Hawaiians observe[d] Twelve Lunar Months every year. Each month featured 29 or 30 lunar phases (the Mauli phase at times being omitted) and was divided into three anahulu called Ho'onui (rising or waxing), Poepoe (full or round) and 'Emi (diminishing).
The start of the new year was marked with the rise of Makali'i, the "little eyes" (Pleiades). The first lunar month of the year, Makali'i, is said to begin with the first New Moon following the rise of Pleiades on the Eastern sky..."
...The new moon is supported by Jupiter so this offers a great chance for a fresh start on a Monday morning. Jupiter’s energy is protective. It’s benevolent, visionary and expansive. Libra deals with love, money and sociability. Try to incorporate these things when you set your intention. More (Jupiter) love (Libra) for example. Try to get along (Libra) with a broader range (Jupiter) of people."That last line "Try to get along (Libra) with a broader range (Jupiter) of people" rings the bells in me as I get closer to a solar return, a birthday coming in mid-November. The New Moon and the New Year of Makahiki give me cause to celebrate positive and amazing progress in a life that needed reassembling. October 15 marks a year's anniversary of committing to retraining my brain (the limbic system-the ancient brain) and in particular the almond-shaped amygdala. For nearly a year of daytimes and night-times I've taken the path less traveled to re-define ideas, images and feelings about big and wild things like: fear, threat, danger and safety. That less traveled path is the one not trodden by habit. If there is one big, big thing this journey of healing from MCS has taught me it's this: the choice is ultimately mine! Blaming others for the habits or choices they make that (might) affect me is my habit. Habits and expectations are locked in if left unquestioned and last October 15th I made a choice to choose differently. Changing is difficult mostly because I have to keep believing the change is worth the discomfort; the water is deep when you launch from solidity of shallow water. The muscles for swimming new and deeper water (change) are unused to the exercise. For me, one of the muscles that needed exercise is the muscle that make my mouth say, "NO. No. nO." No, this is not for me. No, I have had enough and I'm leaving now. No, you don't really know what's best for me."
"The approach we use, and helped to pioneer, is called Housing First or permanent supportive housing. Conventional wisdom has long said that homeless people with disabilities had to “straighten up” before they could obtain housing. But people with severe disabilities cannot access treatment, let alone make dramatic changes in their lives, while struggling to survive on the streets.
" Housing First approaches are based on the concept that a homeless individual or household's first and primary need is to obtain stable housing, and that other issues that may affect the household can and should be addressed once housing is obtained. In contrast, many other programs operate from a model of "housing readiness" — that is, that an individual or household must address other issues that may have led to the episode of homelessness prior to entering housing...
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| Home ... inside a well-built nest |
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| That's the former Blue-sides kitchen at the end of the path |
"Learn how the trees and other plants in our local forests provide habitats for birds and other creatures, and how birds in turn shape the forest. Steve and Martha Ellis will focus on the factors that influence these forest types and the seasonal use by birds. They'll also highlight specific locations for each of these types of forest and give tips on how to find the birds among the trees."
..."With Saturn conjunct Mercury and aspecting Chiron you’re likely to run into situations where people get triggered by perceptions that bring up past wounding. Mercury sextiles Venus and both quincunx Uranus. With Mercury conjunct Saturn, this can result in snap judgements, yours and theirs. Making judgments limits your perception. When you slow down your rush to judgement and allow more time to gather your thoughts and perceptions, you allow a more complete picture to emerge. Reality is a continuum, not a moment in time cast in stone"
| Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak |
"You are approaching one of the boldest “get serious” moments of your life, a process spanning nearly three years... I’ve described Saturn in your Sun sign (or in your rising sign) as an extended phase of coming to terms with yourself. Said another way, this transit is about becoming your own inner authority, something that few people ever do—and which is much likelier with Saturn in your neighborhood. One sad story of our society is people refusing to grow up; other people continue to have authority over their choices and even their opinions. Saturn in your sign can feel like authority figures or seemingly more powerful people imposing themselves on you. This is a reminder to take authority over all of those aspects of your life, and many more where you anticipate this kind of involvement by others..."
Many "get serious" moments fill my life; internal conflict is tattooed into my astrological chart.The years of living seriously with multiple chemical sensitivities gifted me with an incredible remembering, or what I described in my mythic memoir Wood Craft (soon to be published!) as reassembling.
From this beautiful place in the woods, my family and I continue reassembling a life that is built upon foundations that are less grand; built less on hubris and more with humility. The extended clear and dry season allows us to rebuild the 8x8 Quonset hut adding more space for two old dears and their cat to enjoy a comfortable winter, stretched out together on chairs around a sweet round table for hot food and lively conversation. Not too much to expect, and definitely a progression over the past five years. Our choices to build what we build has been influenced on all levels by our finely-tuned connection to how we build and why. No longer willing to believe that if we had everything we would be happy, we needed first to live within -- diving into the deep tunnels and hidden compartments of beliefs to make sure we know our contents, and own them. Last night Pete and I were glad to climb onto the futon after a hot shower toweled dry with a clean bath towel.From Wood Craft this description, "Reassembling is version of recycling beliefs and attitudes that no longer served the original design of Creation. Bits of the original belief or attitude might have sustaining value. Rather than throw the whole kit and caboodle out, to become part of the Cosmic Heap, the wise Creators gave us the inspiration to simply reassemble and start again without too harsh a melt-down, if at all possible."
“I have nothing now but praise for my life. I'm not unhappy. I cry a lot because I miss people. They die and I can't stop them. They leave me and I love them more...What I dread is the isolation. ... There are so many beautiful things in the world which I will have to leave when I die, but I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready.”And you?
― Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are
E lauhoe mai na wa'a; i ke ka, i ka hoe; i ka hoe, i ke ka; pae aku i ka 'aina.
Translation: Paddle together, bail, paddle; paddle, bail; paddle towards the land.
Explanation: If everybody works together the work will be done quickly. On interisland trips, the two most important tools besides the sail were the paddles and the bailer. In heavy seas, the water would wash over the boat and so one or more natives would be constant bailing. Others would be paddling together on command to reach their destination in the shortest time.
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More fog this morning. The heads of the Tall Ones are cloaked in gauze. Cool air and a belly full of oatmeal, I take to the keyboard and open to my on-line astrology class with Elsa P. Focused on the transit of Saturn through the sign of Scorpio, Elsa Panizzon dishes out stories, chart analysis and advice with wit, compassion and honed insight. Slowly and steadily, like a Goat (Capricorn-Saturn) one astrological chart at a time, I read and digest the lessons for scaling mountains. I'm not always sure where a post will lead when I begin though sometimes words do simply back themselves up at my fingertips with directions intact forming sentences and paragraphs. This one is more like the condition of the morning. Instinct has pressed the connection between the Capricorn nature that is very dense in me. After reading and beginning the digestion of today's Elsa class two images set themselves in my mind's eye: one the mountain goat (so often used as a symbol or the animal referencing Capricorn), the other a bull-dozer which is what my father a Capricorn-sun rode for decades of his work life. The article and photo above comes from 1939. Never before have I connected my father's choice of work with his Capricorn nature to scale and skin mountains; but it happened this morning. "Like a father figure, Capricorn is a role model of self-responsibility and accountability. Saturn, with its penchant for discipline, thrives in Capricorn and therefor rules it. Capricorn must continually redefine inner and outer authroity, sidestepping know-it-all attitudes and embodying instead the teacher who can be taught." - Elizabeth Rose CampbellEarlier this week I wrote about reconnecting with my mentor, my kumu-teacher Aunty Betty Kawohiokalani Jenkins. Capricorn figure who is both leader and skillful spider who maintains that nature of teacher who can be taught. I reflect on my father, see him in his youth, and during the years when he rode that iron horse with the skill of a mountain goat. He was an expert at it, loving the work even as he was abused by its torque and noise in times before ear-protection was mandatory. Something Elsa wrote about in our class today moves me forward with this piece. It has to do with the reality that Capricorn is just simply meant to "climb" -- work, and teach. Like it or not, if there is Capricorn, there is work. What is that goat looking at? |
Capricorn is actually the Sea-Goat, whose mythological origins stretch back further than the classical period. , as represented more or less today in the astrologer’s glyph for your sign. Ea was both prescient and omniscient and was particularly connected with work, wisdom and the instruction of mankind. These characteristics remain to remind us presently, of what is traditionally governed by the sign of Capricorn. - Paul Wade, astrologer
I've shivered and shook on a Dozer
I've ranted, and raved, and I've cu'sed.
My kidneys are dislocated
And I've swallowed ten bushels of dust;
My fingers are broken and bleeding
From wielding the tools of repair.
O God of Internal Combustion,
Please answer a cat-skinner's prayer!
The heavens have changed their gowns several times today. Early in the morning while the stars dazzled in a still-dark sky the air was clear and the presence of the wildfires burning in Chelan, a city about 170 miles from Whidbey Island is less persistent. My eyes don't blink to moisten them against the fine soot. Oh how thirsty is Papahonua(Earth). Now, late in the afternoon, kolonahe, a makani olu'olu (a pleasant wind) has moved patches of white clouds into place and the muted blue matches the first days of Autumn. The Equinox has come. From our vantage point here on the island in the middle of the Salish Sea, I sought the shape of Mahina last night and saw her in her finely drawn half-half illumination. In the counting of nights, we are in the 'Ole moons. Today is 'Ole Pau, the fourth and final time of the month when weeding and fixing nets or raking up the yard are perfect activities."A tradition of the sun's north-south track of the cosmic spider, Ke ala a ke ku'uku'u 'path of the spider," is an ancient Hawaiian analog for the sun's motion between solstices and equinoxes in the tropics. The cosmic spider, great Lanalana or Ku'uku'u, spins a web as a grid across the sky in which stars course east to west in fixed tracks, spaces along the horizon being azimuths (lua) 'pit' positions of rising/setting stars, moon, sun, and planets."
"The Hawaiian Understanding of the Universe," Rubellite Kawena Johnson, 2008
