Category: Personal Blog

Jupiter is such a delight. On August 12, it began a year long trip through Virgo and the aspecting of Jupiter in one’s sun sign is always a blessing. It empowers. It brings luck and miracles. It brings money and stability. Love me some Jupiter. It is no accident that I came out of one of my worst depressions in six years and found my footing again just as Jupiter was about to enter my sun sign.

All that being the case, and appreciative as I am of the clarity and strength that it brings, I still struggle with the accompanying lessons. Sometimes, they just make me feel old and tired, regardless of the value inherent in them. Standing up for myself has never been a talent of mine. I was conditioned in childhood not to do it, that it brings pain and immediate negative repercussions. As I look back on my two marriages (three if you count that I married the first husband twice), I can see all of the ways my life and my relationships would have been different if I had said something like, “Let me stop you right there because we are not going to entertain that dynamic…not for a day, not for an hour, not for a minute.” I didn’t. I heard the words “You teach people how to treat you” but I did not implement them in the right places. Instead, I got angry and resentful over the behaviors I allowed.

At this time, I still have trouble finding the appropriate boundaries of when I should actively speak out and when I should let something go. For me, it is like being in a foreign land and not knowing the language. When I do try to stand up for myself, I will frequently swing too far the other direction and bring a bazooka to a knife fight. It is an ongoing challenge and this weekend, I had multiple occasions to practice that very dance. Since there is really no grade card, I have no idea how I did. I feel uneasy and off balance because of it and really, these incidents were like Pez, with one popping up right after the next. It was too recurring to be coincidence. Some cases were more obvious and others were more subtle, but in every one, I felt marginalized, dismissed, and disrespected, which is not a place where any of us want to be. Dignity and grace lie in how we respond when we are there or when someone tries to put us there.

Setting the scene, I run a magical shop called Botánica de La Reina that is in the same room/shop as my alter ego business, ZenTech Computers. Diversifying your portfolio does actually work and it is a nice left brain/right brain, yin and yang pairing. The botánica side usually gets more traffic, but the computer side is not a slacker by any means. Eric, my husband, works with me and my daughter, Delena (22), usually comes in on Sundays to help because it is a little busier then. We are the only permanent computer shop in the entire 40 acre swap meet complex and are the only shop with a lock the door, turn the key building.

1) On Saturday, the moment Eric left the shop to go to the bathroom, a man came in and told me that he needed me to repair his cell phone. I kindly told him that we repair desktops and laptops, but we do not work on cell phones or tablets. I tried to hand him a flyer of a local guy who does great work on cell phones. The guy said, “No, this shop repairs cell phones and I want mine fixed.” I said, “No. Only desktops and laptops.” He stared at me as if I had suddenly grown a third ear on my forehead. “No. This shop repairs cell phones.” I stayed confident, friendly, understanding that he was confused on some level, even though he looked perfectly coherent. I mean, what can you do when someone insists that your shop performs a service it doesn’t. So I just said, “No sir, we sure don’t. I am sorry I can’t help you with that. I believe you must have us confused with Chris, who was the cell phone guy a few booths behind us. He does great work, but is no longer at this location. Here is his flyer.” He then said, “I would like to speak to the owner because clearly, you don’t know much about this shop.” Yes, my eyebrow arched and yes, that is when I was just done. “Sir, clearly you do not know much about this shop because I am the owner and have been since January. I also personally know the previous owner who founded the business and I can assure you that he also did not repair cell phones. Have a good day.”  He stomped out of the shop. I smudged the shop and reinforced the brick dust on the threshold. All of this happened in the space of around ten minutes. Eric came back and smelled the sage and saw the new brick dust and looked stricken. “Oh shit. What happened?” Assessment: Some people are both confused and assholes.

2) Across the walkway from our shop is a gigantic junk yard that is sort of like a dirty, pick and pull of a garage sale. This is hundreds of square feet of discarded estate sale remnants in heaps and piles and occasionally, tables. We have a good relationship with the owners, although we interact with the son more than the father. The only qualm I have ever had with the father is that he blares music from his establishment and it is the same 4-5 CDs over and over and over. I never thought I could possibly dislike “Ain’t That a Kick in the Head” by Dean Martin, but when you hear it several times a weekend for eight months, you actually do kind of want to kick Dean in the head. Out of the blue, the father came into our shop, which he never does. We exchanged greetings and he just sort of walked around and looked. It was triple digits this weekend and we do not have any time of cooling apparatus. After a while of him just walking around, I tried to break the silence by saying, “We should find whoever ordered up this heat!” He looked at me and said, “Quit complaining,” and went back to looking around. I just stood there with my teeth in my mouth because I could not imagine what I had said that warranted this reply, especially since I rarely complain about anything, especially not to him. After a few more minutes, he left without saying anything. I looked at Eric and he looked back at me with the “What?” look. I recounted to him what happened and pointed out that the man would never have said that to Eric, not because Eric is such a bad ass but because he is a man. I told him that I am a shop owner just like the guy across the way and I did not appreciate being spoken to like that. The trick is that I do not want to meet animosity with animosity, especially with someone who is in my near vicinity two very long days out of every week. I let it go, but I was not happy about it. He only said two words to me, but I felt marginalized and disrespected. I smudged the shop. Assessment: Some people have little respect for women and are assholes.

3) A woman likely in her sixties came into the shop and asked if we grew our own sage. I told her no, that we live in the mountains and do not have a long enough grow season to give sage a good fighting chance, but that I have an excellent and trusted supplier in Stockton and I order from them. She made a sour face and said, “Stockton?” I smiled and said, “Yes, Stockton.” I then, just in conversation, said, “My own favorite salvia for smudge, however, is not the white sage in the sage sticks, but the sagebrush that grows wild on Interstate 5. It has a sweeter smell and works just as well. I use it in this Witch’s Broom smudge blend (showed her) that is sagebrush, cedar, sweetgrass, and lavender and it works great.” She scoffed and said, “White sage is for clearing out. If you have anything sweet in it, it won’t get the job done.” I smiled and said, “You know, honestly, I have not had that experience. When I clear a room, if I have a salvia base and then layer the sweeter mix on top if it, it works in a piggyback effect with cleaning and empowering. I have had excellent results for decades.” *smile* Like the first guy, she stared at me really hard. Just then, Eric said, “I use the white sage in my sweat lodge” and as soon as she heard that, she was fixated on Eric and they had a long conversation. Anytime after that when he would try to bring me into the conversation, she would never address me when I replied. She would just glance at me and turn back to Eric again and resume the conversation, usually over top of what I was saying. It was so obvious that once, I stopped talking in the middle of my sentence to see if she would even notice I was speaking and she did exactly the same thing… just turned to Eric. It was weird, but she bought the Witch’s Broom mix. Assessment: It was just Eric’s turn that time and not mine but I smudged the shop anyway… with white sage just to be sure.

4) A very loud woman came into the shop with two beautiful blond girls who were, I would guess, around 10 and 12. She told me she wanted a book that was about Wicca, but one that did not discuss Witchcraft, covens, or spell work because “Wiccans don’t do that and aren’t evil.” I told her that would be a tough find since most Wiccans do consider themselves to be Witches and so most books I know of do reference those subjects. She went on to say that the girls’ Nana came to visit and is a Wiccan and “got them all riled up and interested in it, even though “I did it right. I am agnostic, so I don’t want any of that Witch crap. Just the Wicca.” I nodded my understanding that she had done things right. The very young daughters looked uncomfortable. I looked through our book selection and found Raising Witches by Ashleen O’Gaea and mentally dismissed it, since she did not want the W word around. She said, “What’s that?” I said, “It is an excellent book on raising children in Wicca.” She said, “Why did you not suggest it to me?” I said, “Because the title has ‘Witches’ in it.” She snorted derisively and took the book from me. “I just don’t want them doing any of that evil stuff.” I said, “Of course, you don’t. The challenge is that most books about Wicca do not consider any of ‘that stuff’ to be evil any more than saying a prayer or making a wish, so it is tough to find a book that meets the criteria you requested.” I handed her Simple Wicca by Michele Morgan and she bought it. I smudged the shop. Assessment: Ignorance is still out there. I wish I could have met the girls’ Nana. I picture her looking like the aunties from “Practical Magic.”

Overall Assessment: I read too much into stuff, but still need to find my pacing on the whole “standing up for myself” front. I am also glad I live in a very remote location for the whole rest of the week.

I learned when I turned ten that my purpose on this earth was as a utility…a tool for the benefit of others. My mother was often ill and as the oldest and the only daughter in the family, it fell to me to care for my brothers and my father. What I wanted, what dreams I had, what manifest destiny I felt was there for me was irrelevant because dammit, my daddy wanted his eggs. I don’t blame my parents. They were in a no win situation and were making do as best as they could. As they say, “It was what it was.” Both of them are gone now and I wish they could see me now that I am safe and OK. There is another part of me that thinks we would likely have reversed roles of me being the parent and them being the kids and I’m not down for that. I have six children and that is plenty. Regardless, we will never know because they both died far too young before I could find my peace with them. I loved them truly, madly, deeply and I miss them every day.

I carried my impression that I was supposed to become what others needed me to be into both of my marriages and I am sure that is what led to the destruction of my first marriage (twice, we married and divorced twice) and some seriously compromising of my second marriage. I give somehow give off a vibe that I am open to change into whatever my partner needs me to be, then I become resentful that they set goals for me that are either unattainable or do not interest me. I did a lot of apologizing and crying and feeling like a failure, no matter how many successes I had. The end result was that I considered myself to be that failure and so did my partners. It is easy to objectively see the recipe for destruction, but not so easy when you are programmed with thousands of conditioned responses that create the exact dynamic you know is destructive.

Several weeks ago, around July 21, I became extremely ill. Those who know me well know that I am never, ever sick. I have been ill more times this year than in the past ten years jammed together. That got my attention. The one that happened in July was a week long doozie. I developed a kidney infection and a tooth infection at the same time. This was after just having my teeth checked in March. Having toxins up top and down below completely took me under. I felt like I was swimming in poison. I couldn’t think straight. My entire body felt systemically ill. I took D-Mannos and Oil of Oregano orally, rinsed with salt water and hydrogen peroxide, and drank gallons and gallons of water. Taking Motrin and Tylenol for the pain helped, but I could feel myself immersed in chemicals as well as infection.

This marries up to a time in my life when I was making choices I did not want to make. Specific situations indicated that I needed to find mainstream work (and fast), so I applied at a local staffing agency and submitted applications all over the place. Even my husband doesn’t know all of the places where I applied to work. Nothing. Not a call back. Not a lead. Not an interview. It was humbling, to say the least. Here I was a business owner, published author, PhD, and journalist and I couldn’t even get a call back to be a greeter at Walmart. I felt less than worthless.

Around the Blue Moon, Eric and I had a sweat lodge that was way, way over hot. It was so hot that he left the sweat three times, which is unheard of for him. I stayed and sweated out the mess. It was quite transformative for me and took me a long way toward burning off some long-term resentment that I feel was manifesting as toxins in my body.

As I healed myself of my incredible illness, I healed myself of my sickness, I healed myself of those damaging beliefs. It wasn’t that I was worthless, this was simply not my path. I came out of that illness a different person than the one who went into it. The thing is, the person who went into that illness wasn’t me and the person who came out of it was more me than I have ever been.

I began to make private decisions in my head and quietly put them into effect in my life. Granted, this was only three weeks or so ago, but the effects were profound and immediate. My head cleared and I could think again. I felt plugged in, motivated, and engaged. My shop started making money. Readings began coming in again. My relationship with Eric re-balanced after being weird for a while.

One of these decisions was to change how I eat. In the past, I have made big proclamations and launched into major reform. This time, I stopped all white sugar, most gluten, all highly processed foods, and gave up soft drinks, which was the hardest sacrifice for me. I miss candy. I miss cookies. Now, however, it is on a mental level of “that would really taste good” rather than a physical craving. The cravings went away around 10 days in. I even just went on vacation to Southern California for four days and held strong, despite being surrounded by cookies and ice cream. I eat a lot of salads and protein foods. I eat fresh fruits and vegetables. For the first three weeks, I only ate twice a day. I ate a huge breakfast and then a moderate early supper. Now, I am working an extra, smaller meal into the day because my two nutritional counselors felt I was not eating enough. I just don’t get hungry at all. In the three weeks since I started this, I have lost nine pounds, but as my friend, Chelsea, puts it, “They were the biggest nine pounds I have ever lost.” The weight I lost feels much denser than the usual ten pounds I lose at the beginning of a diet process.

I feel very optimistic about the weight loss because I have seen the end result in my mind and I know it is assured. I always knew it would happen when it was time and not one moment before, no matter how much it was demanded of me. Now, it’s time.

Yesterday, I told Eric I was ceasing all efforts toward finding gainful employment in the mainstream and now I am focused on the shop, my readings, my teaching, and my writing. Those are my passions and everything else will just have to fall in. He was wonderfully supportive, which I appreciate.

I made other decisions in my life, cutting back on some projects that were not paying off to free up more time and energy for those that were. I am not anyone’s tool anymore. Onward and upward.

Meanwhile, I leave you with this earworm:

It is hard for me to believe that just a couple of short years ago, I had the house to myself all day long and wrote books. That was my job. It was a glorious moment as I turn 54 in September, I am trying not to imagine that it was the pinnacle best time of my life. Surely there is  more than that brief time of joy, right? Now there is never enough time. It runs through my figures like the finest sand. I know that in November, I will make tough decisions about which of my obligations stay and which ones go. I look forward to that time, but I also don’t. It will involve letting go of some dreams and disappointing some people and some brutal self-honesty about what is working and what isn’t (now or yet).

I feel strangely confident about the store, having just received some nice confirmations from the Universe. What I will let go of is the ongoing product and inventory development that is such a consumer of time and money. I love doing it and enjoy the creative process that comes with it, but resources on all levels need a break from it.

I am excited to go to the GH Fan Club Weekend in a week and look forward to seeing my dear friends there. I had resolved to not go this year, but a few miracles happened that paved the way, so I am going to have a fantastic working vacation and I hope some down time as well. Delena is going with me and she is a fantastic travel companion. I will have copies of The Insiders Guide to the General Hospital Fan Club Weekend and both the 2013 and 2014 General Hospital Fan Club Yearbook(s) available for purchase.

I now have two teen sons with driver permits, pending licenses. Soon, I will have no more kids at home. Dylan starts college at the end of August and Nathan will begin his junior year of homeschooling at the same time. They have both grown into fine young men.

Once again, I am working with weight loss issues. Those of you who have followed my blog for the ridiculous amount of time that I have been writing it know that this is something I have failed at countless times. I imagine you are as tired of hearing about it as I am of attempting it. One difference this time, whether it is minor or major, is that I have seen the positive outcome in vision, so I am working toward that. I re-started a week ago this past Monday, so…July 20 and since then, I have lost seven pounds. The cravings and desire for comfort eating even when I was not hungry were extreme and probably a hundred or more times, I thought I would cave in. Each day, I managed to keep my intake below 1200 calories, which is the point where I remain the same or gain. I think it was yesterday, or perhaps the day before, that I realized I was not struggling as hard as I had been before, so my hope is that I am over the hill for now. I am in a sweet place where I can eat minimally and be comfortable. What works for me is very, very minimal bread (then whole wheat), high protein, fruits, and vegetables. Essentially, it is Whole 30 without total bread restriction. I also find that I am not negatively triggered by beans and legumes, so I have chili once every couple of weeks. Lots of eggs, endless salads, lean meats, potatoes that are roasted or baked, steamed vegetables, very occasional pasta, but only tiny bits and absolutely no refined sugar products.

The sugar withdrawal is the worst. Even last night when I am in a really good space in regard to eating and was not hungry at all, I got triggered hard at Walmart and wanted to eat every candy bar and drink every soft drink in sight. It was an act of tremendous will to keep from telling myself “Just this one time, it will be OK” or “seriously, you’ve earned this… just eat the damned PayDay and drink the Dr Pepper and you’ll be fine.” But I didn’t and I pouted, but I survived.

To sound completely pathetic, I miss it so much. The burst of pleasure, the comfort, the “doing something just for me” feeling… It is a moment where no one can get between me and the happy. I don’t have other coping strategies for comfort and yes, these are stressful times in KatrinaLand. I don’t even drink wine or vape or anything that could be construed as pacifying. Eating and drinking all the wrong things was it for me. It worked so well that I never bothered to develop a taste for other vices.

I feel wonderful physically. My body works better inside and feels healthier already, although seven pounds doesn’t really translate out to visible results. I found a nice, supportive combination of supplements that stabilizes my energy, works on my cortisol levels, and boosts my metabolism a bit. I eat a lot of B12 for mood mollifying.

I got around another couple of pitfalls with the Aster of Avalon book and it is moving right along. History took care of me in that respect. I did some deeper digging into a key character and found some historical theories about him that created some fantastic plot points for me. The book is almost halfway done and I think it is turning out to be my favorite so far. It is a bit of a deviation from the formula of the first two, but you can’t have seven sisters and have them all tell the same tale. I am very excited for this series. Then I have to write the next in the porn series, then I have to write some more magical stuff, so the year is laid out for books. Hint: that is not something I intend to give up in November.

That is how things roll with Katrina right now. You can see that it’s about the same as always. I wish I had something wise and helpful to share with the world, but right now, it is chop wood and carry water. Thankfully, a metaphor.  If I had 2-3 more days added in between Sunday and Saturday, life would be perfect.

So this year I already did something I promised myself I would never do again and although it was likely for the best, I am not proud of it and hope to avoid it in the future. I totally checked out. I think the last time I did that was in 1992 and I had all the stress I could take. I made a series of very, very bad choices. My marriage ended. A rebound relationship that I thought would work out failed miserably. My job was ending and I had no way to support myself and my three wonderful sons. I was pregnant and felt horrible. I basically went into my room and closed the door and was a horrible, neglectful mother when my children needed me most. I got up like a robot and went to work every morning. The base where I worked was closing down and my office was the only one still open in the entire hospital wing. We had only four or five doctors still doing dictation, so between transcriptions, I would put my head down on the desk and sleep and cry and sleep some more.

My boss, a dear but unassuming lieutenant, would drift back to check on me every couple of weeks. My dictations came in by remote on a complicated old cassette system and I put the finished typed product in an inbox at the medical records department after everyone left for the day. It was not unusual for days to pass without me seeing another human in what had once been a bustling, full service hospital. One day, my lieutenant came in and said, “Were you just sleeping?”

“Of course not,” I laughed. Why would you think that?”

He looked confused and said, “Um…because ‘Dorlands’ is written backwards on your forehead.” The Dorland’s Medical Encyclopedia with its embossed title was, indeed, on my desk and served as my face pillow.

My young sons, who were ten, twelve, and fourteen, had to raise themselves for several months. I saw a therapist and he could not help me chemically because of my pregnancy and nothing he said could move me out of my numbing depression. I did not allow myself to think at all. I just did and then only did the bare minimum that I could and still exist. There was a lot of sobbing and sleeping and occasionally, ranting at people who did not deserve my wrath, like my little boys. I had no friends, no support system, no hope at all.

I did not come out of it until we drove away from that house in July of 1993. Delena was then eight months old. Joe was embittered because so much of the work defaulted to him. I managed to pick up a job at Edwards working for NASA on a top secret jet fighter project. That sounds like a fake story you’d give someone at a bar, but it is true. We lived in a hotel in Lancaster, California for almost two months while I tried to work all day and find house we could afford to rent in the cracks of my time. Ultimately, we couldn’t afford the house and that did not go well, but at least, we had a roof for the remainder of our time in California. I worked three jobs: the NASA job and ultimately back into medical transcription when that drew down, a job reading Tarot cards at a shop in Lancaster, and teaching childbirth classes. There was no rest and there was no hope I would pull through, but I was at least more engaged than I had been before we moved. Not a lot, but more.

It is the time in my life of which I am most grievously ashamed. There were no successes and I could not see any joys anywhere, although I am sure they were there. My children, even for all their current struggles, turned out better than they had any right to. Some are more wounded from that time than others.

Last Fall, my life took a turn I should have seen coming and yet, did not expect, and it unseated me. I tried several different angles to work on it. I sought the advice of some of those in my wide and wise network of friends and did a lot of praying and centering. I realized that my previous self-assessment that said I was actually doing OK and had found my sovereignty was, in fact, off target. I fell hard. I journaled here about it a few times, trying to let the catharsis of written word work its magic on me. I rebounded more than once, only to fall back harder again.

This year, the unthinkable happened. I got sick. Those who know me know I *never* get sick. I have always been in good health and it is rare that things like even common colds or flus get hold of me. I have been ill more this year than I have in the previous fifteen combined and the year is only half over.

This week was the penultimate of sick for me. I know it could be worse, but this was pretty bad and I am taking the hint. Talk about toxic from top to bottom. A tooth I was pretty sure my dentist cracked at my last cleaning began to ache horribly and I developed a very angry case of cystitis. I was a spectrum of pain from my head to my seat. I felt horribly ill on top of the pain. I could feel that a good bit of what I was saying made little sense. I did not sleep well.

I needed to go speak to a staffing agency about picking up some part time work and I have no idea how I made it through that ninety minute experience and I remember very little of it except them giving me the Janine From Ghostbusters assurance that someone with my extensive experience could easily find work in the food service or housekeeping industries. That is what happens when you are self-employed and run your own businesses for eighteen years after leaving a thriving workforce.

I then had a marathon lunch with a dear friend and I mostly remember what we discussed. From there, I went to visit with another friend and talked about employment options with her. As I did so, I realized how absolutely sick everyone was with my own perceived helplessness and my own resignation from the life force. Once again, I had given up. Once again, I checked out. Once again, I stopped caring or investing or trying and once again, I was only doing the bare minimum I could to get by. I was working my ass off, mind you. I never stop working. But I was not emotionally invested in even one thing I was doing. I was angry over how my life went despite all my hard work and so I retreated while leaving my body to keep working. There was no self care. There was no emotional engagement with anything at all. Once again, I was figuratively (although in 1992, it was literally) going into my room and closing the door and crying and sleeping.

My body was reacting to all of the poison that my anger and resentment put into it. My body was reflecting how that poison just sat in me and festered and hurt. My mouth hurt because I was not saying what needed to be said. My bladder hurt because I was really pissed off and holding onto instead of eliminating my wastes.

Yesterday, I had a huge list of things I needed to do for the shop, but I let them all go. I wrote a column for Patheos in which I reseated myself in an effective method of problem solving and made sure to take my own advice. I slept. I read. I prayed. Yes, I cried a bit. I took a lot of Oil of Oregano and d-Mannos and cranberry supplements. I drank gallons of water. I used high concentrate oil of peppermint topically on the tooth, which will be fixed when we have medical and dental benefits again.

The toxins have now mostly left and the rest are cleansing away. The sick part is gone and I am now working with pain management. My head is clear and I feel wonderful and plugged in again. I am engaged enough to notice that my floors need to be mopped and my desk is suffering from piles and piles of *stuff*.

Today will be a busy day of getting things done, including more work on my beloved Aster of Avalon book. She definitely deserves the attention she is getting and I look forward to publishing book 3 of Seven Sisters of Avalon. I am grateful for a day of intentional effort instead of automated responses.

 

 

First, a musical interlude:

Now, a little over halfway through my 2015, it seems like as decent a place as any to evaluate. I was told by several independent sources that this is “my year,” whatever that means, and I invested in the idea. I can honestly say I have never worked as hard in any consecutive months of my life as I have in the past six and that includes working two part times jobs and a full time job as a single mother in the 1990s. I am tired beyond belief and that doesn’t change even when I rest. It seems to be my default status. I am in this uniquely magical place where if I close my eyes for more than a few minutes, no matter where I am or what I am doing, I will immediately fall into active dream time. It is like being a little bit high all the time.

This marks my fourteenth year of transitioning into menopause. I started with symptoms almost the day I turned forty and back then, it included hot flashes, palpitations, erratic periods, irritability, hair loss, and night restlessness. My symptoms are nowhere near as aggressive now. I went through over-the-counter treatment as well as hormone replacement therapy. The over-the-counter stuff worked well for me for two or three years, but then lost its effectiveness, so I switched to a different one for a few months, then quit altogether. The HRT never worked well for me. My goal is not to replace my reduced hormones, but to help my body adapt to the new levels successfully.

I hydrate well. I supplement with lots of B-12 and other supplements and that seems to take off the edge.

Life has changed so dramatically from this time last year. On January 1st, I took over a computer sales and repair business and learned more than I ever wanted to know about repairing laptops and desktops. I invested what I had to spare and then some into the business and as it turned out, much of what the previous owner represented to me at the time of purchase was incomplete or inadequate. I was not told that a good bit of his disclosed income from the business came from working on people’s computers in home, which is not something I feel comfortable doing. The contract he assured was ours that was to cover our store overhead every month never manifested as he was certain it would, even though he is the IT director for the company with which we would contract. They took two months to pay on our first and only transaction, which had the terms of “payment on delivery.” These issues are common to business owners, but I was not positioned to manage them at that time.

My business is located deep inside a giant swap meet in Roseville, California and computers are not typically impulse buy purchases. Most people do not want to pay for parking, carry their heavy PC or laptop into a swap meet, and possibly wait a week to get their repair job back since we are only open on weekends, even though our prices are significantly lower than our competitors. After several weekends of sitting in the store without any revenue at all to show for it and two months of the store not coming close to breaking even, I decided I needed a different variety of things to sell in the store and opened a botanica on one side. A botanica, for those who do not know, is a store that specializes in handmade magical items and aromatherapeutic items. I worked night and day to produce an inventory, which was tough enough as it was, but even worse since I’d already invested beyond the extent of available funds into the computer side that was not paying off.

The botanica does well. Some weekends, it is he driving force in profits, and sometimes, the computer side does better. We still do not break even, but we are getting closer. I meet amazing people and finally I am starting to see a stable inventory instead of throwing stuff to the wall to see what sticks. I have a few new items to roll out over the next month, but mostly, I think we have found our market. My daughter, Delena, is my store manager and helps out every weekend. She just graduated from college with two degrees: Fine Arts and Social Sciences.

On March 20, Eric worked his last day at the Veteran’s Support Office in Placerville. He now works with me in the shop and is otherwise here at home.

Dylan officially graduated high school in May and turned 18 earlier this month. He starts college in August. Nathan pulled his grades up through home schooling and made up some lost credits with summer school. He will continue home schooling this academic year and with California’s new vaccination law, will likely graduate through this program rather than mainstreaming back into traditional high school.

In February, I was honored when Patheos.com accepted me as a full time blogger for a column on Energy Magic. I produce two posts a week, each of approximately 1000 words. I barely get one posted and it is time to post another one. I feel as though I am running out of words. The job pays, in theory, but I have to get to 12,000 hits in a month before it kicks in and this month, I made it to around 6,000. For now, it is an insane amount of work with no return other than to say that I write for Patheos.com.

I am part of a group called North Western Circles Association and we put on a festival in June called PanGaia Festival. A ton of hard work paid off and the festival was extremely successful.

I published my most recent book in January, Weather or Not, and I am still working on the third Seven Sisters of Avalon book, Aster of Avalon, that was due out in December. Life got in the way and I was also a bit stuck on a few things. Delena brainstormed with me and got me through the bottleneck and it is flowing well now. I hope to be finished by the end of Summer. My editor has finished the first quarter of the book and says it is my best work yet.

The year has been a significant personal struggle and I find that I feel lost and confused a lot of the time. I look for guidance inside and out and find none. I see so many life changes and I feel as though it is all passing me by. I remember feeling strong and vibrant, but more as an abstract than a true memory. I am grateful to have had that at some point in my life because I know many never get it at all. I hope to have it again some day.

For now, it feels like that was a brief moment in a very long day. Life is such a series of choices and I am working to find the right ones, including the choices to be healthy, happy, fulfilled, and gracious. It is difficult when a person is on output so long without positive return. I can find blessings, absolutely, but the challenges often feel overwhelming, then I feel weak and ineffectual for feeling overwhelmed. I see others dealing with greater struggles with far more dignity and I wonder what’s wrong with me.

I was raised in a way to believe that if you work hard, you can be successful. I feel as though I never stop working and the breaks just do not come. At June, in the CUSP cycle, we expect to see our crops out in the field and to know that our goals are manifesting beautifully. So far, I have not had that confirmation. I am looking out onto a wasteland of a field…that needs weeding…and watering…and a lot more work. I do not see little mini-corns or beanstalks wanting to be something when they grow up. I see a whole lot of work invested into a harvest of weeds.

It may sound as though I do not have faith and nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, faith is about all I have right now. I cling to it like a life raft. I pray it is not all some huge cosmic joke. I know I have to keep moving because this is the active time of the year. I do not intend to let go of anything in particular I am doing until after November 1st, when I will re-evaluate and decides what serves and what doesn’t. For now, I am the living embodiment of that old joke about “how far can you walk into the woods?” Halfway because after that, you are walking out of the woods. Once I am halfway in, I can turn around and go back or I can keep walking and see what is on the other side of the woods.In this case, there is no going back because what I left is no longer there. There is nothing for me except walking forward into the unknown hoping that what I am doing is the right thing and is enough.

It has been a long time since I updated this online journal, partly because I am burned out from writing for Patheos, partly because there it little new to talk about, and partly because it is even more work to find a positive spin for my current journey. I remade my website yesterday, hoping to invest new energy into it and by proxy, into me. Now I will go develop oils for my shop and make beautiful spell bottles for people who need an extra boost in their lives.

Like a typical Virgo, I might struggle pulling my own life together, but I sure know what everyone else needs.

Maybe I need to find my own Virgo.

I try to conceptualize that I last wrote in this journal back in March and I know it is true, but it feels like yesterday. Time is all wibbly wobbly timey wimey for me lately, not just because of a menopausal haze that seems to have fallen over my brain and neuro system, not just because my sleep is all jacked up and I am between the worlds most of the time, but because my life is changing so fast I can’t seem to keep up with it. I open my eyes, blink twice, then realize the day is gone and it is time to sleep again.

A couple of years ago, I knew I wanted my life to be different. I needed more adventure, more magic, more money, and more substance. I needed things to feel more real and corporeal, but I also needed to feel secure and rooted in something important. Last Spring, my soul sister, Tammy, and I began speculating that it would be fun to do a major festival together for the Sacramento area. We both worked festivals for a bazillion years and both of us had run festivals before, but we never ran one together. The only one we ever worked on together was one another local gal was running. The major Summer Solstice in the area was running its last event that year and she and I both worked it and considered whether we should pick up the torch for the following year. Without a few months of that, PanGaia Festival was off and running in the planning stages with our Dream Team of coordinators assembled. Since then, it has snowballed into a major event and while we could not be more proud and excited, it is a hell of a lot of hard work. The thing has taken on a life of its own and sometimes feels as though it is running and we are trying to catch up.

So that’s one thing.

Back at the end of January, I was looking around for a writing venue and decided to apply to Patheos.com, which is a wonderful blog site that hosts the ultimate set of discussions on absolutely any religion path, and even atheist paths, you can imagine. I sent them my resume, they asked for samples, I sent samples, and surprisingly, I was hired. The pay is based on page views and I have not yet made the number of views required for it to be financial beneficial, but it gives me a place to write with my target audience right there waiting for me. I love the four of you who read my personal journal, but wanted to stretch myself a bit. I write two columns a week there and let me tell you, it is just kicking my complete ass to do it. As soon as I put one blog post to bed, it seems like it is time to write the next one. Plus, when you write about magic, it involves defending your own beliefs and that is so far away from my interests it’s unreal. I believe what I believe and share those thoughts. They aren’t up for debate or interpretation or analysis. Discussion, sure, but I don’t get all bunged up if someone doesn’t believe they same way. Just “cheers” and “love the texture of different beliefs” and “salut” and on we go. Unfortunately, others seriously get off on intellectual debate and historical citations and all that shit just makes me tired as hell. If you don’t reply, you look somehow bested and it hurts your reputation. If you reply with something like “thanks for sharing,” then you look evasive. Arrogance is the immediate kiss of death for any writer and you quickly lose your audience. I am debating whether or not to continue because it takes up a lot of time and the benefit is still something up for debate. I’m…mulling and meanwhile, writing my ass off at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/energymagic/.

So that’s another thing.

The third book in the Seven Sisters of Avalon series is well underway, although I do not get as much time with it as I would like. I hope to have it finished, plus another non-fiction or two, but the end of summer.

Another thing even.

Nathan transferred to Visions in Education homeschooling program the first week of January and we managed to get him from straight Fs up to Bs and Cs for the end of his Sophomore year. Those of you who have done it know that homeschooling is not for sissies and when I homeschooled in elementary school, it was sort of quasi-precious, but in high school learning stuff I did not see until college, it was like brain abuse. To top it off, he was jaded and disillusioned over his previous school experience and I practically had to drag him through this last semester. In the end, he excelled and kicked so much ass. I am very proud.

So there’s that.

Around the middle of February, Eric told me that he wanted to go part-time at the VA and had worked out that the pay would be nearly the same when you considered that he would not pay for full-time benefits or lunch or gas for the two days he would be off. I thought that sounded fine and I was excited that he would have some down time. He was a Veteran Representative for El Dorado County and during his time in that job, he helped over a thousand veterans get their benefits. He is exceptionally good at what he does and it was rare that we would go out anywhere without someone coming up to him and tearfully thanking him for all he did for them, telling me how wonderful he is, and giving him hugs. It is, however, a very stressful job when you listen to the human misery of people all day long. People who are wealthy and healthy do not usually seek out veteran benefits. These are folks who are homeless, extremely ill or dying, left with no resources, reliving horrible battle experiences, and unable to cope with normal life in most cases. Since Eric is also a disabled Gulf War veteran, this was difficult for him and hit some of his own triggers. He sought out counseling for it, but ultimate decided he needed to cut back on his time at work. Since he is also a gold-miner and has not been able to give that good energy investment in a while, it seemed like a solid move to make.

He turned in his resignation from the full-time position effective March 20, making it clear he was available for part-time work. Now, the county bureaucracy being what it is, as of this time, there is still no part-time position in the works two months later and the pay that would be “almost” what he made full-time is no pay at all. He has been busy here extending the chicken yard, fixing the fence, and a million other things. It is nice having him here and he is an incredible help. With Dylan graduated as of late December, Nathan homeschooled, and Eric not working out of the home, alone time simply does not happen. From the minute I wake up until I go to sleep, it feels like someone somewhere needs something from me. I have taken to waking at three or four in the morning just to listen to the silence and try to think and keep my brain safe. The screwed up sleep cycle is not my friend.

Then there’s that.

I bought into a computer shop in December and started in January. I knew a good bit about computers and learned a lot more and now I am pretty fly with them if I do say so myself. My shop is only open on weekends and is in a huge (like 40 acres) swap meet in Roseville, California, which is an hour and a half in no traffic from where I live. My shop is the only fully enclosed shop on the grounds. As it turned out, a lot of what the previous owner told me was not the case and I do not believe he intentionally misled me, it was just shit happens. We worked our asses off cleaning out the shop, which was a combination of a junk yard and Microsoft museum, to figure out what is and is not immediately usable and get what isn’t out of the shop and into storage. We cleaned the shop literally for days.

We sold a few refurbished computers and fixed a few more than that, but in the end, the shop could not sustain itself on sales and service alone and as it became clear that Eric’s work situation was changing, it was even more critical that this place had to get its running shoes on quickly without the luxury of building up a new business. If you can imagine a thriving swap meet environment, you know it is about impulse buys and it is weather related since most of it is outside. For a while, it seemed like any rain we got was on the weekend. It poured and great for California that needed the water, but horrible for business. Then it was cold and most people do not care to walk around a swap meet in the cold.

In March, I was sitting in my shop, trying to stay warm with a space heater, hot lemonade, and layered clothes, and contemplated how I had not sold anything in weeks. The store was a money pit and I was ready to just sell the whole business and be done. The problem was that I did not have anywhere else to go. I tried various home-based businesses with no luck at all. I applied the previous winter for around twenty different jobs including McDonald’s, Walmart, etc and never even got a call back. I would have done about anything to have an income and some security and the only thing that came along was this stupid computer shop that was not holding its own at all. If this had been a magic shop where I sold magical, Pagany, Witchy items, then at least I would have the people to enjoy and…

O_O

…I have a shop. It can be whatever I want it to be.

So I converted a good 2/3 of the shop over to magical stuff in early April. Since then, I have gotten lots of great feedback on what is selling and what isn’t. I started out with the idea that it would be like a Pagan Thrift Store where you could come in and get gently used magical stuff with a few homemade incenses and such thrown in, but since then, the homemade stuff is selling so well that I am going to liquidate the dragons and wizards and candle holders and end up with almost entirely stuff Delena, Eric, and I have made. The shop is called Botánica de La Reina and the online store is here.  It has been wonderful to meet so many new people who are excited about what we are doing. They are so complimentary talking about how beautiful the shop is and how nice it smells. I love feeling eager to get up at 4 AM and head to work for ten hours or so at a time rather than dreading it like I did when it was only computers. The computers still get some action now and then, but the botánica is more lucrative. I like having items people can buy for a dollar or five dollars. The biggest problem magical stores have is they focus on high end inventory and forget they are marketing to broke-ass Pagans. I am working that side of the business and keeping things affordable by combing the internet or foraging for my own supplies to cut out the middleman.

During the week, all I do is write and make products for the shop every waking hour. Eric took over the last month of homeschooling Nathan which was a highly beneficial switch and helped me immensely.

In just over 2000 words, I have described my whole world to you. My friends have been kind enough to bless me with beads, broken and unbroken jewelry, herbs, feathers, and other items I can use to make things for the shop. Every day is either writing and making product or working in the shop. As for the personal journal, time just flew away from me.

As I step back and objectively look at all of this, there are places where I can be frustrated and places where I can be worry, but to what end? It never helps anything and only injects tension into an already shaky situation. All I can do is work hard and give it all my best effort. Then, if the whole house of cards goes up in smoke, I will know I tried. Meanwhile…I work like mad.

Funny how so many of the classic phrases honoring monarchy involve their salvation or ability to remain alive. After the last several weeks, I can certainly see why.

Continue reading “Goddess Save the Queen”

It has been a weird and freaky time, let me tell you. I last blogged when I was still processing all the feels from my recent belly dance class. I enjoyed it and it was a fantastic workout, plus I have always liked that particular instructor, both personally and in her teaching style. Unfortunately, some scheduling conflicts came up requiring that I make some tough choice and I did not continue the class. I love belly dancing and hope to continue learning, but I realized after a lot of thought that the Egyptian style simply does not feel expressive enough to me. I am more of a tribal fusion kind of person so I will pursue that study on my own.

Continue reading “Happy Dance”

Three years ago this month, I decided to take a belly dance class in town. Belly dance has always impressed me and of all dance styles, it is what I most wanted to learn. Hint: the banner above is not me. I have seen women much larger than I am dance beautifully, so I knew size was not a limitation. I found a wonderful teacher and started a beginner class. Within a month, I developed horrible sciatica that lasted for the next two years.

Continue reading “Adventures Dancing My Belly”