I apologize for the relative radio silence of the last two weeks…and, it’s only about to get worse, I’m afraid.
Tomorrow morning–well, in nine hours, actually–I’ll be leaving here for the airport to go to PantheaCon. The arse-crack of dawn will be looking at the time of my departure from here and going “Man, that’s early!” (And what a lovely arse-crack Eos has, incidentally!)
However, as is typical with trips like this, I don’t expect I’ll be sleeping much tonight–I certainly haven’t slept much the last two nights, for that matter. I have not been on a plane since 2010, so that’s a bit of a worry always…But, I also had a lot of preparation for PantheaCon in the last few days, and I still have to pack before I try and get a little bit of sleep. Eeesh…
I am not going to have a lot substantive to say in the present entry, other than a few brief notices:
For PantheaCon Goers: If you arrive on Friday morning early, you can catch us for Inundation at the pool at 7:30 AM; and then again for Inundation on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday mornings at 7:00 AM. If you arrive early enough on Friday, catch us near the Club Max area at 11:00 AM for a short Ekklesía Antínoou prayer to and blessing from Antinous. Then, come to “The Ekklesía Antínoou and Queer Youth Spirituality” at 3:30 PM on Friday, February 17th in Carmel/Monterey; “A Modern Dionysian Initiation” by the Circle of Dionysos at 11:00 PM on Saturday, February 18th (I’ll be doing a small part in that ritual!) in, if I’m not mistaken, Fir; “Queer Rites: Making Meaning for and from Sexual/Gender Diversity” by the Circle of Dionysos on Sunday, February 19th at 11:00 AM in Carmel/Monterey, which is a panel that I’ll be on; and on Monday at 1:30 PM, come to “Super-Syncretism!: Creating Connection & Preserving Diversity” with us once again in Silicon Valley. And, if there’s interest, perhaps we’ll do a quick “something” after that ends as well! And, of course, there’s tons of other wonderful and worthwhile events going on over the weekend, and I’ll be at many of them, so I hope to see a good number of you there–please feel free introduce yourselves to me if you are!
Romulus, Remus, and the Lupa are the Reason for the Season: There’s an old hat, both amongst pagans and others, that Valentine’s Day has something to do with Lupercalia. The short version: it don’t! The slightly longer version: a Christian martyr cult that somehow got tied up with notions of “true love” being “dying for other people” somehow got connected to a notion that, if I recall correctly, goes back to Chaucer that the birds choose their mates on this day, has absolutely nothing to do with a festival that the Romans had on the day which followed, and which the Christians had a tough time suppressing, that involved commemorating the “outlaw” period of Romulus and Remus and their suckling by the she-wolf in a cave, and which was thought to have been about “fertility” (there’s a nice, fuzzy, catch-all concept!) in later times when the significance of the ritual was forgotten. Anyone who tries to tell you otherwise is very poorly informed, and you should not be afraid to say so to them! If your significant other demands flowers and candy on this day–as someone earlier today was telling me he’d spent $175 on those two items alone–to be happy in their relationship with you, then there’s larger problems at play…
As it happens, when I get to California tomorrow, my gracious hosts will be taking part in the regular Lupercalia ritual that I’ve had some version of for the last five years, so I look forward to that!
Yay Washington!: The governor of Washington state has signed the measure allowing for the legality of same-sex marriage in the state into law! It is going to be challenged by a bunch of no-load Christian supremacist schmucks who don’t understand that their religious dictates do not apply to anyone else–much less everyone else–but in the meantime, with any luck this will be preserved, and further challenges to such a measure will hopefully go the way of Proposition 8 in California at present…
EBC Here I Come!: I just got notification today that the Esoteric Book Conference in Seattle, which takes place in September, has accepted my presentation, “Getting Up Off the Procrustean Bed: The Ekklesía Antínoou Serpent Path”! So, I’ll be attending that, and will enjoy it immensely. It’s a very worthwhile event, so if any of you have ever thought about coming to visit the Emerald City, that might be a very good time to do so!
I have much more substantive stuff I’d like to write about–I have a short list of topics, in fact!–but I simply don’t have the time to do so at present, but I hope to resume “regular service” when I return from PantheaCon, and to debrief how all of the events I attended or participated in went! It’s sure to be exciting and enjoyable, so I hope that everyone is well in the meantime, and I look forward to communicating with everyone further via this blog when I get back!
Ave Ave Antinoe–Haec est unde, Haec est unde, Haec est unde vita venit!
