Homage to Jelly

I took Pippy to the vet yesterday, December 29^th, 2015.  While I was checking in, the receptionist, with whom I have been friends for many years, told me an odd thing happened this week.  She said a Shreveport Police Officer called her on Monday.  She was tracing the rabies tag of a dog that had been hit, in downtown Shreveport.  She said she had moved the dog out of the road, and onto the side of the road.  It was Jelly.  I broke down, cried and made a scene, I am sure.  After almost a year, I finally know that my sweet little smushie face is dead. 

I have no idea how she ended up in downtown Shreveport.  Perhaps she was still with Paige.  Perhaps Paige is now homeless or living in her car.  Our homeless tend to hang out downtown.  Perhaps she gave her to someone, or she ran away.  I have no idea.  All I know, is it is finally over, and I can stop killing myself over all of this. 

For a year, I have cried over Jelly, grieved for her, constantly worried where she was or what had happened to her.  At night I tortured myself wondering if she was cold, or hungry?  Did she know I loved her?  That I cried for her at night?  Was she happy?  Now I know, the answer to some of those questions.  I am grateful to the Officer who’s tiny gesture, has meant the world to us.  It has given my peace.

Jelly would have turned 13 this spring.  You can read about our adventures in Meet Paige  and  Goodbye Paige. 

When I finally told the rest of my pack what had happened, Precious the second, suggest perhaps we should howl for her.  So that she might find her way back to us.  I know wolves do this in the wild.  They howl to other pack members, and sometimes for a lost or dead member.  Perhaps Precious found that memory in my mind.  So we began to howl a terrible and mournful cry, by the time we were done I felt Jelly settle near us.  After 2 years my baby was home, if nothing more than her spirit.

I had already lit my candle for her, burned my incense, and called for Holda to come and retrieve her spirit until I could properly cross her last night.  I felt her happy spirit near me all night, and when I lay down I could feel her spirit kissing me.  I called for Bifrost and on it we rode.  When we entered Holda’s Garden, all Jelly’s friends were there.  Boy-Boy aka Prince, Punka, Precious the first, and some of my living babies, Princess and Sophia, had made the trip with us as well.  She was warmly greeted by all who had loved her.  She was finally safe.  The last I saw of her, she was running off behind the Apple Grove to go and hunt for moles, one of her favorite activities in the whole world.  She was always a great huntress.  I returned to this plane, smiled, and told Jay that Jelly was safe and happy. 

I have lost three children this year, Rebecca, Prince, and now Jelly.  As I write this, it is the last day of Yule 2015.  We know that as Holda and Odin ride in the Wild Hunt, black dogs or hounds bay at their feet.  They are gathering up the dead.  Perhaps Prince is riding with the Hunt and called to Jelly.  Perhaps the whole reason he died, was so come this time of year, he could bring her home.  I have no idea, I am just speculating here. 

We always said that Prince and Jelly were married.  We had caught them making out many years ago, and they did love to go hunting together.  We even have “wedding” and “honeymoon” pictures of them together.  Who knows, perhaps it is just our stupid human mind trying to make sense of things.  Maybe Prince was lonely and wanted her to join him.  Maybe he was rescuing her from whatever living conditions she was in.  That’s probable something I will never know, and honestly don’t want to.  I would just make me madder.

We have no body to bury, no collar to put on my altar, so we have decided to bury one of Jelly’s outfits in Boy-Boy’s grave.  I have already made her an offering on my ancestor altar of this little red and white monkey that plays music.  It plays, “I like to move it, move it.”  She loved all toys, but in particular ones that sang or danced.  I have kept this little monkey hid all these years, so she would not find it and destroy it.  It seems like a fitting offering I think.

Ilsa

 

Goat Problems

In late 2012 I had acquired a new dog I named Perro, an Australian Cattle Dog, aka a Blue Healer.  Tami had found him.  I took him because Tami had too many animals.  He had belonged to some Spanish fellows, and they had been trying to get rid of him.  He was such a bad dog, they were planning on putting him down.  I never could properly say his name.  So I named him Perro, the Spanish word for dog.  At first he only spoke Spanish.  He had never been in a house before.  He was terrified to come in the first few days.  It was only later that we would find out how severally abused he had been.

Perro could at times be a very good dog.  Then a switch would flipped in his brain and he would attack.  He had been raised on a horse farm, and he kept attacking the million dollar thoroughbreds.  He was trying to herd them, by biting them in the leg.  He was beaten for that, often.  He would be beaten so badly one time, he defecated on himself.  We would learn later, that if you do not properly train one these dogs from an early age, they kind of go nuts.  They are not for a first time dog owner.  I believe Perro had brain damage from his abuse.  We later found out that his original name meant Devil dog. 

Perro would bite my goats and not let them go.  They would just scream out in pain and not let them go no matter how much I screamed at him, or threatened to beat him.  It was no simple nip in the heals.  He often broke the skin.  Our goat herd was large that year.  We were running about 14 head at the time.  I would turn them out to graze, and go about my day.  They would just take themselves across the highway, to the fire station and start grazing in the woods over there. 

One day we went to round them up, taking Perro with us.  I had hoped he would herd them for us.  He didn’t he just ran around biting them.  Tami and I were riding on the back of the truck, and I had my leg hanging from the tailgate.  Perro was happily following behind us.  Suddenly he reached up and bit me in the leg,  and threw my jeans he drew blood.  The only reason he didn’t take a whole chunk out of me, was because his bottom teeth tried to bit threw my boots, and could not get thru.  I knew I in trouble.  I was bleeding, but I had to cowgirl up and go on.  My goats took priority. 

We were able to get the heard back across the road and in the pen.  By that time I am hurting pretty bad.  “Jay I’m in trouble,” I said.  And I dropped my jeans, in front of Tami, god and everybody.  I was pouring blood at that time.  Tami was shocked and ran for medical supplies.  Jay was pissed and fussed me.  “Why didn’t you say anything?!” he scolded me.  I told him we had to get the herd safe first. 

The wound was bad enough that taking me to the hospital was discussed.  I told them, “No.  If they find out it’s a dog bite they will put Perro down.  It’s my fault for what he did.  I should not have been dangling my leg.”  Thank the gods Jay is a trained medical assistant and first responder.  He patched me up, and although I was sore for a few days, the two deep punctures I received, healed up nicely. 

My goats continued to go across the road, every time I let them out.  The cops were nice about it the first 10 or 15 times they were out here.  In March of 2013, the livestock man came to my house.  He is in charge of arresting people for livestock violations.  He drives a truck with a fifth wheel attachment in the bed, to hook up the goose neck trailer to take your animals away from you.  He is a regular police officer with a gun, handcuffs and everything else. 

He’s a bit terrifying.  He came to my house to discuss my goat problem.  He told me, “If I have to come back out here again I will take all your goats, and it will cost you $75 a head to get them out.”  And he looked around at my dogs, who are free roaming, and said what terrified me most, “and I’ll take your dogs too.”  I kind of lost it after that.  I went into a suicidal depression for several weeks.  I jumped at every sound.  I was terrified he was here to take my fur kids from me. 

We continued to have goat problems.  We put up a fence, and the goats just jumped threw it.  At some point that year Jay and I were both separately slapped with a lose livestock fine.  In August of that year I gave away most of my heard.  I kept Star, Kali, Bridget and Dagda, because they never went across the road.  In September I had to go to court and plead guilty to a misdemeanor.  One of the scarcest things I had ever done. 

Perro’s attitude never improved.  He often wanted to nibble or give love bites to people.  He never got any better.  He had tried love and we had tried whooping him.  I would not keep him confined or chained up.  That is no life for an animal.  We did not know what else to do.  Perro was becoming a danger.  He was still biting the goats.  I never knew if he would bite me again.  I never knew if he would suddenly decide to bite someone else.  What if he bit a child?  I was also feeling a lot of pressure from D & K to put him down.  Perro was unpredictable and a liability. 

Jay and I made the decision to put him down.  It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.  I have never had to put down a perfectly health dog for mental issues.  In the end I could not be in the room with him when it was done, and we did not bring him home to be buried.  I wonder if he hated me for that.  Felt abandoned.  I hope one day he can find it in his heart to forgive me and return to me in a new body. 

Perro taught me a very important lesson.  You can’t save every dog.  Some dogs are just too far gone from, abuse, trauma, bad breeding, etc.  That doesn’t mean we should not try, I just think we shouldn’t be devastatingly angry at ourselves, if we try our best, and it does not work out.  Sometimes we are just not the right home, the right owner, or the dog is not the right breed for you.  I often still kick myself, thinking that I did not do enough for him.   I wonder if someone who knew more about his breed, could have pulled him though this and made him change. 

I recently journeyed to Holda’s Garden.  I wanted to check on some of my goats who had passed over.  Holda told me the pasture was around the bend, and so it was.  Just past her house, down the dirt road, thru a grove of trees I found the pasture.  Sitting among my goats was Perro, watching over them.  I did not expect to see him there.  He came to me, and gave me love.  He told me that he had had, “a broken brain.”  He told me he was all better now and his job was to watch over the goats.  I told him again how sorry I was about putting him down.  He said he didn’t blame me, and assured me again he was alright.  I am glad he is there with them, doing what he loves.  Even if it may all be just in my head.

Ilsa

 

Healing

On Thursday August 25^th, 2011 I had my first major panic attack.  I have covered the day and most if it’s events in a little crazy, just like me.  I had a massive panic attack, that made me regress me to a younger age, in fact I went so far back I ended up thinking I was in one of my past lives.  I have spoke of this day with some breath, but I have not discussed, so far, what happened to me after wards, nor have I discussed the spiritual aspects of this event.

For two weeks after I came home I had the worst headache of my life.  No medication could touch it.  I found it difficult to pray or to journey.  Now I have been journeying for a long time.  To journey, for me, means I put myself in a semi-trance state and go to visit the other side, where my dead and my animals are.  I have been doing this for at least as long as I have defined myself as Pagan, although my techniques have changed over the years.  It is often something I do in times of stress.  It gives me great comfort.

This is totally my UPG.  I tuck myself in bed, because I usually go to sleep at some point during the journey.  It is rare that I come back all the way back across to the land of the living.  The way I journey is, in my mind I stand on my front porch and look down at my outside altar, which is next to a great, big, old, tall Pine tree.  I call for Bifrost, the rainbow bridge, and Heimdall who controls it.  He comes to me on what like a wooden bridge painted a rainbow of colors, on both the walk way and the rails.  He ties up to the porch and I step on.  He is behind a great big, tall, desk with a wooden wheel attached to it, which is always on my left as I step on.  He greats me with a hug and sometimes a kiss and asks where I am going.  I tell him Holda’s Gardens, this is what I have come to call her lands over the years as I have never known the proper name for it.  Heimdall then asks for an offering.  I usually give him what I have had to eat that evening with a glass of sweet tea.  He seems to really like my tea.  It always makes him smile.  He thanks me and he directs the bridge, which acts a bit more like a boat, over the swirling and misty air. 

We soon come to the gate to Holda’s Gardens.  I see it as black wrought iron, filigreed, arch with a half doggie door.  Heimdal ties up the bridge to two statues or columns on either side of the bridge.  I don’t know it’s always kind of misty.  I open the door and go in.  Once I am safely on the other side, he takes off and tells me to call for him when I am ready to leave.  I enter what is essentially Holda’s yard.  Weather it is the front yard or the back I don’t know.  On the other side I find a sandy dirt road, that always feels good under my bare feet.  To the right is Holda’s House, to the left a line of trees that separates the house from the pond.  There is now a bench, in front of the trees, for me.  I often sit under these trees, on the ground with Punka in my lap looking out over the pond.  I do this especially when I’ve had  a bad day.  The sandy road stretches on past Holda’s mill, into the trees, and beyond to the pastures where my goats are.  I usually don’t go down that far.  My guess is this is where the livestock lives.  That area is very green and hilly, like at the base of a mountain or in a valley.

From the spot where I stand I can call any of my deceased animals to me.  It may take them a minute to come to me, as they have to quit what they are doing first.  I often see Precious the first, zoom past me on her wings, chasing the bunny, sometimes it is the other way around.  She informs me the chase is the important thing, not the catching.  So they take turns. 

Holda is almost always the first to greet me, wearing her white dress and her blue apron.  I almost always see her in her grandmotherly form, about age 50 or 60 I would guess.  Then Momma Muriel and Oma come out. Sometimes Father Frey is there as well.  It just all seems to depend on what I need. I can never really see their faces.  I think it is just too much for my human brain to process.  Sometimes we all go into the kitchen and I am fed some type of apple dessert, hot cider or coffee.  I know there is a rule about not eating in the other worlds, but I do not wish to offend her.  When I have refused to eat in the past she gets annoyed with me and says, “EAT!”  I am often surprised she does not slap me in the back of the head when I do this.  It is there I will catch them up on what I am doing and why I have come to visit: occasionally it is to cross a dead animal’s spirit over, sometimes I have a question, sometimes it is to ask for healing for a friend,  or I’ve had a bad day or I just miss them so much. 

Now if all this sounds bizarre or made up to you, I’m sorry.  It is simply how I experience the divine, and it works for me.  All this spiritual healing is about to get a little stranger.

Not long after I had been hospitalized for my first panic attack, Holda came to me in a dream and said, “I don’t want you to journey, work magic, or even pray until after your initiation.”  I was a bit confused, but I agreed to do as I was told.  Every time I tried to do any of this, it just made the headaches worse.  I would do just about anything to make the pain stop.  Holda then took me to a women, in a temple with lots of herbs hanging around her.  I don’t know who she was.  My guess is either Eir or Brigid.   

I asked, “Where we were going.” 

She said, “I am taking you to be healed.”

“Why can’t you heal me?” I asked

She told me she did not do this type of healing, or that I need healing she could not do.  I don’t remember. 

I then asked, “Who is she?”

“She is my sister,” is all she would reply.  I am still a bit befuddled.  As far as we know Holda has no sisters. It is my guess that she used this title to apply to another Goddess.

Within a few days, whenever I closed my eyes, I began to see another Goddess as if she was standing before me.  She had coal black hair, pale skin and red painted on lips.  She would take me to a Greek or Roman style temple.  She asked me to lay down on a stone platform like bed and roll on my right side.  She would then take a large bowl of water and pour it threw my left temple, and into my brain.  I kid you not, from my right temple would pour out snakes.  As she did this technique my headache would lessen, and I would find some relief.  For a long time I thought the snakes were symbols of my illness.  I wonder now if they instruments of her healing.  This went on for several weeks.

Towards the end I asked what her name was.  She told me her name was Danube, and that she was the Goddess of rivers.  I thought, “Oh I will have to look that up.”  She looked at me and said, “you will not find me,” and she was right.  I have yet to identify her.  I have yet to meet anyone who knows who she is. 

I went to two of my elders, in the community, in between being hospitalized and being initiated.  My HP and I were trying to decide if I should still be initiated given my then mental health status.  I believed Holda was telling me yes.  I had hoped a tarot card or rune reading would give me confirmation of that.  I also went to them to ask if they had any idea what had happened to me, and to see if they knew who this mystery goddess was.  They told me they did not know who the Goddess was, but that if she was helping me I should continue to work with her.  I don’t remember what the cards and runes said.  They brought out a Tibetan singing bowl to get a reading on my chakras.  I had a blockage in my 1^st and 2^nd, that I was not terribly surprised at. I am infertile after all.   I was also having a blockage in my crown chakra, something I had never had a problem with.  I wonder now if part of the headaches, was having all that energy stopped.  One of the elders did tell me, that it was not unusual, for pagans to have some type of mental break or psychotic event prior to their first initiation. 

Apparently after I left, one of the elders sent a nasty email to my HP, saying she should never consider initiating someone in my mental state.  Yeh she was not pleased with me about that one.  I did not know, until years later, that she did not like them.  Although we were never sworn to secrecy about anything in the coven, she did not like me talking about such matters with outsiders.  We decided to do the initiation anyways. 

On September 9^th, 2011 I was initiated as a witch into my HP’s coven.  I will only speak to you of one part that occurred during that ritual.  I consider the rest too sacred. At one point I was laid on the ground and covered with a black sheet.  When I arose I felt better than I had in weeks.  My headaches were gone.  There were pictures taken of that night, long since lost to me.  But in the one of me lying on the ground, you can see tons of orbs.  Upon closer inspection you could see a sickle with 13 different points.  The sickle is one of Holda’s holy symbols.   There could be no doubt that the initiation was her wish. 

Even though in a few years time I would be asked to leave the HP’s coven, I have never been sorry I was initiated.  I have never been sorry that I spent my time with them.  I am honored to have learned under the HP. 

Ilsa