Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Honoring the Dead: Dia de Los Muertos, 8th House in astrology


Elisa Miller Mask for Dia del Muertos
...The 8th house is a haunted house.  Like it or not, you’re a medium, or as they’re calling it now, a ghost whisperer.

Astrologically, the charts of people with mediumship abilities most often have Pluto or the 8th house or both strong in their charts.The ability usually opens up when someone important to you dies and provides an anchor on the other side. There’s no opt out button for that, so you need to educate yourself on how to shield and protect yourself as well as how to use this ability...from Donna Cunningham's blog and post "Everything you wanted to know about the 8th House ..."

Tonight is Halloween in the US. I opened my email this morning and found a picture of my grand-niece(a year old just) in her elephant ears head-dress. With her mom and dad the family will be a herd of elephants. It's been several years since trick or treaters climbed our Kuli'ou'ou Valley steps in costumes: witches, fairies, princesses, pirates and not so little Blues Brothers with bags and jack-o-lanterns for their booty. Trick or treat. Now in the woods, our dark and winding forest driveway has probably not seen many (if any) costumes and booty bags for Halloween. Haunted houses for Halloween have never been my thing, but maybe that's because I have a real thing for honoring and respecting the dead. Astrologically? I'm one of those with strong Pluto and a stellium (three planets) in the 7th and 8th Houses. "There's no opt out button for that."

Earlier in the week I opened another email with the subject "Los Muertos." The sender, my friend, a healer and lover of dance and music lives here on Whidbey Moku and has a home in Mexico. I read her message and invitation to join her to recognize and honor those who have passed. Sitting here rain drips steadily from the edge of the vardo roof, splatters on the umbrellas that are soaked through with 'ua kalanai. My feet are bare, but I wear my floppy hat and tights as I search for the story to tell on Halloween, the night before Dia de los muertos. I find this blog authored by Christin Acosta and love the pictures on her post about the Mexican Celebration; but especially, I love the words she uses to describe the color of death:
Brilliant colors and stark value contrasts between dark and light with the addition of warm earthen tones make up the complex palette of colors associated the Mexican Celebration of Dia de los Muertos (the Day of the Dead). Not only are these colors seen among the flowers and decorations that make up the various ofrendas  (altars), foods and decor that are part of the celebration, the colors metaphorically and symbolically mirror the mystical underpinnings of the Dia de los Muertos celebration...
Not far from my writing desk, the one that parks inches from the Radiant Electric Heater and allows me a view of the mossy limbs of Tall Ones still fully standing and those toppled ... a photo of my family who passed into spirit decades ago, and not so very long ago keep us company. I see them often and look to them at all times of a day or night. I think about my family who remain fully fleshed and among them I see the robust little girl with the elephant's ears continues a legacy. Even without costume ears my family has elaborate and generous ears!

I wonder whether Pete and I will be able to spend much time inside with my friend and her celebration of Dia de los Muertos. "We'll see, " I wrote back when she said she burns pellets to keep her house warm. The journey through sensitivities that prevent me from socialization has wrestled some of the demons and ghosts from my path: I join people in different places now. That is a change, things change. Part of the life-and-death mediumship Donna Cunningham describes above involves becoming sensitive to the bridges of time and place present everyday. The Ancestors are to me, ever present. As a girl that frightened me, or maybe it frightened my parents and they frightened me.

 The shadows always intrigued her, even as a girlchild the patterns that happened onto her skin caused something different. Through the screened window the moon did not ask permission to tattoo her. While everyone else slept, this child made room for the moon and the shadows and grew the voice... an excerpt from my poem Moon Tattoos, All rights protected, 2012 Yvonne Mokihana Calizar [read the poem in its entirety on the side bar of my other blog].

The sun has moved into the sun of Scorpio, my ancestral land. Soaked through as it is now, decay will turn the compost damp with mold. I long for some dry white sandy beach-time. But not now. Tonight is Halloween and perhaps it is time to enjoy the thin vale etween the living and the dead and buy a bottle of beer for my dad, look for a can of evaporated milk for coffee just the way they liked it, packages of soda crackers for my cousin; and play ukulele for them all.



1 comment:

Speak from the heart