Category Archives: update

June 5, 2018 · 4:00 pm

Childhood Nostalgia Crushed

Not my grandmother’s home, but very similar.

When I was born, my parents were living with my maternal grandparents in a little town called Washington, Missouri. The house, a little white clapboard two-bedroom house with one bath was my home for much of my young life. As my parents were building their own house about a half an hour away, I spent a great deal of time in that house. It was located on the corner of East Sixth Street, just across from Krog Park. I remember hearing sonic booms as a child, I remember the beauty and the wonder and the comfort that old house was for so much of my life.

My grandparents passed to the West more than ten years ago. My mother and father are also gone. At any rate, curiosity getting the best of me, I looked up my grandparents old address. I just wanted to catch one more glimpse of the house that I grew up in. Google maps virtually led me down the street. I could feel my heart pounding as I recognized other houses, I saw the edge of the park, and I could see the highway that was in front of me. A large Norway Spruce that had been there since the 1940’s was obscuring the view of where my grandparents’ house would be located.

As I neared the driveway, I saw in its place a parking lot to a medical office – and the name of my cousin, who had become a very successful surgeon. In that moment, my heart shattered. There was no semblance of the yard that had once been there with cool comfort and reassurance during the summers spent there. Gone were the maple trees, the holly bushes, the apple trees and an ancient sycamore in the backyard that had leaves bigger than basketballs.

I hoped against hope that they were able to pick up the house and move it somewhere else. Why wouldn’t they?! It had hardwood floors, it was a customized Sears house, for crying out loud! At least, that is what my mother told me. She was, I found out later in life, prone to her own special brand of embellishment.

I then came to the realization that in spite of all of the wonderful memories I had, such a house would have had a very limited appeal today, even as a rental property. The bedrooms were rather small. There was only one bathroom. The attic that served as two other separate bedrooms separated by a bi-fold door was also a nice feature, but probably not too appealing for today’s home buyer. The kitchen was small with simple pine cabinets, no dishwasher, or any of the other modern amenities that people seem to “need” to have. The closets were small, the breezeway was a nice feature. My sister, Julie, and I would play or color out there, particularly during the summer during thunderstorms. The basement had been our play area as children. However, it began to dawn on me that in spite of how special it had been to my sister and me – it wasn’t special enough even for my now-wealthy cousin who had also spent a great deal of time there as a baby to want to save it.

My heart is still at times heavy with the loss of that house to so-called progress. I wonder, however, how I would have felt if it had been saved, or rented out to other people. I’d probably be even more upset that they weren’t living up to what my memories made of it.

As sad as it is, that house still lives in my memory. I can remember the summers I spent there with my sister, Julie. About the “Playground” programs that they had at Krog Park. I can remember what it felt like to look out onto East 6th street from my attic bedroom window and dream that I was on board a great pirate ship, sailing anywhere. One of the large metal swings made like a stand alone porch swing would make a creaking sound that could be heard from my grandparent’s house. Funny, I can vividly recall that sound and the sound of the snow cone man in his beat up old Chevy Impala selling snow cones out of the back of his car for all the kids in the neighborhood. Those are nice memories. And even though the house is now long gone, it still stands in a special place within my heart.

A Log Cabin in the Enchanted Forest

This is the latest from one of my other blogs, RealWorldHomesteading.com. It’s kind of an intro piece of what the blog focus is about and how we ended up being “into all this stuff”. By that, I mean all of the hands-on skills that in our modern era we have all but forgotten – unless we are under duress of some kind. I am a firm believer in not waiting until you have to fend for yourself and or need to be buckled into survival mode. So many of us take for granted the things we can do every day – or we become complacent through all of the conveniences that living in a modern world provides for us. No matter where you are, no matter what your situation, you can do something to empower yourself.

via Real World Homesteading

Writing & Authenticity

This week has been one of simplifying and paring down and getting to the foundations of what is important. All this week I was reminded of the words of a very wise friend who once told me:

“If you want to persuade someone to do something, anything at all, there are five key things you must do in order to insure this. First, encourage their dreams. Then you must justify their failures, allay their fears, confirm their suspicions, and at the end of it all, help them throw rocks at their enemies.”

As writers, in spite of how we feel about the world through our own personal filters, we must do these things. We know that some of the dreams of our readers will never manifest. We know that sometimes the failures are their own fault by means of apathy or lost opportunity. We are more than conscious that the fears they face are just phantoms, their suspicions are nothing more than social media fed fantasies and sometimes their enemies aren’t really enemies at all.

It is difficult to motivate or even entice people to read your work if you are regard them for the most part as being stupid, misinformed or deluded. Secretly, sometimes we writers will often laugh behind our hands or our computer monitors when we realize that someone is actually paying us to state the obvious to the world in the articles that we write. Some days It really can seem like a sham and sometimes there may even be a sort of guilty pleasure in that thought.

The problem is, that what may be obvious for us, is often new information for those who encounter it for the first time. It is our challenge, I believe to let those things that we reveal within our writing, the stories that we tell and the truths that we state all be something that the reader will never forget. It is always a challenge to make what we put out to be wholly unlike so much of the information that we are bombarded by on a daily basis and that is just as soon forgotten. While there is no shortage of voices clamoring to be heard in the digital wilderness, there is a palpable void of authentic voices who are completely and undeniably themselves.

We writers and copywriters spend so much time manipulating words to fit the expectations of our clients, or helping them to maximize the SEO returns and any number of other considerations that are applied to our craft, that we can end up being completely disconnected to that deep inner voice that makes us and our writing uniquely our own.

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Filed under business, update, writing

October 31, 2014 · 1:46 am

Finding Our Way Back to Kemet

This post started with the intention to give those who call ourselves Kemetic a place to look to find resources. I know that I am not the first to talk about this. Certainly Devo Kraemer with the Kemetic Round Table and her blog, as well as Helmsman of Yinepu, Henadology and countless others have stated the same goal. This post is to essentially open up the dialogue and throw out ideas to the greater Kemetic Community as a very small piece of a much grander puzzle. If we can just figure out where we are going, we might end up getting something that has a bit less in fighting and is a bit more cohesive.

All of we Kemetic folk are different. We come from different places, have had different sebau (teachers) It feels a little bit like that road sign on the set of M*A*S*H* that showed where everyone at the 4077th where home was. The road sign served as a starting place, rather a map of how to get there. More than simply telling someone that there is just one temple, one group or one single right way to get to where to go, it will, I hope that something like this might serve more people without any accusations of an agenda.

The truth of the matter is that civilization was born in Kemet. The pharaohs were black, and varying degrees of brown and every other skin colour that was known in the ancient world at the time. This is inevitably what happens in an integrated and cosmopolitan society. By my saying this, it does not make me a revisionist or a racist. Speaking only for myself, my goal is to welcome any and all evidence and discussion, except that which promotes racial hatred and modern cultural divisions that seem to have escalated to all time highs over the last few years.

Like most within the pagan and polytheist sphere, we Kemetics have our share of issues to deal with. We have our dramas and disagreements but overall, I don’t believe it’s anything that cannot be overcome. So…..we can choose to continue to arguments over religious doctrine or other points of contention, or point fingers about who “stole” what from whomever else, or we can acknowledge the fact that for each or us Kemet is a constant call in our lives. Just as in Kemet’s antiquity, I believe that cultural exchanges and sharing were and are the norm. Someone who was well-traveled or could appreciate the customs of the people and places that they visited was welcome as a guest and greeted as a hero or heroine when they returned home to share the knowledge that their travels had afforded them. Being a good, respectful guest was the most important thing of all. I think the akhu (ancestors) have plenty to teach us on many levels and it is something that the world desperately needs.

I believe that we can have that and be the richer even if all we do is try. We are most us here because we love Netjer or the Netjeru and honoring the akhu. The land of Kemet IS Zep Tepi, the First Time. It is inevitable that it calls to our kas with such depth and intensity that we cannot turn away – not even if we wanted to.

But what about Kemet is it that calls us?

Is it the sophistication of design? Is it the fact that science and medicine, literature and the beginnings of writing were born on the banks of the Nile? What do we as modern, 21st century people hope to gain by reviving the religion, the culture and the values of that bygone time? I believe for everyone the answer is different. Even as a child, I dreamed of a day when more people would realize how wonderful ancient Kemet was and there would be a push to restore temples and bring a language back from the Realm of the Dead. With the advances in Egyptology and the push to reconstruct events, study DNA and analyze the overwhelming amount of data coming out of Egypt on an almost daily basis, we may very well see some of these ideas and pushes become a reality.

What I want, what I am asking in this blog entry is for people to think long and hard about what it is in Kemet that draws them so deeply. I sincerely want to hear from each and every one of you – not because I am starting a new group; but rather because it’s something I’ve felt called to ask and to do. I am not doing this for any group, even though I am currently a member of a group. I respect and care for enough people outside of my own respective group and have the luxury of conversing with them in a dialogue of mutual respect. It is of paramount importance to me that this spirit of cooperation continues. For some, such as myself, Kemet was a call felt at a very young age that simply would not let go. For others, it is a reconnection to their own proud history and culture. For others, it might be something else entirely. Whatever it is – it’s important.

It is my hope that the dialogue between all of the different groups can somehow push us a little closer to having a clearing house of knowledge, lists of books to read, online courses being offered for free or at a nominal fee, groups that get together socially for no other reason than to share that interest. Later, we can discuss the potential of boards, or groups on Facebook or Google+ in order to discuss those resources that we find. Whether any of us views it as a culture, a spirituality, a passing interest or even a fandom, it is my personal belief that none of us individually knows nearly as much as all of us do collectively. It is also my belief that if we try we may yet make even more of our dreams about Kemet come true.

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Filed under indigenous, Kemet is Cool Project, kemetic, Ma'at, pagan, politics, racism, rants, Religion, Sekhmet, Uncategorized, update

October 21, 2014 · 5:48 pm

Losing Your Facebook Name & Getting It Back: It Isn’t Really About You

After losing my name on Facebook to a vindictive high-visibility online troll, I penned a blog post, “The Importance of Names“. In recent days, I have been able to reclaim my online name / DNA intellectual property. This has been made possible because of the diligent efforts of a very organized and tenacious community of drag queens and others within the LGBT sphere. I am grateful more than I can say to Miss Roma and Lil’ Miss Hot Mess and all who fought so long and so hard for their patience and dedication and sense of fairness in going after Facebook’s real name policy.

Recently, I have seen posts coming across my feed that somehow Pagans et al are being “targeted” by Facebook in some sort of modern day persecution. I am never sure why these folks seem to think that everything is an inconvenience is somehow someone “targeting” them because of their beliefs or how they look, dress or how they think. While it is true that the dominant culture, and especially corporations within the dominant culture do this, unfortunately, I think that the concept of persecution in this case is more than a little inaccurate.

Let me state at the outset to those in the Pagan and Polytheist communities that this is not about your religion. My case was very probably a personal vendetta by someone else, and Facebook’s real name policy played right into this. For most people losing their chosen screen names, whether they be professional names, pseudonyms for those who want to avoid abusers, American Indian tribal names, or Initiatory names of those within the alternative faith communities, it is only about one thing. It is about the money that your information, online and buying habits represent to advertisers, both current and potential, on Facebook. Having demographics be as accurate as possible to those potential advertisers who are more than a little interested in what you do, what interests you and how you spend your money online .

In short this is not about “targeting” any group for who and what they are. This is about Facebook selling YOUR demorgraphics and YOUR information to advertisers. They cannot effectively do that when you have a pseudonym of any sort. When I lost the name of Fanny Fae on August 29th and had to use my birth name up until last week. With the help of Lil Miss Hot Mess and her forwarding my information as per the instructions, I was able to get my name back in less than 12 hours. YMMV.

If you have lost your chosen Facebook name for WHATEVER REASON, please click the bright “My Name Is” button below and FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS. There are no guarantees, but if people are losing their names, then they must be both methodical (and CALM!) about getting them back. All of the bleeping screaming about religious discrimination, ranting and online petition signing isn’t going to do a goddamned thing. Beat a pillow, scream if you need to, but wait and come back to the keyboard when you are calm. Sure it is frustrating and it hurts and it can leave you exposed and vulnerable and it can cut at the very essence of who you are. Those things can make it feel as if it is very personal. I promise you, it most probably isn’t. The key, however, is to keep your wits about you and push back with singular determination. Facebook sees you as just a packet of information to be packaged and sold. That’s the business they are in. Changing an imbedded corporate policy is never easy, but if you are tenacious, it can pay off.

It is more than past time for the pagan community etc. to quit their mooing and start doing! It would also be a wonderful gesture if some who are able to benefit and get their names back after this Facebook fiasco to actually remember to take the time to thank Sister Roma and Lil’ Miss Hot Mess for what they have done to make this possible. Because of them and their efforts Facebook has now implemented the following policy – which many still are unaware of. Facebook just implemented the policy allowing people to select names other than real names so that they know – but that you can keep yourself safe.

What Other Names are Allowed on Facebook?

As I have said repeatedly, there are no promises for everyone being able to get their assumed names back. However, since I am writing this after having direct experience I have found that if you really are focused, it is possible to get what you want in all of this. Try it and see.

We just need to dispassionately lay out the facts to the powers on Facebook that be because each request to get a name back is being reviewed on a case by case basis. Speaking only for myself, I know that I am fortunate and probably got my name back very quickly because I have been branding with this name for more than a decade. I own the domain, I write on multiple sites under this name and it is pretty clear that I have been out there. Others may not be so lucky, but when you are armed with as much of your information as possible, chances are Facebook will take that into consideration. It is up to each user to make their case, because to Facebook’s marketing team, you and your habits online are $$$. They are in the business to make money.

So why did this happen in the first place?

Let’s be honest; in spite of Mark Zuckerberg’s frequent and very public protestations to the contrary over the years, Facebook’s Real Name policy is NOT about safety or trust. It is about money, and the bottom line is always about the bottom line in corporate culture. While Zuckerberg thinks that anyone who uses a pseudonym or alternative name has a personal integrity that is lacking, that argument is disingenuous. What is really being left unsaid is that the users who use an alias only have “less integrity” in terms of the data that those who use of Facebook provide to their real customers: the corporations and advertising folks who mine that data in order to sell we the users of Facebook to those advertisers or those interested in all of the things we do and are interested in online. The deal is that those advertisers want your eyeballs and what’s in your wallet on their merchandise.

In a word, WE and our buying choices as consumers, are in fact, the product.

This is why the Facebook website / service is “free”, and is almost certainly likely to remain so because your information is just that valuable to them. We need to now ask ourselves, just how much are we willing to give up to Facebook and other companies who sell our information to those who wish to buy the best and most information according to that demographic data.

Another point of interest is that around the time all of this real name push started was when Facebook announced the launch of its Atlas system, which was created as a direct competitor to Google’s in terms of demographic information that could be sold to advertisers and influence the buying public. Facebook acquired Atlas from Microsoft and recently announced the relaunch. Atlas essentially measures demographic information of users so that marketers can use that online information to target advertising to the right place. If you are using Gmail or using Google as a search engine of choice, you see this in action without even thinking about it. Facebook wants to compete with this for their own profits and consumers are being managed any way possible in order to insure this.

Thanks to one of my Facebook friends, I found in a USA Today news story that Facebook’s chief product officer, Chris Cox recently apologized for the outing off the Drag Queens and LGBT community at large for forcing them to use their real names. I applaud the apology, but nowhere in the article was it outlined how these brave queens and others in the LGBT community, including myself, would be able to get back our assumed names. That, thankfully, would come later. I have my feelings about who the single user was who outed or doxxed so many, including myself. But of course, I know that we probably will never know for sure, but I am absolutely certain that Facebook never let any of those who were harmed know who was responsible. However, the chain of events were far too closely related in my humble opinion to be mere happenstance. I don’t trust either party in this case.

We certainly should be aware that corporations such as Facebook care little to nothing about the individuals behind the accounts or their reasons for choosing to use a pseudonym or assumed name. They only know that when a user chooses not to use the name that is on a birth certificate or driver’s license, the information it can present to those wishing to know the most about you (eg. advertisers and marketers) have skewed information and is not worth as much as if you were to use your given name.

If you are a witch and you use your initiatory name online as a way to keep yourself safe and your boss and coworkers out of your private life, for example, that is not going to be the name on your credit card or your PayPal or bank account. Advertisers want you to make buying decisions based on the information they serve up to you on a constant basis. This is how if you click a story link, three other “related stories” will pop up under the link to the story that caught your eye in the first place. Again, that adds up to clicks per view and companies pay handsomely for those ratings. And they are not content to just be on your desktop at home or at work: They want to be on your mobile devices and be able to locate you and market to you based on where you are and what you are looking at or near on a real-time basis. If Facebook can pull that off, that is big time money. If you use an assumed identity, that again, changes the viability and the effectiveness of that information. Facebook and the advertisers purchasing that information know that all too well. And now, so do you.

Say it with me so that it really sinks in this time: “We are the product.”

Being forewarned is being forearmed and representing yourself online as you see fit and insuring your own personal safety, Facebook’s marketing demographics be damned, is all about getting your own power back.

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Filed under business, Ma'at, pagan, politics, rants, Religion, update

September 1, 2014 · 4:49 pm

The Importance of Names

What’s in a name? Plenty. A name is the essence of who we are. It can be the name that we are given at birth, or a nickname which signifies who we are within communities, or it can be an Initiatory name. Sometimes a name is a persona we choose for ourselves in order to keep us safe from the prying eyes of employers, or those who wish us harm such as ex-spouses, abusive family members or stalkers who want to impinge on our personal lives and our personal freedom. Names that do not appear on our birth certificate, Social Security card or driver’s license are no less valid than the initiatory names and pseudonyms that we use. Some may use a ‘fake name’ to bilk, defraud or deceive others online. Facebook, Google and many other places have in place so-called real-name policies that are designed to help, but sometimes end up hurting.

This past week, this policy ended up happening to me. My “real name” is not Fanny Fae. It is the nickname of an ancestor of mine, Frances or Françoise McKay and used the name of this blog, Fanny Fae. My reasons for doing this on Facebook and elsewhere, primarily were to 1) protect myself from my ammo-sucking, gun-toting, “Take ‘MERICA back for Jesus”, and “Convert to Christ or DIE”, and “Left Behind” series-believin’ family members who object to my being a polytheist & lesbian woman legally married to her partner after 22 years, and 2) This name is a brand that I own and intend to keep on owning it. She started as a fictional character on Livejournal and PanHistoria more than a decade ago and I have fiction and other things that are mine written under that name – and they will stay being MINE. Those that know me knew of my motivations. There were never any attempts by me to deceive, defraud anyone. Just a nice safe, almost-anonymous ID to be able to live and to work unencumbered by my religious extremist family and to protect what I perceive to be my intellectual and DNA property. Most everyone in the writing, Pagan and polytheist communities knows me by that name and I have made quite a few friends with it.

From my understanding, Christian Day, an occult shop owner with stores located both in Salem, MA and New Orleans, a radio host, author and “warlock” who rose up to take on the Evil Charlie Sheen a year or so ago, decided to out or ‘dox’ me and anyone else that he knew who had a “fake name”. He took it upon himself and enlisted the help of his friends, groupies and flying monkeys to follow him in this endeavor. That is what I was told. I have no idea because I was not online at the time. It really isn’t important at this point how or why it happened or who did it. I refuse to participate in feeding negative energy to a person who claims he “swiffs” it for his own purposes. The end result was Facebook logging me out of my account and telling me that I must use my real name, but could add Fanny Fae as a nickname in parenthesis. I did so.

I admit, at first I was angry. This sensation lasted all of about five or ten minutes. Then I realized that with the Sekhmet book, hopefully in production to come out soon, it was probably a good thing to stave off potential objections by those who do not equate this ID with my real name. When I explain to them the circumstances and my reaction to it, most have been very accepting and understanding. Some, still safely behind their initiatory names or ones that they have contrived to also stave off inquiries from employers, abusive ex-spouses, etc. have been more than understanding. I daresay that Mr. Day will not be able to swiff their energy from them either.

The biggest inconvenience to me, so far, has not been my weirdo, religious wing-nut family pounding on my virtual door -( though I do expect this to happen eventually), but so many people in the groups that I either admin or those who I am friends with now asking, “WHO the F*** is Christina Paul?!” I have to explain to them what happened in a Cliff’s Notes version and it always ends up being o.k.. Most did what I did and just shrugged and moved on.

What companies like Facebook, Google and all of the other social venues and corporate conglomerates don’t understand is that most of our lives are online these days. All it takes is someone with a bit of tenacity, some basic computer skills and a credit card and they can get whatever information on any of us that they want to. The entire backlash by consumers about issues of privacy, should also include the ability of persons such as myself and others to give good reasons why they want to hide behind another name. Ninety-five per cent of the time, those who do, are not trying to do anything illegal. They are just trying to live their lives quietly and unemcumbered . Not everyone who chooses to use a pseudonym has gone through abuse, or has to put up with hands-in-the-crazy relatives, or employers that want to know what their employees do on their off-time as much as they do for the time that they have those employees on the clock. Being able to mask at least some part of our lives that we feel is private and not open for public scrutiny should be as natural as closing the shades at night when we get undressed. We are all pretty much at least virtually undressed when all of our lives are out there for everyone to see.

With all of the recent bouts of identity theft – whether financial, or someone such as a celebrity having someone impersonate them – of course, knowing who you are dealing with is a very good idea. On the other hand, there needs to be dialogue about having a choice for those who have very good reasons for wanting to stay hidden. Companies such as Facebook and Google should not assume that the only reason why people choose “fake names’ or are reluctant to not use real names on their services is for potentially illegal reasons. It isn’t. Having a safe space to be able to interact with others is of paramount importance. Facebook and Google, et al, have unfortunately become the village square du jour. You can always opt not to use those services, but to do so leaves you potentially cut off from what most people use as a support network. Someday we may have other choices that offer more privacy -or we can hope that these companies get a clue and realize that they have become part of the problem that allows the rise of social ills such as online bullying and stalking. Companies such as Lifelock and other identity theft and credit monitoring services are doing a booming business these days. I am left wondering if Facebook and Google don’t get some sort of kickback because they are by their own policies very probably helping to create the problem in the first place.

I know you….I know all of your names.

That is a bit of ancient Kemetic or Egyptian heka or authoritative utterance that is said when you gain knowledge of all of the names of someone and you are set to either magically protect or curse them. We Kemetics take things like the words we use, and especially names very seriously. There is the legend about how Aset (Isis is Her Greek Name) wanted to get the secret name of Ra and by manipulation was able to obtain that secret Name or Ren. Ra knew that with it, Aset could destroy Him. But He also knew that without paying the ransom to Aset by giving it to Her, that He would die. Like that story, our names and how we are identified and move through this world are double edged swords. They can hold great power and they can be used to destroy us utterly. As I always have said, “My name is my integrity”. Nothing is more potentially dangerous as when something does something in your name that you don’t approve of. Like your word, your name serves as a bond. Naming is branding. Some of us like to have absolute control over our names and our branding in order to set us apart from everyone else. Celebrities, recording artists, authors, etc. know this reality all too well. The more we are out there and participate in social media, the greater for the potential for companies such as Facebook and Google to be used by those who DO want to do illegal things and bilk others to gain more and more power. It is a fine balance to walk, and having one-size-fits-all policies serves no one in the end. These venues have already been used for such purposes. The real name policy in most of these incidents did nothing to safeguard it from happening.

This is an issue that I think deserves more discussion. My outing came from someone else wanting to be vindictive and to cause me and others harm. They failed in that endeavor with me other than it has created a few minor inconveniences. These have already been overcome, so the major explosion that he likely expected ended up being more like a dud firecracker. Still, privacy is an issue that will not go away and it will take thoughtful consideration rather than wholesale policies in order to make things more safe for everyone.

‘Sekhmet Meritamen, Physician of Qenbet’ – by Wbnrnpt, for the website, Ancient Sites, now known as Ancient Worlds

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Filed under akhu / ancestors, business, dreamwidth, fiction, kemetic, livejournal, magickal alchemy, mystic woo-woo, pagan, politics, sekhmet, update, writing

Tagged as current events, facebook, google, pagan community, privacy, update

July 6, 2014 · 1:46 pm

A Week of Challenges

Funnel cloud with rotation over the prison in Anamosa. This is less than two miles from our log cabin in the woods. (Photo courtesy of Lori Kula)

I should have known when the tornado hit Anamosa, that this week would not be the best. It didn’t matter that there was a three day weekend coming up at the end of it. When your Monday consists of 80 mph winds and flooding throughout your immediate area, chances are the rest of the week is going to rather suck.
I had just returned from Cedar Rapids getting food and running errands when the skies started turning that lovely green colour you can only get in tornado weather. Ducking into the safety of home, I dropped the groceries on the floor of the kitchen and turned on the news to see maps of our area on doppler radar splashed with huge swaths of yellow and red across the screen and the robotic voice of the NOAA computer indicating what warnings and watches were in effect. Straight line winds of 80 miles per hour and more, thunderstorms, golf ball-sized hail, flash floods. Batten down the hatches and take cover.

Merissa, our Labrador Retriever / Pointer mix, was pacing about me nervously as I pulled in the wind chimes, the deck furniture and my life-sized mosaic peacock sculpture into the safety of the living room. She and I then went downstairs to the basement, into the safety of the herb / craft room because it is in the ground, has wooden shutters on all of the windows, it is the safest place in the house. There among the jars of herbs, the craft and painting supplies and near the heavy floor loom, I could see by cautiously peering out one of the shutters, that all hell was breaking loose outside. We lost power just as I heard the high pitched squeal and roar of tornadic winds rushing through, the logs groaned and creaked against the high winds. It was all loud enough that I didn’t even hear the cracking limbs of the elm tree by our driveway when it crashed to the ground. I remember praying to Shu and to any gods that would listen that we could weather the storm.

The winds finally subsided after about 15 minutes or so, but we were still without power, internet and cellphone service. The phone service came back in a couple of hours. However, internet and power would remain off until 2:30 a.m. the next day. In town, I am told that there are still homes that are completely without power. The damage was widespread enough that I am told we got a mention on the nationwide broadcast of the Weather Channel and I happened to catch a mention on CBS This Morning from Charlie Rose. Workers from Servicepro across the country have been dispatched to help deal with the damage. Thankfully, no one was seriously injured or killed this time around. By the time the 4th of July rolled around, the town’s fireworks had been postponed until August 31st and everyone was too damned exhausted from clearing away downed limbs and uprooted trees and debris that no one felt much like celebrating much of anything.

On Tuesday, the hard drive of Hemingway, my inherited desktop, decided to start handing out errors. It had not yet failed but its death knell was being sounded. I grabbed one of my 1 TB external drives and began the long process of backing up everything while I set up a brand new alienware machine. Don’t get me wrong. I love new computer toys. I dread setting up a new machine however because the OS is new and quirky and I have to spend time familiarizing myself with it. I also have to find all of the disks for all of the programs that I use in order to get the new machine set up to where it is workable. Those programs have to be loaded and licenses entered (Thank goodness I have a master file for this!) Not to do this means straddling two or more machines in order to be able to function in my home office. Every time I go through this, I vow I will have all of the disks in the same place so that all I have to do is open a drawer and the process will be streamlined. I confess, I am still working on that one.

Last night my trusty HP DV9000 laptop decided that the wireless network card needed to stop working. I just happened to have another USB network card on hand and loaded it. It is working now, but it has the nasty habit of making me retype my network password every time it loses its connection.

Hopefully, I will finish my client work by the time I have to toddle back down to the store and deal with being around people again tonight. So far the sky is clear and the birds are singing. Being out here, in spite of the storms and the occasional challenges is worth it all. To borrow a line from the Concrete Blonde song, “Take Me Home”, off of their ‘Group Therapy‘ album,

“Life is beautiful, & terrible & strange….”

In my experience and in this place, I have found it to be completely true. And to be honest, I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

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Filed under business, update, writing

Tagged as log cabin in the enchanted forest

April 24, 2014 · 3:40 am

Regarding Sekhmet’s Stolen Image

Chris M. Morris, via Creative Commons Sometime on Good Friday, the Goddess Temple in Cactus Springs, Nevada was invaded by thieves. The space that had always been open to anyone wanting to come visit the Goddess, to pray and to enjoy the peace of the sanctuary could do so unhindered. It was this that made it possible for those with a more heinous mission in mind to succeed in stealing the centrepiece of that place, a four foot tall statue of Sekhmet that weighed just under 100 pounds.

The Priestess in Residence came into the Temple to find Sekhmet gone. The thieves had left behind only tire tracks, and in them was the necklace that the statue had been wearing, indicating that she had been tipped while being spirited away in the night from the place that had been her home for the last 21 years.

For the celebration of Earth Day that was scheduled to be held at the Temple, a picture of the statue was set in the place of where the image once stood. The Earth Day Celebration went on as planned.

Right now, there is much speculation within the Pagan community as to why it happened or who might have done it. The first thing that came to mind is that somehow, since it was done on Good Friday, it was religiously motivated, as if to remove an image sacred to those who are not a part of the Big Three monotheistic faiths. Others have suggested someone just wanted to make Sekhmet their own. Others have posited that because of the area of the country and because Sekhmet personifies power itself, that the culprits could be drug dealers who believe that stealing a bit of mojo is perfectly acceptable. Whatever the motivations are, the Pagan community and all those who love Sekhmet are upset by the theft.

Initially $500 was being offered for information that led to the arrest and prosecution of the culprits. That has since been kicked up to a $2,000 reward. I would not be surprised if that figure increased yet again.

The unfortunate byproduct of this tragic event are those Pagans who wring their hands and drape themselves over the furniture, wailing that this is about religious persecution – or that if this had happened in a Christian church or Jewish synagogue, the press coverage would somehow be more than it has been. I understand the deeply personal feelings that people have toward Sekhmet and that someone would do something so terrible is frustrating and brings up anger, sadness and the overall feeling of somehow being violated. I also know what it feels like when the issues and events we hold near and dear are not adequately covered as we feel they ought to be. I think anyone who is on the receiving end of being even in a small way touched by any sort of crime – be it a hate crime or something else must feel that irritation that no one could possibly understand. Pagans in particular, seem to love to latch on to crises of this type because it makes them feel as some “persecuted other”. I never saw much use in wallowing in that sort of self-pity, personally.

To be honest, I never thought I would see the day Sekhmet’s children would resort to playing the victim card and yet I have in these past few days. Some have resorted to comparing and contrasting our religious site being desecrated and comparing our pain to the pain of others when thier faith was lashed out against. Somehow they conveniently have forgotten in another crime that is unrelated but took place just before Easter where three innocent lives were lost last week during Passover. Ironically, all three of the victims who were slain by a white supremicist were Christians. It is my view and in the interests of ma’at that I believe that no one should be singled out, begrudged or feel persecuted for their beliefs, or have their sacred spaces violated. The ones who whine about how we of “Other” faiths that are not Jewish, Christian or Muslim are so very persecuted and discriminated against conveniently forget the burned churches, the desecrated mosques, the ravaged Sikh temples, that have all have been the scenes of senseless violence and desecration, all based on hate and intolerance. Our prayers go out to their families and our voices whisper hopes toward peace and understanding. It is what we should do for each other as human beings. Skin colour, race, religious conviction, sex, sexual preference and any number of other things does not trump the fact that we are all human beings and have to share the space, so to speak.

While the stealing of the statue is a tragic, heinous thing, too many within Paganism’s ranks love to use that common excuse that gets handed out is to blame the media – especially when screaming “religious persecution”.

This, in my personal opinion, is not an act of persecution. We need to stop with the assumptions that somehow it was. There were no slurs painted over the space, the building was left intact- they took the statue, something that cannot be replaced. It’s a theft. Cameras may be necessary as a precaution to insure against future thefts, or worse, the safety of worshipers. That’s the way of things these days. It has to be, unfortunately. Slanting the story is not helpful. We now live in a world where that kind of trust is not something that can be easily given to just anyone. We used to sleep with our doors unlocked and our kids could play in their own front yards. Both things are becoming increasingly rare now – but of course, that has nothing to do with religion. It has to do with a society that is largely out of control.

We are not the dominant religion, that is true. We are not Jewish, Christian, or Muslim, but we can practice our religion for the most part unmolested. Do people lose their lives here over being pagan? Hardly. That is what the comparison with the Passover shootings was about – and it is relevant. Can people in India, Africa, and even Egypt itself say the same? Absolutely not. I know of native Egyptians who do worship Sekhmet – but they cannot do so openly or it is a death sentence.

There is no point to the practice of comparing and contrasting of pain and transgressions and tresspasses against “Us” versus the ones suffered by “Them” – whichever side we happen to be on. Any religion being oppressed, any desecration of a holy site is an outrage and intolerable. As a Priestess of Sekhmet, I ask is our suffering any greater than the churches that get burned down, the mosques that are desecrated, the medicine wheels that are destroyed? No. Absolutely not.

Whomever did this – be they someone who lusted for Sekhmet’s image itself, or someone in the drug cartels or someone just doing something ignorant and hateful, I can say without reservation that they will have literal hell to pay. In spite of Sekhmet’s loving, healing aspects – and She has many – there are very dark parts of this Goddess that are invoked when Ma’at has been transgressed. To those who know Sekhmet and those “darker” aspects of Her, know without any shadow of a doubt that the move was a very stupid one indeed.

That statue will be returned – or not. But we are undamaged, and Sekhmet’s worship is undeterred. One thing is for certain, however, those who stole Her image will get what they have coming to them. I know for a fact, Sekhmet’s Arrows Do. Not. Miss.

In my years of experience, Sekhmet, as far as Deities go, is most definitely NOT a victim; and neither, I dare I say it, are Her children. We will not curl up into a ball and wail and bemoan the situation. We will not stop doing what we have been doing since the resurgence of Sekhmet’s worship in the world. We know who our Mother is, and She knows us. We who know that we belong to Her carry Sekhmet within us. Our minds hone in on Her with a singular focus. We do this because She IS the very Personification of Power or Sekhem itself. To succumb to this blow is to give that Power away.

Rest assured, we have absolutely no intention of doing that.

(Mirrored at niankhsekhmet.com)

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Filed under kemetic, pagan, politics, rants, Religion, sekhmet, Sekhmet, update

March 16, 2014 · 5:45 am

Migration

After a great deal of thought, I am going to be switching some things over with this blog. I will be keeping the name, fannyfae.com, but I have another domain, NiankhSekhmet.com (Life Belongs to Sekhmet). It is my Kemetic name and it would probably be much better if all of the Kemetic related posts went to live there and the fiction, herbal, writing businesss and other types of posts will remain here. Of course, I am still working on a new banner for the site, even if the wallpaper is a bit familiar.

In short, the work for both blogs will be more specifically focused. So pardon my dust and I do some rearranging. I promise to keep everyone posted. It gives me the opportunity toward more specific types of branding in posts. I know that one will be for the ebooks and business while the other will be more personal.

So look for this space to change a bit over the next few weeks. No doubt I will be doing the same over on Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook, Google+ & etc. If anyone needs to reach me, they may do so here or can write me at fannyfae at gmail dot com.

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Filed under business, Uncategorized, update, writing

January 29, 2014 · 6:33 pm

ENOUGH!

There is no shortage of people in the world, and especially online who want to worship or honour the Kemetic (Egyptian) gods or Netjeru. You would think after 20+ years of Kemetics being online they would have tried to build alliances and make bridges without the petty infighting and holier than thou bullshit that gets handed around like last year’s Christmas fruitcake.

Let me state at the outset before I say anything else, that I have no grand vision of being “in charge of” anything. I am not here to take anyone to task or to fight with anyone else. This is not some half-arsed attempt on my part in order to get students or for me to become a guru of some sort. I am flat-out not interested in such things at all. Been there, done that, and I donated the T-shirt because it wasn’t “me” anymore. I’m just like everyone else in that I am committed to the culture, the history and the religous ideals of Ancient Kemet. I am not an accredited Egyptologist. I fully acknowledge that I am here by the grace of Sekhmet and the generosity of many, many talented sebau (teachers) and to them I am eternally grateful and I refuse to dish or diss on any one of them.

Lately I have noticed increasing factionalisastion going on within the Kemetic landscape. In the years that I have been blissfully far removed from the jealous infighting, the petty backbiting, hubris and ‘witch wars’ that seem to be part and parcel of the so-called Pagan “community”, I have watched those traits migrate here. After 20+ years, I am exhausted.

So, that being said, I am going to do everything in my power to establish a list of various Temples, Shrines, blogs, organizations, information resources, etc. because it is absolutely needed. If anyone thinks I am doing this for any specific organization, guess again. I’m not. Sekhmet has given me marching orders 1) finish the book and 2) establish the network because honestly, the Pagan Community and the Kemetic Community in specifics deserve at least a modicum of respect, in spite of the differences between us and it’s time that this happened. It is long past time, to be honest. This should have been done some 20 years ago, but for whatever petty, ego-driven, any other set of reasons, it did not transpire. It’s going to happen NOW.

We are bigger than this. We should not (still) have to be listening to the petty, catty, bitchy, in-fighting that goes on for no good reason. There are no good reasons why we cannot do this. If I have to kick ass, or become some sort of pariah, ostracized or called out for being a Kumayah, Pollyanna Kemetic, so fucking be it! We are long past done playing at this. It’s time to do it.

Still have doubts? Let me spell it out:

It’s about, GOD, or the Gods (plural) and our relationship to them, people!! Get OVER it! We all have something to contribute and we NEED to be doing that in the interests of Ma’at. I am not interested in hearing the arguments against such a thing moving forward. I will not give credence to he said / she said, petty grudges from years ago that happened on Usenet, Ancient Worlds, or Tumblr. There are no more excuses, so don’t bother bringing them up to me. It’s time for all of us to ask ourselves, each and every one: “WHY the fuck are you here?!” We collectively need to take what I call the Janet Jackson Approach and ask ourselves, ‘What have YOU actually DONE for the God(s) lately?! What have you done for yourself lately?!” After answering those questions honestly, the next question to ask must be, “What’s stopping you? Who do you think is preventing you from doing it?” If we fall into the temptation to start to point fingers at anyone else than the man or woman that is in the mirror, then I encourage each of us to remember that with that pointing of fingers, there are still three other fingers and a thumb pointing right back at us.

I will write this up in more detail in a bit, however, if anyone imagines that I am doing this to step on toes or encroach on their “territory”, they need to take a step back. This is solely about trying to take a cursory census of who thinks the idea of a collective of those who are bound by the things that we believe and hold dear is more important than the ongoing factionalization that we have been suffering from for over 20 years.

Playtime is over. It’s time to STFU and get to work. If you want it, well then each of us needs to determine just how much and what we are willing to do in order to achieve it.

Excuses are boring. Let’s get to it.

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Filed under kemetic, mystic woo-woo, pagan, politics, private, rants, sekhmet, update, writing

Tagged as #kemetic fandom, kemetic, rant, sekhmet