spring update

For those that think I've dropped off the face of the earth, I'm happy to report I' clinging to it for dear life, and thought I'd update the blog as to where I have been the past few months, current projects and where I hope to be in the future.

Last December I attended a small pagan event in Miami called Turing Tides, which I”ve attended several times in the past. I helped participate in the main ritual, to Hecate, which was glorously non-wiccan in it's design. The main rit is based around threes, three “quarters”, three faces of Her, etc. It was very refreshing to see departure from the “standard model” in a wiccan centric group like that. The event is run by a local council of CoG, so the departure was even more surprising.

February had me flying across country to attend my very first Pantheacon. With all the controversy surrounding furgeson and the “black lives matter” hastag campaign, I was happy to report that I had very little contact with the issue while there. California pagans are an odd lot, at once very socially active and again very naiive about those who don't hold the same left of center values. I had the pleasure of attending Ally Valkyrie and Rhyd Wildermuth's workshoip on radical pagans, and foound myself in a sea of anti-capitalist propganda. Pagans I've argued with over political issues were all there, Starhawk, T Thorn Coyle and others who are the california “new left”, while I remained probably the only libertarian in the room. I kept my mouth shut and was awed by the incredible mistruths being passed around.

One particularly humorous one for me, after doing my undergrad in optical physics, was to hear Starhawk extol the virtues of solar panels made of raspberry juice. I didn't tell her it was actually raspberry juice stained titanium dioxide, and its energy output is way too low to be used as anything other than a novelty. But hey, never let the facts get in the way...

I also was privilaged to be able to teach a workshop alongside Stephanie Woodfield at Pcon. There was a last minute cancellation, and she offered to combine her workshop on ancient warriorship with my Warrior Mindset workshop to give a broad introduction to being a warrior. I am grateful to her for the opportunity.

I also had the chance to meet and have lunch with Morpheus Ravenna and Brennos of the Coru Cathbodua. There have been differences of opinon in the past, and while we aren't necessarily on the same page about everytthing it was good to have a face to go along with the words on the screen.

My March project just wrapped up recently: I was on the organising committee for a new pagan festival in Florida called Equinox in the Oaks. It was a wonderful magically immersive weekend, where we built the theme on service to the land, the Gods and the community. I taught Warrior Mindset again and it was a full house. I believe it was well received from the feedback I got.

From here out, my schedule starts to thin. The last year since the Round Table has had me travelling a lot. I'm planning to pull back on the schedule. I will be attending and teaching at Morrigan's Call 2015 in Connecticut this June, planning on teaching wm again as well as a new workshop on leadership skills.

After MC, there won't be any more until probably December. I'm planning work on an entirely new writing project as well as beginng a side project selling crafts through Etsy. There are many awesome things there, but I have a particular vision for some things I want to do.

This blog will get more attention, as it serves a vehicle for some ideas I want to discuss. I found the more I travel, the pagan community is not this monolithic thing but more fragmented and different. I believe there is a place for warriorship in the pagan community, not just among those who carry guns but among all who are called to being one.