Goings on

Posts have been a bit scanty recently. I've been reading up on the Apollo and Dionysus business for the next Campbell RoundTable meeting on the 8th, but mostly I've been getting all my non-writing business caught up in preparation for participating in National Novel Writing Month, which is held in November. I've decided that I won't be working on "The Mythologist", as it's already in mid-stream. Instead, I've decided to try to write a children's novel that I've had in mind for some time. The goal is to complete 50k words in the month of November, which comes out to about 175 pages, which should be just about right for a children's novel. I don't have a title for it yet, but it's about two siblings who discover a magic book. When you write words in the book, then put your hand on the pages, you're sucked into a story based on the words that you wrote in the book. The kids discover the book in the house of their new next door neighbor, a kindly old explorer and professor of (you guessed it) mythology. So, we'll see how it goes. I think it'll be interesting to see what happens if I just write full out for a month, and see where the story takes me. I think it'll be an interesting experiment.

Novel Writing Month

It's been a few days since I last posted, sorry about that. I've had some things I've been thinking over throughout the weekend, mostly related to whether or not I'm serious about committing to losing weight. A friend responded to my recent post about the pursuit of perfection with an offer to work out together, so I'm deciding if I'm ready to get started for real.

In other news, next month is National Novel Writing Month, and I've decided to participate this year, in an attempt to get The Mythologist written once and for all. I figure if I work, balls out, for one month, I can get about 200 hours in over 30 days, which may be enough to get a first draft finished, which would be such a relief. So, that would mean, no housework, no knitting, no reading, no working out, etc. for one month. I think I can do it.

Interesting Article about George Lucas

can be found here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21365041/

titled: Can Lucas be trusted with the Star Wars Universe? Key Quote:

"What sent us out into the summer air from the theaters in 1977 and right back into the ticket line to see it all again was his ability to hit on a combination of certain mythological truths so ancient they’re practically embedded in our DNA, and he played that chord with big spaceships exploding in the background."

Thoughts on a new book

It's amazing the things that come to me when I'm hovering in the state between sleeping and waking. After I put Alex down for afternoon nap I lay down for a few minutes, with random thoughts flitting through my mind, nothing settling. I started thinking about the non-fiction book I'd been planning on writing eventually (on the journey of the artist through the underworld), and it came to me that the book I need to write (other than The Mythologist, that is) is on why story is important. Simple as that. Once Upon a Time: Why Story Matters. I need to think this through some more, but I believe this will work.

Apollo and Dionysus

So, the babysitter is here and I finally get a chance to write my blog for today.

I'm getting an early start on next months RoundTable meeting, which is on Apollo and Dionysus. It was interesting having Rich at last month's meeting-he brought up a lot of stuff on Artemis that I hadn't made the connection to, so I'm going to range a little wider in my research this month in an effort to make the conversation deeper. So, I've just ordered a book on the psychology of Apollo and Dionysus, plus I'll read Ginette Paris' chapters on Dionysus. We'll start there, and see where we end up.

On a related note, I knew I was married to the coolest guy in the world when I called him the evening after our lecture at Pacifica on Apollo and Dionysus, and he sent me the lyrics to this song. Ron is the best. :)

Writing novels is haaaard!!

I'm such a whiner today. I've been reading Neil Gaiman's blog recently, and he's working on finishing his latest novel. I believe it was due to his publisher a few days ago ;). I can't decide if I feel better or worse reading his thoughts about the hard work of writing a novel. I think I feel better, because, when the time comes to sit down at your desk and get the words onto the page, his experience and mine aren't all that different. The only thing that's different for me is that I have a baby that's due to wake up from his nap anytime now, and when he does I have to stop working and tend to him, which can be frustrating when you're really rolling.

Christina Rosetti's Goblin's Market

After reading Neil Gaiman's essay on the fairy tale yesterday, I was inspired to post Christina Rosetti's poem Goblin's Market. It's a bit long, but here it is in its entirety. Enjoy.

Update-I realized that the poem was entirely too long for a blog post, so theres a link to it here.

There are some interesting essays on Goblin's Market to be found here.

Fall Festivals

Ron and I took Alex to a harvest festival at a big farm nearby on Saturday. See the photographic evidence in the post immediately prior to this one. :) There were so many people there-it was like visiting Disneyland. They had hay rides, a pick-your-own pumpkin patch, a corn maze, etc. It was such a huge deal, it got me thinking about harvest festivals in general, and what an ancient part they are of human culture. I remember reading The Golden Bough years ago; how James Frazer talks about the sacrifice of the king that would happen during harvest festival, to ensure the return of the crops the following year.

More thoughts to come later.

Image is "Corn King" by Charles Vess.

PS-Neil Gaiman's recent essay on fairy tales can be found here.

Alex's First Caramel Apple

Worlds Cutest Baby

Round Table Meeting

We had the October RoundTable meeting last night at Third Place Books. There were six of us there, including me. Rich Schwab, who used to be the RT leader was in town and was also there, which always makes for lively conversation. There was also a woman there named Artemis, which, given our subject manner, was appropriate. :)

The discussion was interesting, and the meeting was a lot of fun. We talked about Artemis for a bit. Rich told the story of The Handless Maiden, whose themes of purity fit in well with the Artemesian subject of the meeting. He also told the story of Sedna.

Overall, a successful meeting.

(The image is an art piece by Caz Love)

Update: I found an interesting essay on The Handless Maiden by Midori Snyder here.

Phil Cousineau

I wanted to take a moment here to talk about writer, filmmaker, and Campbell friend Phil Cousineau. Both the man himself and his work have had a real effect on where I am today, and I'm so grateful to him for that.
About the same time that I discovered Campbell's work about 7 years ago, I also went through a phase where I was reading anything I could find on pilgrimage. I discovered Phil's book The Art of Pilgrimage, and really loved it. I also read a book called The Joseph Campbell Companion, written by a woman who had spent a month (!) in workshop with Joe at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California. I went to Esalen's website and discovered that Phil Cousineau would be leading a workshop that fall, so I signed up. Phil had just come out with a book called Once and Future Myths, and I thought to myself "I like this guy-he's talking about travel and myth, my two favorite things".
I'll save my experiences at Esalen for a later post, but, after attending that workshop with Phil, I found myself back at Esalen a year later, this time for a month as a work scholar, and I met Phil again then. He vaguely remembered me from the year before (I think), so we chatted for a bit.
I saw Phil again a third time at Esalen a year and a half later for the Joseph Campbell Centenary Celebration that was held in March of 2004, and again at the Mythic Journeys conference in June of that year.
Everytime Phil and I have spoken he's been incredibly kind and encouraging. Meeting him, seeing what he was doing in his career, made me think that it might be possible for me to follow my bliss myself. Perhaps I didn't have to be a technical writer forever, working a job that made me want to cry at the end of every day. Now, 6 years later, I have a masters degree in Mythology, and I'm teaching and writing on myth and the other things that I'm passionate about.
Now, although Phil does recognize me now when he sees me (the last time was at a talk he gave here in Seattle last December, just before I had Alex), but I'm still not sure he remembers my name. ;) However, it doesn't matter-he encouraged me just enough when I needed the courage to follow the left hand path, and I'll always be grateful for that. Maybe someday we'll be leading a workshop at Esalen together-who knows? :)

Further thoughts on Artemis

I've been thinking a lot about Artemis today, after my reading on her yesterday. One aspect of her archetype that I think will be most valuable for me personally is the ideal of the lithe, athletic woman. I have the image of her bounding through the forest with her animals, being fully in her body. I have spent too much of my life with the archetype of Athena, dominated too much by the intellect, fully sprung from the mind of the father. I was raised by a single father, in a home and community dominated by masculine energy, so the archetype of Athena has always been a very safe and comfortable place for me. Over the last few years, I've had the privilege and opportunity to begin to explore the Aphroditic side of my nature, and, more recently, I have come under the influence of the archetype of the Mother. This has been wonderful, of course, but I also look forward to welcoming Artemis into my life-I've been looking for ways to be more in balance between body and mind.

Artemis is fully in her body. She enjoys her body, the athleticism of it. Thinking of her brings up a memory for me. I think I was about 9 years old (coincidentally, the age that Artemis prefers her young tomboy companions to be). I went on a hike with my dad and brother. As a kid, I was tall and lanky, all arms and legs. I can remember bounding up the mountain like a gazelle, calling back to my dad to hurry up. I remember the joy of being in my body, of having long legs that ate the trail as I climbed up and up. I've lost that sense of joy; I've spent too much time with mind, and not enough with body. I hope Artemis can help to bring me back into balance with my natural self.

Alex lovin' on his momma

Artemis: Wilderness and Wildness

I've been reading up on Artemis for the next meeting of the Joseph Campbell Foundation Seattle RoundTable. It's been interesting; Artemis is not a goddess that I've taken much time to think about before, so I've been grateful for the opportunity.

Artemis is Apollo's twin sister. They are the children of Zeus and Leto. When Hera found out that Zeus had been unfaithful (again), she put a curse on Leto. Leto was in labor for nine days and nights. Artemis was born first, without pain, and she then helped her mother with Apollo's delivery.

The goddess Artemis is a remnant of an earlier paleolithic goddess of the hunt. She is a virgin goddess, of wild spaces and animals. She is also, interestingly, the goddess of childbirth. When a woman gives birth to a child that process is part of her animal nature, therefore Artemis is there for her for that (breastfeeding as well).

An interesting aspect of the Artemis myth (explored in greater detail in Ginette Paris' book The Psychology of Abortion) is that, while she is the goddess of birth, she is also in charge of the quick death. In her book Dr. Paris explores the notion that whether or not one is capable of being a parent is the first decision one must make as a parent. So, if a woman cannot be a mother, she must (as a mother) provide the quick death.

Artemis' influence is also increasingly relevant to the ecology movement as well. She is the protectress of wild spaces, and of solitude. In her role as virgin goddess, she stands alone, not in relationship to a lover (as is Aphrodite), a spouse (as is Hera), or a child (as is Demeter). She is the guardian of those times in our lives when we need to be in solitude.

More to come later.

Books used as research for this post:

Pagan Meditations
The Psychology of Abortion
The Myth of the Goddess: Evolution of an Image

How I came to study myth

Growing up, I loved reading fairy tales and myths. I always loved stories, and read obsessively since I was three years old. Books helped me get through my parents divorce at age 5. When I got to college, I majored in English and writing.
After I graduated, I wanted to go on for more schooling, yet I was having a hard time deciding what to study. Literature appealed, of course, and comparative lit, but it wasn't the only thing I was interested in. I also considered anthropology or archaeology, and I was also doing a lot of reading on religion, after I left the evangelical church of my childhood behind at age 25.
In the late nineties, I discovered this new web site called amazon.com. Surfing around Amazon was always a wonderful adventure, and, given my interests, I eventually found books by an author called Joseph Campbell. I found a series of his called "The Masks of God", and I eventually ordered the books. It took me a year to read all four, but once I was done I knew what I wanted to do with my life.

My dog Hank and the pursuit of perfection

It's easy for me sometimes to labor under the delusion that it's possible for my life to be perfect. I didn't always have this problem, but ever since I met Ron it seems like occasionally I have thoughts along these lines: "well, if I just get in great shape, and write a perfect, amazing, bestselling novel, I would have everything I wanted and my life would be perfect". A few years ago, the big things in my life that I didn't have that I wanted were a husband and baby. Then, in 2003, I met this amazing guy, and, like dominoes falling, all these things that had been on my "wish" list for life started coming to me. The engagement ring, the wedding of my dreams, the graduate degree in mythology, the world's most beautiful baby-it was coming hard and fast.

Now, my life is so very happy and fulfilled. The two things still "out there" that are on my wish list are a career doing what I love, writing and talking about myth, and to get healthy and in shape, and I'm actively working on those two.

I used to fantasize about what the perfect life would look like-husband, baby, dog, house in Queen Anne with a view of the ferry boats. However, now I don't think of that life in the same way, having three out of the four. My dog helps me with this.

When I finally talked Ron into adopting a dog (all part of my plan for creating the perfect life), we found a breeder of beautiful English labs in our area. Her stud dog is gorgeous-almost white. When the puppies were born and we first saw the pictures, one of the pups in the litter had a black spot on the back of his neck. My first thought was, oh, I don't want that one-it would interfere with my idea of the perfect life. How can my beautiful dog in my perfect life have a black spot? Of course, given the way that the universe works, it was that dog that the breeder chose for us, mostly for his temperament (he was the most mellow pup in the litter, and she knew we had a baby on the way).

So, I had to let go of my ideal of the life that looks perfect. I love Hank so much, and I would never trade him for any other dog, just because he's mine. However, I'm also so grateful now that I did get so lucky as to get the pup with the black spot. He reminds me every day of how silly I was, thinking that if I could just get things a certain way, my life would be perfect. Of course it never would have been, and I would never want it to be. Every time I slip and start to think "if I could just...", I look at my beautiful dog Hank, and say a little prayer of thanks.

Thoughts

A few months ago I read Elizabeth Gilbert's wonderful memoir Eat Pray Love, and yesterday I made a point of catching Oprah because she was being interviewed. Of course, being me, rereading the book (as I've been doing over the past few days) and hearing the interview made me long even more than I already had been for some travel. I knew when I got married and had a baby that my travel would be reduced for a while, that I wouldn't be as free to go when and however I could as I had been. However, every time Alex smiles at me or Ron kisses me I remember that it was worth it.

Anyway, one of the things Ms Gilbert told Oprah is that there are three things she does every day that anyone can do. The first was this-every morning, get out your journal and ask yourself the following question: "What do I really really really want?", then answer the question. I pondered that question for the rest of the day. For the most part in my life, I have the things that I really really really want-my husband and son. The only big things that are still "out there" for me are getting in shape, and getting my career going. So, I had to ask myself the question-do I really really really want those things, which was something I hadn't honestly asked myself before.

I was reminded of the first chapter in Phil Cousineau's book Once and Future Myths, where he talks about the myth of Sisyphus as a metaphor for the creative struggle. The idea is that the work of writing the book (or creating whatever it is you're trying to create) is rolling the boulder up the hill. You get a moment's rest as the boulder rolls back down, as you walk back down the hill. This is the part when your book comes out, you go on tour, get feted, etc. Then the struggle starts back up again. Camus tells us in his essay on Sisyphus that he learns to love the struggle, and we must too.

I've been working so much this week on my Anya and the Bear story that I've reminded myself of the joy of the work itself, although it is work, a lot of work. I've realized that it's too easy for me to procrastinate my life away, and that I must write every day or lose my momentum. Hopefully writing daily in this blog will help with that. I'm still working on the getting in shape question. wish me luck.

Round Table Discussions for next year

I've been trying to get more RT members interested in coming to the meetings, so I've got some new strategies for after the first of the year. This fall we've been discussing the archetypal roles of the greek gods. The first meeting, in September, was on Aphrodite, but unfortunately only one person showed up. Partially my fault, though, because I got the word out late. This month the meeting is on Artemis. I'll be sending out a newsletter to the RT later today on what we'll be doing going forward. In November, we'll talk about Apollo and Dionysus, and December will be on Zeus and Hera, the Royal Marriage. I'll post a little essay on each class the next day.

Anyway, going forward I thought we might do a series on Campbell's "The Masks of God". I think many Campbell fans may be intimidated by them, given the length and intensity of the series. So, one discussion each on "Primitive Mythology", "Oriental Mythology", "Occidental Mythology", and "Creative Mythology". We'll see how that goes.

Recent events

Joseph Campbell says in The Power of Myth that when you follow your bliss, doors will fly open where there had been none previously (I'm paraphrasing). That has definitely been the case for me over the past couple of weeks. I've had some wonderful opportunities come up for me career-wise. Fiction writing wise, I've had one of my favorite authors ask to see one of my stories. He asked for it, I didn't ask him to read it-important point. Anyway, he's going to give me some help/advice on where I might publish it. So-woohoo!

In more myth-related news, I've been invited to submit papers to two conferences in 2008-one in Santa Barbara, and one in Zurich. I'm also preparing a paper for an upcoming issue of Spring Journal. So, overall, lots going on, and it's exciting, after so many months of treading water, primarily caring for Alex.

mythicstories.com

My website is finally getting updated! It's still immature, but there is some information about my work up at www.mythicstories.com