is Bennachie, also know as "Mither Tap" ("Mother Tap" due to the breast shape of the hill). In ancient times it had a significant religious role in the indigenous people's lives. (The Old Woman, the Cailleach, usually inhabited the largest hills and peaks in the area.) While I can't see Mither Tap from any of our windows, the second we're on the road that winds down to the cemetery it (She?) comes into view.

For a year or two now I've been desperate to get to the summit to collect materials to create my own neolithic/stone age hammer. (In stories the Old Woman brings Winter down by striking the ground with Her hammer.) I have no idea how to fashion a hammer out of stone, sinew, leather and wood BUT THAT ISN'T GOING TO STOP ME. (FEAR ME, SCOTLAND, FOR ONE DAY I WILL CONTROL WINTER AND YOU WILL TREMBLE IN THE RIPPLING WAKE OF MY AWESOME POWER! (<- Actually, LOLOLOLOL, I just want to ensure A WHITE FUCKING CHRISTMAS EVERY YEAR, THANK YOU VERY MUCH.))

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After collecting a mostly perfect roadkill rabbit (THAT'S ANOTHER STORY I'M SAVING FOR LATER, BUT THE CONDENSED VERSION IS: FOUND A DEAD RABBIT - RATHER BLOATED BUT 100% IMMACULATE FUR - ON THE WAY TO THE STANDING STONES AND SKINNED ITS PELT TO BEGIN THE LONG ROADKILL FORAGING PROCESS OF CREATING A HOMEMADE RABBIT BLANKET; YAY FOR STANDING STONES PAYING IT FORWARD!) and offering this year's bounty at the stones we casually drove around the country as the sun rose, admiring the mist riddled landscape, gawking at the sheer number of pheasants and carefully looking for even more roadkill.

This is mist rising from the local loch (a man made feature created hundreds of years ago) during sunrise. If you have a super great memory you might remember me mentioning "THE LOCH" when pointing out the glimmer of water in the distance in pictures taken at the new cemetery (as opposed to the old cemetery where we go to leave offerings and gifts and help tend the graves of complete strangers since I'm unable to care for the resting place of my family and ancestors).

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The loch and village containing both cemeteries are named after an infamous magician that lived and practiced the black arts just a mile away (the "Wizard Laird"). He spent part of his youth in Italy, supposedly studying magic, and upon returning home continued his "satanic" practices here. He's buried in the very graveyard we visit - the same cemetery where he allegedly stole corpses of unbaptized babies for his nefarious deeds - although the exact location of his burial site has been "lost" and a modern marker in the shape of a headstone was created to commemorate him and his family.

(I have a kind've sort've maybe idea of where he is. Occasionally I leave a treat for him when we visit the graveyard, knocking on the totally nondescript monument to "wake" him up. The first time I did that I requested that he send me his magic birds - crows, rooks, magpies and jackdaws (I already had the crows and magpies, I eventually got the rooks but I'm still waiting for the jackdaws) - and that very night I had an unsettling dream where I found myself standing in a very specific location in the cemetery, practically choking on the overwhelming, blinding presence of something with big heap ju-ju.)

Catch and Release

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They stealthily creep into the house late at night through open windows around this time of year. We watch them spin their webs in corners of room in the warmth of modern living, and eventually, after days weeks and months, the perfect gossamer threads become heavy with dust and debris and sag like old Halloween decorations turning our office/computer room into a Hammer horror movie.

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Harvest Home Altar (Dark)

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The picture above is my ancestral altar where I'll be plying my recently - and not so recently - deceased ancestors and relatives with food and drink throughout our harvest celebration. (Because I'm somewhat estranged from my family I don't have any pictures of anyone except for my mother, and even THAT image is the only one I have of her.)

Tonight's menu? Leftover yogurt soup (I made fresh stock using frozen bones from last year's Christmas goose and dumped in carrots, baby corn, potatoes, rice, roast duck and grilled sirloin steak marinated in miso soup), cubes of cornmeal spoonbread (it's a Ukrainian thing) and homemade garlic bread.

The bowl to the right contains Mabon's first meal - an oatmeal breakfast using PROPER pinhead oats, whole milk, a shredded apple, nuts, plums from outside, whole milk and honey. (Everyone in the house - including the rats - had a bowl before we began harvesting on the equinox.) On top of it is an offering of a glazed donut (REDUCED TO CLEAR GLAZED DONUTS? YES PLZ!) and an Italian cookie. (<- I continuously add whatever we're eating to their altar so they don't miss out on anything.)

Below are a few blurry candlelit shots of our main harvest home altar, thanks to baking bread all day (FOUR RISES? WHY DOES UKIE BREAD ALWAYS NEED EXCESSIVE RISING?!) I'm dead tired so I'll skip out on explaining shit until I have better quality pictures. (There are A LOT of skulls and A LOT of food and A LOT of Slavic kitsch.)(It'll look a billion times more impressive with some light. Honest for real.)

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(Almost) Jointed Roadkill Pheasant

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From THIS to THIS (<- above!). I hung the pheasant for one night, butchered it the following night, washed it, dried it, wrapped it up in a cotton tea towel and stored it in the fridge. (OH, PLASTIC TUPPERWARE BOX WITH LID, <3!) And there the gutted, partially jointed roadkill sat for another day or two thanks to me being 100% engrossed with the creation of our harvest altar yesterday.

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Things scavengers with opposable digits might not tell you (you can thank me for my frankness later):

* Death smells like bile - acidic, sour, acrid, awful, off-putting and rank. Death? Death smells like sauerkraut even Ukrainians won't eat.

* It all doesn't ALWAYS come out in one go (or the second, or the third, but by the time you're scooping for the fourth time you pretty much ruptured the last of the organs into a pureed mess of offal leaving you with an unidentifiable cocktail of insides which may, or may not, be a visual improvement depending on how delicate your sensibilities are).

* Fuck the feathers, you're never going to get them all. (THERE COMES A POINT - AFTER MANY A FRUSTRATED FAUCET RINSINGS - WHEN YOU REALIZE THAT THE TEENY, TINY BLACK PLUMAGE FLUFF STICKING TO YOUR PARTIALLY JOINTED PHEASANT WAS PUT THERE BY THE DEVIL HIMSELF. DON'T CONTINUE NEEDLESSLY ROLLING THAT BOULDER UP THE HILL ANY LONGER THAN YOU NEED TO, TRUST ME ON THIS.)

* That sour, defrosting dead Yeti whose last meal was a barrel of 1000 year old sauerkraut smell will go. Honest. I know the meat smells like vomit NOW, but after rinsing, patting dry...well, actually, after the first round of rinsing and drying it'll still smell like ass (just like your hands). But it'll go away. The processed bird I pulled out of the fridge today? Smells a whole helluva lot more appetizing than the majority of store bought poultry.

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After dredging the jointed pheasant and 300g of venison in seasoned flour I added the game to a waiting casserole (butter beans, black-eyed peas, pancetta, tomatoes, chicken stock, balsamic vinegar, thyme, oregano, white wine, garlic and mushrooms), and the meal's currently cooking away in the oven. (Since this is a crock pot recipe and I don't have a crock pot I'm leaving it in the oven overnight on a low temperature to emulate a slow cooker. By the time I wake up I should have fork tender game casserole. <- LONG LIVE FREE FOOD IN THE FORM OF ROADKILL!)

(Holy shit I'm so tired I can barely think. IF NONE OF THIS MAKES SENSE LET'S BLAME IT ON THAT, OKAY?)

Altar Building at 4:30 AM

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Last night the altar building gremlins crashed the altar building party and left a despair-filling trail of destruction and carnage. (This side of the kitchen? It ain't got NOTHING on the OTHER SIDE of the kitchen. Or my in-laws' bedroom. (SHH! I'LL CLEAN IT UP BEFORE SHE COMES HOME FROM HER BUSINESS TRIP.) Or the backroom, which currently resembles a stable thanks to all of the hay trampled into the carpet. <- REAPED WHEAT LAST NIGHT INDOORS AND ASSEMBLED MY DIDUKHY.)

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I was so busy I DIDN'T EVEN HAVE THE TIME TO CLOSE THE CABINETS. (SERIOUSLY. FOR REAL.) Note the McDonald's deflated box for their new chicken sandwich deal thing sitting in the middle of the crowded counter (the meal of altar building champions). IT'S OKAY, THOUGH, BECAUSE I HAD A RITUAL BREAKFAST CONSISTING OF PROPER PINHEAD OATMEAL, AN APPLE, PLUMS FROM THE BACKYARD, NUTS, WHOLE MILK AND HONEY. (The rats said "MORE PLZ!" but I wasn't about to dig into the ancestors' share to feed greedy, spoiled pet rats. RATS! CEASE WITH YOUR PATHETIC OATMEAL BEGGING!)

Mabon Roadkill Dinner

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I just spent twenty effing minutes trying to figure out what sort of pheasant this is because its markings didn't match anything on Google. ("OH MY GOD I'VE DISCOVERED A NEW SPECIES OF PHEASANT!") And then, after a moment of genius, I plugged in "juvenile pheasant" and all was revealed. (STUPID JUVENILE MALE PHEASANT NOT MOLTING ENOUGH FOR THIS NOVICE ROADKILL SCAVENGER TO EASILY ID YOU.)

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My only experience with processing a pheasant was watching my father hand over a brace of birds to my mother that he and our family dog (a German short-haired pointer) caught earlier in the day. I remember bits of downy plumage drifting aimlessly in the air, and my mother sitting on a lawn chair, outside, enveloped in a blizzard of fluff and feathers. (Neither of the memories helped me much when it came to butchering the bird earlier this evening. <- THANKS MOM.)

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I mean, really, the copper feathers should've been the big giveaway (along with the red ring around the eyes), but because I didn't see the all-familiar black-green-purple iridescence I naturally assumed the most ridiculous hypothesis. (NATURALLY!)

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I know I got burned by the rabbit, but lightening, surely, can't strike twice - right? (I MEAN, IT'S NOT LIKE PHEASANTS ARE KNOWN CARRIERS OF ZOMBIE DISEASES, RIGHT? AND THE BODY WAS STILL HOT AND PERFECTLY FLOPPY AND THERE WAS NO OPEN WOUNDS AND SCAVENGERS AND CARRION HADN'T EVEN HAD A CHANCE TO SNIFF IT OUT. SO IT SHOULD BE A-OKAY, RIGHT? I MEAN, ESPECIALLY SLOW COOKED WITH VENISON AND TOMATOES AND FRESH HERBS FROM OUTSIDE AND BALSAMIC VINEGAR AND WINE AND PANCETTA*.)

(* THE PANCETTA TOTALLY, TOTALLY MAKES IT A-OKAY. HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLE GET SICK EATING SCOTTISH COUNTRYSIDE ROADKILL IF YOU COOK IT IN A DECENT WINE?)

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Last night, when falling asleep, my last thought was "OH, GOD, TRY AND REMEMBER TO OPEN UP THE CROP TO SEE IF THERE'S ANY VIABLE WHEAT KERNELS TUCKED AWAY" and I totally, totally forgot about it until I accidentally decapitated the bird a little too high and cut into the crop. (AND THE CROP, IT SPILLETH.)

And there were viable seeds, and it smelled rank, disgusting and sick but I scooped the lubricated kernels out with a spoon and tossed them into a dish and managed to only mentally dry heave. (I'm going to dry them out and then plant them next spring. MY WHEAT? COMES FROM THE BODY OF A DEAD PHEASANT WE ROASTED FOR OUR RITUAL HARVEST MEAL. <- MY WHEAT IS MORE MAGIC THAN YOUR WHEAT.)

Normally I save internal organs for FUTURE WITCHCRAFT but I decided to offer the offal to the crows and the Old Woman (Cailleach), so I spilled the bloody contents of my innards bowl at the base of the sycamore tree outside our office/computer room window. The feathers were binned, but the head and legs were cleanly hacked off with my ritual scissors and sneakily slipped into the freezer.

(OH, GOD, ONE OF THESE DAYS I'LL GET A WOODEN BOARD, SOME NAILS AND A BOX OF BORAX. UNTIL THEN MY SACRED ANIMAL PARTS WILL REMAIN COMMITTED TO THEIR LONELY FREEZER GRAVE.)

Paint it Black Days

OH, GOD, TODAY'S ONE OF THOSE PAINT IT BLACK DAYS. (Sigh.)

Shango Tree Plums

The Tree of Life ribbons were first wrapped around my human maypole on May Day (<- BELTANE BJ!), and then hung up on the only fruiting branch of the Shango (Bone) Tree on Midsummer. I'm seriously considering boozing these plums up to create a super swanky, super special ritual/ceremonial plum liqueur. (<- To be consumed during my favorite sort of rites - nudge, nudge, wink, wink...ahem.)

Fall Harvest

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Walled gardens at Drum in mid-September.

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Buff-tailed Bumblebee (Bombus terrestris)

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Red Admiral Butterfly (Vanessa atalanta)

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European Peacock Butterfly (Nymphalis io)

Rewards of Freedom

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Today's two things of note:

1.) Drove to a local castle with my mother-in-law in tow to prove to her that yes, in fact, I can drive. (PLEASE, GOD, LET THIS COUNTRY JAUNT FINALLY LAY TO REST THE NOTION THAT I'M A "LEARNING DRIVER"; I'VE BEEN DRIVING SINCE 15, THANK YOU VERY MUCH. <- JUST BECAUSE I HAVEN'T BEEN BEHIND THE WHEEL OF A CAR FOR FOUR YEARS DOESN'T MEAN I DON'T KNOW HOW TO DRIVE. JESUS.) In fact, her manual riding self seemed relieved when I offered to drive back home.

2.) Meandered down a minefield of game bird roadkill (the Gask/Spring Hill standing stone country lane) and eventually succumbed to temptation when passing a non-flattened female pheasant. Unfortunately, her intestines were ruptured and there were patches of fly eggs so I had to ditch any hope for roast pheasant and settle for a pair of feet and an immaculate head which now reside in the outside freezer. (We didn't have pins to tack the one good wing against a wooden board so it - along with the rest of the headless, footless bird - will get committed to a ritual fire tomorrow evening.)

September Sickness

Sick again; I caught this nasty bug last week at the movies, we think. (I caught July's nasty bug at the movies, and August's nasty bug from the rabbit.) The weather's been spectacular, but I've been out for the count and I'm dreading all of the haws (hawthorn berries), masts (beech nuts), blackberries and rowan berries I'm missing out on while this unwelcomed shit drops from my nasal cavity down into my lungs. (If this glorious Indian Summer shifts the second I'm well the Universe is going to have to contend with a V. angry witch.)

Last Job

Death follows me so closely that it occasionally trips me up like a dog underfoot. And I don't mean that in a extraordinarily supernatural way where everyone and everything I know and love dies suddenly or inexplicably and I leave a blazing trail of lifelessness and despair in my wake (although that has, on one or two occasions, happened). It's more subtle than that, more LULzy than that.

When I was born I was dealt #13, but it wasn't until a few years ago that I finally accepted the category I had been filed under - mostly out of reluctance to admit that I got branded with THE COOLEST, MOST AWESOMEST CARD/CONCEPT OF THEM ALL, THANK YOU. (I mean, everyone wants the bestest one, right? And without even trying - without even hoping - I got issued the coveted badass one - death. Which in itself is worth a billion and two LOLs since I'm absolutely petrified of my own mortality. Death, fittingly enough, is afraid of dying.)

I didn't have one big, defining moment when the heavens split open and granted me divine enlightenment. I have small moments, small LOLS, small serving sizes of understanding and acceptance. Instead of one lightening bolt I have daily electric shocks that form a themed pattern that stretch back to as far as I can remember. Instead of being told once, I get reminded every day.

(Which makes up for the fact that I don't have an impressive or cool story of my birth (boringly average, no storms, no complications, although I WAS born at Resurrection hospital, and the joke's punchline had to sit for nearly thirty years before I finally got it), or a pivotal death defying moment that shaped the rest of my life (I nearly suffocated in gym class - rolled up in a gym mat with no air as classmates sat on top to stop me from "escaping" until I eventually blacked out - but the only significant thing that came from that experience was developing a touch of claustrophobia).)

I had no definite career plans until advanced anatomy and microbiology (university level classes offer to the "gifted" seniors to bulk up their GPAs and academic records). Two weeks into anatomy and suddenly my Rainman savant talent was switched on - I was made to dissect and wield a scalpel. The teacher marveled at my innate ability and I was satisfied, finally, that I could do SOMETHING remotely "artistic" with my hands - other than apply liquid eyeliner.

(My mother? A famous Native American potter. I felt cheated by life that I didn't inherit her natural talent for drawing. I desperately wanted to do something creative with my hands, but sketching and painting and drawing were SO out of the question because even though I could apply liquid eyeliner flawlessly, I couldn't draw a fucking circle without it looking misshapen.)

Advanced anatomy showed me I had natural surgeon hands - accurate, confident, quick. When cutting through the connective tissue loosely binding the small intestine (of my fetal pig) together in condensed ruffles my teacher watched through her fingers occasionally squeaking "SLOW DOWN, SLOW DOWN, YOU'LL CUT THE INTESTINE IN HALF!" but without result. (NEWSFLASH: STUBBORN ARIES IS STUBBORN.)

In seconds I spread the intestine out like an organic boa, smiling as proudly as Edward Scissorhands with his garland of paper dolls in front of a stunned classroom. (The object of the exercise was to extract the small intestine, unblemished, so we could measure who had the biggest and smallest - if you accidentally damaged yours you were immediately disqualified).

DOCTOR, I thought. SURGERY, I thought. But then, at the end of the semester, we visited a morgue at a semi-local medical school to watch an "autopsy" of a mummified woman. AUTOPSIES, I decided, surrounded by cadavers and drawn sheets, holding the cold hands of a corpses. When everyone else had gathered at the vestibule of the cold storage chamber I was still lost in a maze of gurneys and silence, touching, listening and sitting with the dead.

I cried the entire bus ride home. Quietly, silently. I remember staring at the barren landscape of the Midwest's winter, everything saturated in rain and gray. I don't know if "hollow" or "empty" covered it, but I wasn't "full" either. I just was, I guess, and even to this day I don't completely understand the reaction. (Guilty for leaving? Grieving for people who were never claimed so their bodies were donated to medical research and study? My first taste - my first introduction - to the concept of mortality?)

When I graduated later that academic year I had already been accepted into a pre-med program with a major of microbiology to become a forensic pathologist*. (HAPPINESS IS HANDLING ORGANS AND, ALSO, GROWING BACTERIA IN BEEF CONSOMME AGAR.) Unfortunately, higher education and I didn't mesh. My first stab saw me dropping out after a semester due to contracting glandular fever (infectious mononucleosis), my second stab saw me almost stabbing my lab partner (LOL!) thanks to my unnatural levels of aggression being goaded on by an anti-depressant I shouldn't have been on.

(* I feel the need to point out, just in case eyes are being rolled, my decision to go into that specific medical field predates all of those godawful CSI and BONES shows that are directly responsible for "forensic pathology" being one of the most popular areas of medical science now. I graduated from high school in 1998 and was a university student the same year.)

(PHEW, OKAY, GOOD, WE GOT THAT UNCOMFORTABLE EXPLANATION OUT OF THE WAY AND NOW WE ALL KNOW THAT I'M NOT PART OF THE CRINGINGLY LAME POPULATION INSPIRED TO MAKE MAJOR DECISIONS REGARDING MY LIFE AND CAREER DUE TO MINDNUMBINGLY FADDISH TV SHOWS.)

Despite my love of anatomy, of microbiology and all things sharp, slippery and begging to be cut open and removed I never returned to university or pre-med. I regret not returning in my own way, but I know, now, I don't have the temperament for it. I hate rules, I hate schedules, I hate the bullshit game you have to play pretending to be interested in people and things. I hate school and its lack of freedom and I'm not patient or tolerant or a team player, so I can't imagine spending an additional decade (or more) of school while putting myself into debt just for the ability to perform autopsies.

Italics eventually made the point that I didn't really want to become a doctor, I just wanted to get paid for being a skilled butcher. (LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, MY HUSBAND, WHO KNOWS ME BETTER THAN I KNOW MYSELF.) That burst of clarification most certainly saved me from a third failed attempt. I have the stomach and heart for the work, just not the patience or motivation to jump through the overly complicated (and costly) hoops. (Sigh.)

(I mean, there is embalming and becoming a mortician, but I famously hate people and interacting with them. I'm anti-social, solitary and any social interaction I make is always half-fueled by autism. I lack the inherent empathy and sympathy needed to deal with people, let alone emotionally fragile and grieving people. I suppose Italics and I could become a husband and wife team, but I'd hate to saddle him up with the position of "PERSON DEALER" because Christ knows I don't fucking want to do it.)

The prospect of becoming a certified butcher never seriously crossed my mind until I relocated to Scotland. (BUTCHER? WHAT? YOU MEAN YOU DON'T ALWAYS HAVE TO GET YOUR MEAT FROM THE GROCERY STORE? WOW.) Even though I had helped process and portion up several deers when spending my childhood summers with my family on the reservation (I'm part Native American; plains folk, Lakhota) it never occurred to me that it could be an occupation.

Those experiences made a lasting impression on me - skinning a deer with my bare hands (literally, after making the incision using your fingers to break up the bubbly layer of adipose between skin and muscle to pull back the pelt), carefully stripping whole haunches of meat into neat piles of muscles, cupping gelatinous, warm organs in the palms of my hands as blood raced down my arms and stained my clothing.

If it wasn't for the fact that that I had - and still have - a huge reverence and empathy for animals (more so than people, but that's not entirely uncommon with autistic people) I suppose "ENJOYMENT FROM DISMEMBERING ANIMALS AND BEING COVERED IN BLOOD" would be a hint at something darker and more disturbing that needed to be addressed.

(I don't want to kill, I want to give a second life. Every animal feels like a pet and when I find a dead one - either freshly killed and perfectly intact, or rotting and unsalvageable - a part of me cries, sometimes holding the more intact ones and apologizing for the car that hit it, feeling somehow personally responsible that I wasn't there to save it and feeling angry and vengeful that something was taken away from me.)

I don't know what came first - butcher or taxidermist. My only experience with butchering is of the deer mentioned above, my only experience with taxidermy is thanks to a jar of Vick's VapoRub.

(My Mom, for reasons I'll never know, took up taxidermy when I was crazy young. When I was two I was left to my own devices long enough to rub an entire jar of VapoRub in my hair, and no matter what she did she couldn't get the oil out. Supposedly she washed my hair until my scalp was irritated, she tried rubbing alcohol - she even called my pediatrician for advice, but nothing. It wasn't until she remembered that she dusted fur with cornstarch to absorb excess grease that the crisis was finally averted, and I was introduced to the art of taxidermy as a sort've kind've subject/study.)

I think butchering came first. Taxidermy came after, once I became interested in ritual slaughter and preserving the otherwise unfavored offal and organs. (There's a purpose for everything, from hearts to eyes to tongues to wind pipes.) My first love was meat and how layers of muscles were seamless sewn together with ligaments and cartilage, my second love was taxidermy - immortalizing and celebrating not only a lost life but creating a corporeal marker of my BLACK MAGIC work.

When I REALLY got into cooking I REALLY got into the food I was working with. Meat became a seductive, sensual things to touch and handle which appealed to my (legitimately) retarded tactile self. (Old walls arouse me. Touching them, rubbing them, brushing my skin against old mortar and bricks and stones. Fur, mud, blood, water and meat. They all evoke a desire - a need, a want - to strip off and run my naked body over the texture, to feel it slip across my bare skin and scratch and cover and blanket me until I'm enveloped in sensory ecstasy.)

So it started with cooking. But then I wanted to know more. I wanted to cut my own pieces of meat, I wanted to carve distinct portions recognized by butchers and cooks. I wanted a slab of an animal to reduce to piles of workable pieces. But I also wanted to know where the animal came from, how it lived, how it died. And then, ultimately, I wanted to be the hand of death knowing that the life I was going to take lived to its fullest and died with respect and reverence it deserved.

I wanted everything - the experience, the meat, the fur, the bones, the organs, the hooves. Nothing wasted, everything used from testicles (or ovaries) to mountains of fat and skeletal frames. I wanted to be the slaughterer, the butcher, the bone cleaner, the hide tanner, the taxidermist, the organ preserver and the feared witch of the woods from ancient fairytales. (The last one, admittedly, came a little bit more naturally.)

For the ability to take life I wanted to be able to restore the balance and give that sacrificed life (whether by my own hands or by an unfortunate circumstance) a second chance. That, and, I love our pets too much to commit them to the ground, even though "chthonic" seems to be encoded in my spiritual DNA. As morbid as it might seem, I'd rather have the things I loved the most in my life with me for the remainder of my life (and I'm not just taking about "golden, happy memories").

So when I say "death follows me so closely that it occasionally trips me up like a dog underfoot" it's not that I embody the concept of the grim reaper, but, instead, I'm a conduit. (I mourn, I offer relief, I give second life.) It's around me, it's always here. My life is a memento mori; dying animals find peace in my arms and I grieve their loss and my inability to be Life instead of Death. (I want to SAVE and HEAL, but all I've ever been able to do is COMFORT and PREPARE.)

I'm the last thing they know before they succumb to the mystery of death. I'm a gateway, the middleman. I'm the other side of the coin, but I'm flesh and blood. My job is the Last Job, and by writing this entry I finally understand why I wasn't programed to be the type of person who has the patience or tolerance to commit to something as all-encompassing as medical school and a career in forensic pathology - while Death is part of me, and I'm a part of Death, working as the bridge isn't what I was destined for (regardless of having the heart and stomach for it) and any career which involved me playing the role of Preparer would ultimately detract and detour me from the reason why I'm here.

(Sometimes understanding and enlightenment is bittersweet, isn't it?)

Harvest Moon Joyriding

Growing up I was a good kid; a super crazy good kid. Perhaps suspiciously so, since I wasn't reigning myself through an exercise of restraint - I just wasn't interested. (<-- WHICH MEANS, NATURALLY, I WOULD GROW UP TO BECOME A PARENT'S WORST NIGHTMARE SINCE I HAD AN ENTIRE MISCREANT YOUTH TO MAKE UP.)

I hung out with underage drinkers, but I didn't drink. I had stoner friends, but I didn't smoke. I didn't date, I didn't have sex (until Italics came around at age 17, but he lived in Scotland and I lived in the Midwest so any sex was very limited sex - with STUPID amounts of contraceptives because THERE WAS NO WAY I WAS GETTING PREGNANT, EVER - in two week bursts separated by several months).

I wasn't even remotely interested in the opposite (or same) sex since I was LOLtastically mentally underdeveloped (despite my bizarre behavior and reactions no one suspected I was autistic until I moved in with a teacher/principal/government worker who had first hand experience with (and knowledge about) autism).

I didn't swear, I never talked back, I had a steady part-time job, I paid for my own things, I did my chores, I was an honor student and I was involved in embarrassing amounts of extracurricular school activities. In the few instances my parents felt the need to reprimand me they were at a lost as to how to do it. ("YOU'RE GROUNDED!", "FROM WHAT?", SILENCE, "GO MOW THE LAWN!")

My parents were hard on me, though. And I don't think I'd be embellishing or exaggerating when saying that there were points when they were down right cruel to me, making me the butt of disappointment, anger, frustration and control so tight that you'd think that I was my complete opposite - my younger sister of two years.

(Who, incidentally, was an underage drinker, stole booze from the alcohol cabinet, smoked both cigarettes and pot, was sexually promiscuous, stole money and things from people, was a failing student and eventually became a meth head living in a trailer with utilities constantly being turned off.)

I wonder, now, what the source of negativity was. Was it because I was overweight? My father bordered on being obsessed with the shape of my body, and when guilt was piled on it was pile fucking on over something I didn't even notice. (Was it disappointment because being thin would've been icing on the cake for them? Was it because they saw the wild animal in me, and tried to control it and keep it caged to stop it from tasting freedom?)

I had to fight for certain rights. At age 14 I still wasn't allowed to shave my legs despite being tormented at school (it didn't even OCCUR to me that I needed to shave my legs until gym class when my leg hair stuck out between the exquisitely groomed, gangly legs of other pubescent girls and even THEN it didn't occur to me until the entire female population treated me like I had leprosy). It took me talking back for the first time - "MAYBE YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE FACT THAT I'M GROWING UP!" - which rendered them speechless.

I couldn't wear nail polish until I was in high school; couldn't touch make-up until I was 16. (And then, when I could, I couldn't be bothered waking up 20 minutes earlier just to slap on some foundation and eyeliner.) I had these puzzling weird, verging on archaic, rules thrust upon me, but my sister wasn't held to the same standard and to this day I don't understand why we were raised differently.

When I graduated to the next level it broke the glass ceiling and my sister was only one step behind; nail polish, make-up, everything. After my 8th grade outburst I was allowed to Nair my legs, my 6th grade sister instantly began shaving her legs. (They knew it, but they wouldn't let ME shave my legs. And once stubble began growing back in I tried everything from tweezing them out - way too much effort - to ripping them out with duct tape - doesn't work, trust me - because they refused to buy me another bottle of Nair. After several weeks of experimenting with deliberate hair loss I just began shaving myself since my sister hadn't been chastised or punished for breaking one of the hard rules of the house.)

ANYWAY ANYWAY ANYWAY.

Anyway, this isn't an OH, WOE IS ME AND MY TEENAGE HARDSHIP entry, I just kind've sort've wanted to give a basic idea of the schism in the house and how I was, LOLically enough, a V. good girl growing up, not out of pretension or devious intent, but because I was, I guess, a kid who wasn't interested in - or even considered the possibility of - breaking rules. So, clearly, I know that you'll know (and, more importantly, understand) why I did what I did last night -

I TOOK THE NEW FAMILY CAR OUT JOYRIDING.

(Shhh! Don't tell the in-laws because THEY DON'T KNOW and I DIDN'T ASK FOR PERMISSION. And even though I AM insured I'm only insured under my married name, not my maiden name which is present on my still valid US license. And, technically, I'm only allowed to drive on my US license for the first year of living here, and I've been a resident of bonnie ole Scotland for nearly a decade.)

BUT YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND THE TEMPTATION I FACED!

I've spent nearly 10 years being driven around, with no ability to be independent myself. I've spent nearly 10 years living behind windows and doors, unable to get a job or even go to the grocery store myself. I've spent nearly 10 years imprisoned in this house, and the only change of scenery I got was going out for a walk. I've spent the last several years not even going out - as in, 3-5 months have passed without me so much as crossing the threshold of the door - because it felt like it became too much of an inconvenience to drop me off at the movies once a week.

I've spent nearly 10 years living and existing in a gilded box due to the reluctance of allowing me to drive. Due to not having a job I don't have any money, which means I can't leave the house because I can't even afford bus fare (so when a catastrophic "incident" occurs my only option to "get away from it" is literally running into the woods and hiding amongst the brush, or hiding in the cemetery - me, a woman who turns fucking //30// next year). Due to not having a drivable car I've never been able to explore the countryside, do my own grocery shopping or errands, or even drive myself (or Italics) to the emergency room.

(Thanks to having property in Florida my in-laws take off for entire months leaving us behind, unable to drive or get around. It's terrific great that now there's on-line shopping, but that still didn't stop us from going hungry last year when we both had influenza. (<- We were so sick we couldn't walk down to the somewhat local gas station for simple essentials - milk, eggs, bread - and we didn't know the neighbors well enough to ask them to shop for us. Worse yet, all of the on-line delivery slots were full for two days since it was the fucking weekend so we just went hungry because THERE WAS NO FOOD IN THE HOUSE TO EAT, AND NO WAY TO GET TO THE STORE.))

I have wept, I have pleaded, I have begged, I have threatened, I have demanded, prayed, beseeched and nearly given up hope. And then, just after I angrily rubbed in some bloodied dirt onto a car tire, just after I found myself inching closer and closer to the end of my rope, the small red car broke. Within a few months a car - a car //I// can drive - took its place. (It officially arrived a few days ago.) Yesterday was the first day that both in-laws were away for the night, leaving the keys to the little automatic parked right outside the kitchen window in the key drawer.

(CUE PROBLEM CHILD MUSIC HERE.)

"BUT WE DON'T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING," I promised Italics, "WE COULD, YOU KNOW, JUST GET IN THE CAR AND SIT IN IT. WE WOULDN'T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING OTHER THAN JUST SIT. WE COULD JUST SIT SIDE-BY-SIDE IN THE FRONT AND...TALK." (And when he laughed that "OH, MY WIFE IS SO CLEVER AND SMART AND FUNNY AND GOOFY" laugh (you know that laugh; when your dog does something incredibly smart and funny but bad) I knew that I had him hooked.)

At twilight I flung my purse and jacket in the back and started a car for the first time in nearly five years. Rear mirror was adjusted - although not the side ones, or the seat, because IT'S NOT LIKE I WANTED TO LEAVE A NOTE IN THE CAR SAYING "OH HEY I DROVE THIS VEHICLE WITHOUT PERMISSION OR KNOWLEDGE!" - and headlights and wipers were figured out, seat belts fastened and with the first blast of fresh air through the vents WE WERE OFF, BABY.

(Actually, I was cautiously - perhaps humorously so - reversing out the driveway and slowly creeping into the dead end we live in, BUT IT WAS PRETTY CLOSE TO "WE WERE OFF, BABY".)

"SDHPGOHDFGOBNFGSPOHFDJNSLDFGOIFDHGSDOFBNGOIFD," is all I can say, really, when attempting to sum up the burst of divinely granted freedom I felt. (OOOOOOOOH, SO //THIS// IS WHAT JOYRIDING FEELS LIKE!) Carefully tracing curves and bends we followed an all too familiar path to the cemetery, but deviated at the crossroads and went up the hill and then down (up?) a country lane only traveled once or twice before.

(I totally knew where I was going, but the same couldn't be said when I made a right instead of a left when attempting to pick up the tiny road that runs parallel to a beech hedge near the new portion of the cemetery (as opposed to the old portion which we regularly visit to make offerings) to return back home.)

I KNOW my eyes should've been glued to the road (I think, second for second, it was more glued to the speedometer - making sure I wasn't going to fast even though I was only doing 40 in a 70 zone) but I got distracted, and how couldn't I? The moon - the Harvest Moon, only the BIGGEST MOST FULLEST MOON OF THE YEAR - had begun rising over darkened hills and glowed a luminous yellow-white against the powder blue sky.

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We momentarily parked in a lay-by (since the country roads are so tiny there are regular indents in the side of the road to allow one car to pull over to let incoming traffic by) and watched, both nervous and excited and jittery and free, the 80s Michael Mann moon make its ascent into the heavens. And then we were off, again, hugging the left lane as the headlights cut through the strengthening dusk, catching out a fox who paused, just for a second, in the middle of the road to glance at us before darting off into a hedge.

(V. GOOD SIGN, CRAZY GOOD SIGN, IN FACT, SINCE I'VE FINALLY ACCEPTED THE FACT THAT THE FOX IS ONE OF MY ANIMALS.)

Rabbits and hares paused as we slowly crept by, occasionally rising on their haunches to investigate the ambling vehicle before sprinting off to the safety of burrows. And before I knew it we were there, the Drum Circle, a monument I had only been to once before, a monument that I promised myself would be the very first place I drove to. We arrived just as the moon began inching above the hill's horizon, illuminating the golden husks and sheaths of wheat.

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We clambered over the metal gate and lost ourselves in a sea of rustling grain, rabbits and unseen animals darting beneath the blanket of wheat causing stalks to rattle as they invisibly raced faster and further away. And we stood, side by side, nervously glancing at the car we left behind in a lay-by, standing in the crudely shaped stone tower commemorating an ancient battle that soaked the hill with death and blood watching the moon rise.

Glorious. Unearthly. Magic. (Unfortunately none of that got caught on camera; I've got a good camera, just not a great one for night shots.) I looked at Italics and he looked at me, and there was an understood silence between us, but before either of us could act on it I said "MAYBE THE FIRST TIME OUT WHEN WE DON'T HAVE PERMISSION TO BE OUT ISN'T A GOOD IDEA" - although it would've provided a LOL story for the ages, how Italics and I got picked up by the police for having public sex at a national monument on our first joyride.

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So instead of sex (or oral sex) we went home, and I lost my way only once which was quickly corrected with a three point turn (or, uh, two point because no one important that needed to be impressed was watching). "OH MY GOD, DID YOU EVER THINK WE'D BE SEEING IT LIKE THIS?!" I laughed as we eased into the small village, glancing at the cemetery gates of the graveyard, having never been behind the wheel of a car when passing some place we know so well (but only because we've walked to it time and time again).

And then the Universe laughed as I accidentally clipped the concrete curb when laughing, bumping us up into the air momentarily as I offered a sheepish grin to Italics who didn't look entirely impressed but didn't hold it against me. (Ah, well, I'm entitled to one tiny hiccup, right? I MEAN, IT HAS BEEN FIVE YEARS SINCE I LAST DROVE. IN FACT, I COULDN'T EVEN REMEMBER //WHICH PEDAL WAS THE GAS// WHEN I FIRST GOT IN. IT'S BEEN //THAT// LONG.)

With some reluctance I parked the car, ensuring we left nothing behind and Italics even going as far as to using a kitchen wipe to clean off some of the mud and debris from the frame. (Will they notice? Will they see it's not exactly parked how they left it? Will someone see that the rear view mirror was readjusted? That new miles were somehow tacked on? That there's mud or dirt that wasn't in, or out on, the car before?)

By the time we were home the otherworldly moon and turned worldly, and through the torn veils of translucent clouds I could still see the roundness and fullness of this year's Harvest Moon above the house, shining down on us, the car and the freshly made memory of our secret joyride road trip. It's only taken about 10 years, but, baby, I finally got this harvest in.

My life? It suddenly began yesterday, September 5th, celebrating a teenage cliche that's only 16 years late.

Skinless, Eyeless

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Blame Bacchus

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Back arched, bodies locked. Computer room love, quiet and carnal, in the silence of early morning. (If two bodies were ever made for one another...)

August 29th Walk

Instead of SEARCHING WITHIN MYSELF FOR ANSWERS (see V SRS THINKING) I'm going to crack open one of the billion image folders sitting on my desktop and tackle a recent walk we took to the (semi-)local cemetery. (YEAH, IT'S GOING TO BE ANOTHER SLIDE SHOW OF SCOTTISH COUNTRYSIDE YOU'RE PAINFULLY FAMILIAR WITH TO THE POINT OF BEING TEDIOUSLY BORING, SORRY.)

For weeks I've been cooped up with no outlet for release. I spent a significant portion of the past two weeks with a mysterious case of "stomach flu" (see DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE) after the rabbit incident (see AUGUST 16TH WALK) making migrating away from the bathroom a dangerous game to play. (Not that I really could have if you took the fever and chills and cramps and fatigue and light-headedness into account.)

Once the bug cleared we found ourselves up at night, which usually isn't THAT much of a problem since we're more than happy to track on over to the cemetery in the middle of the night, but thanks to this being the wettest August, ever, the weather hasn't been conducive to midnight walking so, up until two days ago, I spent a huge portion of the month IMPRISONED INDOORS BEHIND THESE SCOTTISH "BUNGALOW" WALLS. (<- Can't drive; I don't have a car, hence relying on walking everywhere for any sort of escape.)

When dawn finally broke and I saw the sun tentatively peeking behind a veil of partially translucent clouds lighting up the baby blue sky I knew I had my chance. ("OHMYGODTHESUN'SOUTLET'SGOFORAWALK!") Delicate stomach be damned, I wanted to see how the elderberries and blackberries were getting on, and how the lavender at the Nun's grave was doing and feel, taste and see the season shift from late summer to early fall. (SEPTEMBER, YOU BETTER BE GOOD TO ME SINCE AUGUST TURNED OUT TO BE A CRACKWHORE.)

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Early morning sun lighting up the fall-kissed Scottish landscape. (Further along the left is the small ruined church we occasionally visit (in winter, in late summer) and the hedge of beeches that frames the remainder of our walk to the cemetery.) Soon this'll be our only natural looking bit of country; they've begun digging up the fields on the other side of the road to build acres and acres of new houses.

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Cattle sunning themselves in front of the (now unoccupied) disturbed children's home. (BETTER ENJOY THAT SUN, COWS, SINCE WE HAVEN'T SEEN MUCH OF IT THIS SUMMER, ESPECIALLY IN AUGUST. <- It's September fucking 2nd and none - ABSOLUTELY NONE - of my tomatoes are even close to being ripe. NO, THANK //YOU// SCOTTISH WEATHER!)

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We had a short movie clip of a mother and calf nuzzling noses (AWWW!) but it was way, way too pixelated to post. (It was crazy windy that day, which was a bittersweet reminder that soon I'll need to break out my rabbit earmuffs and head scarves to keep my ears properly warm when walking down to the cemetery.)

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An epiphyte! (ZOMG! ZOMG!) Around here mistletoe is probably the best known "PLANT THAT GROWS IN ANOTHER PLANT" (other than rowan), but, in this case, it's a fern way, way up in a beech. (So "way, way up in a beech" that I have NO EFFING IDEA HOW TO GET TO IT because I DESPERATELY WANT TO COLLECT SOME ON ST. JOHN'S EVE NEXT YEAR. Sigh.)

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Hedgerow litter. (We later found a Smirnoff bottle, but both were a little too nasty to bring home and clean for tinctures and witchy plant concoctions.) The more we explore the narrow strip of trees (normally we either cut through it to access the pasture field behind it to get to the ruined church, or we stay on the sidewalk on the other side of the street that leads into the tiny village where the cemetery's located) the more affection I feel for the jagged wall of trees and shrubs. (A litter day pick-up is now inevitable.)

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Every once in awhile we go off processed junk food. (Are we awful stoners, or what?) When that happens it usually coincides with an energetic burst of cooking and baking that inevitably fills the store bought sugary void. Tired with oreos and chocolate mousse pumped full of preservatives, I made a batch of Italian cornmeal cookies flavored with marsala after our hoard of peanut butter oatmeal cookies disappeared.

Later in the day (later in OUR day, more correctly, since I was baking in the kitchen around three in the morning) we were off to the cemetery which meant a round of offerings for everyone. (One for the Nun, one for Muriel, one for "Wizard Laird" and two for us. Guess which one I absently picked for Papa (Ghede), not realizing WHY I did until we got to the graveyard? Sometimes the most obvious things are the things you don't see, even when they're right under your effing nose.)

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A crumbling, lichen and moss encrusted stone wall separates the country road from the asphalted footpath that stretches from where we live to the tiny village on the outskirts of the (ever growing) town. Indigenous plants pop up halfway to the graveyard, first starting with red raspberries, then apricot raspberries, then even more red raspberries until they give way to the long tentacle arms of blackberries. These guys still have a way to go, but I'll be back in a week or two to harvest them for jams, vinegars and syrups.

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I read in a foraging book that the biggest, sweetest, most desirable blackberry is the one growing at the very tip of the branch, and it's always the first to ripen while the others behind it are a week or so behind. And the further up (down?) you go along the branch the more bitter and less desirable the berries become. (Less desirable in the sense of raw eating, the ones in the way back are still tres excellent for baking, jamming and preserving.)

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It's too depressing to even talk about. Seriously. (I spent my childhood running away from housing developments that swallowed rural communities, and at age 29 I'm back at square one feeling helpless and heartsick.)

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After we consummated our marriage (we practice Hieros Gamos; the Great Rite, Scared Marriage, whatever you'd like to call it) in a local wheat field on Midsummer we sat together, newlywed and high, watching the sun rise over the rolling Scottish hills as cocks crowed in the distance. That was the last time we saw dawn unfettered, unencumbered by bulldozers, metal gates and giant pits gutting the earth open. We'll never see that sunrise ever again.

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It's not mine anymore. It's not anyone's; not the foxes or rabbits or hares or pheasants or grouse or deer or mice or badgers or hedgehogs. They put up a gate to keep us out as we watch the destruction of our beloved countryside (and home). Up until a few months ago I felt blessed living in this area, that I managed to relocate in a pocket of perfect balanced living. Within the matter of weeks everything 180ed and I'm desperate to break free, get away, hide deeper in the country where I can live in peace, far from colonies of modern homes that clutter up the once free and wild landscape.

Sterilizing Bottles, Round 1

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Bottles = 1, Ms. Graveyard Dirt = 0

(If you can believe it (OH, I KNOW YOU CAN; SHARP KNIVES + CAVALIER ARIES = CUTS FATED TO HAPPEN) within two minutes of peeling labels off glass bottles I managed to nick my left* thumb with a knife and drew blood. <- Which means this project is EXTRA magic now, naturally, of course, witchy nudge-nudge wink-wink.)

(* It's "magic" when it's the left hand, it's "a motherfucking inconvenience and a deliberate bane to my existence sent by fucking God himself" when it's the right one (aka, the masturbating hand).)