Driven to Drink by Editing

Yes, that is coffee and wine together. And a candle.

This is my world this week, as I wrap up a tardy issue of The Pomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studiesas soon as a certain person OK’s my copyediting job on her article and I can send it to the layout editor with the rest. Articles in this issue come from Russia, Lithuania, the Czech Republic,[1]Are we supposed to say “Czechia” now?Britain, and the United States.

Then will come layout for the Bulletin for the Study of Religion and, oh yes, another Pomegranate to get us back on schedule.

Always at hand (to the left of the wine glass), the Chicago Manual of Style. Learn it, people—or at least bookmark the important shortcuts. (Actually, CMS is for editors; academic writers can get by with A Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Theses, and Dissertations  for considerably less money.)

On the right, Kaarina Aitamurto and Scott Simpson’s edited collection, Modern Pagan and Native Faith Movements in Central and Eastern Europe — the article that I was editing referenced it quite a bit. And of course a back issue of The Pomegranate for those “How did I do X last time?” questions.

Male evening grosbeak (Cornell University).

But there are advantages to working at home, like being pestered by dogs, particularly Wendy the foster dog, an excitable German wirehaired pointer.[2]She has been living here since March, but now that her owner is out of the hospital and feeling better, he hopes to pick her up next month.

She clatters into my study: “Come quick! come quick!” then rushes through the open door onto the veranda.”Look! Birds! Birds! We must act!”

“No, Wendy,” I say, “those are evening grosbeaks. We are not hunting them.”

“Ha!” she says, and the next morning on dog walk,she dashes into the brush and comes out with a very very dead grosbeak, which she carries proudly into the house.

Retrieving birds is what she does — can’t punish her for that! And she knows it.

Notes

Notes
1 Are we supposed to say “Czechia” now?
2 She has been living here since March, but now that her owner is out of the hospital and feeling better, he hopes to pick her up next month.

A Brand-New Holiday for Dogs

I am punting on this post, referring you instead to this one by John Beckett on this year’s new holiday (greeting cards will be available next year, I am sure): “Celebrating Wolfenoot as a Pagan.”

Yesterday I celebrated my friendship with A Certain Dog by cleaning up all the piles of vomit he created, indoors and out in the dog run, after eating . . . a bunch of deer parts he found in the woods, near as I can tell. Plus his breakfast.

I tried telling him that he did not have to eat it all at once, but could bring some home in his carrion bag. Did he listen?

Massive 2015 Year-End Link Dump! Something for Everyone!

This is a Druid knife. It says so.

Some of the links that I saved that never turned into blog posts . . .

• The Internet loves quizes, so “What Kind of Witch Would You Be?” (answer: hearth witch). I always suspect that the answer is based on just one question, while the others are there just for fluff and decoration.

• I saved this link from the Forest Door blog because I liked this thought:

This is, indeed, one of the roots of many problems in modern polytheism – people being unwilling to wait and let things naturally evolve. My biggest concern here isn’t the specific examples of mis-assignment (though they do exist, and are indicative of a serious lack of understanding in some cases). It is the fact that these folks are sitting around trying to artificially assign gods to places and things as if it’s just a game, or at best an intellectual exercise.

Local cultus is the new kale.

Is a knife named for Druids meant for Druids? (Echoes of allegations of human sacrifice?) Just what does “Druid” mean here?

• I did like John Halstead’s post on “the tyranny of structurelessness.” See also “Reclaiming.” See also “The Theology of Consensus.”

• Turn off the computer and play a 1,600-year-old Viking war game.

• From last July, a Washington Post story on Asatruar in the Army.

A photography book of modern British folklore. Not an oxymoron.

• More photography: “Earth Magic – Photographer Rik Garrett Talks About Witchcraft.”

What if witches hadn’t changed that much since medieval times and were still fairly close to the popular imagery conveyed by their early enemies during the classical witchhunts?

• So you’re a Pagan? Here are ten ways to show respect for your elders. It’s the Pagan way.

• Philosophy should teach you how to live. “Why I Teach Plato to Plumbers.” Also, it’s Pagan.

• Reviewing a book on Greek and Roman animal sacrifice, which was, after all, the chief ritual back in the days when Paganism was the religion of the community.

• Was it the bells? Morris dancers attacked by dogs.

• Camille Paglia’s definition of “Pagan” is not mine, but she still kicks ass. Also, “Everything’s Awesome, and Camille Paglia Is Unhappy!”

• Embiggen thy word-hoard! Visit the Historical Thesaurus of Engish.

• But if you really want to go down the 15th-century rabbit hole, follow The Great Vowel Shift.

The New Yorker covers psychedelic therapy. To learn more, follow and donate to the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies. Also: “How Psychedelics Are Helping Cancer Patients Fend Off Despair.”

Looking good for an academic interview.

A review from last year of Season of the Witch: How the Occult Saved Rock and Roll.

• From the Chronicle of Higher Education: “How to Be Intoxicated.” Not surprisingly, Dionyus figures in more than does binge-drinking.

• Apparently the Yakuza, the Nipponese Mob, planned to call off Halloween due to a gang war. So how did that work out?

Pagans, Folklore, and Dogs

Click over to Pagans for Archaeology, where Yewtree interviews Australian Pagan scholar David Waldron, author of Shock! The Black Dog of Bungay: A Study in Local Folklore, about dogs, folklore, and the Pagan revival.

I think a key issue for me was that transmission of symbols, images and ideas from the pagan past are very fragmentary, complex and ambivalent. People are very quick to throw the “Pagan Survival” label around because they so badly need to feel a connection to the past and a feeling of pastness in what they do. People can also be very quick to deny connection to a Pagan past when debunking. One thing that was really apparent to me when doing my research on the Black Dog of Bungay from a local history perspective, was that it is not a zero sum game. Let’s look at the Black Dog of Bungay for example. There are fragments in the myth from the Celts, Vikings and Romans for example. However, if I was to speak to a 16th century Puritan in Bungay he may not even know what a Celt was and would certainly take offense at the suggestion his view of the attack on St Mary’s church by a Black Dog or “Devile in such a likenesse” was Pagan.

He makes some interesting points about how folklore incorporates outside interpretations, digesting them, and  presenting them as truly indigenous and original. Worth a read.

Dark of the Moon

I tend to get into some bad places psychologically when it’s the dark of the Moon and work is not going well. “No one respects me, no one pays any attention to what I say”—that sort of thing.

The best cure is to take a dog (who may or may not pay any attention but who can be bribed) and go for a hike, interrupted with geocaching, as described at the other blog.

Cold Weather

I came home Tuesday evening and found that M. was upset because one of the dogs was missing. Shelby is a collie-mix who was one step above feral when we got her, and although she has learned to appreciate having her own bed, regular meals, and belly rubs, she will still wander onto the national forest looking for carcasses to scavenge.

M. had looked for her already, but I volunteered to go out too. The temperature was about 10 degrees F. (-12 C.) and dropping. Light, powdery snow was falling. I changed clothes, grabbed a walking stick, and headed up the Forest Service road into the Mason Gulch Burn, stopping occasionally to call and whistle.

From last summer’s forest fire to this: the snowy ground, the black skeletons of pine trees like nervous pencil marks on white paper, the lowering clouds, and the failing light. All was silent except for the whisper of snow on the fabric of my coat.

If any scene exemplified the phrase “dead of winter,” that was it.

When it started getting too dark to see, I went home, dogless. As it turned out, she was hanging around a neighbor’s house. In her doggie brain, she must think like this: “Life is good now, but if these people fail me, I had better have a Plan B. And a Plan C. As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.”

Cross-posted to Southern Rockies Nature Blog.