Eggs at Equinox

My Old English Bantam hens began their laying on or near Equinox. They ovulate on the sun cycle and are not lit or heated unnaturally during the dark Minnesota winter.

So we are supposed to celebrate the balance of light and dark with egg dying and the March Hare mythology. Having to wait until nearly May Day to do my egg balancing ritual (as Easter was designed to never fall on Equinox) really messes up my psyche!

Eostre (the Goddess of Spring) was to be celebrated at Equinox because our menstrual cycles and those of the other ovulating creatures of Earth need balancing in Spring and Fall. It's no good going into the May Season without having a cleanse, a fast and purge of Winter's fatty and dying foods.

The liver, kidneys, lungs, large intestine, and the skin need refreshing in the Spring and Fall.

If we wait too long for this ritual, we adversely affect our bio-rythmic cycles. This is especially important for women of child bearing age. Often our cycles will reverse themselves at the Equinoxes. One half of the year we may bleed on the full moon and then it will switch.

So in the old, old days when women's bodies were worshipped as vessels of the Goddess, we knew exactly when we were fertile and when not. This made certain May and June rituals safer in terms of planned pregnancies.

But, alas. Women's bodies were vilified and treated as vessels of Satan's power. Pariarchal religions wanted women to be weak and in the dark about how our bodies work. In this way they could control women and therefore, the goddess. Destroy them together.

This is why I don't like Easter time. It screws everyone up. Too bad.

I still dye my Eostar Eggs at Equinox. Sigh.
Kari

How Equinox Balances all parts of our selves

It's one of the two most important holy days, the other being Fall Equinox.

Look, if we take the time to think about our dark selves, the roots of our trees, how to nourish the roots, then we can expect great juicy buds, fragrant blossoms, and nutritious fruits for the light half of the year. If we don't take this time to balance, we plunge ahead into the summer time with too many "yes's" on our lips and too much sap in our brains. Then when Fall comes, our balance is more difficult. So it's time to fast, clean out our innards and our brains, and get ready for the sap rising.

If we balance in the Fall, get our bodies ready to hibernate and slow way down, prepare for the dark half of the year, we may not be quite as depressed over the winter. We have to take back our natural rythms as humans. This society we live in is without rythm, without connection to the seasons, the cycles, the changes ...but the changes happen whether we are connected to them or not.

So my muses tell me to take time at Equinox - get clear headed, clean in body and spirit. So when it's time to dance circles around the May Pole, I am ready for the buzz!

Happy Equinox!
Kari

My Space Page for Huldre!

Hello All,

Huldre (the band) now has a page at my space. Here is the link: http://myspace.com/huldre

We are going into the studio in May to begin our first CD together. We are very excited. In the meantime, listen to some of our Mp3s.

Maren and Kari have recieved the most beautiful Scandinavian Bronze Age String Skirts made by Terri Allen just for Huldre. View and read more at my Runakari blog.
We will be working with photographer, Stella, from Emella for CD cover etc.

The next time you can hear us live is at the May 1st show at the Bryant Lake Bowl Theater in Minneapolis. More info.

See you soon,
Kari, Maren and Ken

Scandinavian Bronze Age String Skirt

I am pleased to announce that I have recieved a most beautiful String Skirt from Terri Allen. Modelled after the Egtved Girl's garment (see link below).

I have finished hanging the weights of bone, shell, rock, seed, wood and resin on the hem. An updated photo will appear here soon.

The Bronze Age in Scandinavia was roughly 1400 BCE. On the coast of Jutland/Denmark, there were settlements and up into the Norwegian coastline as far as present day Oslo, as far as we know.

Anyhow, the weather was milder then. Citrus grew on the coastlines. The line of Lilith, which was the migration out of Phonecia that took the Matriarchy of Babylos on the move. The runes, the SunGoddess, Herding and fine textiles, water craft, and smithwork followed these Mothers into Crete, Etruruia (Modern Day Northern Italy), Hungary, North West to Scandinavia and North East to Siberia.

This would have been the begining of the Vanir mythology, the MotherGoddess and the Twin God/Goddess pair. Lilith, the first woman God sent to Adam in the Garden of Eden, did not hang around very long. She got fed up with Adam pretty quickly and moved on. Her children by him and by many other kinds of beings, like the ones she met coming North, became the Huldre, Tomte, Nissen, Side, Yetti, ...all sorts of creatures who humans are all part kin to through Adam. (Adam's second wife, Eve, was the mother of the patriarchal migration to follow).

The String Skirt used by young women in athletic ritual are depicted in many variant forms from Crete to the Balkans.

The Runic Alphabet, mythologies and fashions combine to make a compellingly lovely picture of this migration. The philosophies of this culture can only be described propperly by women as the culture itself was propelled and sustained by the Mother's teachings in work, song, and life process.

Here is some great reading:
http://www.smith.edu/hsc/museum/ancient_inventions/stringskirt2.html

http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/EgtvedGirl.shtml

http://www.shanmonster.com/belly/gallery/strippers/belly387.html

This last one I think is especially important to read from the perspective of the Amazonian Belly Dancers and Warrior tribes of Sheba and Troy. Women celebrated their skills as warriors, athletes, and in virility of all natures. Sexual conduct was considered a natural human and divine connection and treated as holy with rituals and institutions overseen by various dieties and patron energies.

While sexuality and femininity were later seen viewed as evil and worthy of slaughtering out of our human condition, today we understand the importance of our sexuality and our female side. Both men and women are encouraged to find balance with their yin and yang or female and male selves.

Happy Equinox
Kari