Midsummer & the Darkness

I hope you had a great Midsummer Sabbat. Mine was very pleasant. I celebrated it with my coven and some friends at our covenstead. It was a small, intimate gathering and the ritual focus was on using the sun's light to reveal things about ourselves that we want others to see. My brilliant High Priest lit our coven's power candle from the sun's rays using a magnifying glass and we all lit ourvotives from it. I dedicated my candle to my Georgian training. I'm working on my second degree and that brings new duties that are more public. This level of Wiccan training is beyond being your own priest/ess and becomes about serving the community more. Before I can receive my second degree, I will be required to teach a class or workshop and lead a community ritual. I've done both already, but now there's an officialness to it I guess. I actually feel a little nervous. I have no problem working with people I consider my peers, but performing before my elders is another thing altogether. They're all very supportive and I am my own worst critic. So I dedicated my summer solstice candle to that work so that I might reveal to myself and others that I can do it and do it well.

I've spent the days since Midsummer thinking about how I want to spend the rest of year magickally. Even though it was 96 degrees yesterday (and felt like 104 degrees, no exaggeration), the sun is already starting to wane and we are entering the dark half of the year. I've already started thinking about my ancestors again. Partly that's because I'm already making plans for Samhain. I've registered to attend Florida Pagan Gathering and I'm brainstorming ideas for my coven's Samhain celebration, which may be the community ritual I lead. I've planned my coven's Samhain the last three years (since I've been a member) and I like to mix it up and am searching for fresh ideas.

I have no doubt that Lucumi is also influencing my early thoughts about the ancestors. Most people think of the Orishas when they think about Lucumi, but that path works very heavily with eggun (the dead, spirits, ancestors). I think the idea goes that where the Orishas are unpredictable, impossible to control, and have their own ideas about how things should run, your spirit guides and ancestors generally want to help you and want to be helped by you so developing a relationship with them is very important. It's thought that they are more helpful in practical ways on a day to day basis. It's common for Santeros to have a bóveda, an eggun altar, which I don't have, but should. The problem is that I live with my mother and she's not to keen on having altars all over the house. Finding the right spot can be tricky.

I'm debating whether I should receive Ilekes, the sacred necklaces, this year. Normally it's the first initiation followed by the Warriors, but I skipped it because in my consultation I wasn't told to receive them. I was advised to receive the Warriors and Olokun, but I can't receive Olokun or anything else now until I receive the necklaces. I wanted to know which Orisha crowned my head first so I could receive that necklace as well and now I know. It's a matter of drawing up the courage to go through with it, but I'm no hurry either. Right now I want to continue basking in the knowledge that Ogun rules my head, develop a relationship with him, and continue strengthening my relationship with the Warriors in general.

I've been thinking about whether there have been signs that it might have been Ogun. After the reading I remembered a tambor (a ritual drumming party) about two years ago where Ogun came down. At one point he reached over some people to me, handed me a dollar, held my hand a moment, and spoke to me, but I didn't understand what he said. And my friend Quaaa recently reminded me that I'd told him about a dream a couple months ago. I was sitting on a bench talking with large, beautiful, very dark-skinned black man dressed in red. I had been confused at the time because red is associated with Eleggua, but I was sure it was Ogun at the time. Quaaa said it was possible and now it appears I was right after all. I wish I could remember the details of that dream. I really should be better at keeping notes about such things.