I got substantial work done on The Book of Sisyphus this weekend, but there’s still a lot of hill up which to push.
Boo cat has not come home. (Shit. I’ve now told the world I call her Boo cat. Now she’s probably ashamed to come home. Shit.)
Sentences Never Before Seen in Print
(These are a hobby of mine.)
Overheard at Festival of Souls: Do you have a bucket for the gourds?
Me, to Arthur: Get that catapult off my dashboard.
Posted at Mystic Wicks in response to my blog entry: Funny article about mouth cancer. (Is that the oxymoron of all time or what?)
And the granddaddy of them all: Deb, have you got any cream cheese? I left mine in my coat.
The Work of Writing and the Reputation of a Publisher
I’ve been working on The Study of Witchcraft since, I think, forever. Seriously, I think I started it in utero.
Okay, I wrote this book, because I thought it was a good idea. I thought it was something that would be useful to beginners of a studious bent. I wanted it to be a slim volume, for two reasons. First, because I thought it would be interesting as a study guide, where I would point towards knowledge and you (the reader) would go fetch. A Cliff Notes to Wicca, if you will. Second, because everything I write is MEGAHUGE and I wanted to see if I could be more terse. It was an exercise for me as a writer.
So I wrote the book and I shipped it off to Llewellyn. Now, you need to know that this is the fourth book I have sent to Llewellyn, and the first three were immediately snatched up. So I sat home, waiting for snatch to happen.
Not so much.
I hear from Llewellyn some weeks later. They like the book, but it’s too light, too short, too everything I was interested in writing. They want depth, they want length, they want it to be more chewy.
So I added a homework section to each chapter. I thought that was chewy. (Please know that chewy is my word. I have never gotten a letter from an editor requesting chewy goodness. More’s the pity.) I mailed it away with much anticipation.
Too soon.
So now I’m rewriting for the third time. The letter I have on my desk, from my editor, says, in part:
“should be expanded upon”…”should not be limited to the bare beginners’ [material]”…”Do some research”… “flesh the book out more and provide greater depth.” … “Right now the book is too superficial in some parts”… “We need more inspiration in this book, more of the meat”.
If you are Pagan or Wiccan you are now laughing hysterically, because you know, you know, that Llewellyn would never ask such things! “Everyone” knows that Llewellyn is shallow, that they hate scholarship, that they publish only tripe and silly, fluffy beginners’ books.
Yet this is not my experience, and in truth, never has been. I have defended my publisher numerous times, but there’s a limit to how much you can do that, because it sounds self-serving and, well, defensive. And people say, “Well, Deb, they publish you, but other than that they suck,” or “You’re the exception that proves the rule.” But I don’t think so. I don’t think they have editors on staff who write letters like that just for me.
Reputation is virtually unshakeable. People like to believe they know what they know. And people like to feel superior. It is lovely to be able to snort disdainfully when a certain something or someone is mentioned. For a Witch to say “Llewellyn SNORT” is like an art critic saying “Norman Rockwell SNORT.” How plebian. How beneath my lofty self.
Let’s be honest here. Lewellyn has published some suck-out-loud books. Books that have made me snort so hard I inhaled gnats. Books that have damaged both the publisher’s reputation and, quite possibly, the brains of those who’ve read them. But to honestly critique a bad book is simply not the same as dismissing an entire body of work, most of which the critics haven’t even seen.
So…gotta get back to work. Must. Write. The Meat.
So Whadya Think?
Took me forever to figure out how to do this. It’s really very simple. But my brain. Sigh.
Caesar Salad
A Caesar Salad, in its original form, has
The whole mess is prepared fresh in a wooden bowl that has been rubbed with raw garlic cloves.
We used to make a vegetarian Caesar Salad that substituted fresh-crumbled blue cheese for anchovies. It was a good substitution, because the blue cheese had much of the tang and saltiness of the anchovies, and flavored the bowl in the same way. A big salad of this sort was a main course in our family.
Not long ago, really less than ten years, before “Caesar Salad” was on every menu everywhere, it was a specialty. And if you went to a restaurant and found it on the menu, they’d ask you if you wanted anchovies** when you ordered.
It’s not that I object to it being On. Every. Menu. Everywhere. It’s just that I haven’t seen a real Caesar Salad anywhere in more than 15 years. Okay, I get that raw or coddled eggs cannot be legally served. (’cause of the salmonella. ’cause of the antibiotic-laden chicken feed. But I digress.) But even given a viable substitution (like an eggy mayonnaise) is there even such a thing anymore as an authentic Caesar recipe? I mean, isn’t “Caesar salad” now some kind of euphemism for “any salad with croutons and Parmesan cheese and probably no tomatoes or carrots”? Last night I ate dinner at Wendy’s (so sue me) and it had bacon bits. Bacon bits? Bacon bits? My outrage is boundless. Okay, it’s bounded. But it’s there.
Caesar salad is a term that anyone uses to mean anything. So ordering it doesn’t tell you what you’re getting. On a similar note, a “bagel” is a boiled, not baked, bread product. But you’ve probably never tasted one unless you live in Brooklyn. You’ve probably only had fake bagels that are baked. They’re kind of tasty, but they’re not bagels. And nobody knows, and nobody cares.
Come to think of it, doesn’t this apply to Wicca these days? There’s a core meaning of “Wicca” that was accepted for many years, until the notion of Eclectic Wicca came along. It’s not a matter of Eclecticism being an illegitimate way of practicing religion, not at all! It’s a matter of using language authentically, so things mean what they mean. So that Caesar Salad has eggs, and bagels are boiled, and Wicca is an initiatory Mystery religion.
Okay, I accept that language changes. In Wicca, there is a real and growing movement of Eclecticism. And as I often say, Modifiers Are Our Friends™. “Eclectic Wicca” is the new thing, “Traditional Wicca” is what we used to call “Wicca,” and everyone is happy, and language plods on.
But the modifier thing isn’t working, because there’s a huge voice within Paganism that not only believes “anything goes” (wasn’t Kate Capshaw cute singing that? But Temple of Doom is an evil movie. But I digress) but resents the very notion of defining terms to mean something. “Pagan/Wicca/Witch/Goddess must mean whatever I say it means and how dare you say otherwise!” So you have self-contradictory amalgams like “Christian Wicca” (shudder) and “Wiccans” who don’t cast circles or call quarters or worship deities, and people who do all those things but “aren’t Wiccan” because they don’t like the Wiccans they’ve met and don’t want to be associated with them.
They’re all a bunch of Caesar salads with vinegar dressing and chopped walnuts as far as I can see.
*A coddled egg is cooked for one minute at low temperature
**Because some people don’t like anchovies, I guess. Fancy that.
Something I really, truly, never imagined I’d read.
For those nights when you just don’t feel like it, turns out your excuse is right here.
People who don’t even know they’re expressing bigotry
I received this email, from a source I’ll be polite and leave unnamed:
We are reprinting your amusing article about James Bond that you had in the NY Times. Would it be fair to identify you thus: “Deborah Lipp, a practicing witch, is the author of the upcoming “Ultimate James Bond Fan Book.””
My response:
Is it normal for you to identify your authors by their religion? If not, I suggest you leave mine out.
My letter to Target
Read about the Target boycott here.
My letter:
I have a wonderful, fun Target right near me in West Nyack, and I enjoy shopping there. However, I will not be shopping at Target anymore, as long as you continue to allow your pharmacists to discriminate against customers on the basis of religious belief.
The Civil Rights Act does not allow employees to refuse to do their job, nor to interfere with the private relationship between a patient and physician. As long as Target pharmacists are allowed to discriminate against customers, I’ll shop elsewhere. I’ll also be advising my family and friends to do the same.
In the meantime, I sincerely hope you reconsider this regressive policy.
Watusi & Keeping it real
My cat Watusi has been missing for ten days. It’s taken me this long to be able to write, or indeed talk, about it. She’s been spotted a few times in the complex, but I haven’t seen her and the neighbors haven’t been able to get near her. So I’m hopeful that she’ll return. But meanwhile I’ve been on a rollercoaster of guilt, grief, fear, love, and a kind of longing.
Longing. I can feel her absence everywhere. Feel the emptiness in my lap, hear the silence in the bathroom (because no one is hovering near the shower and whining), feel how the temperature of the bed is lower with no one sleeping on my feet.
In Witchcraft, we’re very concerned with the imaginative task. We use visualization as our stock in trade. Sometimes this is tricky. Suppose I’m doing a spell to get Peewee a new job. How do I visualize that? Do I picture Peewee commuting to his desired location, dressed in work drag? Do I picture Peewee receiving, or cashing, a paycheck? Do I imagine a stereotypical Boss Guy shaking hands with Peewee and saying “Welcome aboard!”? Do I question why I have a friend named Peewee in the first place?
All but the last are the sort of thing often visualized in spells. They require a vivid imagination and an ability to focus on a scenario and make it real. We use meditation to build the ability to silence distraction and improve focus. We practice with guided meditations and learn to build a library of mental imagery that will stand us in good stead. We work in groups so that our disparate mental images overlap and reinforce one another (and we communicate extensively so that they don’t contradict one another).
Visualization has never come easily to me. I have no sense of dimensionality. I am left/right impaired and I get lost in parking lots. I can’t visualize the rotation of an object and I have never solved a Rubik’s cube. I have used every trick of the Witch’s trade to make it work. Sometimes my mind is stuck in the abstract. I manipulate the abstract to work my will. For example, I might just see the word JOB in big, bold letters in my mind’s eye, rather than (or in addition to) anything more cinematic.
With Watusi, there has been no problem. My relationship with her is tactile, physical, and present. There’s no abstraction in loving a cat. When I close my eyes, I can feel her, see her, experience her. I am holding her, she is heavy. She is kissing me on the lips (crazy girl), her left eye is running (again). She is meowing and I hear it exactly, in all its nuance of intonation that distinguishes between Good morning and I’m really goddamn thirsty. In a word, she’s real.
All I want is my girl back. But in the meantime, the experience is teaching me something about Witchcraft, and something about keeping it real.
Local Organizing Means Being Local
My friend Tom has been posting about the transient nature of Democratic organizing. There’s no permanent groups where you can just join up.
I know I keep getting these things from MoveOn telling me about local events in Nanuet, NY. Turns out that what they mean is, the local event that I could potentially host in my home.
So it occurs to me that part of the problem, or at least part of my problem, is the disconnect of modern culture, particularly on the urban/suburban coasts. Opening my home to my neighbors would be more appealing if I knew my neighbors better. The Republicans started organizing through churches in the 1980s, and that works, because you know the people with whom you go to church. But just a general call to local Dems? In my home?
On a parallel note, my local Wiccan clan has been having the devil of a time (no pun intended) finding a place to hold a large ritual for Yule. It certainly seems like the supply of reasonably-priced rental halls for small, grassroots type groups has dried up. Used to be there was always a VFW hall or Masonic Lodge or some such available.
Are these similar things? Is the ability to connect face to face drying up in the urban/suburban world?
