As 2011 came to a close, Yule arrived. with Yule came my preparations for the ritual but something very strange was happening to me.
It started as a little bump. I thought I hit my head on the car door again, but no this welt got bigger over time. Okay, I thought. I've been bit by a freaking spider. The welt covered the right side of my head and then it started draining. It was bloody at first. And then the pain came.
Oh it felt like my head was on fire! I did the same thing for this as I did for my foot some 4 months prior. Lots of aspirin and other over the counter pain medications. They would help for a bit, like 2 hours, and then the pain would return. I couldn't take any more meds for another 4 hours, that is if I liked my liver to remain functional.
I beared this pain for about a week after yule, as I did not want to ruin Christmas. On 27 December I had enough of it and went to the hospital to get looked at. I had hoped all I needed was a lancing, some penicillin derived drug and then sent back to work. Negative.
They admitted me to the emergency room on the spot. Before I knew it they had jammed an I.V. into my vein (that sucker HURT! and made me feel queasy too.) and Was pumping me full of morphine (mmmmm, morphine!). They took a culture and suspected it to be MERSA or some-such thing that resists antibiotics. Well it was just a simple staph infection, but the infection was so bad it was making my blood pressure high. if it wasn't for the fact that we drained the dang thing every night, thanks to Raven. It might have developed into sepsis.
So they start me on IV antibiotics and that morphine and get ready to prep me for surgery. They needed to cut my head open and remove the 'cyst'. Well apparently there were multiple cysts. The diagnosis was cellulitus. That and that dreaded thing which I had suspected but denied for about 10 years...
Diabetes.
Yes my blood sugar was high too. My A1C was over 11 they said. I was to be put on insulin immediately. Great. Now I get to shoot up and get pricked every freaking 4 hours. Yeah, there's a reason you don't sleep in a hospital, they wake you every 4 hours or so for this and that. Check the glucose, check the blood pressure, check the oil and transmission fluid, etc...
Then I had my surgery. This was my first time. They prepped me with a drip to numb me and then they put on the mask. I remember nothing that happened for the next two hours. I wake up groggy as hell and talking weird crap in the recovery room. I remember nothing about the surgrery, not a thing after the anesthesia. Its as if there is a memory block. Very unsettling to someone who even remembers their dreams as they sleep.
I was trained to shoot myself up with insulin, as I would be going home with it. I already knew how to eat. Simple, just go low-carb or no carb. Yep I had to give up sweets, but thankfully my blood pressure was not cause by anything wrong with my heart or high cholesterol. Great I can still eat meat! I'd hate to have to live my life eating rabbit food every day. That would be a death sentence for me.
I got to spend New Years Eve alone in a hospital room. It might have been the drugs (mmm...morphine!) but I swear something changed in me that night. I had a bizarre feeling that I could suddenly sense everything around me! My shields were completely gone. There was a buzzing in my head and a numbness in my soul. But what was very disturbing was the fact that I could no longer feel the animal within. The wolf had detached itself from me!
I was calm and at peace as the ball dropped that night. There was no rage, no fury, no storm. Just a numb feeling. I felt alone. I felt afraid. I was at the edge of a great cliff and not fearing to take the next step over the edge. I had felt something similar before when I 'became the storm'. In that experience I found another piece of myself, In this one all the pieces now separated themselves out. I heard that familiar voice in my mind...
"I am still here. I have never left you, as I am you. The separation was necessary for the body to heal. When the body has been cleansed the spirit which has also been cleansed along with the mind will recombine. That is the way of the Oroborous Serpent. Solve et Coagula."
To anyone else but me, and perhaps those who are learned in the occult, this whole episode would most likely come across as a drug induced fantasy. And indeed it may be. But chemognosis is a legitimate form of gnosis nonetheless. I tend to listen to myself even when I fail to listen to others.
Shortly after midnight, the oroborous transmutation began. I began to feel my mind and spirit rush back into my being. The wolf was back, and with a vengeance! The calmness was still there, and a bit of confusion. But the drive to kick this disease in the arse was very strong. I focused my rage not at myself, as I knew this did not happen by fault of my own, but at the disease itself. I wanted off those damn injections! They were like a cage to me.
So for the next month, Jan 2012, Raven would be away watching mom and dads place while I learned to add my diabetic regimen to my daily life. Check my glucose, take a shot, eat breakfast, then get ready for work where I have to shoot up again before lunch. Fun. Actually its' not so bad. The shots are from these neat pens that look like a Bones McCoy spray hypo. Sometimes it stings but if I get it right, it doesn't hurt. What's really a prick are those danged lancets for the glucometer.
Anyway, after a month I am healed up in my head and getting used to this diabetes thing. yes I miss real chocolate, but it's something I needed to do for some time and acknowledge the fact that I have a health issue. Oh by the way, my A1C seems to have dropped from that 11 to almost 7 by the end of January. sadly, my finances are going to hell in a hand-basket, but I am working with the county to get my meds.
Feb and March had me dealing with my new lifestyle by myself, as Raven was house-sitting for Mom and Dad while they were out in Arizona visiting my sister and step-brother. I basically learned what made my glucose shoot up and it seemed as if the insulin injections were doing anything. Had the idiot doctor at the hospital not checked to see if I was insulin resistant? I took my blood glucose readings in the morning and right after work to get a fasting reading. Mornings were always high, but afternoons were getting lower. I recorded everything on a spreadsheet and discovered that my trend was indeed going down, very slowly. I found out that the ADA diet does not work for me. 60 grams of carbs per meal? Hell no! I eat my few carbs at breakfast and then minimize them through the day ending with no carbs at night. This seemed to do the trick. I then found out that my previous diet was full of nasty carbs like potatoes, corn and pasta. I had to say good bye to pasta forever for that stuff, even the whole wheat, made my glucose shoot like a rocket. But what really gets my goat is the fact that I can't even touch a Krispy Kreme anymore. I have found that for snacking or gamer food, I cant eat any of that either! No corn chips, no potato chips, not even popcorn! The only thing I found that is okay for me are Slim Jims. Granted, they are loaded with salt, but my blood pressure and cholesterol is not an issue. I also love spicy foods and found out that the capcesin can actually help reduce glucose. Yes, I've looked at this thing that I have feared for a decade and ripped it's head off. I used what I know of alchemy and science to transmute the situation. No, it is NOT a cure and it never will be. But it is now controlled. And I might add, I'm doing it without medication or insulin. I have also dropped about 15-20 pounds. I am the smallest I've been since high school, hovering around the 200 pound mark now.
I had to get through this my way. I had to finally accept the fact that I have a chronic disease. I was going to transmute the situation and not let "diabetus" beat us. I've been told by many that they wish other diabetic patients had the same attitude. No sir! I will not be dependent on medications and have a devil may care attitude about my diet. I am rather attached to my feet thankyouverymuch!
We wolves survive everything that is thrown at us. Be it nature or man. We face it, we find it's weakness, and then we exploit it without quarter.
It seems that the true nature of the Stone has now shown itself to me and has begin to transmute not only that without, but within as well. I do honestly feel reborn. Oroborous indeed.
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Introducing Arcanus Tempestas Greywolf - Part the Sixth
2011 - They Year of Weirdness.
Winter 2011
The new year started very oddly with dead birds falling from the sky and fish washing up on shore. The whole 2012 end of the world bullcrap was in full swing.
Through the Occult Book Club I managed to teach my alchemy lessons, all seven of them now, to that group and got to do it in a masonic hall. It was the first time I have ever been in a masonic hall and even though we were limited to the common area it was still awesome. The masonic friend who contacted me from last summer's dinner was our host. I could feel the history of the place. The building I think was over 150 years old even though that masonic lodge was in existence for 250. There was much energy to the place, I never felt anything like it before, or maybe I had. Could this be the Philosopher's Stone? I have always suspected the Freemasons to be at least partly based in the teachings of alchemy. But as I quickly learned while the 'secret' teachings are based in hermetics and roscirucianism, very few Freemasons even truly understand the meaning behind their rites.
Speaking of masonic rites, I did manage to witness an Investiture of Officers, one of the few rites that is open by invitation. I was impressed. These guys have to do everything from memory, no notes! The entire ceremony took about an hour and a half. I'd like to see the old coven even attempt anything lasting more than a half hour, and from memory! Once again I felt as I should belong. It would be a few weeks before I was voted on however and in the process of waiting I met up with another therian.
Enter Margie
She contacted me via witchvox on the Ides of January and was impressed that I called myself a therianthrope so openly. We started emailing and before I know it we were talking on AIM and even via video. She was very wise in the ways of magick and the occult, or so it seemed. She started claiming that she more than likely knew me in a previous life and I started believing her as well. I had though that maybe, just maybe, I had finally found my spiritual sister. I would soon find out that I was wrong.
Margie soon showed her true colours. She started having issues with everyone she lived with. Her lover, her family, everyone. She moves out of her lover's house and back in with her father and sister. She then moves out of there and back with her lover. This goes on for another month and then I don't hear anything until she calls me collect from a mental ward in Philadelphia. Apparently even though she is a recovering addict, her mind is still fracked up and she was off her meds. I started to think about everything she said to me, everything she shared, and that which I shared with her. She would freak me out about my wife, saying things such as "I think she is going to have trouble with her heart soon" or "she's going to die in the hospital". I hated Margie for that crap!
Eventually she totally falls off the face of the earth. I get another phone call message that she's in yet another mental hospital and that was the last I heard of her. I can't believe I fell for half that woman's crap! I actually cared about her. I shared things with her on a personal and spiritual level. Because I got burned more than once with females who say they are wolf therians, I am now very, VERY leery about associating with them. I might have let my desire to find my spiritual sister blind me to the truth. I still hope to find her, but I will be seriously cautious from now on.
Blackballed!
The Freemasons got back to me about my election. I was Blackballed. The reasons are such that I cannot say explicitly, as I gave my word. I can say that it was through no fault of my own, but it did involve a power play. Once again the truth of a thing has shown itself. I might try again with a different lodge as I have that option in six months.
But by winters end, I would learn that my days would be numbered at my place of employment.
Spring and Summer 2011
The Spring of 2011 saw me unemployed after 2 1/2 years with the Joneses. They simply could not keep afloat regardless of all the ideas we came up with. The housing market even by that time was still a shadow of what it once was. It was a good fight, but in the end Mr. Jones had to close the shop.
I immediately went and got unemployment compensation, getting about a half pay per week. I could still survive, but certain bills, like the fraggin student loan, would just have to eat it. I managed to pay for those things that matter like the rent, electricity and car payment. I went on food stamps but even that was limited to about 50 bucks a week.
In the first week of may I managed to land an interview for a PHP/HTML development job at a clothing factory. The interview I think went quite well. I remember that I dressed up as fine as I did for the masonic investiture earlier that year. It was too warm to wear it. I thought I nailed the interview.
After the interview, we went to an SCA event, the first one I had in years and the first one with Bri in NC. Very interesting. As we set up the camp I heard thunder in the distance. "That sounds pretty bad" I said. We had had some terrible storms in April, the first true tornado in Central NC in years, and they hit between Fayetteville and Ft. Bragg. They do not call me Arcanus TEMPESTAS Greywolf for nothing, I am a Stormwolf after all and I know when a storm is coming. "Oh no, that's just them shooting ordinance on the range. Oh no, there's a quarry nearby." Right. Sure. Uh huh. Before It hit I reached out with my mind to try to steer it, but it smacked me upside the head mentally. It would NOT be controlled! By nightfall the storm was upon us and blew everything away in a mighty gust. Tents got turned into twisted masses of metal, plastic and canvas, all the stuff got wet. We had to spend the night in the car. Not fun.
May, June and July were spent with me generally staying home, applying for jobs from my computer and playing retro games. I got back into Meridan 59 which is now free to play, I got out of it after I remembered how much freekin PKing there was. I got back into LotR Online. Awesome.
New Job, New Roommate
I never got the good gig at the clothing company, I had to settle for a contract position with the city which paid $1.50 less than what I was making and with no benefits or even paid holidays and let me tell you, government offices have a lot of holidays. Even though Christmas was on a Sunday, you still had the following Monday off so that was 88 bucks gone for the week. But at least we got some help from a roommate who was also a coven member.
Nikki was part of our coven for some time this year. She was about to be deployed in Afghanistan and decided that an apartment with another soldier wasn't cutting it. She asked to move into our spare bedroom. Raven asked me and I gave an enthusiastic yes. Not only was I thinking of the extra financial help at the time, but I kinda liked this girl, she's a good kid! Like I said she was a soldier, in our coven and also an avid gamer and SCAer. I told her that she was most certainly a therian and a fox at that. She has always had a thing for foxes and wouldn't you know she'd be a 'soulless ginger' so guess what kind of fox. Red of course! I had a great time with her when she was with us, I even learned to make some German food. She got a bit more into therianthropy and I taught her some practical alchemy as we attempted to make coloured flames with household chemicals, much to the chagrin of the wife.
The End of the Darkrune
Darkrune, Dark Alcove, Sylent Mynd, Mr. Circumstance and a myriad other names for himself, would show his true colors. He met Nikki at his place of employment and started 'hitting' on her as he always does in his playful flirtatious way. Nikki never met him before but the first impression was passed over as just a friendly tease. But it didn't stop there. Apparently he even tried to ask Nikki privately to come to his place and not in a truly playful way. Things got bad and before you know it de-freindings happened on FB and elsewhere. I managed to get wind of some of the thinks he was saying behind her back and I stepped up to the plate and told the bastard to knock it off! So he turns on me. This guy who treated me as a friend for five years decided I was no longer worth his time. Apparently this guy had decided to turn atheist and totally treat anyone who believes in any type of spiritual path as a misguided fool and an idiot. he bashed everyone in the pagan community. He went into me by basically telling everyone he knows that I think I change into a full wolf in the pale moonlight and I control people in my 'pack' with magick. Geez, what a friggin jackweasel! This guy who used to be into Norse religion, paganism, magick and the occult, had turned into an atheist prick?(Not that all atheists are.) WTF? I 'declared war' on him and all that he stood for, especially when my friends and family, my 'pack' as he so eloquently put it, was concerned. It was truly over between us, just because I stood up for someone. I think most of this started when he bashed on witches in the community when they were talking about all the weird crap that had been going on with the environment at that time. In NC, we had tornadoes in April. More weird weather in May followed by an earthquake in August and then the threat of a major hurricane. All someone said on FB was that 'mother nature is pissed' and then he bashes on them for putting the blame on mother nature and that the great gods or the boogy man is coming to destroy the world. Holy friggin Bhuddah on a skateboard son! Get a flipping grip! I don't care if your an atheist, just don't go trash talking everyone because they believe in something. Okay enough about this guy.
The Voyage Home
In early September we head with Nikki back to Florida. The first time I and Raven had been back home in almost five years. We told nobody of this because we wanted to surprise them. We had it planned since July. Unfortunately my foot would have an issue just before we head out.
I don't know, maybe it was a poorly fitting shoe, maybe I walked too much but somehow I managed to get what was at first a very bad swelling on my middle toe on the right foot. Te pain started to get really bad to the point that walking was difficult. By the time of the SCA event, I was in serious pain, but figured it was just a bad blister and went anyway. Mistake.
The pain was so unbearable and the walking so difficult that I was munching aspirin, ibuprofen and acetaminophen like it was candy. Finally the damn thing bust open and starts bleeding, heavily. This thing went deep! I was hurting so much that I missed a viking wedding because I couldn't walk from the camp.
Raven had an issue, we thought the heat was getting to her heart so we managed to have us shack up for the remainder of the trip in the air conditioned 'infirmary' that the EMTs on staff had set up. Her with heat issues and me with a bad foot where all I could do was hobble. What a trip. Still, I managed to do what I set out to do. I went for one thing, to remember what it was like and to feel the energy of Florida once again. I saved that energy and put it in a 'bottle' so to speak. I met people I haven't seen in years, but still, I would have liked to have met others. In retrospect, and I'll tell that tale in the January 2012 issue, I could have lost the toe.
Fall 2011
In the fall of 2011 I would actually hear from that crazy, mentally ill Margie again. She told me that she headed out to California to be in a band. Now she's homeless and living with another homeless guy in some camp somewhere and "he's the one for her'. She uses the library computer like all the other homeless slobs in the area. Jeez. I just wish she'd get her crap together and leave me alone. Come back once your life is straight. I have no time for such crap anymore, seriously.
It was a hell of a summer, all those Arab uprisings and whatnot. My foot healed up in about 2 weeks and you'd think nothing happened to it. The fall was a hell of a lot better. October means Samhain and ours was rockin'. A few new faces showed up that time including a few we met at the coffee house pagan chats.
We did a haunted hayride and haunted house at the local park. Wicked fun.
I started doing my writings sometime around September. I put together a DeviantArt site to contain all my chapters. It's pretty cool so far. It's based on my life as a therian, but it adds a lot of pop culture and sci-fi/fantasy influences including but not limited to Anime, Star Trek, Star Wars, Harry Potter and back to the Future. Part of it even includes steam-punk! The Edwards Brother's Mysteries. A short vignette done around Halloween that involves two wolvenkind brothers in Victorian England on the trail of Jack the Ripper.
Nikki would leave the army due to her becoming pregnant by Mid November. We wish he luck in her new civilian life and an easy birth, due sometime in march I think.
Money was getting tight, but still things were looking up for me in November and December. There was the possibility of me getting a permanent gig with the city and actually having paid vacation days. After Samhain, I decided I wanted to do the Yule ritual. I had everything planned. It was going to be so awesome and include a few alchemical things.
That is until Yule actually occurred and my head exploded with excruciating pain and a nasty bloody, pussy discharge...
Monday, April 23, 2012
Introducing Arcanus Tempestas Greywolf - Part the Fifth
2008-2010: The Time of the Stone
We left off at about September of 2008, when I had honestly believed I had formulated the Philosopher's Stone from at least a personal and spiritual standpoint. Various things that I had wanted to return were returning. Things requiring change were changing. Let us recap for a bit.
July - Left Wal-Mart hopefully for good and was offered a tech job in Downtown Fayetteville.
August - Settling in with said tech job and learning the ropes. I quickly saw that my skills, my foundation, was shaky after being outside the box, even with the college training I had 4 years prior.
September - The waters returned to Hope Mills Lake and it felt as if the energies were in balance once more. Pagan shops sprang up like wildflowers to oppose the "Dark One's" store, and all of them in the same Flea Market. Raven began working with a store owned by the one called Rune in the previous chapter. We also got involved with more local pagans through Silver Stars and a newcomer store (Talisen). I felt a strong connection with the owner of the newer store and even joined her meetup group. Sadly, once again all was not as it appeared.
As time went on, while good things were starting and I could see the alchemical reactions forming, something inside told me that something was wrong. The foundation of the Stone's formulation was based on shaky physics and dodgy theory and more importantly inexperience. Things were not as they appeared and soon the reaction that started began to crumble.
October 2008
The market crash that lead to the Great Recession begins. As a result, many companies that had over-hired for new projects, including mine, let people go. The reason I was given was that I was not exactly what they wanted and I was incompetent for the job assigned. Bull! Since Sept, I was beginning to question the legitimacy of the company and of its owner. I mean what kind of an idiot has you fill out required paperwork to see just exactly what assets you own? Apparently I had nothing he wanted and he let me go. In retrospect it was a good idea to leave that job. At the time however, I thought I had created a false Stone and everything was falling apart at the seams. I was beginning to panic and regret even attempting the experiment. But what I did not see at the time was that the Stone was still transmuting my life in subtle ways, showing me what needed to be shown. It was through working at that Tech company downtown that a co-worker would give me a job lead. One that would give me the foundation I needed.
November 2008 - Enter the Jones Boys
In the middle of November, about 3 weeks into my unemployment, so short as to not have even claimed a cent of it, I was offered a position by Mr. Jones at his Real Estate company. The work was pretty much the same as it was for the other company, but for a smaller company that was family owned. It was shaky at first, but I began to expand my knowledge of PHP and Javascript. Mr. Jones was quite particular and a perfectionist and yes I would screw up every now and then, but for some reason known only to him, he never fired me. This was a great boost to my confidence and I would learn more as time went on. I would learn so much from Josh, my co-worker and all the little tricks behind coding. It was not a perfect situation and there would be ups and downs, but I think the 2 1/2 years I worked with them was the best experience I could have asked for.
2009 The Rebirth of an Alchemist
If 2007 was the Black Phase, in which the operation begins by removing the dark matter within, then 2008 was the White Phase wherein I was being lifted rather quickly to the realms above. Indeed it did feel very euphoric. That is until the transmutation began to move into the Red phase and that would sum up 2009. The Red Phase is reintegration. That which was false was seen for what it was and laid to the wayside. I would then reintegrate that which was true within me once more.
Early that year I would continue to work with the Jones' and see a new President inaugurated. We would then be moving to a smaller office to cut corners. Every day with that company I knew could be my last, since it was Real Estate after all. I learned how tenacious Mr. Jones can be.
Raven and I would be invited to the wiccan circle on post at Ft. Bragg. It was the first major pagan community since Florida we were associated with. It was also our first time ever on a military base. I would continue the networking of military people through my gaming activities at the Hobbit. Soon I was visiting with people on base like it was another town. I even did a class on basic alchemy for them. It was awesome!
The base on circle was good, but not exactly what we were looking for, as time went on we found that gas was getting more expensive and we started to look for closer alternatives. It would not be until after Dark Rune pulled his shop out that Raven would join with another.
Oh yes! The shops that sprang up last year would change or completely disappear in 2009, once again thanks to the crash of '08. Actually, I saw some of the magickal warfare that was going on, while leaving myself out of it. The "Dark One" and the "New One" went at it. But the new one did not have a strong foundation and soon her shop was closed all the time. She did people wrong and soon that shop, the largest ever in that flea market, would disappear. Mind you, I was beginning to question the owner as she considered me a newbie to magick. Of course I never did show anyone at that time what I had done and what I had been doing.
Soon only the Dark One and Silver Stars remained. But then another shop would come by. Silver Sisters moved in shortly after Talisen's shop left and then soon Dark Alcove would leave. The original owner of Silver Stars eventually left due to personal issues and left the shop to the co-owner, who would then become part of our new coven.
Late in the year Raven would join up with Silver Stars for doing card readings and consignments. The owner and her daughter combined with Raven and I formed a new "group". First it was a pagan meetup group at the coffee shop, eventually the inner circle became a new coven. Come to find out most of the members that joined in this coven were once part of the original Silver Star's owner's group back in the day. Once again Raven had picked up strays. I tried to get other people in the group as well, but sadly they ended up being "incompatible". I decided to let Raven handle it and became contempt to stand in the sidelines. However my guided meditations became a hit with the group. There was a bit of a squabble that ended in people not liking each other and with me thrown in the middle of it. In the end, those two stopped showing up entirely and it was quite frankly better for all concerned. I was not getting into yet another witch-war. I have bigger and better fish to fry now. This "incident" happened right around the holidays and would trickle into the 2010 year.
For a while we were having meetups at a coffee house called Xtasy Ice Cafe. The most awesome shop I knew. Once a month we would hold a "stitch and bitch" to generally combat the one the "J-dites" had. It would be through this that I would meet Faerybliss, daughter of some witches that have been around this town for years. And though her would I cross paths with someone I had not seen in 14 years. But before all that, Raven would fall ill.
2010 - Year of Changes both Great and Terrible.
April 2010
The same date that the oil rig in the Gulf exploded and gushed millions of gallons of crude into the water, Raven would fall ill and be sent to the hospital. She had been coughing quite a bit since the winter and we thought she had walking pneumonia exacerbated by her smoking. Sadly we found out that she had a heart condition. Congestive Heart Failure, although they called it "mild". Needless to say I was devastated by this. Once again I was put into a relationship with someone who was chronically ill. Of course Raven took it all in stride while I was the once freaking out. I had a feeling that this may have not been a natural occurrence. Why would she just get hit with heart failure like that? I had to look into the aether once more and make absolutely sure.
I hate it when I am right...
Raven was hit magickaly. Somehow someone had used her great heart against her. I had a number of suspects, but it didn't matter. Each one of them would feel retribution, and by 2011, they all did, but that story is to come up later.
As I said, I could feel that Raven was hit by a magickal attack. I did what I knew would help, based on alchemy and hermetic science. I help speed her recovery and so did the many hearts that Raven had touched before this began. A shining field of love enveloped her and everyone who visited her in the hospital could see it. She even looked like she did before she went in. I truly believed she was cured. Yes, my Raven was cured of the magickal ills, but the damage to her body would be permanent. I felt as if I lost part of her that day. Now she can never become the golden one, as the transition into that level of reality may become too great for her body to cope with now. The shock of that level of transmutation would definitely kill her, or so that is how I believe it to be. Nevermind the "lifestyle changes" she had to make for her heart. When did we become old?
Life continued in 2010. Raven survives, I continued to do my work with the Jones' and the coven continued to grow. It was almost like it was back home. And then I would meet someone from my past. Bri.
I knew Bri since I was living with Raven's cousin. She was only a teen in those days. We met at the Xtasy Cafe during one of our meetups and I just had to ask since I saw her FB profile, if she was the one who ran the Vampire LARP back at Crane's Roost in 1996. Sure enough, it was her.
Through Bri I reconnected with my past, but also bolstered my future. Bri lives on the property of a wealthy, tho eccentric, matron of the town who has various pagan evens on the property. My father had managed to attend one of these gatherings back in '07. Now it was my turn to experience this and also add more persons in the local community to my network. it was on her birthday that I got to go to the property for the first time. It was awesome, even if it wasn't a pagan gathering.
Enter the Masons
In May of 2010 I received an email via witchvox. The mail simply stated that the sender represented a small group of a half dozen men who get together and have a dinner once a month and discuss various esoteric subjects. He saw my profile on wtichvox and thought if I would like to be their guest speaker. In no way did he ever imply in the message who or what he was, but somehow I knew that it had to be from an esoteric order. I even had a memory in my subconscious that swears I've seen a group like this mentioned on witchvox. Could it have been a precognition? What had the Stone done this time? Have this order finally found me? Are they Masons? Yes. I suspected they were Freemasons even before I found out. In my mind as I read the email I was saying that "they have found me." Imagine my astonishment when I did a Google look-up on the guy who emailed me and found out he was indeed a Mason, and from the same lodge I had walked past a dozen times before downtown. Truly this had to be the work of the Stone.
I met with the man at the local coffee shop, the very same one in which the "Dark One" held her little gatherings and on the same evening. Yes she was there, but we ignored each other, or I at least her. As I met with the man he told me that all they wanted was someone to talk about alchemy and other esoterica over diner which would be at a fine dining restaurant, their treat. I was overwhelmed by this. I had never, ever been approached as an "expert" in anything before. Other than from witchvox, how else could this man even know about me. Was this the work of the Philosopher's Stone? For I had only done one class on alchemy before and that was on post. Had my reputation preceded me? There was no logical way. I never announced or proclaimed my skill that greatly. Perhaps I was overreacting at the time.
The dinner was very nice and while I felt intimidated at first, I opened up little by little. I had the first 3 chapters of my written alchemy lessons from when I was still in Florida, and years before the Stone experiment. But I forgot that I had mentioned Freemasonry in those notes, specifically about the corn, oil, and wine (the wages of a Freemason) being related to the philosophic salt, sulfur, and mercury. It was this kind of thing they were looking for, someone to show them what the symbols meant, for apparently there are those who want to bring that understanding back to the order. I was honored to be in the presence of like minds that night, and while they were quick to point out that this was not a Masonic event of any kind and they were not allowed to "recruit", I began to debate within myself if I wanted to be a part of that order. "What could I learn from them? What keys do they hold? These guys are based in alchemy, but most don't even know it! Would I benefit? Could I exchange my knowledge?" Many such thoughts ran through my head.
For the remainder of the summer, the thoughts of the masons and the dinner ran through my head. I was contacted by the man who set up the dinner sometime before October. At that time I believe I and Raven had just been to our first event on the property I mentioned earlier, thanks to Bri. things were looking up, finally. We were planning a major event for Samhain at our house and I had invited the man who invited me to that dinner, her invited two more from his order. That was it. I needed no more convincing. I was going to ask to be a Mason on Samhain.
Samhain 2010 was impressive. Raven managed to be part of the first ever Zombie walk. We went to a Halloween party, the first time in 4 years. and we had our coven open Samhain, must have had 15+ people, including representatives of both Silver Stars and Silver Sisters. It was a blast. It was on that night after everything that I "asked 1 2b 1". The petition was done in November and then began the lengthy process of waiting for it to be announced to the lodge, me being interviewed and reviewed and then voted on. This entire thing would continue into the next year. Oh the hopes and the fears. The thoughts of being with people of like mind and the possibilities.
To be continued in 2011 - The Year of Weirdness
We left off at about September of 2008, when I had honestly believed I had formulated the Philosopher's Stone from at least a personal and spiritual standpoint. Various things that I had wanted to return were returning. Things requiring change were changing. Let us recap for a bit.
July - Left Wal-Mart hopefully for good and was offered a tech job in Downtown Fayetteville.
August - Settling in with said tech job and learning the ropes. I quickly saw that my skills, my foundation, was shaky after being outside the box, even with the college training I had 4 years prior.
September - The waters returned to Hope Mills Lake and it felt as if the energies were in balance once more. Pagan shops sprang up like wildflowers to oppose the "Dark One's" store, and all of them in the same Flea Market. Raven began working with a store owned by the one called Rune in the previous chapter. We also got involved with more local pagans through Silver Stars and a newcomer store (Talisen). I felt a strong connection with the owner of the newer store and even joined her meetup group. Sadly, once again all was not as it appeared.
As time went on, while good things were starting and I could see the alchemical reactions forming, something inside told me that something was wrong. The foundation of the Stone's formulation was based on shaky physics and dodgy theory and more importantly inexperience. Things were not as they appeared and soon the reaction that started began to crumble.
October 2008
The market crash that lead to the Great Recession begins. As a result, many companies that had over-hired for new projects, including mine, let people go. The reason I was given was that I was not exactly what they wanted and I was incompetent for the job assigned. Bull! Since Sept, I was beginning to question the legitimacy of the company and of its owner. I mean what kind of an idiot has you fill out required paperwork to see just exactly what assets you own? Apparently I had nothing he wanted and he let me go. In retrospect it was a good idea to leave that job. At the time however, I thought I had created a false Stone and everything was falling apart at the seams. I was beginning to panic and regret even attempting the experiment. But what I did not see at the time was that the Stone was still transmuting my life in subtle ways, showing me what needed to be shown. It was through working at that Tech company downtown that a co-worker would give me a job lead. One that would give me the foundation I needed.
November 2008 - Enter the Jones Boys
In the middle of November, about 3 weeks into my unemployment, so short as to not have even claimed a cent of it, I was offered a position by Mr. Jones at his Real Estate company. The work was pretty much the same as it was for the other company, but for a smaller company that was family owned. It was shaky at first, but I began to expand my knowledge of PHP and Javascript. Mr. Jones was quite particular and a perfectionist and yes I would screw up every now and then, but for some reason known only to him, he never fired me. This was a great boost to my confidence and I would learn more as time went on. I would learn so much from Josh, my co-worker and all the little tricks behind coding. It was not a perfect situation and there would be ups and downs, but I think the 2 1/2 years I worked with them was the best experience I could have asked for.
2009 The Rebirth of an Alchemist
If 2007 was the Black Phase, in which the operation begins by removing the dark matter within, then 2008 was the White Phase wherein I was being lifted rather quickly to the realms above. Indeed it did feel very euphoric. That is until the transmutation began to move into the Red phase and that would sum up 2009. The Red Phase is reintegration. That which was false was seen for what it was and laid to the wayside. I would then reintegrate that which was true within me once more.
Early that year I would continue to work with the Jones' and see a new President inaugurated. We would then be moving to a smaller office to cut corners. Every day with that company I knew could be my last, since it was Real Estate after all. I learned how tenacious Mr. Jones can be.
Raven and I would be invited to the wiccan circle on post at Ft. Bragg. It was the first major pagan community since Florida we were associated with. It was also our first time ever on a military base. I would continue the networking of military people through my gaming activities at the Hobbit. Soon I was visiting with people on base like it was another town. I even did a class on basic alchemy for them. It was awesome!
The base on circle was good, but not exactly what we were looking for, as time went on we found that gas was getting more expensive and we started to look for closer alternatives. It would not be until after Dark Rune pulled his shop out that Raven would join with another.
Oh yes! The shops that sprang up last year would change or completely disappear in 2009, once again thanks to the crash of '08. Actually, I saw some of the magickal warfare that was going on, while leaving myself out of it. The "Dark One" and the "New One" went at it. But the new one did not have a strong foundation and soon her shop was closed all the time. She did people wrong and soon that shop, the largest ever in that flea market, would disappear. Mind you, I was beginning to question the owner as she considered me a newbie to magick. Of course I never did show anyone at that time what I had done and what I had been doing.
Soon only the Dark One and Silver Stars remained. But then another shop would come by. Silver Sisters moved in shortly after Talisen's shop left and then soon Dark Alcove would leave. The original owner of Silver Stars eventually left due to personal issues and left the shop to the co-owner, who would then become part of our new coven.
Late in the year Raven would join up with Silver Stars for doing card readings and consignments. The owner and her daughter combined with Raven and I formed a new "group". First it was a pagan meetup group at the coffee shop, eventually the inner circle became a new coven. Come to find out most of the members that joined in this coven were once part of the original Silver Star's owner's group back in the day. Once again Raven had picked up strays. I tried to get other people in the group as well, but sadly they ended up being "incompatible". I decided to let Raven handle it and became contempt to stand in the sidelines. However my guided meditations became a hit with the group. There was a bit of a squabble that ended in people not liking each other and with me thrown in the middle of it. In the end, those two stopped showing up entirely and it was quite frankly better for all concerned. I was not getting into yet another witch-war. I have bigger and better fish to fry now. This "incident" happened right around the holidays and would trickle into the 2010 year.
For a while we were having meetups at a coffee house called Xtasy Ice Cafe. The most awesome shop I knew. Once a month we would hold a "stitch and bitch" to generally combat the one the "J-dites" had. It would be through this that I would meet Faerybliss, daughter of some witches that have been around this town for years. And though her would I cross paths with someone I had not seen in 14 years. But before all that, Raven would fall ill.
2010 - Year of Changes both Great and Terrible.
April 2010
The same date that the oil rig in the Gulf exploded and gushed millions of gallons of crude into the water, Raven would fall ill and be sent to the hospital. She had been coughing quite a bit since the winter and we thought she had walking pneumonia exacerbated by her smoking. Sadly we found out that she had a heart condition. Congestive Heart Failure, although they called it "mild". Needless to say I was devastated by this. Once again I was put into a relationship with someone who was chronically ill. Of course Raven took it all in stride while I was the once freaking out. I had a feeling that this may have not been a natural occurrence. Why would she just get hit with heart failure like that? I had to look into the aether once more and make absolutely sure.
I hate it when I am right...
Raven was hit magickaly. Somehow someone had used her great heart against her. I had a number of suspects, but it didn't matter. Each one of them would feel retribution, and by 2011, they all did, but that story is to come up later.
As I said, I could feel that Raven was hit by a magickal attack. I did what I knew would help, based on alchemy and hermetic science. I help speed her recovery and so did the many hearts that Raven had touched before this began. A shining field of love enveloped her and everyone who visited her in the hospital could see it. She even looked like she did before she went in. I truly believed she was cured. Yes, my Raven was cured of the magickal ills, but the damage to her body would be permanent. I felt as if I lost part of her that day. Now she can never become the golden one, as the transition into that level of reality may become too great for her body to cope with now. The shock of that level of transmutation would definitely kill her, or so that is how I believe it to be. Nevermind the "lifestyle changes" she had to make for her heart. When did we become old?
Life continued in 2010. Raven survives, I continued to do my work with the Jones' and the coven continued to grow. It was almost like it was back home. And then I would meet someone from my past. Bri.
I knew Bri since I was living with Raven's cousin. She was only a teen in those days. We met at the Xtasy Cafe during one of our meetups and I just had to ask since I saw her FB profile, if she was the one who ran the Vampire LARP back at Crane's Roost in 1996. Sure enough, it was her.
Through Bri I reconnected with my past, but also bolstered my future. Bri lives on the property of a wealthy, tho eccentric, matron of the town who has various pagan evens on the property. My father had managed to attend one of these gatherings back in '07. Now it was my turn to experience this and also add more persons in the local community to my network. it was on her birthday that I got to go to the property for the first time. It was awesome, even if it wasn't a pagan gathering.
Enter the Masons
In May of 2010 I received an email via witchvox. The mail simply stated that the sender represented a small group of a half dozen men who get together and have a dinner once a month and discuss various esoteric subjects. He saw my profile on wtichvox and thought if I would like to be their guest speaker. In no way did he ever imply in the message who or what he was, but somehow I knew that it had to be from an esoteric order. I even had a memory in my subconscious that swears I've seen a group like this mentioned on witchvox. Could it have been a precognition? What had the Stone done this time? Have this order finally found me? Are they Masons? Yes. I suspected they were Freemasons even before I found out. In my mind as I read the email I was saying that "they have found me." Imagine my astonishment when I did a Google look-up on the guy who emailed me and found out he was indeed a Mason, and from the same lodge I had walked past a dozen times before downtown. Truly this had to be the work of the Stone.
I met with the man at the local coffee shop, the very same one in which the "Dark One" held her little gatherings and on the same evening. Yes she was there, but we ignored each other, or I at least her. As I met with the man he told me that all they wanted was someone to talk about alchemy and other esoterica over diner which would be at a fine dining restaurant, their treat. I was overwhelmed by this. I had never, ever been approached as an "expert" in anything before. Other than from witchvox, how else could this man even know about me. Was this the work of the Philosopher's Stone? For I had only done one class on alchemy before and that was on post. Had my reputation preceded me? There was no logical way. I never announced or proclaimed my skill that greatly. Perhaps I was overreacting at the time.
The dinner was very nice and while I felt intimidated at first, I opened up little by little. I had the first 3 chapters of my written alchemy lessons from when I was still in Florida, and years before the Stone experiment. But I forgot that I had mentioned Freemasonry in those notes, specifically about the corn, oil, and wine (the wages of a Freemason) being related to the philosophic salt, sulfur, and mercury. It was this kind of thing they were looking for, someone to show them what the symbols meant, for apparently there are those who want to bring that understanding back to the order. I was honored to be in the presence of like minds that night, and while they were quick to point out that this was not a Masonic event of any kind and they were not allowed to "recruit", I began to debate within myself if I wanted to be a part of that order. "What could I learn from them? What keys do they hold? These guys are based in alchemy, but most don't even know it! Would I benefit? Could I exchange my knowledge?" Many such thoughts ran through my head.
For the remainder of the summer, the thoughts of the masons and the dinner ran through my head. I was contacted by the man who set up the dinner sometime before October. At that time I believe I and Raven had just been to our first event on the property I mentioned earlier, thanks to Bri. things were looking up, finally. We were planning a major event for Samhain at our house and I had invited the man who invited me to that dinner, her invited two more from his order. That was it. I needed no more convincing. I was going to ask to be a Mason on Samhain.
Samhain 2010 was impressive. Raven managed to be part of the first ever Zombie walk. We went to a Halloween party, the first time in 4 years. and we had our coven open Samhain, must have had 15+ people, including representatives of both Silver Stars and Silver Sisters. It was a blast. It was on that night after everything that I "asked 1 2b 1". The petition was done in November and then began the lengthy process of waiting for it to be announced to the lodge, me being interviewed and reviewed and then voted on. This entire thing would continue into the next year. Oh the hopes and the fears. The thoughts of being with people of like mind and the possibilities.
To be continued in 2011 - The Year of Weirdness
Introducing Arcanus Tempestas Greywolf - Part the Fourth
Middle 2000s - Quest for the Philosopher's Stone
"Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Alchemy's First Law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only, truth."
- Alphonse Elric, Fullmetal Alchemist
In the middle 2000s, I became quite an anime nut thanks to Cartoon Network's Adult Swim. Cowboy Bebop, Outlaw Star, and of course Wolf's Rain. Wolves who could do a form a glamor and appear as humans? Anime rocks.
But in 2004 anime wasn't the only weird stuff that I was watching. That year I saw 3 hurricanes criss-cross the state of Florida, and I danced in the eye of one. My sensei Bob, who had just broken up with his lady, ended up becoming a roommate of Me, my Wife and Roy. He challenged me to go in the middle of the storm and truly feel it. I did as he asked. I went out into the stinging rain and truly went to feel the storm. I opened up myself to it and went into the meta-state of a clear mind. I felt a fury even more intense than a full therian mental shift. The absolute fury, the power, the knowledge of existing simply to exist. You are a force of nature, no mind, no worries of economics, politics, or hunger. You simply exist and ride the fluid that is the atmosphere. THIS was the burning rage I felt within. The wolf was but one aspect of myself, the storm was another. Rage without, and the calm quiet within. I was then Arcanus TEMPESTAS Greywolf. The Wolf of Storms!
The middle 2000s saw me become more attune with my inner power. Knowing what a thing is is the first step in learning how to manipulate, or transmute it. I was already into alchemy before the best anime ever caught my eye. That of course was Fullmetal Alchemist. These guys really did their homework on this. It is a fanciful tale of a world where alchemy is a real science. Alchemists actually do read the code of an object, break it down and reform it, and simply by drawing a transmutation circle about it, which look very much like sigils and seals from Solomon's Grimoires. Anyway I encourage people to go out and see it for themselves. Good story, and like all stories, one with a lesson. A lesson that would even affect a 30-something year old werewolf-magickian.
2005 - September We move to Eustis and shortly afterwards the worst hurricane in history hits New Orleans. Katrina. Having experienced the 2004 hurricanes I could feel what Katrina was doing and the fact came over me that this storm was not natural. As a matter of fact I felt that the 2004 hurricanes and even the Tsunami were not natural as well. Someone was fraking with magick was what came out of my mouth. I know many would say I'm insane or event that I'm just reading too many conspiracy theories but think about it. I've be at this thing since my teens and I understand how magick, alchemy, whatever you want to call it, works. A terrible thought had crossed my mind. If you had a power that nobody could trace back to you, that nobody would believe is humanly possible, would you use that as a weapon. My distrust of humanity told me yes, they would. Now what if a terrorist had that ability? Now what if our own GOVERNMENT had that ability. We all know that remote viewing was a real applied science used in secret spying. Who's to say there haven't been agencies researching magick or psionics? We know this stuff has been going on since WWII. Who's to say? Indeed.
In any case I felt something was drastically wrong with the earth and that humanity was tapping into something they had no business tapping into. This could only spell disaster.
2006 - We leave the old coven behind. The fractured coven of 2004 actually got back together and reformed itself like the Phoenix. Mostly because they did it without me. I was so proud of those who remained and made it work. But we decided that it was time for a change, we moved to North Carolina. The reason? I thought I could find other therians and complete my search for the Stone there.
Fayetteville. November 2006. We find one small shop in the Flea Market. It seemed all well and good, but there was something wrong about it. I was no stranger to the dark side and knew it well so it did not affect me. At first we thought it was the only thing, so we stayed with it. I will admit, there was something oddly familiar about it, something from my past...
At Wal-Mart I knew someone for some time and never knew she was connected to the pagan community, until I did a search and found an old meetup group. She was on it. I emailed her and we talked the next day at work. She herself was not a witch or pagan, but her boyfriend was. This is when I got involved with Rune of the Dark Alcove. We met at the old Cross Creek mall and it was like we knew each other immediately. So much in common. While I have felt rage and pain, it was nothing to what I could sense in Rune. He was betrayed and hurt in a way I have never experienced. He reminded me a bit of old Bob. He then told me that the people at the shop we were going were not what they appeared, in fact they were necromancers and dark arts practitioners. A wave of rage came over me. I had nearly been fooled again. Nearly brought into a dark web of deceit and lies and betrayal. But still I was now caught again in another damned fight, but this time I launched a pre-emptive magickal strike of my own. I did my "Sever the Black Tendrils" ritual and had my wolves track down the source. What I discovered was something more powerful than I ever experienced. No less than 13 individuals were involved in the binding. The tendrils would come back like cutting the heads off of a hydra, the wolf was not enough, I had to show them what real power was. I had to become the storm.
BOOM!
Yes I got rid of the nasties, but there is a reason why I posted that bit about equivalent exchange at the beginning. You see I paid a price. That price was loosing my car. For 9 months I had to bum rides to work or walk. An experience I do not wish to repeat. That was most of 2007. Yes I know it may well have been my stupidity in not preparing for the worst and having my car serviced and maintained properly and nothing magickal, but you never know with things like this. In any case I know my cousin and her husband and father-in-law are on Myspace and I only want to thank them for helping me through a rough time and putting up with me when I was without a vehicle.
All this time I was still pursuing alchemy. Reading up on astrology, the permutations of the Name of God "YHVH" and finding out that not only could you evoke elements and planetary forces, but the astrological signs were in fact Alchemic Processes! The permutations of YHVH were the key to unlocking that power. At last! I had the key to deciphering alchemy. Astrology, Kabalah, Golden Dawn ritual and everything I had ever learned about magick an the occult finally were coming all together, the prices finally fit!
Sadly in April of this year, I would say goodby to my old master. The one who first made me aware of what and who I truly am. Robert James Rush. May he party with Bacchus as he always did.
Brother Dark Rune helped me to obtain a vehicle in 2008, it was the beginning of recovery for me. My alchemy knowledge was growing day by day. In May of this year, during a Mercury Retrograde, I performed a ritual which was intended to "Capture the Volitile". At about the same time, my counterpart created a planetary talisman. What we did was truly significant.
"The Philosophers' Stone: those who possess it, no longer bound by the laws of Equivalent Exchange in Alchemy, may gain without sacrifice, create without equal exchange. We searched for it, and we found it." - Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist. Upon finding the Philosopher's Stone
I truly believe these events in some way helped to create a Philosopher's Stone. Not a physical red dtone that grants eternal life, but a spiritual awakening and what is more, all that I have quested for, all that which was lost due to folly and deceit, all that what once was mine has returned.
July 2008 - I regained a tech job and left Wal-Mart for good.
August 2008 - We have found the true pagan community and have involved ourselves in it. What is more, I am gaming again and with Traveller.
September 2008
The waters have returned to Hope Mills Lake
The dark cloud that has been over this town for so long is lifting
More Pagan stores have opened in the Flea Market
Now I am not as egotistical or foolish enough to think I was the only hand in all the change that had happened, that's just plain silly. But I may have done something at the right time. Perhaps that negative cloud was rising before I performed my ritual and that was just enough for it to come through the astral.
There is a big however though. What I have gained may not be exactly what I had before. The job I received is not the IIA. I am monitored closely and have to deal with 8 others in an open room with me so everyone can see what the other is doing. We are a team and we work for someone else, just like Wal-Mart so what I have a fusion of the old and new, how very alchemical. But as any good alchemist you make due with what you have and transmute it to your needs. As a result, I have taken steps never to have a car break down again, I managed to secure a card so I can use that for emergencies. Never before have I thought I could have credit, now I do. I take this as a partial victory.
Still I understand the nature of the Philosopher's Stone and know what true power is. The sun is a manifestation of the Stone, transmuting hydrogen into helium and energy. In turn that gets transmuted into many other elements and great energy. How many stars are there in the galaxy, the universe? That energy permeates everything in the universe, molds it, shapes it, and transmutes it. THAT is POWER!
"Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Alchemy's First Law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only, truth. But the world isn't perfect, and the law is incomplete. Equivalent Exchange doesn't encompass everything that goes on here, but I still choose to believe in its principle: that all things do come at a price, that there's an ebb and a flow, a cycle, that the pain we went through did have a reward, and that anyone who's determined and perseveres will get something of value in return, even if it's not what they expected."
- Alphonse Elric, at the end of the Fullmetal Alchemist series
And there is the lesson that was learned. 30 years of going though it, still going through it, still learning, still doing.
But now I understand. Better to have learned the lesson in 30 years, than to have not learned it at all.
"Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Alchemy's First Law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only, truth."
- Alphonse Elric, Fullmetal Alchemist
In the middle 2000s, I became quite an anime nut thanks to Cartoon Network's Adult Swim. Cowboy Bebop, Outlaw Star, and of course Wolf's Rain. Wolves who could do a form a glamor and appear as humans? Anime rocks.
But in 2004 anime wasn't the only weird stuff that I was watching. That year I saw 3 hurricanes criss-cross the state of Florida, and I danced in the eye of one. My sensei Bob, who had just broken up with his lady, ended up becoming a roommate of Me, my Wife and Roy. He challenged me to go in the middle of the storm and truly feel it. I did as he asked. I went out into the stinging rain and truly went to feel the storm. I opened up myself to it and went into the meta-state of a clear mind. I felt a fury even more intense than a full therian mental shift. The absolute fury, the power, the knowledge of existing simply to exist. You are a force of nature, no mind, no worries of economics, politics, or hunger. You simply exist and ride the fluid that is the atmosphere. THIS was the burning rage I felt within. The wolf was but one aspect of myself, the storm was another. Rage without, and the calm quiet within. I was then Arcanus TEMPESTAS Greywolf. The Wolf of Storms!
The middle 2000s saw me become more attune with my inner power. Knowing what a thing is is the first step in learning how to manipulate, or transmute it. I was already into alchemy before the best anime ever caught my eye. That of course was Fullmetal Alchemist. These guys really did their homework on this. It is a fanciful tale of a world where alchemy is a real science. Alchemists actually do read the code of an object, break it down and reform it, and simply by drawing a transmutation circle about it, which look very much like sigils and seals from Solomon's Grimoires. Anyway I encourage people to go out and see it for themselves. Good story, and like all stories, one with a lesson. A lesson that would even affect a 30-something year old werewolf-magickian.
2005 - September We move to Eustis and shortly afterwards the worst hurricane in history hits New Orleans. Katrina. Having experienced the 2004 hurricanes I could feel what Katrina was doing and the fact came over me that this storm was not natural. As a matter of fact I felt that the 2004 hurricanes and even the Tsunami were not natural as well. Someone was fraking with magick was what came out of my mouth. I know many would say I'm insane or event that I'm just reading too many conspiracy theories but think about it. I've be at this thing since my teens and I understand how magick, alchemy, whatever you want to call it, works. A terrible thought had crossed my mind. If you had a power that nobody could trace back to you, that nobody would believe is humanly possible, would you use that as a weapon. My distrust of humanity told me yes, they would. Now what if a terrorist had that ability? Now what if our own GOVERNMENT had that ability. We all know that remote viewing was a real applied science used in secret spying. Who's to say there haven't been agencies researching magick or psionics? We know this stuff has been going on since WWII. Who's to say? Indeed.
In any case I felt something was drastically wrong with the earth and that humanity was tapping into something they had no business tapping into. This could only spell disaster.
2006 - We leave the old coven behind. The fractured coven of 2004 actually got back together and reformed itself like the Phoenix. Mostly because they did it without me. I was so proud of those who remained and made it work. But we decided that it was time for a change, we moved to North Carolina. The reason? I thought I could find other therians and complete my search for the Stone there.
Fayetteville. November 2006. We find one small shop in the Flea Market. It seemed all well and good, but there was something wrong about it. I was no stranger to the dark side and knew it well so it did not affect me. At first we thought it was the only thing, so we stayed with it. I will admit, there was something oddly familiar about it, something from my past...
At Wal-Mart I knew someone for some time and never knew she was connected to the pagan community, until I did a search and found an old meetup group. She was on it. I emailed her and we talked the next day at work. She herself was not a witch or pagan, but her boyfriend was. This is when I got involved with Rune of the Dark Alcove. We met at the old Cross Creek mall and it was like we knew each other immediately. So much in common. While I have felt rage and pain, it was nothing to what I could sense in Rune. He was betrayed and hurt in a way I have never experienced. He reminded me a bit of old Bob. He then told me that the people at the shop we were going were not what they appeared, in fact they were necromancers and dark arts practitioners. A wave of rage came over me. I had nearly been fooled again. Nearly brought into a dark web of deceit and lies and betrayal. But still I was now caught again in another damned fight, but this time I launched a pre-emptive magickal strike of my own. I did my "Sever the Black Tendrils" ritual and had my wolves track down the source. What I discovered was something more powerful than I ever experienced. No less than 13 individuals were involved in the binding. The tendrils would come back like cutting the heads off of a hydra, the wolf was not enough, I had to show them what real power was. I had to become the storm.
BOOM!
Yes I got rid of the nasties, but there is a reason why I posted that bit about equivalent exchange at the beginning. You see I paid a price. That price was loosing my car. For 9 months I had to bum rides to work or walk. An experience I do not wish to repeat. That was most of 2007. Yes I know it may well have been my stupidity in not preparing for the worst and having my car serviced and maintained properly and nothing magickal, but you never know with things like this. In any case I know my cousin and her husband and father-in-law are on Myspace and I only want to thank them for helping me through a rough time and putting up with me when I was without a vehicle.
All this time I was still pursuing alchemy. Reading up on astrology, the permutations of the Name of God "YHVH" and finding out that not only could you evoke elements and planetary forces, but the astrological signs were in fact Alchemic Processes! The permutations of YHVH were the key to unlocking that power. At last! I had the key to deciphering alchemy. Astrology, Kabalah, Golden Dawn ritual and everything I had ever learned about magick an the occult finally were coming all together, the prices finally fit!
Sadly in April of this year, I would say goodby to my old master. The one who first made me aware of what and who I truly am. Robert James Rush. May he party with Bacchus as he always did.
Brother Dark Rune helped me to obtain a vehicle in 2008, it was the beginning of recovery for me. My alchemy knowledge was growing day by day. In May of this year, during a Mercury Retrograde, I performed a ritual which was intended to "Capture the Volitile". At about the same time, my counterpart created a planetary talisman. What we did was truly significant.
"The Philosophers' Stone: those who possess it, no longer bound by the laws of Equivalent Exchange in Alchemy, may gain without sacrifice, create without equal exchange. We searched for it, and we found it." - Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist. Upon finding the Philosopher's Stone
I truly believe these events in some way helped to create a Philosopher's Stone. Not a physical red dtone that grants eternal life, but a spiritual awakening and what is more, all that I have quested for, all that which was lost due to folly and deceit, all that what once was mine has returned.
July 2008 - I regained a tech job and left Wal-Mart for good.
August 2008 - We have found the true pagan community and have involved ourselves in it. What is more, I am gaming again and with Traveller.
September 2008
The waters have returned to Hope Mills Lake
The dark cloud that has been over this town for so long is lifting
More Pagan stores have opened in the Flea Market
Now I am not as egotistical or foolish enough to think I was the only hand in all the change that had happened, that's just plain silly. But I may have done something at the right time. Perhaps that negative cloud was rising before I performed my ritual and that was just enough for it to come through the astral.
There is a big however though. What I have gained may not be exactly what I had before. The job I received is not the IIA. I am monitored closely and have to deal with 8 others in an open room with me so everyone can see what the other is doing. We are a team and we work for someone else, just like Wal-Mart so what I have a fusion of the old and new, how very alchemical. But as any good alchemist you make due with what you have and transmute it to your needs. As a result, I have taken steps never to have a car break down again, I managed to secure a card so I can use that for emergencies. Never before have I thought I could have credit, now I do. I take this as a partial victory.
Still I understand the nature of the Philosopher's Stone and know what true power is. The sun is a manifestation of the Stone, transmuting hydrogen into helium and energy. In turn that gets transmuted into many other elements and great energy. How many stars are there in the galaxy, the universe? That energy permeates everything in the universe, molds it, shapes it, and transmutes it. THAT is POWER!
"Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is Alchemy's First Law of Equivalent Exchange. In those days, we really believed that to be the world's one, and only, truth. But the world isn't perfect, and the law is incomplete. Equivalent Exchange doesn't encompass everything that goes on here, but I still choose to believe in its principle: that all things do come at a price, that there's an ebb and a flow, a cycle, that the pain we went through did have a reward, and that anyone who's determined and perseveres will get something of value in return, even if it's not what they expected."
- Alphonse Elric, at the end of the Fullmetal Alchemist series
And there is the lesson that was learned. 30 years of going though it, still going through it, still learning, still doing.
But now I understand. Better to have learned the lesson in 30 years, than to have not learned it at all.
Introducing Arcanus Tempestas Greywolf - Part the Third
The new millennium...
The year 2000 was a continuation of the joy of 1999. I got to travel and see the Grand Canyon. I went from a solitary to group practitioner by way of an Orlando pagan group. I still thought I had it made. I then made some foolish decisions. I tried to help people again and get involved in things I should have left alone. I became very good at the lesser banishing ritual and thought I could banish any negative force. I thought I could help people by doing ritual cleansings and banishing. I got involved with a couple who were not what they appeared to be. I also got involved in a wiccan group who on the surface seemed okay but had elements of the previous SCA witch was in it. I knew the people involved and thought the war was settled between Bob and this other witch that I didn't even think twice about it, I was over it by this time. Apparently the combination of this witch who was chastised legally by my master and the wrong choices would add up. Everything came to head in March of 2001 when I dared experiment with Chronomancy. That's right kids, uncle Arcanus played with time magick. Believe this to be codswallop if you wish, but I did go through with this magickal experiment, that much is true.
The ritual was simple. Create a circle of charged quartz crystal around me and intone the proper date astrologically. The effect was to be similar to the 'Quantum Leap' effect where I would astrally travel back in time to my past self. Part of this was due to the fact that I believed that the 'voice' and the deja-vu experiences were in fact due to myself doing this particular type of magick in the future. I felt I was magickaly experienced and knowledgeable enough to tackle something of this magnitude. I was wrong.
My equations were perfect. I had everything lined up correctly. The banishing rituals on the elemental and planetary scale were enacted. I even made sure I wrote notes in case there was temporary amnesia. Everything seemed perfect. At the time of the casting, everything was perfect. When I came out of the astral time-votrex everything seemed right, but I felt younger, and a bit confused. There was that amnesia effect I was expecting. I then thought that I may have switched places with my younger self, indeed I had. This was the law of exchange in action. While me age 30 was in the body of me age 16, age 16 me was displaced in my age 30 body. Even after the ritual and we were back where we needed to be, it was incomplete pieces of my 30 year old self were stuck back in 1986 and vice-versa, eventually all would straighten itself out, but not in time. This is where I seriously fraked up magickaly. Work became confusing due to having to retrieve memories. I did not take things a seriously as an adult would have. I am still not sure if this was the cause of me loosing the best job I ever had, nonetheless I did loose it.
After loosing my tech job that paid 35K a year, and the fact that I was only a month away from full vestiture of my 401K really torqued me off. The young kid that was still in me disappeared, and the angry dark wolf came back to the surface. I would stay in my room and not do a damned thing except to call the state and let them know I was still looking for a job so I could collect unemployment. 6 months later I would be contacted by a Wiccan coven.
Sept 2001. I would hook up with the Moon Children of the Earth coven, led by Crystal Moon a 3rd degree wiccan High Priestess who was only a bit younger than me. The first meeting was general an Esbat and get together and everything seemed cool. I really liked this group and I felt at home in this, my first coven. Me and Crystal have the same ideas on teaching, book knowledge types. She knew I was without job and helped me to find one. Then next week happened...
9-11-01
A date that will live in infamy as much as 12-7-41 did before. Those towers falling only enraged me more than seeing the plane crash into them. I could not hold back the shift, the rage was too intense. I had to run to the backyard and howl. I knew this was it, we were going to be at war, I just knew it. This may be Raganarok or whatever you want to call it. The following weekend we went back to the coven-stead to talk about the 9-11 attacks. When it came my turn to share, I freaked out everyone. Last week where there was a happy puppy about to learn new stuff in a group, there now sat a dark and fearsome beast. I was in full shift, and far from happy. "To you sons of camel whores, we will hunt you, we will find you, and we will destroy you, that can be certain." My face was contorted, my eyes squinted and glowing with burning rage. The HPs and her maiden could see my astral form, my true form. Before them sat a wolf, ready to attack and unleash his fury upon all who betrayed him and wronged so many innocents. It was then an there when I knew that the wolf was not my totem, but I WAS the wolf!
After that fateful day I lost all hope for mankind and any hope for the future. I became a wanderer on a dark path. Although I was part of a coven, it didn't really matter. All I had to do to go through the degree system was take a test for 1st degree which I passed and go to an elevation ritual. A year and a day after that I would take my 2nd degree test, pass it and be elevated by the then Maiden of the coven. You see Crystal and her husband came apart and the coven fell into the maiden's hands. I was to become the High Priest and assist in the coven. At this time I was in and out of jobs so I had plenty of time to deal with the coven. I was foolish to try to take on responsibility when I was still trying to get over a major issue, unemployment, but what was I going to do, brood in front of my computer all day? Besides I had taken upon myself to become as powerful as I possibly could be, go through the ranks in the coven and learn true magick power so that I could correct the mistakes of the past and get back what was rightfully mine. Spring, the HPs of the new coven stepped down and before I knew it I was the one in charge. My way of running the coven was at first liaises-faire, do what thou wilt and all that. That attitude would have serious repercussions in the fact that no one would respect me. We were a wild and free coven but rituals were structured. It was all well and good until people wanted more. There were then debates and discussions, but never a full blown witch war. In the end they went with either a vote, or what I decided.
In 2004, I finally landed a permanent gig at Wal-Mart. And at that time work became my biggest priority. I simply could not direct a coven and work and go to school(even if it was online) at the same time. I tried to delegate authority, but then that led to politics. Who's first at being a first as it were. It held together until the day we lost the house that was our coven-stead. We were renting and the landlady sold it. So with no place to go, the coven debated on where to do anything. "I'm closer", "I'm more experienced" yaddah yaddah. It was the beginning of the end.
We moved from Sanford to Eustis FL and met up with a Wiccan 2nd degree who had been trained out west in a Gardenarian coven. I was intrigued by how Wicca was done the "Old School" way and I pretty much found out that my coven was little more than a pack of fluffy bunnies led by a ceremonial magickian. I brought her in and decided she should at least be 1st degree. Well this did not go over well with the rest of the group and a great schism was created. There were attacks on both ends and before I knew it I had a full fledged witch was on my hands. I ended it my way, which effectively meant telling everyone to screw themselves and going home. The coven was over. I gave all the coven stuff to whoever wanted it and washed my hands of the situation. No I was not liked by many people after that fact. But I did not care. I was now free to pursue the real magick I so desperately looked for. I knew that Wicca as it was with this group was not what I wanted. I also discovered what it was I truly am, a quick search on yahoo found the word "Therianthopy". I also learned that the key to the great code of the universe had been under my nose all along in the art of Alchemy. I then decided to pursue the Great Work and declare myself an Alchemist and Hermeticist.
The old coven would eventually pick up the pieces and reform anew like the great Pheonix. "Igne Natura Renovatur Integra", Through Fire is Nature Remade Whole.
This story is still not complete, the last chapter details how I actually discovered the Philosopher's Stone and set things back the way they should be, and the trials and tribulations therein.
Then again, an alchemist's story is never complete...
The year 2000 was a continuation of the joy of 1999. I got to travel and see the Grand Canyon. I went from a solitary to group practitioner by way of an Orlando pagan group. I still thought I had it made. I then made some foolish decisions. I tried to help people again and get involved in things I should have left alone. I became very good at the lesser banishing ritual and thought I could banish any negative force. I thought I could help people by doing ritual cleansings and banishing. I got involved with a couple who were not what they appeared to be. I also got involved in a wiccan group who on the surface seemed okay but had elements of the previous SCA witch was in it. I knew the people involved and thought the war was settled between Bob and this other witch that I didn't even think twice about it, I was over it by this time. Apparently the combination of this witch who was chastised legally by my master and the wrong choices would add up. Everything came to head in March of 2001 when I dared experiment with Chronomancy. That's right kids, uncle Arcanus played with time magick. Believe this to be codswallop if you wish, but I did go through with this magickal experiment, that much is true.
The ritual was simple. Create a circle of charged quartz crystal around me and intone the proper date astrologically. The effect was to be similar to the 'Quantum Leap' effect where I would astrally travel back in time to my past self. Part of this was due to the fact that I believed that the 'voice' and the deja-vu experiences were in fact due to myself doing this particular type of magick in the future. I felt I was magickaly experienced and knowledgeable enough to tackle something of this magnitude. I was wrong.
My equations were perfect. I had everything lined up correctly. The banishing rituals on the elemental and planetary scale were enacted. I even made sure I wrote notes in case there was temporary amnesia. Everything seemed perfect. At the time of the casting, everything was perfect. When I came out of the astral time-votrex everything seemed right, but I felt younger, and a bit confused. There was that amnesia effect I was expecting. I then thought that I may have switched places with my younger self, indeed I had. This was the law of exchange in action. While me age 30 was in the body of me age 16, age 16 me was displaced in my age 30 body. Even after the ritual and we were back where we needed to be, it was incomplete pieces of my 30 year old self were stuck back in 1986 and vice-versa, eventually all would straighten itself out, but not in time. This is where I seriously fraked up magickaly. Work became confusing due to having to retrieve memories. I did not take things a seriously as an adult would have. I am still not sure if this was the cause of me loosing the best job I ever had, nonetheless I did loose it.
After loosing my tech job that paid 35K a year, and the fact that I was only a month away from full vestiture of my 401K really torqued me off. The young kid that was still in me disappeared, and the angry dark wolf came back to the surface. I would stay in my room and not do a damned thing except to call the state and let them know I was still looking for a job so I could collect unemployment. 6 months later I would be contacted by a Wiccan coven.
Sept 2001. I would hook up with the Moon Children of the Earth coven, led by Crystal Moon a 3rd degree wiccan High Priestess who was only a bit younger than me. The first meeting was general an Esbat and get together and everything seemed cool. I really liked this group and I felt at home in this, my first coven. Me and Crystal have the same ideas on teaching, book knowledge types. She knew I was without job and helped me to find one. Then next week happened...
9-11-01
A date that will live in infamy as much as 12-7-41 did before. Those towers falling only enraged me more than seeing the plane crash into them. I could not hold back the shift, the rage was too intense. I had to run to the backyard and howl. I knew this was it, we were going to be at war, I just knew it. This may be Raganarok or whatever you want to call it. The following weekend we went back to the coven-stead to talk about the 9-11 attacks. When it came my turn to share, I freaked out everyone. Last week where there was a happy puppy about to learn new stuff in a group, there now sat a dark and fearsome beast. I was in full shift, and far from happy. "To you sons of camel whores, we will hunt you, we will find you, and we will destroy you, that can be certain." My face was contorted, my eyes squinted and glowing with burning rage. The HPs and her maiden could see my astral form, my true form. Before them sat a wolf, ready to attack and unleash his fury upon all who betrayed him and wronged so many innocents. It was then an there when I knew that the wolf was not my totem, but I WAS the wolf!
After that fateful day I lost all hope for mankind and any hope for the future. I became a wanderer on a dark path. Although I was part of a coven, it didn't really matter. All I had to do to go through the degree system was take a test for 1st degree which I passed and go to an elevation ritual. A year and a day after that I would take my 2nd degree test, pass it and be elevated by the then Maiden of the coven. You see Crystal and her husband came apart and the coven fell into the maiden's hands. I was to become the High Priest and assist in the coven. At this time I was in and out of jobs so I had plenty of time to deal with the coven. I was foolish to try to take on responsibility when I was still trying to get over a major issue, unemployment, but what was I going to do, brood in front of my computer all day? Besides I had taken upon myself to become as powerful as I possibly could be, go through the ranks in the coven and learn true magick power so that I could correct the mistakes of the past and get back what was rightfully mine. Spring, the HPs of the new coven stepped down and before I knew it I was the one in charge. My way of running the coven was at first liaises-faire, do what thou wilt and all that. That attitude would have serious repercussions in the fact that no one would respect me. We were a wild and free coven but rituals were structured. It was all well and good until people wanted more. There were then debates and discussions, but never a full blown witch war. In the end they went with either a vote, or what I decided.
In 2004, I finally landed a permanent gig at Wal-Mart. And at that time work became my biggest priority. I simply could not direct a coven and work and go to school(even if it was online) at the same time. I tried to delegate authority, but then that led to politics. Who's first at being a first as it were. It held together until the day we lost the house that was our coven-stead. We were renting and the landlady sold it. So with no place to go, the coven debated on where to do anything. "I'm closer", "I'm more experienced" yaddah yaddah. It was the beginning of the end.
We moved from Sanford to Eustis FL and met up with a Wiccan 2nd degree who had been trained out west in a Gardenarian coven. I was intrigued by how Wicca was done the "Old School" way and I pretty much found out that my coven was little more than a pack of fluffy bunnies led by a ceremonial magickian. I brought her in and decided she should at least be 1st degree. Well this did not go over well with the rest of the group and a great schism was created. There were attacks on both ends and before I knew it I had a full fledged witch was on my hands. I ended it my way, which effectively meant telling everyone to screw themselves and going home. The coven was over. I gave all the coven stuff to whoever wanted it and washed my hands of the situation. No I was not liked by many people after that fact. But I did not care. I was now free to pursue the real magick I so desperately looked for. I knew that Wicca as it was with this group was not what I wanted. I also discovered what it was I truly am, a quick search on yahoo found the word "Therianthopy". I also learned that the key to the great code of the universe had been under my nose all along in the art of Alchemy. I then decided to pursue the Great Work and declare myself an Alchemist and Hermeticist.
The old coven would eventually pick up the pieces and reform anew like the great Pheonix. "Igne Natura Renovatur Integra", Through Fire is Nature Remade Whole.
This story is still not complete, the last chapter details how I actually discovered the Philosopher's Stone and set things back the way they should be, and the trials and tribulations therein.
Then again, an alchemist's story is never complete...
Introducing Arcanus Greywolf - Part the Second
Enter the 1990s...
The quest for the solution to my question of why religion "is what it is" and the proof to my theory that all religion is based on "one thing" came about from my soul searching experiences in college. When I entered college, I had absolutely no idea what the deuce I wanted to do with my life. I had just gotten through high school by the skin of my teeth, my old D&D group were scattered to the four winds and I found myself alone and living with my grandmother, which may have been a mistake. Top it all off with the fact that I was not working and generally living off of school grants and loans. The school of hard knocks came quickly, but I totally ignored it. I was forced to leave school and get a job only to quit that job and go back to school and try to get my GPA back up. The first 2 years of college were a dismal failure. I had the same attitude I had in high school. I shifted majors every semester it seemed. First electromechanical engineering, then physics, then chemistry, then biology, then ending with liberal arts. It took me 4 years to get my 2 year degree and by then I had so many elective credits I could have been a Junior by the time I entered UCF.
During my early college years I continued gaming with kids who were still in high school. It did not help that we lived right next to a bookstore in Deland, FL. Every week I would by something new, especially a Dragon magazine. The occult studies were put on hold (my grandmother didn't approve) I would still do experiments when she was out of town. My social deviance would continue even in those days. I did learn how to drive at least and soon saw myself driving to school. I would go back to Titusville and visit the only friend I had left there. Even though he was a Christian and not one of the D&D group I spent many weekends with him. I think he helped to calm my butt down a bit, but we were still weird. Dennis my friend, those days will always be remembered (Schmaltz!).
I left my grandmother and moved back in with my mother in 1990, and then went back to school after a disastrous foray in the real world. Apparently I was still not ready for it. It was a job as a graphic artist, or rather a draftsman. I was totally unprepared. School didn't help, mind you I didn't really study very hard either. It wasn't me. Also at this time my empathic ability shot right through the roof where I was sensing everybody's pain, in addition to my own. I learned to create the mental blocks quickly, but once a mind has touched you it's very hard to remove the experience. What was needed was a shield to go up the minute I sensed something. Ah youth...
I joined the Society for Creative Anachronism that year with my mother. The SCA is a unique experience and I am told you do not reach the exalted rank of Uber-geek until you have been in it at least a year. I found it interesting at first, and then a little too political. But if it were not for the SCA, I would have never met the people who would actually help me through a very difficult stage in my life.
It was through the SCA that I was first exposed face to face with Wicca. I had heard of it through my readings as a teen, but never thought it was for me, a bit too sexually oriented for my tastes and I thought the whole thing was one big Freudian nightmare. That theory was shattered when I actually witnessed a Wiccan hand-fasting ceremony. Suddenly a memory from my past came back. Ceremony, circle, fire, unity candle, jumping the broom. All these things seemed oddly familiar to me. It was also at this time that the "deja-vu" experiences I had in my teens came back with a vengeance. Every SCA event I attended seemed familiar to the smallest detail. The "buzz" had returned. But I still was blocking it, refusing to see what it was.
The early 90s were a flash of events, but all of them important. I was only a bystander in the SCA from 1990-1992. After 1992 I actually got involved. Enter Herr Doktor Wulf van der Russ, mka Bob Rush. A man who would be my Obi-Wan. Fencing was being introduced into the SCA and I wanted to be a part of it. This man put a sword in my hand and said go at it. I got poked repeatedly. He then had me go in the garage and play with an experienced fencer in close quarters. Poke after poke I simply could not keep the touches from getting me. Then it happened. My first real shift. Time seemed to slow down, I could feel the rage swell within me from the frustration. I could feel my face begin to contort and my eyes focus on the opponent. Parry, parry, thrust. Touch was mine. I scored my first touch. it took me a few seconds to come out of it and I was all like, what the frak just happened?
"You just cracked your shell with your egg-tooth" was what Bob said to me, but what I heard was Obi-wan "you have just stepped into a far greater world"
Needless to say fencing soon became my aggressive outlet, I became quite good, nothing masterful mind you, but I could hold my own. My technique was chaotic, doing a different move every bout to keep people guessing. Honestly I didn't even know what I was going to to next, I just let the subconscious rage direct me.
I also went head first in to witchcraft. I was introduced to it by Buckland's Complete Book of Witchcraft. I was more interested in the actual magick side of things rather than the whole religious aspect (deities and holidays) of it. I wanted power, real power. A power I could use to get what I desired without anyone being the wiser. The whole religion part of it didn't seem to mesh with me at that time. I would commune with nature and actually begin to feel the energy of the earth at that time. I was still unaware of what was truly inside of me trying to come out.
In 1994 tragedy would enter my life. My chronically ill mother would pass away. While this devastated me, I felt as if her passing was necessary. At last this woman was in peace, no longer in pain. If only I could know such peace. I entered a very dark period in my life. My attitude towards all started to waver and I sought solace only through gaming, the SCA, and school. I had to get a job now and I went into working at SubWay with the gaming/SCA group I met the year before my mothers death. I ended up living with Roy, my mother's last lover and whom I would consider an step-father.
In 1995 I would come face to face with what most would call karma or the threefold law. Today I simply call it "exchange", and there is nothing equivalent about it. I was asked, no tricked by someone to "reflect" negative energy back at someone who had supposedly done her wrong. I was young and foolish and just beginning to understand magick. I soon learned that the person was the one in the wrong and I felt the brunt of the backlash. Work became unbearable and I soon learned that college at UCF was never going to pan out. I left school and work and went to live with the gaming group, living on what was left of my mother's life insurance claim.
Life with this group was an experiment in socialism. Anyone who had money put it into the pot and the bills were paid out of that. That was fine for those of us who did not work, a bit of a pain for those who did. Somehow it worked out for about 2 years. I also effectively quit the SCA at this time and drowned myself in magick and computer gaming. I did manage to learn a bit of HTML in the process. As I said we were a major gaming group, it was not uncommon for us to be playing until 3am. One of these people is on my Friends list. Chaz, Scott, Lewis and Bob thank you for your friendship and support during those years we lived together. We had our ups and downs, but the time will never be forgotten.
Also during this time I started to look at Wicca from a new perspective. Perhaps there was something to the laws and tenets of the craft after all. Thanks to the internet I learned more and more about Wicca and the craft in general. I talked on IRC and message boards and learned more and more about stuff. I also came to the conclusion that my mother had been experimenting with it shortly before her death. She did a naming ceremony for her first grandchild in 1994, months before her death. I didn't know at first, but the ceremony was in fact derived from a Wiccaning! Always the tactful one, mom stated that it was a "non denominational" ceremony. Seeming that it was performed at an SCA event she did not want to offend anyone. I was also helped by reading the books of a witch in the SCA. I was always welcomed by Connie to watch her house and from there I would read the works of Cunningham and Silver Ravenwolf. I learned where I went wrong, and soon dedicated myself properly to Wicca in 1996.
This person who introduced me to Wicca proper also landed me my first gig as a computer programer. I was a web designer then a web administrator, it seemed as if the karma was paid off, but I still had to face another test...
I was watching Connie's house late Feb 1997 and the dog that had never had a problem with me decided he was going to be belligerent. Perhaps he was scared in the fact that "mom" was not home, but in any case he challenged me. He sat there growling at me as I tried to get to the bathroom. I was certain he was going to bite me. I put my hand out as you would when approaching any unfamiliar dog, he didn't bite, nor growl. I was like, okay you're trying to assert dominance. Fine. Frak you! And I walked over the dog with full assertiveness. It was when I let my guard down with a sigh of relief that the dog grabbed my arm by the wrist. I was like "oh you so did NOT bite me just now!" I did not try to pull my hand from his clasped jaws but rather let him continue to hold on as I looked at him with the same kind of feeling I had when I first "zoned out" in that first fencing match and mentally said "Let go, let go NOW!" The dog let go, stood its ground barking but did not make another attack and I headed for the door going to Roy's house just down the street.
The bite was bad. The canine had reached down to the Ulna and was causing considerable pain. I sat in the emergency room for hours before anyone came in to look at the wound, which was actually 2, one on the top and one on the bottom of the wrist. All they did was sterilize it and put a steri-stip on it. No stitches since it was an animal bite and they wanted it to drain.
Needless to say when Connie came back, she was not amused. She did some magick on the wrist, the first time magick was done on me I might add. I also did some stuff to aid the process. The night of the bite I had a dream of the wound being cleansed in a bubble bath and the wound disappearing. Apparently this had an effect for on the 3rd day after the hit I went back to the hospital for a checkup. The nurse's aid freaked because the scab on the bite had puss. The head nurse cleaned the wound and said, "no it's not infected, that was all the toxins rising to the surface." No infection, brilliant. It would still be days before I gained the full functionallity of my wrist. I was painful to even use the mouse at work. Though this I learned 2 things. I accepted the wolf within, but I became fearful of dogs. Dogs became my "Shadow totem". It would take years to get over the fear of dogs.
In 1998 I experienced my first "Witch War". While I was not directly involved in it, my master Bob was at the forefront of this. It all started when someone in the SCA, someone I knew from when I first joined, started doing crap that involved teching wicca to minors. That wasn't the worst of it. She was using magick and ritual to coerce others into joining her 'coven'. Orgies and bloodletting were rumored to be happeneing. I could feel the rage of the wolf buring within me, but my Master warned me not to get involved, even though I knew that my mother was a victim of this witch's wrongdoings. This bitch even claimed to have performed death curses, claiming she was the one who caused someone to get into a motorcycle accident. I wanted to kill her. "And that is why you must not get involved", said Bob. I heeded the master's warnings, and stayed my hand. This would be a situation that would not be fully resolved until well into the early 21st century.
1999 was the last, best year of the 20th century. I was living the high life. I had a good job, a good wife, didn't have to want for much and was growing more powerful and confident by the day. I felt I could do no wrong. I was going on roadtrips across the country, got to see New Orleans that year and saw Weird Al on stage. There were a few revelations and tribulations and sadly it all ended too quickly. In the end the decade would end as it started, at an SCA event. I would meet this very strange lady who was a witch and had a knack for just seeing inside people. She told me many things that I can't quite remeber but summed it up as "You are meant for far greater things than what you are doing. There will come times where you must make a choice. There will be times where you must be alone. But in the end you will know who you truly are." That night was new year's eve and as the clock chimed 12 and Y2K faded from fear into foolish folly I could feel my true self come to the surface. This was the greatest shift I have yet experienced. I was the wolf at that point. I was on all hands and feet and baying at the moon!" A new dawn has come. Sadly it would be short lived. While I felt the world was my oyster, I would learn in the '00s that it could be easily taken away from someone who has a weak foundation.
That story to continue in the next installment.
The quest for the solution to my question of why religion "is what it is" and the proof to my theory that all religion is based on "one thing" came about from my soul searching experiences in college. When I entered college, I had absolutely no idea what the deuce I wanted to do with my life. I had just gotten through high school by the skin of my teeth, my old D&D group were scattered to the four winds and I found myself alone and living with my grandmother, which may have been a mistake. Top it all off with the fact that I was not working and generally living off of school grants and loans. The school of hard knocks came quickly, but I totally ignored it. I was forced to leave school and get a job only to quit that job and go back to school and try to get my GPA back up. The first 2 years of college were a dismal failure. I had the same attitude I had in high school. I shifted majors every semester it seemed. First electromechanical engineering, then physics, then chemistry, then biology, then ending with liberal arts. It took me 4 years to get my 2 year degree and by then I had so many elective credits I could have been a Junior by the time I entered UCF.
During my early college years I continued gaming with kids who were still in high school. It did not help that we lived right next to a bookstore in Deland, FL. Every week I would by something new, especially a Dragon magazine. The occult studies were put on hold (my grandmother didn't approve) I would still do experiments when she was out of town. My social deviance would continue even in those days. I did learn how to drive at least and soon saw myself driving to school. I would go back to Titusville and visit the only friend I had left there. Even though he was a Christian and not one of the D&D group I spent many weekends with him. I think he helped to calm my butt down a bit, but we were still weird. Dennis my friend, those days will always be remembered (Schmaltz!).
I left my grandmother and moved back in with my mother in 1990, and then went back to school after a disastrous foray in the real world. Apparently I was still not ready for it. It was a job as a graphic artist, or rather a draftsman. I was totally unprepared. School didn't help, mind you I didn't really study very hard either. It wasn't me. Also at this time my empathic ability shot right through the roof where I was sensing everybody's pain, in addition to my own. I learned to create the mental blocks quickly, but once a mind has touched you it's very hard to remove the experience. What was needed was a shield to go up the minute I sensed something. Ah youth...
I joined the Society for Creative Anachronism that year with my mother. The SCA is a unique experience and I am told you do not reach the exalted rank of Uber-geek until you have been in it at least a year. I found it interesting at first, and then a little too political. But if it were not for the SCA, I would have never met the people who would actually help me through a very difficult stage in my life.
It was through the SCA that I was first exposed face to face with Wicca. I had heard of it through my readings as a teen, but never thought it was for me, a bit too sexually oriented for my tastes and I thought the whole thing was one big Freudian nightmare. That theory was shattered when I actually witnessed a Wiccan hand-fasting ceremony. Suddenly a memory from my past came back. Ceremony, circle, fire, unity candle, jumping the broom. All these things seemed oddly familiar to me. It was also at this time that the "deja-vu" experiences I had in my teens came back with a vengeance. Every SCA event I attended seemed familiar to the smallest detail. The "buzz" had returned. But I still was blocking it, refusing to see what it was.
The early 90s were a flash of events, but all of them important. I was only a bystander in the SCA from 1990-1992. After 1992 I actually got involved. Enter Herr Doktor Wulf van der Russ, mka Bob Rush. A man who would be my Obi-Wan. Fencing was being introduced into the SCA and I wanted to be a part of it. This man put a sword in my hand and said go at it. I got poked repeatedly. He then had me go in the garage and play with an experienced fencer in close quarters. Poke after poke I simply could not keep the touches from getting me. Then it happened. My first real shift. Time seemed to slow down, I could feel the rage swell within me from the frustration. I could feel my face begin to contort and my eyes focus on the opponent. Parry, parry, thrust. Touch was mine. I scored my first touch. it took me a few seconds to come out of it and I was all like, what the frak just happened?
"You just cracked your shell with your egg-tooth" was what Bob said to me, but what I heard was Obi-wan "you have just stepped into a far greater world"
Needless to say fencing soon became my aggressive outlet, I became quite good, nothing masterful mind you, but I could hold my own. My technique was chaotic, doing a different move every bout to keep people guessing. Honestly I didn't even know what I was going to to next, I just let the subconscious rage direct me.
I also went head first in to witchcraft. I was introduced to it by Buckland's Complete Book of Witchcraft. I was more interested in the actual magick side of things rather than the whole religious aspect (deities and holidays) of it. I wanted power, real power. A power I could use to get what I desired without anyone being the wiser. The whole religion part of it didn't seem to mesh with me at that time. I would commune with nature and actually begin to feel the energy of the earth at that time. I was still unaware of what was truly inside of me trying to come out.
In 1994 tragedy would enter my life. My chronically ill mother would pass away. While this devastated me, I felt as if her passing was necessary. At last this woman was in peace, no longer in pain. If only I could know such peace. I entered a very dark period in my life. My attitude towards all started to waver and I sought solace only through gaming, the SCA, and school. I had to get a job now and I went into working at SubWay with the gaming/SCA group I met the year before my mothers death. I ended up living with Roy, my mother's last lover and whom I would consider an step-father.
In 1995 I would come face to face with what most would call karma or the threefold law. Today I simply call it "exchange", and there is nothing equivalent about it. I was asked, no tricked by someone to "reflect" negative energy back at someone who had supposedly done her wrong. I was young and foolish and just beginning to understand magick. I soon learned that the person was the one in the wrong and I felt the brunt of the backlash. Work became unbearable and I soon learned that college at UCF was never going to pan out. I left school and work and went to live with the gaming group, living on what was left of my mother's life insurance claim.
Life with this group was an experiment in socialism. Anyone who had money put it into the pot and the bills were paid out of that. That was fine for those of us who did not work, a bit of a pain for those who did. Somehow it worked out for about 2 years. I also effectively quit the SCA at this time and drowned myself in magick and computer gaming. I did manage to learn a bit of HTML in the process. As I said we were a major gaming group, it was not uncommon for us to be playing until 3am. One of these people is on my Friends list. Chaz, Scott, Lewis and Bob thank you for your friendship and support during those years we lived together. We had our ups and downs, but the time will never be forgotten.
Also during this time I started to look at Wicca from a new perspective. Perhaps there was something to the laws and tenets of the craft after all. Thanks to the internet I learned more and more about Wicca and the craft in general. I talked on IRC and message boards and learned more and more about stuff. I also came to the conclusion that my mother had been experimenting with it shortly before her death. She did a naming ceremony for her first grandchild in 1994, months before her death. I didn't know at first, but the ceremony was in fact derived from a Wiccaning! Always the tactful one, mom stated that it was a "non denominational" ceremony. Seeming that it was performed at an SCA event she did not want to offend anyone. I was also helped by reading the books of a witch in the SCA. I was always welcomed by Connie to watch her house and from there I would read the works of Cunningham and Silver Ravenwolf. I learned where I went wrong, and soon dedicated myself properly to Wicca in 1996.
This person who introduced me to Wicca proper also landed me my first gig as a computer programer. I was a web designer then a web administrator, it seemed as if the karma was paid off, but I still had to face another test...
I was watching Connie's house late Feb 1997 and the dog that had never had a problem with me decided he was going to be belligerent. Perhaps he was scared in the fact that "mom" was not home, but in any case he challenged me. He sat there growling at me as I tried to get to the bathroom. I was certain he was going to bite me. I put my hand out as you would when approaching any unfamiliar dog, he didn't bite, nor growl. I was like, okay you're trying to assert dominance. Fine. Frak you! And I walked over the dog with full assertiveness. It was when I let my guard down with a sigh of relief that the dog grabbed my arm by the wrist. I was like "oh you so did NOT bite me just now!" I did not try to pull my hand from his clasped jaws but rather let him continue to hold on as I looked at him with the same kind of feeling I had when I first "zoned out" in that first fencing match and mentally said "Let go, let go NOW!" The dog let go, stood its ground barking but did not make another attack and I headed for the door going to Roy's house just down the street.
The bite was bad. The canine had reached down to the Ulna and was causing considerable pain. I sat in the emergency room for hours before anyone came in to look at the wound, which was actually 2, one on the top and one on the bottom of the wrist. All they did was sterilize it and put a steri-stip on it. No stitches since it was an animal bite and they wanted it to drain.
Needless to say when Connie came back, she was not amused. She did some magick on the wrist, the first time magick was done on me I might add. I also did some stuff to aid the process. The night of the bite I had a dream of the wound being cleansed in a bubble bath and the wound disappearing. Apparently this had an effect for on the 3rd day after the hit I went back to the hospital for a checkup. The nurse's aid freaked because the scab on the bite had puss. The head nurse cleaned the wound and said, "no it's not infected, that was all the toxins rising to the surface." No infection, brilliant. It would still be days before I gained the full functionallity of my wrist. I was painful to even use the mouse at work. Though this I learned 2 things. I accepted the wolf within, but I became fearful of dogs. Dogs became my "Shadow totem". It would take years to get over the fear of dogs.
In 1998 I experienced my first "Witch War". While I was not directly involved in it, my master Bob was at the forefront of this. It all started when someone in the SCA, someone I knew from when I first joined, started doing crap that involved teching wicca to minors. That wasn't the worst of it. She was using magick and ritual to coerce others into joining her 'coven'. Orgies and bloodletting were rumored to be happeneing. I could feel the rage of the wolf buring within me, but my Master warned me not to get involved, even though I knew that my mother was a victim of this witch's wrongdoings. This bitch even claimed to have performed death curses, claiming she was the one who caused someone to get into a motorcycle accident. I wanted to kill her. "And that is why you must not get involved", said Bob. I heeded the master's warnings, and stayed my hand. This would be a situation that would not be fully resolved until well into the early 21st century.
1999 was the last, best year of the 20th century. I was living the high life. I had a good job, a good wife, didn't have to want for much and was growing more powerful and confident by the day. I felt I could do no wrong. I was going on roadtrips across the country, got to see New Orleans that year and saw Weird Al on stage. There were a few revelations and tribulations and sadly it all ended too quickly. In the end the decade would end as it started, at an SCA event. I would meet this very strange lady who was a witch and had a knack for just seeing inside people. She told me many things that I can't quite remeber but summed it up as "You are meant for far greater things than what you are doing. There will come times where you must make a choice. There will be times where you must be alone. But in the end you will know who you truly are." That night was new year's eve and as the clock chimed 12 and Y2K faded from fear into foolish folly I could feel my true self come to the surface. This was the greatest shift I have yet experienced. I was the wolf at that point. I was on all hands and feet and baying at the moon!" A new dawn has come. Sadly it would be short lived. While I felt the world was my oyster, I would learn in the '00s that it could be easily taken away from someone who has a weak foundation.
That story to continue in the next installment.
Introducing Arcanus Tempestas Greywolf - Part the First
As this is a cathartic self analysis, I have decided to produce a chronological account of myself as it pertains to the metaphysical and spiritual side of my life. But as all things connect, it may slip into other facets of my being.
At a young age I was exposed to anything and everything I had an interest in, be that science, mathematics, reading, science fiction, comics, and yes even religion. My grandfather understood the importance of knowledge and was always giving me books to read. Mostly textbooks (he worked as a high school custodian in his later years) and then later Reader's Digest publications. I had a fondness for books on codes and puzzles. It was not uncommon to see my face in the encyclopaedia just to pass the time. Later I gained an interest in books about weird stuff such as metaphysics, UFO's and other X-Files like subjects.
Television helped to form my mind as well. I remember watching Sesame Street and Electric Company pseudo-religiously back in the 1970s. At the age of 10 I was actually watching Dr. Carl Sagan's Cosmos, and understanding it. I thank my uncle for exposing me to space science back in the 1970s shortly after Star Wars came out. I knew what an eclipse was, understood the difference between a Galilean and a Newtonian telescope and could explain how and why the moon has phases by the time I was 10.
Yes I was always a nerd, and encouraged to be one. Language and Science made sense to me. I could easily see the code around me but as I entered my pre-teen years there was one aspect of life that confused, and scared, the hell out of me. That was religion.
I soon found out that there were things in this universe that could not be simply explained through science and logic. Couple that with knowing that humans could wipe themselves off the planet in a nuclear conflagration and I soon entered the angsty teen stage at the humble age of 12! I was also being teased for being a nerd and an overweight one at that. The confusion would build to a head. I was also beginning to feel and sense things of a metaphysical nature all of this did not make any sense to me. Was I going to hell? Was Jesus and God "out to get me?" Why did I start seeing things like simulacra on the bedroom door? What the hell happened on that September night back in 1983?
Oh yes, September 1983. This would be most possibly my first encounter with the paranormal or whatever you want to call it. It all began when my mother fell ill and was in the hospital, the beginnings of her chronic illness. She hired a babysitter-caregiver who was a bit looney. This caregiver was into things that I did not understand. She called herself a Christian, but one who did "magick?" At that age I had no idea what she was talking about. All the stuff she spouted only continued to confuse me about religion. Then one night after my sister busted her knee up on freshly graveled pavement and had to go to the emergency room for stitches, this weird "Christian" lady performed some type of healing ritual on my sister. My sister was laid up in the living room, and I was in my bedroom. That night I started hearing what at first I thought was the television. It sounded like demonic laughter. Next thing I hear is the weird lady "boo-hooing" and running to the guest bedroom. I could not quite get myself to open my bedroom door and investigate, out of fear. Remember I read up on this stuff even by the age of 13. Finally when the sounds were gone, I opened my door and got the courage to find out what the hell happened. The weird lady was not in the bedroom(?), my sister was on the couch sleeping soundly as if nothing happened. A bag of tomatoes bought that day was strewn all over the floor and the clincher was a small plastic "wineglass" with a lock of my sister's hair in it. WTF! I knew this was the signs of some kind of ritual gone horribly wrong. I went back to bed and confronted the caregiver with questions. "Did you perform an exorcism?" "What happened last night?" etc.. She would not answer completely, but continued to assure me my sister was not possessed and was fine.
The fear of the unknown was quickly overruled by my naturally inquisitive nature. I had to find out what the frak happened, and why my sister was the focus of this. E.V. if you are reading this, please forgive me for this is an important point in my life, even if you don't remember it. I tried to look up everything in the occult section about it. All I could find was references to calling spirits and daemons, stuff I really didn't want to get caught up in at that time. Just when the confusion was at it's peak some answers came to me as I was inducted into the Boy Scouts.
I think it was October of that some year, I went to my first Scout Camp-Out. The forests and hills of Minnesota are truly breathtaking, at least in the 1980s they were. This was the first time in the years of my young life that I felt I truly belonged. Being outside, cold crisp air, lakes and trees. The voices in my mind began to quiet and I felt at peace. It was here that I experienced my first non-religious ritual. Induction into the scouts involved all being in a circle, with a bonfire in the center. You take the oath and dedicate yourself to being a scout and living by the motto and oath. I was finally part of something, and not an outcast, this was the first step to knowing who I was.
Early the next year, I did survival training in the scouts. Me and another experienced scout were to truly rough-it in the cold Minnesota snow. We built a lean-too and insulated the ground from our bedding. The task was simple, spend the night alone, just the 2 of us, with as little as we could carry. It was a fun experience, cold, but fun. It was that night I had another experience. While answering nature's call in the overnight hours (and quickly as possible), I saw her. I don't quite remember if this was real, or a dream, but I saw the most magnificent animal. A wolf. I was not afraid, she looked at me with her amber eyes glowing in the night and we just froze, staring at each other. She then went on her way as if to acknowledge her acceptance of us being in her domain. Or perhaps it was more than that. It would not be for many more years that I would even remember the experience.
Time would continue and I would enter my teen years. I also noticed something changing within me. I was not quite as afraid of things as I was before. I was much more aggressive, fights with other kids was not uncommon. Grades dropped as I was no longer interested in math or science anymore. This would continue after we moved to Florida due to my mother's health. I got in with a nerdy crowd and learned how to play D&D and computer games. I also learned a bit of the martial arts, sparing with friends on the coquina rock so prevalent in Florida. The mid 1980s were my deviant angsty teen years. While still a nerd, I was more and more obsessed with the metaphysical and occult. This is when I denounced religion entirely and began to experiment with the occult. I discovered that I was most probably a pagan and said my gods were Herne the Hunter and Gaia. Herne of course I gained from watching Robin of Sherwood back in that day. That show was my first introduction to paganism and demonology to a degree. I considered myself to be a "wolfs-head" due to my iconoclastic nature. I even did a D&D game scenario where Robin hood had a wizard. I also had a small "alchemists lab" full of chemicals I would find or get by other means. I was mostly a pyromaniac, burning sulfur and iron filings to make sparky effects. Yes I did experiment with making fireworks, nearly burning down the house in the process. Seeming as I always played the wizard in D&D, I was the Mage-Boy of the group.
Yes, my grades were affected by this deviant behaviour, I didn't feel school was important. It was a miracle that I actually turned it around in my senior year to graduate.
At the age of 18, I was a nerd, a wannabe wizard, a hardcore D&D gamer, self-proclaimed pagan and a social deviant with a crapload of unexplained rage within me. Little did I know all the answers I seek would come to me in the college years. Which will be blogged in part II...
At a young age I was exposed to anything and everything I had an interest in, be that science, mathematics, reading, science fiction, comics, and yes even religion. My grandfather understood the importance of knowledge and was always giving me books to read. Mostly textbooks (he worked as a high school custodian in his later years) and then later Reader's Digest publications. I had a fondness for books on codes and puzzles. It was not uncommon to see my face in the encyclopaedia just to pass the time. Later I gained an interest in books about weird stuff such as metaphysics, UFO's and other X-Files like subjects.
Television helped to form my mind as well. I remember watching Sesame Street and Electric Company pseudo-religiously back in the 1970s. At the age of 10 I was actually watching Dr. Carl Sagan's Cosmos, and understanding it. I thank my uncle for exposing me to space science back in the 1970s shortly after Star Wars came out. I knew what an eclipse was, understood the difference between a Galilean and a Newtonian telescope and could explain how and why the moon has phases by the time I was 10.
Yes I was always a nerd, and encouraged to be one. Language and Science made sense to me. I could easily see the code around me but as I entered my pre-teen years there was one aspect of life that confused, and scared, the hell out of me. That was religion.
I soon found out that there were things in this universe that could not be simply explained through science and logic. Couple that with knowing that humans could wipe themselves off the planet in a nuclear conflagration and I soon entered the angsty teen stage at the humble age of 12! I was also being teased for being a nerd and an overweight one at that. The confusion would build to a head. I was also beginning to feel and sense things of a metaphysical nature all of this did not make any sense to me. Was I going to hell? Was Jesus and God "out to get me?" Why did I start seeing things like simulacra on the bedroom door? What the hell happened on that September night back in 1983?
Oh yes, September 1983. This would be most possibly my first encounter with the paranormal or whatever you want to call it. It all began when my mother fell ill and was in the hospital, the beginnings of her chronic illness. She hired a babysitter-caregiver who was a bit looney. This caregiver was into things that I did not understand. She called herself a Christian, but one who did "magick?" At that age I had no idea what she was talking about. All the stuff she spouted only continued to confuse me about religion. Then one night after my sister busted her knee up on freshly graveled pavement and had to go to the emergency room for stitches, this weird "Christian" lady performed some type of healing ritual on my sister. My sister was laid up in the living room, and I was in my bedroom. That night I started hearing what at first I thought was the television. It sounded like demonic laughter. Next thing I hear is the weird lady "boo-hooing" and running to the guest bedroom. I could not quite get myself to open my bedroom door and investigate, out of fear. Remember I read up on this stuff even by the age of 13. Finally when the sounds were gone, I opened my door and got the courage to find out what the hell happened. The weird lady was not in the bedroom(?), my sister was on the couch sleeping soundly as if nothing happened. A bag of tomatoes bought that day was strewn all over the floor and the clincher was a small plastic "wineglass" with a lock of my sister's hair in it. WTF! I knew this was the signs of some kind of ritual gone horribly wrong. I went back to bed and confronted the caregiver with questions. "Did you perform an exorcism?" "What happened last night?" etc.. She would not answer completely, but continued to assure me my sister was not possessed and was fine.
The fear of the unknown was quickly overruled by my naturally inquisitive nature. I had to find out what the frak happened, and why my sister was the focus of this. E.V. if you are reading this, please forgive me for this is an important point in my life, even if you don't remember it. I tried to look up everything in the occult section about it. All I could find was references to calling spirits and daemons, stuff I really didn't want to get caught up in at that time. Just when the confusion was at it's peak some answers came to me as I was inducted into the Boy Scouts.
I think it was October of that some year, I went to my first Scout Camp-Out. The forests and hills of Minnesota are truly breathtaking, at least in the 1980s they were. This was the first time in the years of my young life that I felt I truly belonged. Being outside, cold crisp air, lakes and trees. The voices in my mind began to quiet and I felt at peace. It was here that I experienced my first non-religious ritual. Induction into the scouts involved all being in a circle, with a bonfire in the center. You take the oath and dedicate yourself to being a scout and living by the motto and oath. I was finally part of something, and not an outcast, this was the first step to knowing who I was.
Early the next year, I did survival training in the scouts. Me and another experienced scout were to truly rough-it in the cold Minnesota snow. We built a lean-too and insulated the ground from our bedding. The task was simple, spend the night alone, just the 2 of us, with as little as we could carry. It was a fun experience, cold, but fun. It was that night I had another experience. While answering nature's call in the overnight hours (and quickly as possible), I saw her. I don't quite remember if this was real, or a dream, but I saw the most magnificent animal. A wolf. I was not afraid, she looked at me with her amber eyes glowing in the night and we just froze, staring at each other. She then went on her way as if to acknowledge her acceptance of us being in her domain. Or perhaps it was more than that. It would not be for many more years that I would even remember the experience.
Time would continue and I would enter my teen years. I also noticed something changing within me. I was not quite as afraid of things as I was before. I was much more aggressive, fights with other kids was not uncommon. Grades dropped as I was no longer interested in math or science anymore. This would continue after we moved to Florida due to my mother's health. I got in with a nerdy crowd and learned how to play D&D and computer games. I also learned a bit of the martial arts, sparing with friends on the coquina rock so prevalent in Florida. The mid 1980s were my deviant angsty teen years. While still a nerd, I was more and more obsessed with the metaphysical and occult. This is when I denounced religion entirely and began to experiment with the occult. I discovered that I was most probably a pagan and said my gods were Herne the Hunter and Gaia. Herne of course I gained from watching Robin of Sherwood back in that day. That show was my first introduction to paganism and demonology to a degree. I considered myself to be a "wolfs-head" due to my iconoclastic nature. I even did a D&D game scenario where Robin hood had a wizard. I also had a small "alchemists lab" full of chemicals I would find or get by other means. I was mostly a pyromaniac, burning sulfur and iron filings to make sparky effects. Yes I did experiment with making fireworks, nearly burning down the house in the process. Seeming as I always played the wizard in D&D, I was the Mage-Boy of the group.
Yes, my grades were affected by this deviant behaviour, I didn't feel school was important. It was a miracle that I actually turned it around in my senior year to graduate.
At the age of 18, I was a nerd, a wannabe wizard, a hardcore D&D gamer, self-proclaimed pagan and a social deviant with a crapload of unexplained rage within me. Little did I know all the answers I seek would come to me in the college years. Which will be blogged in part II...
The Emerald Tablet of Hermes Trismegistus
Verum, sine mendatio, certum et verissimum:
Quod est inferius est sicut quod est superius, et quod est superius est sicut quod est inferius, ad perpetranda miracula rei unius.
Et sicut res omnes fuerunt ab uno, meditatione unius, sic omnes res natae ab hac una re, adaptatione.
Pater eius est Sol. Mater eius est Luna, portavit illud Ventus in ventre suo, nutrix eius terra est.
Pater omnis telesmi totius mundi est hic.
Virtus eius integra est si versa fuerit in terram.
Separabis terram ab igne, subtile ab spisso, suaviter, magno cum ingenio.
Ascendit a terra in coelum, iterumque descendit in terram, et recipit vim superiorum et inferiorum.
Sic habebis Gloriam totius mundi.
Ideo fugiet a te omnis obscuritas.
Haec est totius fortitudinis fortitudo fortis, quia vincet omnem rem subtilem, omnemque solidam penetrabit.
Sic mundus creatus est.
Hinc erunt adaptationes mirabiles, quarum modus est hic. Itaque vocatus sum Hermes Trismegistus, habens tres partes philosophiae totius mundi.
Completum est quod dixi de operatione Solis.
It is true, without a lie, certain and most true,
That which is below is as that which is above, and that which is above is as that which is below, to perform the miracles of the one thing.
And as all things were from the one, by means of the meditation of the one, thus all things were born from the one, by means of adaptation.
Its father is the Sun, its mother is the Moon, the Wind carried it in its belly, its nurse is the earth.
The father of the whole world is here.
Its power is whole if it has been turned into earth.
You will separate the earth from the fire, the subtle from the dense, sweetly, with great skill.
It ascends from earth into heaven and again it descends to the earth, and receives the power of higher and of lower things.
Thus you will have the Glory of the whole world.
Therefore will all obscurity flee from you.
Of all strength this is true strength, because it will conquer all that is subtle, and penetrate all that is solid.
Thus was the world created.
From this were wonderful adaptations, of which this is the means. Therefore am I named Thrice-Great Hermes, having the three parts of the philosophy of the whole world.
It is finished, what I have said about the working of the Sun.
Quod est inferius est sicut quod est superius, et quod est superius est sicut quod est inferius, ad perpetranda miracula rei unius.
Et sicut res omnes fuerunt ab uno, meditatione unius, sic omnes res natae ab hac una re, adaptatione.
Pater eius est Sol. Mater eius est Luna, portavit illud Ventus in ventre suo, nutrix eius terra est.
Pater omnis telesmi totius mundi est hic.
Virtus eius integra est si versa fuerit in terram.
Separabis terram ab igne, subtile ab spisso, suaviter, magno cum ingenio.
Ascendit a terra in coelum, iterumque descendit in terram, et recipit vim superiorum et inferiorum.
Sic habebis Gloriam totius mundi.
Ideo fugiet a te omnis obscuritas.
Haec est totius fortitudinis fortitudo fortis, quia vincet omnem rem subtilem, omnemque solidam penetrabit.
Sic mundus creatus est.
Hinc erunt adaptationes mirabiles, quarum modus est hic. Itaque vocatus sum Hermes Trismegistus, habens tres partes philosophiae totius mundi.
Completum est quod dixi de operatione Solis.
It is true, without a lie, certain and most true,
That which is below is as that which is above, and that which is above is as that which is below, to perform the miracles of the one thing.
And as all things were from the one, by means of the meditation of the one, thus all things were born from the one, by means of adaptation.
Its father is the Sun, its mother is the Moon, the Wind carried it in its belly, its nurse is the earth.
The father of the whole world is here.
Its power is whole if it has been turned into earth.
You will separate the earth from the fire, the subtle from the dense, sweetly, with great skill.
It ascends from earth into heaven and again it descends to the earth, and receives the power of higher and of lower things.
Thus you will have the Glory of the whole world.
Therefore will all obscurity flee from you.
Of all strength this is true strength, because it will conquer all that is subtle, and penetrate all that is solid.
Thus was the world created.
From this were wonderful adaptations, of which this is the means. Therefore am I named Thrice-Great Hermes, having the three parts of the philosophy of the whole world.
It is finished, what I have said about the working of the Sun.
Comming Back to Blogger
Okay. I've tried Livejournal and it doesn't look like anyone is reading anything there. So, after quite some time, I think I'll be coming here to blogger. I started this as a replacement for my MySpace blog, but it didn't seem to work too well with Facebook. Maybe that has improved.
So, without further ado, I will start posting here again. Starting with the Emerald Tablet and then my short(?) autobiography.
Enjoy!
So, without further ado, I will start posting here again. Starting with the Emerald Tablet and then my short(?) autobiography.
Enjoy!
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