U.S. Groundhog Day, pre-Celtic Candlemas Focus on International Rewilding/Reuse of Old Farmland w/Solar Assist
U.S. GROUNDHOG DAY, PRE-CELTIC CANDLEMAS FOCUS ON INTERNATIONAL REWILDING/REUSE OF OLD FARMLAND w/SOLAR ASSIST
First Wednesday Creative (& Insecure) Writing Celebration of Indo-Euro-Brit Support for Rewilding Old Spaces w/Solar Panel Technology
Getting Carried Away by their own Animal Festivities
Americans do seem to take Groundhog Day a little too literally sometimes—Pres. Biden’s staff getting rather more worked up about holding the poor animal (ground squirrel/marmot) on high for the cameras this year, rather than low for the (poor beast’s fodder) grass & wood-fiber—beaver cousin pictured below top left). And it is the magical creature’s flat-tailed beaver cousin, that Europeans (bar a few Scots purists) think will save the Day—or at least some of our blessed days in the immediate future of the planet and for all of us grateful inhabitants—if we’re spared!
In U.S.A., February 2nd is usually reserved as a fixed date for the miracle animal’s so-called peep out of his underground hideaway—very similar to us obscure writers, hidden away in our Muse-bower or whatever serves to give us undisturbed solitude with our keyboard—before he theoretically pronounces the weather forecast for the coming month [traditional six week gap]. This year’s Candlemas-Beaver-Groundhog Day got a little complicated by Chinese New Year’s being celebrated early with the beloved #Wabbit—aka Hare—coinciding with the last week in January 2023—so they can celebrate a candle-on-water floating ceremony; but the end results appear to come together as February—ancient Candlemas—begins.
Candlemas, as we learn repeatedly from our ancestors, is traditional Feast Day of Bride; Bridei; old British Brigantia; Forest Maiden & Earth Mother—identifying with Ancient Egyptian ISIS [‘Eset’], above far rt., Egyptian Queen of Heaven & Mother of the World. As Patron of all women, she has in recent years (with feminism rising) become world icon for International Women’s Day. It’s crazy in the Shetland Isles as they, too, are celebrating Up-Hellya amid gale-force winds!
It’s Brazil & S.American Carnival time also—traditionally an end to winter with street parades taking over every town.
Chinese New Year tradition—in nations like S.Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Singapore, mainland China, Burma & Philippines include a prayer-float from shore towards the open ocean, pictured left.
Hawai’i, particularly in winter months, is dominated by an increase in numbers on the southern route of migrating Whales—most vivid & entrancing, the Humpback whales, who often give birth in these tropical waters before returning to their northern grounds in the Salish Sea(B.C.) to overwinter.
Mid-Pacific technology appears already to be able to outstrip Western thinking—perhaps increased hours of sunlight have something to do with it—a Hawai’ian farming project, given Local Government funding & support, are offering farmland acreage on Oahu, HI, complete with installed solar panel-covered roofs—like glasshouses w/built-in sun—so their solar panel technology will be used to maximum, gathering rays while simultaneously covering useful greenhouses.
British Weather Used to Max for Windpower
As a Scots ex-Pat—grateful for no longer having to endure the rigours of the wintry North Coast [Aberdeenshire, Banffshire, Moray Firth], I’m proud to see, not only restoration of my personal tree glade outside my walled garden, pic top rt. but the continued appreciation of the stand of hazel, wild & domestic cherry (gean; morello; pear & alder, bottom 2nd l.) to supplement plum, birch & previous century’s copper beech. Foregound Redwood [Sequoiadendron Giganteum] planted to celebrate the birth of my son there adjacent to/obscuring the two-century-old Douglas Fir [Pseudotsuga Menziesii; gifted by David Douglas as a seedling to the then Minister in residence in 1827 at the Old Manse who was designate Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, Edinburgh, at that time. Scots pine aka Caledonian Pine abound.
It is also truly amazing—and fairly Scots in nature—to know that the little kirk below the Manse in the farmland of the Kirkton continues to celebrate a Sunday service once every two weeks!
Nevertheless, weather & human nature being relatively constant—although increasingly wild conditions appear to be taking hold, the winds of the North are being harnessed—following a lead by radical innovator Burnett of Williamston family, led by daughter ‘boss’, with their Culsalmond/Colpy windfarm. Now wind & wave harnessing is occurring through the Glens of Foudland as far as Maggieknockater in the Buchan peninsula to electric generator power centers in the Black Isle, Cromarty; reaching into Sinclair territory in the Far North.
Easter Island Facial Traits Show Influence on Other Pacific Island Residents
Many Europeans may not notice, but there is a noted characteristic in Hawai’ian, and other mid-Pacific island residents like French Frigate Shoals, Guam, resulting in a less-circular “Caucasian” round-headed appearance, and more flat-backed, almost sheared-off shape for which Easter Island’s gods, below—and presumably their ancient resident population—were known. It is remarkable that the Hawai’ian Royal House, headed by King Kamakameha whose statue stands in downtown Hilo, HI overlooking Lilli’ewa Bay, (bottom rt.) took pride in this trait.
Last of the Royal Hawai’ian line, Queen Lilliuokalani, died last week, aged 90. Her hand-sculpted coffin made of local koa wood is currently lying in state in the Royal Palace, Honolulu. She was the daughter of Queen Lydia Kamakameha (1838-1917) who was the ultimate sovereign of the Islands and who lived during the annexation of Hawai’i by the United States in 1898.
Hawai’ians are not only proud of their facial characteristics and unique Pacific heritage, but on special occasions—during hula dance festivals or fire & light ceremonies, they dress with leis (orchid garlands w/mix of tropical blossoms-frangipani, plumeria, hibiscus-in their hair) usually tied in a “topknot”, shown above left. Easter Island topknots were a feature of all the gods aligned on the island’s shore. They were carefully chosen from local volcanic rock, sculpted into the topknot shape.
Many are now lost.
Hawai’ians are not only expert hula dance performers—using hip movement which Europeans take years to learn. But their body shape—maybe considered large to Britiish eyes—in particular with current mountain-climbing madness gripping a (mostly male) muscle-bound population.
Body movement, however, reveals a supple quality within waist & hip gyration that Caucasians are hard-pressed to emulate. It takes years to learn.
Access 2 balmy ocean temperatures have a lot to offer, & many Hawai’ians bathe once or twice daily in local pool. Pictured here rt. within a literal stone’s throw of downtown Hilo, is fave Lilli’ewa Bay. Its easy shallow sandy beach makes it popular not just with locals, but w/Oldies visiting who may have found volcanic black rocks difficult to negotiate elsewhere!
It’s also the single most sought-after go-to pool for that Pacific anomalous practice of Doolah-tending: South Seas (Bali, initially) assist within water to help young mothers prepare for giving birth.
Hawai’ian Paradise Wins Hands Down, Despite Weather Woes
Bottom Line:when all else is said, locals may complain about the weather; Californians about drought alternating with hurricane disruption; New Zealander Kiwis about people raiding their carefully-guarded environmentally-protected reefs, but it’s relative.
Pele—Hawai’ian goddess of fire & ice—continues to reside atop the Mauna, pic above l, holding the world’s largest telescope array [extra-large telescope, ELT] in her sacred grasp, while anchoring her watery toes 29,000ft into the Pacific Ocean’s deepest trench below. She is revered from ocean fringe to Mariana Trench; from coastal California—earthquake roadblock above top rt.—to Bali, Indonesia, Fiji and beyond. Like the Phoenix, ISIS, Egyptian Queen of Heaven, pic top far rt. she may fade but will never die. Even the world telescope symposium atop her sunset summit, above l., keeps touch with local Hawai’ian ‘guardians’ adhering to their policy of no unnecessary disturbance/development at her summit.
It is sacred ground, after all.
Meanwhile, despite record dry rock-bottom water supply (not) in drought-ridden No.Cal (pic 3 above rt.), organic rewilders and other gardening/planting enthusiasts continue to allow the ground around the sacred mountain and its new farmland project in Oahu to prosper—as it will even more when planned solar-panel-roofed greenhouses are erected.
And what about the workers?!
Yes:we writers, IWSGers, NaNoWriMo-ers, Muse-driven regular bloggers, insecure or otherwise, are fortunate to have such a neighborly friendly heritage right on our doorstep. Whether we’re groundhog fans or not, whether we’re just monthly First Wednesday bloggers with a leaf of fresh mint or homegrown lettuce to chew on [lucky us]; let’s agree we are a fortunate lot.
Some people never get past the comic section in their local newspaper—confusingly, Hawai’i’s own is Bahamian (Herald-Tribune) in reverse:Tribune-Herald! See what happens when you let the fritillary (above bottom rt.) out of the chrysalis!
And meantime in authentic Hawai’ian lingo, may I again wish all Hau’oli Makahiki Hou! Happy New Year. Keep on writing!
©2023 Marian C. Youngblood
Social Media Meets its Match—Hackers with Pretend Money Worming Their Way into People’s Hearts
With great sadness I preface this blog with news that Her Majesty the Queen, 96, has died at Balmoral Castle on the Royal Estate, Aberdeenshire. We send sincere condolences and support/love to the Royal Family.
Not certain if as a Brit ex-pat, currently living mid-Pacific, I should announce her death as a post- or ante-script to IWSG & First Wednesday, but a series of unprecedented events this week led me to miss this month’s deadline by 2 days {GMT-1 day PDT}.
My Angelic choir clearly approved/sent spiritual help support my request 2recover from mental & physical violation. Not only did Source aka the Universe send power outage-cum-rainstorm couple hours Weds. evening, but my computah wouldn’t load the blog. Death announcement arrives as the date/midnight changes to zero-day+1 Hence delay, date confusion—didn’t backdate to correct-so here goes Writing Addicts Pic rt. © NewYorker Monarch sits on 11thC Stone of Destiny.
SOCIAL MEDIA MEETS ITS MATCH—HACKERS WITH PRETEND MONEY WORMING THEIR WAY INTO PEOPLE’S HEARTS
FIRST WEDNESDAY BLOG—TIME FOR CREATIVE WRITERS, ARTISTS, MUSICIANS—INSECURE OR OTHERWISE—TO RISE OUT OF OUR DUSTY WRITING CAVERN INTO THE LIGHT OF DAY TO CHRONICLE/COMMENT ON HUMANITY’S SEPTEMBER FOLLIES—BEFORE THE FALL
Hack-Attack: new fearsome enemy on the home front that nobody thought would last
Human memory bank-especially in a child’s 1st, happy, protected, familiar territory with beloved toys, dollies, baby names-rulez!
"I'm gonna buy a paper doll that I can call my own / A doll that other fellas cannot steal / And then those flirty flirty guys / With their flirty flirty eyes / Will have to flirt with dollies that are real" John Mayer
As the Old World [double-entendre] gets demolished around us to make way for the New—below left Cahuenga cut-off where SoCA’s Hollywood “superhighway” (no longer exists) used to link northern end of San Fernando Valley Hwy with downtown Los Angeles Civic Center. Demolished too are downtown Alhambra district Japan and Chinatown, with loss of beloved restaurants like The Far East Café. Korean food trucks replace.
As fuel prices soar, superhighways aren’t getting the traffic. Windfarms and environmentalists rulez.
A ‘stay-at-home work-from-home’ preference shown by majority of employees during our enforced two-year isolation period—using video meetings instead—has begun to rub off on businesses around the globe, with outdoor walks, recreational gardening and a work-at-home-ethic becoming the norm. Remarkably, Saudi desert’s THE LINE, recreational ‘outdoor living’—a feature of old hippie times—is likely to catch on with the new wave—nouvelle vague—of iGen/Generation-Z of youngsters finding joy, pleasure and fulfillment in simple pursuits.
This shorthand version of ‘happiness’ is the wavelength accomplished hackers beam in on. But it’s the oldies—but goodies with a kindly trusting heart—who get spammed.
Decline… and Fall—Call Center Consciousness
There are many spaces between Earth and Heaven and in between are The Doors
misquote Wm.B.Yeats by Jim Morrison & The Doors
In the ‘Fifties when Baby Boomers were ‘in’, English-speaking nations commissioned call centers in Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, Pakistan using [cough] “English-speaking” local labour at a fraction of cost of a similar outfit at home in the West. They died pre-internet revolution, with onset of mobile phones, but seem to have raised their head again in this latest phone-related scandal.
In the ‘Sixties and ‘Seventies, nobody gave a thought to such strange remote telephone exchanges. An antiquated (but cheap) method of communication did survive the noughties’ boom. But now, surprise surprise, not only is the hacking empire privy to your personal information, but it has resuscitated the old call-center theme—this time in Nigeria, South Africa and Midlands England.
To a veteran ex-pat Brit with octogenarian comfort zone, a Manchester accent even in text—dahling—is a whole lot less intimidating than a voice on the line in broken accent telling you to hang up already.
The little lady from Manchester—so short of breath you can hear her gasping between texts—but so inner circle—in the know about it all—she has time and patience to chat (text)with an oldie—usually a safe bet as we Booomers & beyond less likely to baulk at bottom line when the money chat comes up.
iGens & Millennials are decidedly wary creatures; have little time for subjects that need a long-winded explanation. Often the shortest answer—no—can take Boomers and vintage grannies a very long time to unearth from their verbal repertoire. So they/we say yes instead and then wonder why our friendly social media accounts no longer belong to us.
Cleverly, the technique works in the hackers’ favour: soc.med. sites like Pinterest and Facebook aren’t equipped to handle breakdown. Restoring isn’t an option, either—your site no longer belongs to you. One has to start all over at the beginning; ask to join Insta, send a new photo—the newbie approach.
Meantime—every day since—my poor iPhone jumps and splutters, beeps and cajoles me from mine- no-longer Insta account telling me fifty-two messages from the hacker to all of my followers. Some of my followers still think it’s me. And until I have the strength to initiate a new account, I’m unable to correct that. Thankfully some (young, bright minds) figured it out & challenged the chat-monkey.
Monsieur Musk Plunges into Twitterdom
Most brilliant of all events, however, unfolding in this cyber-saga of crazies, and because I managed to (sortof) get my Twitter page up and running again, albeit with no files or explanation to friends: I asked Elon Musk to look into security risk and hacking potential of his new acquisition.
True to his image as Humanity’s Saviour, not only did the dear billionaire listen, actually read my text, give it some thought, respond! and follow up but my stats on that day hit the ceiling. Bless you M.Musk
Warning to oldies who get targeted: at first it feels friendly, ‘why not help her? I’m old, what harm can it do?’ Loads. Don’t mean losing friends. I mean losing one’s mind. Constant texting-even when I didn’t reply- sent me to cloud cuckoo-land. More below.
I believe in Musk. I believe he will actually make the change which wraps all this garbage up into a spaceball and flings it into orbit to join all the other spacejunk circling ever circling out there till it falls…
In 40% of hacking cases, the target is older, newcomer-friendly, artistic, feels socially responsible to help humanity and therefore, almost invariably will respond to the long-reaching arm of a complete stranger asking intimate personal questions with a view to “helping out”.
Generation Gap Plus Factor—More Oldie+Goodie Vibe
The older the target, the greater likelihood of receiving off-the-wall personal questions amicably. This sole fact of difference in age producing a different response on a thorny subject has been a miracle catalyst in the whole “false-coin” issue. Hackers already know who the best targets are: they’ve usually well beyond middle years. They’ve had their life. It’s okay to help another out, especially if they’re only just past the starting gate.
One pill makes you larger / And one pill makes you small / And the ones that Mother gave you / Don’t do anything at all
Go ask Alice when she’s ten feet tall
And if you go chasing [White] Rabbits / And you know you’re gpin’ to fall ——— Tell them a hookah-smokin’ caterpillar / Has given you the call
When logic and proportion have fallen sloppy dead / And the White Knight is talking backwards / And the Red Queen’s lost her head / Remember what the dormouse said:
Feed your head / Feed your head
courtesy Gracie Slick 1967 & Jefferson Airplane/Starship White Rabbit
‘Advice from a Caterpillar’ from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll illustration by Arthur Rackham d. Sept. 6th 1867-1939 (71) via his dau. Mrs B. Edwards
‘Sixties: Biggest, Most, Best, Weirdest—all the Superlatives
Sample text (below right) received by new Insta ‘followers’, with emphasis on revealing your own pet project, so that #superfriendly lady hacker from Birmingham or Wolverhampton can encourage a ‘sale’
If you were assured a sum of 50 thousand [take your pick, Euro, Yen, Roubles], how would you spend the money?
- New car
- New house
- Cruise liner vacation abroad
- Help relatives
- None of the above
I don’t want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve immortality by not dying
Woody Allen
Music holds the space as underlying influence in all 20thC generations. The earlier the group, the more likely are they to be controlled by addiction of choice. Twenties and Thirties: booze, including illegal venues. Forties: war-restricted, but booze and cigarettes. Fifties & early ‘Sixties: heroin, cocaine, opium. Late ‘Sixties: everything including hard drugs, heroin, cocaine, synthetic and natural coca, ayahuasca, methamphetamine, opiate morphine, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) & recreational ganja.
Closing the StarGate: Full Harvest Moon ends Twin Flame Month
So what do the ‘Sixties and 21stC 2022 Full Harvest Moon post-8/8-Lionsgate Twin-Flame month have in common?
For several generations of moviegoers/big screen watchers, film production invariably features as a growing-up medium. Less so is the attitude of Millennials, 16-year old Gen-Zs and 20-year old iGens to anything that smacks of Media, television news, man-made hype. They are, as a rule, only interested in one person aka self.
This generational trait surfaces in art, film, media presence, social interaction, text and creative identity.
Google the first of the bigtime internet-friendly outfits has warned Google Chrome users of the security risk posed by “friendly” hackers.
Twitter, as we’ve seen above, is responding to the threat with appropriate action.
Writing All the Way to the End
For us (Insecure) Creative types, writing fills the gap between empty memory Muse-infused hippie cabin in Redwood country and 21st Century internet wobble from a system of bots who will control our cyber-future.
Stargates are familiar. We’ve all been here before. As all the best ‘Fifties & ‘Sixties beat generation know, Reggae and Boyband Dance Moves are just playful repeats of an age-old message. This one’s REALLY the last time round, this time. Maya gate-keepers confirm.
p.s. Rainstorms over Pacific and gates of Balmoral; yet HM managed to hold an audience with new Tory PM Liz Truss to form a goverment, before she died Weds/early Thurs—like her daddy Geo.VI— in her sleep. Royal Family members William, Charlotte & George had flown north from Norfolk to Ballater and Balmoral on Monday, to be by her side as she rested on advice of doctors. She asked Tory appointee Liz Truss in her official capacity as Monarch to form a government Tuesday. Died peacefully in early hours of Wednesday a.m.
Ticking all the boxes, Your Majesty. Stay cool, Ma’am. We love you.
Like Her Majesty, tapping her riding crop with an impatient dig at the Almighty B4 the Pearly Gates: Open the Door brother: Immortality here we come.
Or words to that effect. Writers write. Bloggers blog. Gardeners plant gardens and the rest is in the hands of Fate. Go ask Alice. She knowz. ©2022 Marian C. Youngblood
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Ancient Calendar More Accurate Than Ever—Harvest Lammastide—When Nature and Heavens Sparkle & Entice
ANCIENT CALENDAR MORE ACCURATE THAN EVER—BACK-TO-THE-LAND ETHOS—MOTHER EARTH GUIDES US HOOMAN (Insecure) WRITERS, ARTIST-CREATORS, MUSICIANS, COPS, HOSPITAL & CONSTRUCTION WORKERS & esp. FARMERS
FIRST WEDNESDAY BLOGMOBILE ROLLCALL from COSMOS for WRITERS to EXIT LAVATUBE HIDEAWAY & GREET ANCIENT LUGHNASADH/LAMMAS & HER PERSEID METEOR SHOWER SHOOTING STAR PARADE
SIRIUS Summer Dog Days Predict H2O, PERSEID & η-AQUARID Meteors💥
There is pleasure in the pathless woods, there is rapture in the lonely shore, there is society where none intrudes, by the deep sea, and music in its roar; I love not Man the less, but Nature more
George Gordon of Gight, Lord Byron, died 1824 aged 36
August has traditionally had pride of place in European culture. Normally frozen like Juneau, AK at same latitude 58ºN, this year northerners join Mediterranean nations basking in unaccustomed warmth of Gulf Stream marvels carried relentlessly from Florida and Bermuda to reach beyond Iceland, Faroes, the Baltic, to Archangel & Nordkapp.
Sunspots Kindle Britain/Europe’s Hottest-Ever Temperatures, Pacific El Niño
An unusually large CME—coronal mass ejection—caused when a large sunspot curves round to face Earth during solar maximum—featured first week August in Washington State’s far NorthWest territory bordering Canadian Vancouver Island’s whale migration route—folk memory or consciousness trigger?
Mud Lake, WA rt., unusual Aurora latitude 47ºN—same as St.Michael’s Glastonbury tor, Newport, Bath, Somerset, Glamorgan & Roman market town Caer Gwent Chepstow, S.Wales—all with music festival Severn-estuary-related connection2 subterranean faultline hotsprings in Somerset & Brittany—seemed to send a signal last week from the Heavens—Aurora Borealis usually a feature of winter skies—to festival party-goers excited to return to mask-free music in Britain, Berlin, Monte Carlo, Miami, Santa Cruz, Mendocino, Monterrey, London’s SouthBank Centre and NYC’s Central Park.
Stormy Times Call4 Stormy Measures—Can WiFi Forestry Replace Corn Dolly-Clyack Sheaf
All along Scotland’s North Coast—Aberdeenshire, Moray Firth, former Banffshire, traditional inshore fishing boats like this oak vessel in Gamrie Bay plied waters from Peterhead to Elgin, Black Isle, Highland Fault-Glenfeshie-Caledonian Canal ©G.Robertson
From birth in the Ocean on ancient Pictish Burghead Fortress’s North Shore beach, STORM is daughter of a long tradition of Clavie-burning crew of Fire Festival-every-Quarter men & youths who shoulder a burning barrel of tar, below rt. around the coast town dispensing gifts of charred oak to residents, then hoist it to Doorie fire altar on fort’s highest rock to smoulder and burn, saving one ember for next time.
STORM, the gigantic puppet robot doll made entirely of environmental waste, is THIS WEEK gracing Edinburgh’s groovy Festival Fringe with her unique presence. Joint Creators Trees for Life, Glenfeshie, Invernessshire original Findhorn Foundation spin-off guru Alan Watson-Featherstone’s 30-yr forest, and Vision Mechanics Storm’s creators, are together spreading the word on #NewAgeConsciousness & tree-planting
Sunspot Triggers Summer Aurora & Pacific Tropical Storm Stevo
Across the pond, Hawai’ians pride themselves—nay boast—of another goddess: higher-than-Everest 29,000ft Mauna Loa (calculated to snow-covered peak from deep ocean floor). She’s a hurricane-buster, famed for side-swiping every ocean impediment that comes her way—Pele-speak for local goddess’s near-miraculous ability to redirect storms north and rain south away from her unique mountain home. Goddess Pele conspires with brother El Niño & volcanic sisters worldwide to spew lava when and wherever possible over machine/mechanical devices to make us (hoomans) wake up!
Ten years ago I was able to post an El Niño video without hassle—they want premium content now 😦
Check out how Pele’s volcanic brethren either side of the Equator are holding our oceans steady in August 2022 on run-up to 8/8 Lionsgate. CMEs turn on a switch. Voilà volcanic mayhem worldwide as Stromboli, Vesuvius, Etna, Sangay Ecuador & Kyushu’s Sakurajima react to Lammas sunspot activity. Twin-sis Mauna Kea spouts from her lava tube in Hawai’i Volcanoes NPS temporarily CLOSED, hoping sunspots & Perseid meteors will slow later in month for reopening. Meantime Big Island virtual pix…
Perseid meteors sparkle to Earth from their vortex in Algol’s binary eye of Medusa clutched in heroic hands as Perseus rescues Andromeda from Cetus, the Whale, below rt. Sirius Canis major rises East to bring breathless Dog Days, the Nile bursting its banks to flood Luxor during hot rainless dry nights.
Appropriately, Guatemalan Elders have known for decades that human ascension predicted by their ancestors has already begun. Daykeeper Hunbatz Men, modern Elder of the Guatemalan Maya, foresees no apocalypse, but encourages deep meditation and generosity to trigger joy & gratitude in a thankless world. Similarly, Islam uses prayer and gift-giving as a discipline.
Signs of the [End] Times or Birth of a New Age?
Judaic scripture [Revelation uses sacred numerology and dramatic descriptions of the Rapture and Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse—war, pestilence, famine and death to symbolize the End of Days.
Arab sacred texts repeat the need for constant prayer by the devoted in order to be saved. The Maya believe that sharing their higher understanding handed down by their elders from the time of their Ancestors will save the human race from itself. Maya wisdom says the New Age began four years ago.
Ailkey Brae, above bottom left, is classic example of 5,000 years squeezed into Lammas week: Aikey Horse Fair, held as recently as 1980s on the harvest stance below Aikey Brae Recumbent Stone Circle [RSC] twins with Culsalmond, at entrance to Glens of Foudland—also RSC territory—where on St.Serf’s day in July, tradition held St. Sair’s Fair on the “market stance” field of Jericho next to its [ruined] RSC. Biblical refs aside, St. Sair was patron of Colpy, sanctified annually at neighbouring Williamston well.
Burning Man, Combine Harvesters, Plant New Trees for Old Times
Meanwhile Black Rock in the Nevada Desert, two hours North of Reno, fave tent-city for Burning Man l.above, long before Covid, will run again mask-free this year August 28-September 5th-a post-pandemic event: main tickets $575—$100 more than in 2020. Tents, camping, food vendors festival materials included.
If you are shivering in goosebump land because of Jack Nicholson’s 1980 psychological thriller, The Shining, directed by Stanley Kubrick, based on the 1977 Stephen King novel, you are wise to keep head down, windows closed as your campervan screeches into high gear mounting 7,000-ft Donner Pass. Kubrick moved King’s Overlook Hotel to Washington state to avoid clash with the real Overlook, which will accommodate late festival-goers as spare camping back-up. Nightmare city!
FIRING-THE-GRID IN FEBRUARY 2023
While we’re staying cool and hydrating hourly through this heatwave, it’s good to plan ahead for a world super-togetherness event, Fire-the-Grid2 February 21, 2023. World meditation focus on that day will peak at the moment of 11:11a.m., so plan to be seated, safe in your comfort zone ready to feel joy—biblical rapture—for minimum five minutes by 11:07. The Universe is giving you four minutes to prepare.
Agriculture Adaptable to ReNew-able/ReOldie-Wayz
Sentimental throwback time, above :agriculture eclipsing summer in winter: Kirkton of Bourtie top, farm steading in winter of 1981 later converted to posh modern (granite) house complex; lower: RSC same farmer’s field with summertime barley bales rolled like missing megaliths against midwinter sunset in S.W. Kirkton of Bourtie stone circle, glimpsed from the Old Manse.
TRADITION LINGERS IN THE OLD WORLD
Traditionalists are still rampant in Europe—nay Colonialism never died. Countries bordering the former “Silk Road” were affected by opening of the Suez Canal, Qanātu as-Suways, 1859, linking the Red Sea & Mediterranean, as 1500 years of travel became a short 120-mile ocean hop, skip & jump between the North Atlantic and southern Indian Ocean.
Egypt is main beneficiary, as water level—Nile linked to SIRIUS rising—became controlled: only loss was having to re-site iconic Abu Simbel temple to higher ground. Ethiopia, Iran and Arabian Gulf nations boomed as the Red Sea dried up.
With such history of drought & water-consciousness, it’s satisfying to watch Saudi ingenuity triumph in the desert. Snaking for 100 miles from Red Sea shoreline, construction on the wondrous temperate-climate-controlled triple level high-rise mirrored city, THE LINE has begun. Two sub-levels house train track & infrastructure, leaving street level for glass-enclosed gardens, theatres, offices, 24-hour restaurants, recreational pools, sports arenas and a 100-mile shopping complex.
No cars or trucks. Completion is due 2030.
All Stops Out for Dream Concepts & Dealing with the HEAT
THE LINE Saudi dream-city makes for interesting contrast.
Proposed as robotic-press-button permanently cool, totally-enclosed 100%-temperature-controlled habitat along a new RedSea-DeadSea highway, The LINE will bring artificial light-cum-air-conditioning where only camels plodded before. Unlike the Saudi rail link which serves Mecca from the coast during annual Hajj for Eid gift-giving after the Ramadan fast, the LINE breaks new ground, heads for mountainous terrain where shopping, walking, pool-dip coffee-klatching become the norm over minaret calls, mosques and touching prophet Mohammed’s A.D.605 Black Stone.
Veteran Song Circle/Fire Festival Traditions Bring Communities Together
If the thought of camping out in mud-soaked portaloo-contaminated rain-drenched fairground conditions in Reno NV, top, gives you goosebumps, think again.
Those running the show have learned from past Music Festivals—Newbury, Glastonbury, Big Sur, Woodstock, to current Leeds, London’s LLCM Meltdown Festival & 4 Scots fans THIS WEEK Edinburgh Festival Fringe— do your own thing—be gentle with the Earth, our Mother—plant a tree yourself—Add your 21stC futurist consciousness—and a donation—2Storm & the Forest
Beyond Uranus or Back Underground in Writers’ LavaTube Hideaway
NASA’s recent launch of its James Webb telescope reveals unprecented images of Uranus, top middle left—in my oldie-but-goodie mind joining V.ger and Spock in that uncharted area beyond the Solar System called the Kuiper Belt—Spock-Speak image top middle rt. Alien Klingon ‘wessel’ ditching in San Francisco Bay, Spock in white, Scotty in charge of whales—movie Star Trek IV the Voyage Home.
If URANUS’ moons and her vertical axis [c.f. Saturn and Jupiter on the horizontal] delight and inspire you to plant another garden in the Earth—from above or below—go for it. Plant up a storm
The gardening Caledonian pine tree-planter in me wants to stay topside all the time. But my writers’ Muse is a stickler for personal discipline—that’s freedom in subterranean #lavatubespeak!
8/8 LionsGate this week & Lammas goes on for another three. Enjoy. ©2022Marian Youngblood
Human Kindness Grows Tentacles—Learning new Migrant ways in CultchaShock of Moving Home—
HUMAN KINDNESS GROWS TENTACLES LEARNING NEW MIGRANT WAYS IN CULTCHASHOCK OF MOVING HOME
MONTHLY FIRST WEDNESDAY EMERGENCE FROM SUBTERRANEAN/SUB-PACIFIC CINDER-CONE TUNNEL for INSECURE WRITERS, FLYAWAY SUPERSCRIBES & WORD-ADDICTS OF ALL AGES
Driving on Right… Thinking on Left
Catherine Zeta Jones‘s experience—a Welsh-born (Sept. 1969 barely a Millennial) star of Glamorgan, S.Wales, then London, Paris, New York and LAX with her hit Chicago (2002, also Renée Zellwegger & Richard Gere) brought her full attention world-wide. Working with and eventually marrying Michael Douglas was a clincher in Hollywood, but she swears her daily quickies to local supermarket or even regular swing-by her hair stylist still cause her palpitations.
You think she’s kidding? Driving on or off the freeway in downtown Los Angeles—or even a leisurely stop off for fries in demure Beverly Hills is not automatic. It causes her to do her “British click-click” as she switches her brain to remember to drive on the right.
It’s no joke.
Back home, on sweet-perfumed winding hedge-lined roads of Tiger Bay rural South Glamorgan—home to Welsh stars Shirley Bassey & Tom Jones, we Boomers, pre-Boomers—Crazee-Oldie Land Girl Diggie Chickies use bicycles, maybe a pony, a horse or two if we’re fortunate, and we DRIVE ON THE LEFT.
This remarkable observation may have escaped the attention of the Greater American continent or in fact most of the Western World and including Oz/NZ & Indonesia; but interestingly NOT Japan. This curious anomaly results in a parking lot in downtown Hilo, Big Island, HI where traffic travels left: entry & exit look left. This teensy weensy change in direction caused chaos on entry to the Suisan marina and dock parking lot—built by Japanese contractor—for the official government-funded multi-glitter rocket-boosted star-filled sky over Hawai’i’s downtown Bayshore—the municipal fireworks display last Monday night, July 4th. Please allow the 4th to be with you. Blatant crib. Sorry Star Wars.
It boomed and popped (superb right-brain chaos thinking) for a prescribed Government-funded fully loaded Fireworks Display lasting precisely 90 minutes. Then all the vehicles drove on the LEFT to get back out on the Highway. Thank you Queen Liliuokalani (last queen) for having us on your shoreline.
I empathize deeply with Catherine—wondergirl to beat all exports from pre-Celtic mystical Wales. I don’t live in SoCal or even get to do a little shopping on Rodeo Drive (long time ago)—no longer desire. But growing up in Scotland, having 30-year offspring period; then zoom All Change—CulchaShock USA here we come. Neither American husband understood. They drove on the right: always; no problem. But neither got it that it was not automatic for me. There’s not a day I don’t forget to remember which side of the street to look out for traffic on: Boom she-bang. Give that woman a ticket.
Olde Times Always There—iGens Tackle Retro-Book-Learning
But there’s hope for us Oldtimers—call us what you will—WWII Land Girls—who wore the dizziest snaz headscarf routine to keep unruly hair out of the pail while milking the cow—or planting kale & cabbage.
May not be quite old enuff to be a Land Girl, but my parents had friends who were and the ethos stuck.
Armed with bucket and spade, sometimes water hose or mechanic’s toolkit, Brit lady volunteers pretty well ran everything behind the scenes, vide HM Queen bottom left, on visit to War Museum to see her khaki wartime volunteer uniform.
Even our language is different. Lingo changes generationally—each new gen a new word. Only now they’re called memes. Don’t ask me. I’m not a millennial. Nor am I an IGen, GenZ or even a Boomer. Ahem. I was born before the Julian calendar change. Well, not quite that old. But…
Onward and upward: pix top above mostly the gorgeous and forever timeless-no-age-looking Zeta-Jones in triplicate counter-clockwise from top left 1. Butterfly nebula to get us thinking aerial thoughts on transformation and transfiguration in this new world 2.&3. trailer for and Catherine’s seminal scene from Chicago starring Richard Gere & Renée Zellwegger 4. July 2022 reconciliation-family reunion of husband Michael Douglas’s estranged son, courtesy selfless Catherine <3. 5. Semi-serious break from Silly Season distractions: Wild boar—contested entrant into human race for environmental regeneration unpopular with some new rewilding charitable institutions; carved stone rooftile found embedded in Chesters fort, Northumberland, part of Hadrian’s Wall abandoned before Roman exit A.D. 420. Sacred wild boar was not only emblem of the 20th Legion Deva Victrix, but important enough for legionaries to hack away at Gordon territorial boar coat of arms in Aberdeenshire [Deva also ancient pre-Celtic name for River Dee—goddess’s victory over sacred water]?
Aberdeenshire is coincidentally target of summertime exit from London heat to pleasures of Scottish country dancing, highland pony trekking, forest rewilding and—later—Braemar Gathering attended by Her Majesty. Formerly part of her holiday from metropolitan demands after she views Windsor Horse Show [fave animal after corgis] & Windsor Royals Polo Match. Unable now to ride because of spinal pain, at age 96, she deputized grandson HRH Prince William to swing his polo stallion around like he’s a professional, good at animal recognition/communication and care. There are plenty horses waiting for them in Balmoral, after touchdown in Scots capital, Edinburgh, to “receive the keys to the kingdom”; a short tree-planting session and (private) passenger train ride later & she will reach Outlander territory allowing rain, wind, trees, river Dee and peace to enfold. She may even get some personal catchup time for reading (and planting more trees) with the children. Lonach Gathering, Strathdon gathers friends of mountain, sky and earth together as the Clans march through the Glen to the sound of the pipes.
Without libraries, what are we? We have no past, no future
Ray Bradbury
Probably most famous of all, the Great Library of Alexandria, Egypt, holding scrolls in its Mouseion—an Academy dedicated to the nine Muses held papyrus scrolls from Nineveh, Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon 605 B.C.; Sumerian, Assyrian, Mesopotamian papyrus records brought into port in ships of Hellenic origin. This aura of cultural academia was created as a royal initiative on impetus of author-historian Ptolemy I Soter c. 320 B.C. with his son, c.240 B.C Ptolemy II Philadelphus, after the death of Alexander the Great, 323 B.C. when the empire collapsed, dividing into three. The Library was built in the Brucheion (Royal Quarter, below l.) as part of the Mouseion building which included living quarters dining facilities and tax-free academic lifestyle for a dozen teachers. Sacred ‘temple’ for an estimated 400,000 scrolls held by royal command the main purpose of the Ptolemaic campus of buildings was to show off the wealth of Egypt, with research as a lesser goal. Library contents were created strategically for the benefit of their royal ruler, with the Chief Librarian appointed as personal tutor to the king’s son Intent was if scholars were completely freed from all the burdens of everyday life they could devote more time to research and intellectual pursuits. Historian Strabo called the group of scholars who lived at the Mouseion a σύνοδος (synodos, “community”). As early as 283 B.C. they may have numbered between thirty and fifty learned men.
The *Place of the Cure of the Soul*
Μουσεῖον τῆς Ἀλεξανδρείας original Mouseion Academy sacred to Goddesses of the Arts, Nine Muses, was established as major part of Ptolemaic plan: academic tax-free community learning institution, shared dining-living quarters, garden walk, botanical zoo, teaching classrooms, lecture hall, a dozen academics including a Head Librarian. Ptolemy II Philadelphus son on father-historian Ptolemy I Soter’s advice, provided a learning environment, lecture halls, shared dining, reading room, meeting rooms, gardens, creating a model for the modern university campus.[32] A hall contained shelves for the collections of papyrus scrolls known as bibliothekai (βιβλιοθῆκαι). An inscription above shelves read: “The place of the cure of the soul.”
You Have to be Both Sexist & Racist to Remember WWII
Perfectionist in personal appearance, HM’s superb timing @QueensCanopy est. 2022 her charity of choice encouraging tree-planting by spade & rake aka WWII WRAC female-backup force technique! Monarch’s war uniform held London Military Museum
Alternate aphorism from Brit Land Girls as reaction to learning of American G.I.s’ rural station as uniformed migrant gum-chewing baggy-pants-wearing khaki bois drinking at the local: “Them Yanks—over-weight, over-sexed and over here”
Remembering to Remember or Forgetting Writing Cues, Deadlines
July stand by! It’s traditionally hurricane season in Bahamas and Antilles—but it’s Silly Season in the Press Office—this grateful not-so-young pre-Boomer still breathing & counting the sacred numbers, despite current trending political Brit. Downing Street news. No.10 Cat is more clued in on that story.
Much more relevant to the wondrous miracle of being present—of hauling oneself by one’s bootstraps out of our Cinder Cone Cave of Writerly Solitude to Face the World for one first Wednesday per month: think NaNo & IWSG who both have summer projects on the slow burner.
Smell Burning? It’s a cloud of leftover dynamite, gunpowder smoke from July 4 Independence Day Weekend+Monday fireworks-to-die-for, sparkler* heaven for Oldie Americans, rocket shower gems for toddlers. All cats indoors, however. Drive ‘wrong way’ down Bayshore & Banyan.
Watch yer feet for S.Korean Enhypen-clone #redsnapper bangers—all the rage.
*p.s. On anti-glitter sparkler campaign, I washed some of my shiny (sixties’) Mendocino abalone shells and resulting glitter scattered on the carpet as I dried them was verrrry sparkling!
Light Beings Call (Writing) Hideaway Hotline by Sacred Numbers
They say home is where the heart is; Deepak Chopra says breath is life; Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh would say breathe in I have arrived—breathe out I am home, Peek out cave take in-breath; write blog post blog tune into madness of human lot. On exhale, the pundits say, we put the world to rights. Happy 4th or as #roaring ‘twenties star Groucho Marx said “plenny mo’ numbers”. Happy scribing. ©2022 Marian Youngblood
Nighttime Chat with Ancestors in Dreamtime Taps Universal Subconscious to Quiet Fear bring Calm
NIGHTTIME CHATS WITH ANCESTORS IN DREAMTIME TAPS UNIVERSAL SUBCONSCIOUS TO QUIET FEAR, BRING CALM—THE UNCONSCIOUS HEALING METHOD
First Wednesday Writers‘ Assignation w/Mother Earth Topside to HEAL post-Emergence from Depths of Subterranean Wo/Man Cave
There are drawbacks to spending writing time predominately below-ground, but then one’s time is one’s own. This has been a boon during our two-year hiatus from #RealLife. Especially if great-grand-auntie Minnie & Co hold forth from their gallery EVERY night in Dreamtime.
Oldies’ #Vintage Gardening Method—Simple Job vs. iGen Virtual or Millennials’ Truckathon Total-Clear Techniques
Let your joy explode your questions. All that matters will fall into place and you will know—without thinking—easily. Drop burdens of separateness and all strivings to gain knowledge and come into the wholeness… All is one.
Let us unite.
Dorothy Maclean message from the Devas in Memoirs of an Ordinary Mystic Findhorn Foundation Press, 2010
While British school/university curriculum continues through June, in U.S. Memorial Day weekend topped teenage graduation ceremonies adding a new virtual voice, as they enter ‘real’ life via their iPhones. Life, they might find, especially one guided by our revered tween-and-twenties iGen-Gen-Z offspring (probably to Millennial parents)—oh dear newest graduates join an almost totally VIRTUAL WORLD—think everything is doable because it can be simulated electronically.
During World Medical Meltdown, Nations Return to Traditional Ways—Summer Music-Fire Festivals—Burning Man 14thC Version
Images below pull heartstrings, coming as they do from another era—a time when the world was safe from rabid disease and the unpredictable destiny of the human mind to conquer it—when masks were something you wore to a fancy dress party or masquerade: from left, Black Rock, Nevada desert giant Burning Man ready to light. Camping out over 3-4 days for music festivals like Woodstock brought out community spirit; music comes in all sizes—staircase in Valparaiso lol. Tarot pick to guide us through. Lower l.secretly all waiting for solstitial moonrise ©MCYoungblood Hill of Barra Kirkton of Bourtie stone circle RSC 6/21/11 extreme moonrise Metonic cycle; lastly— Gustav Klimt‘s golden phase goddess of Health and Medicine, Hygieia—we should know cos she holds caduceus symbol of medical knowledge.
Nations like Pakistan, Japan, S.Korea and most of the former British Colonial regimes have a long history of ‘grow-your-own’. They are geared to help each other manage food production and delivery, when times are hard, with many farming families sharing organic harvests in simple community eating places. Street vendor/outdoor eating is becoming popular in cold countries, too as summer progresses.
Not all countries choose the food-share option, however—some can barely feed their own homeless. While others—more affluent, or like UAR-Dubai-Iranian bloc dedicated to sharing summer festivals and wealth, have led—with European help—to establish secure food-emergency supply chain. Attention via smartphones/instant messaging worldwide, idolizing hospital epidemic docs and medical workers, has elevated 24-hour non-stop dedication to their job to near-angelic proportions—slotting them firmly in the Spirit realm. Health Angel Spirit-Mother figure Hygieia, above Klimt oil & gold on canvas, rules with her [serpent-entwined] rod!
Pure 22-carat Gold symbol of wealth from time immemorial—precious metal mined & worked by ancient cultures: Islam, Assyrian Egyptian, Rome as their ultimate show of power. Left Caduceus Gk.= staff of life, entwined by serpents of pagan spirit world, imparting secret occult knowledge to the initiate. Still used in hospitals. rt. Full regalia: Gold Coach for the Jubilee. Her Majesty hasn’t sprung a platinum one.
All stops are out in London for nonagenarian HM Queen’s Platinum Jubilee parade events involving the royal gold coach, the monarch’s priceless heirloom regalia, with full retinue attending of every member of every Euro royal house from Hohenzollern, Battenberg [now Windsor], Romanov, and Hesse to Monaco, Malta and Gibraltar. Every wearable Guards uniform will be worn, horses shod & cannon & gun salutes performed to the National Anthem over two weeks in June, anniversary of her 1952 coronation.
Typically for the tiny monarch—whose miniature frame can only just hold bucket and spade—focus on her Queen’s Green Canopy features strongly during lockdown, with tree-planting by other royals too. While no longer physically able to ride horseback, Her Majesty adores the outdoors.
Summertime Good Fun Times
British Summertime garden parties—aka dance the night away without a mask ‘good fun-times’ have escalated with relaxed government ruling—stimulating community-led initiatives of outdoor games, theme parks and back-to-nature walks in local woodlands.
New Moon on May 30th clustering conjunct Jupiter-Mars supportive of main moves in Gemini: Mercury direct; sun/moon holding just out of reach of Taurus’s hold on Venus and Uranus—Neptune holding emotional Pisces full-on water no respite, according to lifetime tarot reader and spiritual astrologer, @isispriest David Zunker:
Double or quits: new Moon with Sun exact 11:11p.m.in super-go Gemini-with Mercury now direct-moves a supportive Taurus-Venus-Uranus conjunction, Jupiter-Mars conjunct Aries held trine by emotional Neptune in Pisces:
Watery suggestion—”We open our minds to new connections and ideas but hold on to cherished goals, while remaining flexible to new possibilities. Allow your destiny to pull you through time.” David Zunker
Back to the Land—Bay Area Trustfund Dropouts Move North—Rock Music Follows
The ‘Sixties go down in history as a “Time when if you remember it, you weren’t there”. Liverpool had the Beatles for England, just when New England captured American youth débût performances by new groups at E.coast Woodstock and W.coast Altimont. Grateful Dead, Joni Mitchell, Carole King and some unheard of music groups [like the Doors]! were literally getting their act together.
Down in the Jungle Living in a Tent—Better than a Pre-Fab—
No Rent
Down in ?Hackney livin’ in Clover—wait till the landlord comes—All Over
pseudo Haiku take on British Radio ‘Home Service’ wartime humour Spike Milligan, The Goon Show, 1956
Magically, the San Francisco Bay Area was a magnet for music. Even the Brits ended up playing there*, while real hard-core back-to-the-Earth living attracted many groups farther north-exodus from Santa Cruz or downtown Haight-Ashbury to Mendocino and Humboldt redwood country.
As one of those who was actually there 1969-1973—a clear advantage to Boomer/pre-Boomer vintage status—tho’ some of it IS difficult to remember—was hearing groups’ first performances [Crosby, Stills, Nash débût with Richie Havens, Neil Young, Mamas&Papas]. Above pix, courtesy ©London Records owners Deram-Threshold rt. reveal Brit Moody Blues’ wild-west cave-dwelling fire-burning passion for songs “To Our Childrens Childrens Children” [Never Thought I’d Live to be a Hundred, Gotta Make the Journey Out ‘n’ In] set in a fantasy hippie den on a distant planet; clear taste in décor similar to (below) contemporary NoCal group Cat Mother’s entwined psychedelic window on their [mushroom & music] world. Cat Mother ‘and the All-night Newsboys’, seminal album ALBION DOOWAH [Strike a Match and Light Another…]©Polydor photo 1970 ©Chamberlin shows group family portrait outside their Albion, CA self-built shack/living quarters for six-man band+families.Lead singer-songwriter Michael Equine sitting on outhouse roof; Redwood clearing on Albion Ridge. Buckminster Fuller dome-home; skunk under the bed redwood treehouse, Windjammer ocean restaurant.
*Graham Nash—long-serving CSN singer-songwriter—is English ❤ New tour announced for 2022!
Within a Cone’s Throw of…Cairngorms National Park
Scotland’s Moray coast is often overlooked in a search for Britain’s largest national park: Cairngorms NP at over a million acres (1,118,720 to be exact-size of Luxembourg, or 4,528 sq km (1,748 sq miles). Within shouting distance of North Coast dolphin sighting, the coastline boasts other marvels: Brodie Castle, Cawdor (of Macbeth fame), and probably the greatest cathedral “Lantern in the North” Elgin, burned by the Wolf of Badenoch. Forres has its witch lore—Edinglassie hanging tree shows rope marks. And Valiscaulian order Pluscarden Abbey hides in the coastal ridge, keeping monastic time since 1100.
Findhorn nestles between Burghead’s largest northern Pictish hillfort and Lossiemouth military airbase, currently on standby. The spiritual community lies within ancient curtilage of 8thC Duffus Castle.
Rather like the trees and vegetables of Findhorn community’s Nature Spirits, summoned by Dorothy Maclean or Eileen Caddy’s ‘still small voice within’, Nature speaks. It takes a lifetime to hear her. It’s up to us now.
I don’t want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve immortality by not dying
Woody Allen
End Times: Fire-the-Grid to Invite Joy, Gratitude, Prayer
Terence McKenna spoke of the Eschaton—a final end-of-world spiritual event predicting human ascension to the Oversoul. He was adamant the human race has purpose toward the symbiosis of man and machine—his hyper-complexification [thinkSpock, LLAP #Mindmeld].
Both he and psychoactive dabbling colleague Ram Dass/Richard Alpert have gone up the sky elevator, but felt the human race was headed inexorably to its Omega Point. McKenna was skeptic but convinced—alongside sacred wholistic practitioners Caroline Myss, Greg Braden, Deepak Chopra, Clarissa Pinkola-Estes, David Spangler/Lorian Foundation, to recharge via prayer & joy, as regular input to Fire-the-Grid. He was adamant the human race is constantly speeding up to meet its own designer future.
Native American wisdom talks of Return of the Bird Tribes (Ken Carey) just as native Wisdom-Keeper shaman Kiesha Crowther/Little Grandmother / Message for the Tribe of Many Colors describe changing times as a prelude to an awakening human condition within this new nature-loving, spiritually-based, sacred commune of souls.
We have help.
‘There is a river flowing now very fast. Some will be afraid and try to hold on to the shore. Feeling torn apart, they will suffer greatly.
Know the river has its destination.
The elders say we must let go of the shore, push off into the middle of the river, keep our eyes open and our heads above water.
And I say, look around and see who is in there with you and celebrate’
Hopi Elder Prophecy, Oraibi, Arizona 2000
Angels to Guide Us: Love the [Writer’s] Cave You’re In…
1st Wednesdays come around with alarming frequency when you’re underground—with a bunch of [Insecure] Writers banging on the door to your secret inner sanctum. But it’s worth it for the feeling of gratitude it instills in us humans who’re only just beginners in this new way the Universe likes to work it.
Keep on lovin’ what you do—has to be our angelic motto of the day-week-Mental-Awareness month. And with the trees [and Dorothy’s sweet peas] guiding us, what can we newbies do but acquiesce, go with the flow, allow. By letting (Mother) nature spirit move us where she needs us to be, we learn to be willing children in a brand-new guessing game. Let solstitial festivities begin. ©2022Marian Youngblood
The Scythian Connection—Eastern Scotland & Ireland Share Famous Firbolg Ancestors: Create First Scythian/Scots Race
THE SCYTHIAN CONNECTION—EASTERN SCOTLAND & IRELAND SHARE FAMOUS FIRBOLG ANCESTORS who SAILED BALTIC from THRACE to GAUL— CREATED FIRST SCYTHIAN/SCOTS RACE
RECENT FORENSIC/DIGITAL IMAGERY REVEALS CELTIC GENETIC ARCHETYPE
Sailing the Baltic from Ancient Thrace, Scythian Genes reach Belgic Gaul, Eire and Caledonia
According to Irish writers, the Picts, in their first progress to Ireland from Thrace, settled a colony in Gaul, and the tribes called Pictones, Pictavi in that country are descended from them. They also gave their name to Pictavia, Poitiers and the province of Poitou. From these Picts are descended the Vendeans of France.
It would appear that the Picts were Celtic-Scythian or a mixture of Celts and other branches of the Scythian family from the Caucasus, and spoke a dialect of the Celtic language.
The Caucasus mountains synchronously create the Euro-Asian mountain divide. How revealing.
Discovered 1997 in a cave in the Black Isle, Rosemarkie Man, above left—reconstruction based on forensic digital imagery and carbon dated A.D.430-630—shows remarkable “Caucasian” Nordic &/or Hispanic features. Perhaps he arrived in a boat of skins and wood like the Broighter, right, found in a gold hoard on a Kerry beach, at the entrance to Lough Foyle. Long journey from the Baltic. Even longer from ancient homelands on the Black Sea.
The original boat would have had nine benches for the rowers, with 18 oars/rowlocks, a long oar for steering at the stern, three forked barge poles, and a grappling iron or anchor and a mast. This is the kind of boat which traded in prehistoric seas between the Channel, North Sea, Mediterranean, Baltic and west mainland Europe—Celto-Belgic, Gaulish, Brittany decor share similarities. Scythian influence had them bringing back not only goods but also ideas, technologies and fashions.
Focus of the Broighter hoard, the gold boat has ancient symbolic meaning. As centre of a rich offering to sea god Manannán macLyr, it was placed by the sea shore on a raised beach leading to Lough Foyle.
The sea was, as it still is today, an unpredictable force.
Mythical Manannán ruled his otherworldly kingdom, riding out over the waves on his chariot. He is ultimate master mariner, impervious to the sea’s deadly turbulence. Early sailors were as superstitious as their descendants! Easy to understand why open boats like this would seek his help and protection.
Along with the delight of the boat itself, the gold objects found alongside were mostly imported from the Mediterranean, including two gold neck chains from the east—possibly Roman Egypt.
Setting out from above the Arctic Circle, Scythian Celts sailed south through the Baltic in ships like the (sacred gold) Broighter Boat, above right, navigating from Archangel or St Petersburg, Lübeck, Bergen, through the North Sea, via the English Channel, Guernsey to Brittany and N. Gaul; and from the Cornish coast to W. Ireland and North to Pictland.
Caledonian chiefs were provided with wives from among widows of slain Tuatha de Danaan by Milesian monarch Eremon, so Cruithneans became “possessed of North Britain & there founded the kingdom of the Picts which continued for many centuries until 9thC when conquered by Kinneth MacAlpin, king of Dalriadic Scots-Irish colony in Scotland.” Psalter of Cashel 10thC
Class-II Pictish carved stone Monymusk, Aberdeenshire left, late cross, stylized cauldron; Reliquary original home
Akkadian Indo-Euro script, over: Akkadian Cimmerians were culturally caucasian, similar to Scythians 1000B.C.
Big Guys with Quivers of Arrows, Renowned Harpists
Belgians were called in the Gaulish-Celtic language Bolg and Bolgach, hence Firbolgs, and Firvolgians; and by Roman writers Belgae, Belgii. Celtic Bolg means ‘quiver of arrows’—apparently they were great archers, although bolgach also signifies ‘corpulent’. So, visualize large men of stout size; celebrated for their bravery. they fought with great valour against the Romans, and were called Fortissimi Gallorum by Julius Caesar, ‘most valiant of the Gauls’.
Bolgs owned a huge landmass. (Roman) Gallia Belgica covered extensive territory stretching through Gaul and northern France, including present country of Belgium. They were divided into separate tribes or nations: Parisii, Rheni, Belovaci, Atrebates, Nervii, Morini, Menapii.
Belgians were a mixed race of Cimmerians and Germans, or a Gaul-Teuton mix like Cimbrians. Having adopted neighbour Germanic language, they were sometimes considered a Gothic or Teutonic race. They were chiefly Celts or Gaels, and spoke a dialect of the Celtic language in German/Teutonic.
Every Bolg Town a Firbolg Market Town
Wealth & status were shown (above) as desirable in prehistoric and early-medieval cultural art. Mithras, god of Rome’s fascination with war and sacrifice, top left Phrygian helmet worn by honored legionaries; sacred pinnacle of Roman foot soldier’s devotion and belief. Caledonians’ sacred symbols, middle, began long before Pictish (Class I & II) incised & relief stones, with fields of Buchan littered with granite carved stone balls-all designs-c.3000B.C. In pre-Christian Scotland, early Class-I boundary stone at Drimmies, Inverurie ABD rt. in situ missing top symbol, but flowing symbol, l.below, may indicate river Don—important waterway—stone’s throw away with feet of lost ‘arch’, mirror & comb c.f. Pictish Class-I symbol chart where symbols are locally identified, e.g. horse Inverurie; bull Burghead. Last pic: Bullion Class-II relief slab Angus, approx. same vintage as battle of Nechtansmere, c.685, example of late Pictish (royal) artisan-craft smithworking community attached to a large cultural centre. Old man on horse drinking unsteadily—classic Class-II relief, no symbols but great realism, both rider & horse.
Many centuries before the Christian era, the Belgians (Bolgs) of Gaul sent colonies to Britannia. When Caesar invaded Britain, 55B.C., they were a powerful people already possessing the southern part of England from Suffolk to Devonshire. Belgic tribes in South Britain included: Cantii in Kent, Trinobantes in Essex and Middlesex; Regini and Atrebates in Surrey, Sussex, Hampshire, Berkshire, Wiltshire and Somerset; the Durotriges in Dorsetshire, and the Damnonii in Devonshire and Cornwall. Their capital city was Venta Belgarum, (trans. Bolgs’ Market; Winchester).
The Caledonians, (Picts, or Cruithneans), according to 9thC Psalter of Cashel and other ancient annals, were an Indo-European race from Scythia on borders of Europe and Asia. According to Venerable Bede, writing in 7thC Ecclesiastical History of the English People, on their flight from Thrace/Scythia through the Baltic, via Finland, they made their way over the North Sea to S.Ireland—present Bay of Wexford. Not being permitted to settle at Inver Slainge, they sailed for Albain, Scotia, “that part of North Britain now called Scotland”.
While Scotland’s Caledonia is strewn with burgh markets, fairs and summertime food festivals celebrating local specialties, equivalent Welsh, Cornish, Brittonic (Saxon-English) market towns retain their Roman character (and in places, name Venta) around which Brit agriculture and livelihood was focused: e.g. Winchester Hampshire above, Gwent-on-Wye ‘Venta’ major market S.Wales.
In an historical context, Chepstow’s Welsh name, Caes Gwent, castle of Venta, Roman ‘market place’, shows how ancient are its roots and significant its position on the confluence of the river Wye (over which the 11thC Castle of Gwent still towers) with the Severn’s great tidal estuary which eventually flows into the Bristol Channel and the Atlantic Ocean. This is southern heartland of ancient (pre-Celtic) Brythonic kingdom, where ancient Britons spoke a dialect understood by other Britons of Prydein–Roman Britannia. Their language was understood over the water-bridge in Brittany, throughout Cornwall, Isle of Man, Rheged (ancient Cumbria), Dumbarton and Strathclyde (Dun-Britton), Brigantia (Yorkshire and Northumberland) and northern Pictland (Prydein). Their ancient monuments, aligned with the movements of the heavens and dedicated to their ancestral dead, were generations older than Stonehenge. Avebury’s great circle is their nearest relative in design and in time. As are the stone balls.
Nation of Shopkeepers Come Thru with Aid when Chips are Down
Pre-Celtic waterways like great tidal Severn estuary, left, combine ancient travel route, with Roman market town, and modern shipping canal. CaerGwent=Chepstow from Roman Venta & Gaulish Brythonic Caer castle holds ancient custodianship over River Wye, Wales, & Atlantic waters
Weren’t you wondering when the Scythian connection would penetrate?
Yes, the blue&yellow flag flying over valleys between the Caucasus and the Black Sea—Ukraine. That’s where our Scythian gene comes from. That’s the cross-Caucasus Asian-Euro mix that confounds any division, brings a HUGE international so-called Caucasian alliance to front & center. You thought DNA & ancestral genealogy research were dominated by Viking-Norse? Re-think: Caucasus wins hands down.
The French—never great buddies with the English [contra the Cruithne aka 16thC Auld Alliance MQS, French court language insinuating its way into Scots]*—are reputed to be origin of uncomplimentary Brit shopkeeper comments—more likely attribution to Napoleon who really didn’t like them. Mixing metaphors here, shopping seems to have unforeseen cultural advantages in breaking barriers—like big personally-driven overseas deliveries from Bradford, Liverpool with the Euro-consortium Médecins sans frontières, and Poland and Finland loaning military equipment normally used for rescue. Shopkeepers adding groceries to growing international rescue mission for refugees score top marks for volunteering.
*Local Scots understand French imports like golf caddy (cadet, young boy), and colloquial ‘loo’ (‘gardez l’eau’) as maid throws bucket of water into Edinburgh street below—16thC—no plumbing.
Writing our Way Out of A Situation is Good (Insecure) Writers’ Cave Advice
In Ukraine, the horse is a symbol of loyalty, devotion and freedom. They still have wolf and auroch (exist in wild) symbols of fertility and strength. Crane symbolizes sadness for their native land. And they tell ancient stories of angels and dragons, like other border communities. They share mythical gods of ocean and mountains with other cultures like Brythonic Bride. Shakespeare even wrote King Lear to satisfy his craving for mythical tales of ancestral gods. Rashly, Scythians calculate Gregorian calendar now along with Western world countries celebrating Easter a month late, a dislocated Ramadan and dislodged Carnival, with a slew of social media reels to cover their trail.
A Doric Northeast Scotland (Cruithne) calendar calculation rhyme for Easter should keep us on local track with the ‘fit like’ dialect. Spoken to me at the Back o’ Bennachie, by a born-‘n’-bred Insch quine with full intonation—Picts, Scots Irish & adoptive Brit-Scythian-Thracians might like to try it.
Fit like?
‘First come Candlemas
Syne the New Meen
The niest Tiseday efter ‘at
Is aye Festern’s E’en.
That Meen oot
An’ anither at its hicht
The niest Sunday efter ‘at
Is aye Pasche richt.’
Ancient Scots Easter calculation. Anon
We in our Writer’s Cave send what we can: support comes in many guises. Gotta get out the Scythian dictionary. Or maybe, like the Doric of N.E.Scotland above Pictish throwback medieval Cruithne dialect (fit like translates as how are you); or Edinburgh’s insider French from a Parisian courtly ‘close’ [passageway], we will probably keep on keeping on.
©2022 Marian Youngblood
WildCats, Wolves Call Ancient Caledonia Home
WILDCATS, WOLVES CALL ANCIENT CALEDONIA HOME
First Wednesday March Hares—aka Insecure Scribes & Weather-Wordsmiths—Emerge from STORMY Subterranean Hideaway
Today Good Hare Day
Uplands are unique spaces for nature, climate & people but they are in crisis. Years of harmful land management practices has pushed nature to the fringes of these wild spaces across Scotland. If we are to tackle the climate and nature emergency, Scots govt. take action at scale and pace to protect these landscapes and species which call them home— RSPB Jas. Silvey
Mountain Hare Chas.Frederick Tunnicliffe 1937
Hares March in First Year of Protection by Scots Government
Today marks the one-year anniversary of protected status for one of Scotland’s most elusive but ancient animals—the mountain hare.
Protection was brought in for the species because of RSPB concerns of declining population and that illegal culls were seriously impacting the species’ conservation status. These concerns were expressed over many years that annual, unregulated culls carried out across many intensively-managed grouse moors were having a devastating impact on the hare population.
RSPB used different data to come to same conclusion: that mountain hares had declined, most apparent from late 1990s in areas of the hill country predominantly managed for grouse shooting.
This evidence was used by Scottish Government to report to the EU that conservation status of mountain hares was “unfavourable” and was the catalyst for protection introduced March 2021.
Future Wolf Bear Beaver Highland Coos/Aurochs’ Mixed Reception
Experimental projects in Cumbria, and the Lake District in vicinity of Roman Hard Knott Pass fort show signs of beaver settling in nicely. A west-coast entrepreneur tries convincing hard-line foraging farmers that heilan’ coos are not so much cattle as genetically extinct Aurochs with gentler grazing habits.
No agency south or north of the Border has introduced actual wolf cubs, though talk continues.
Many look to Highland Fault line 30-year old new growth at Glenfeshie by original charity Trees for Life as an example of what volunteer and donated workforce can do long term in Invernessshire. Caledonian Canal catchment drains off forest understorey waterways, beloved of beaver—and oysters. Scots Pine, aspen, birch and hawthorn foster lichen and berries attracting pine marten and red squirrel.
Early Spring Highlights Grouse Moor Activity
Easter is considered ‘late’ this year 2022, tradition holds never until after Feast Day of Bride maiden of Spring.
Calendar calculation ‘old style’ holds to ancient rhyme centred around February 2nd Candlemas in both pre-Xtian and Roman Orthodox Catholic church—if new moon occurs AFTER that date. New moon 2/1/2022 [February 1st], aka too early for traditional count; so wait until new moon March, aka 3/1.
Calendar switches—on schedule—re-arranging run-up to Easter in apparently flawless fluid fashion: Fat Tuesday #MardiGras Pancake stuff-yourself day before deprivation fasting of Lent, Ash Wednesday, personal 40-days in solitary.
Pride of Leopards Three Castles & Cast-Iron Cat Colonnade
Northeast Scotland has traditionally been dominated by Aberdeen with North Sea ocean connections. It built ships for the Baltic run.
Victorian Union Street—linked by iconic cat-bedecked Union Bridge, above—bankcrupted the City.
Its architectural grand plan constructed white Rubislaw granite buildings to flank upper (Music Hall Doric/Ionic columns) and lower Union Street (Jamieson & Carry, Boots & Woolworth’s Emporium, above lower left). Bridge Street descends behind trams to Joint Station, lower level, and The Green.
This elevated superstorey ran over LNER & LMS Railway lines, over former Den Burn—now Union Terrace Gardens, top far rt. perspective toward H.M. Theatre and Wallace Statue—with tunnel access from the harbour. Stretching from ultra-conservative granite Queen’s Road/Albyn Place, Union Street’s mile-long double-decker ‘overpass’ leads its tentacles underground to joint granite foundations (Uptown Baths, Crown St.P.O., Langstane; Tivoli Theatre, the Green, Belmont Street and the Aberdeen Art Gallery. Terminus: Castlegait, Town House, Tolbooth, and Lodge Walk—police HQ—to St.Nicholas).
Alexander Marshall Mackenzie’s granite 1884 Aberdeen Art Gallery, the main visual arts exhibition space in the city, beckons with a multi-coloured granite colonnade (Kemnay pink, Peterhead red) in foyer leading to its upper galleries.
17thC Provost Skene’s House & 21stC Marischal Square Street Art
In ‘granite city’ Aberdeen grandiose preparations near completion on 2022 107million-pound pedestrian park-oriented centre Marischal Square, where Scots sculptor Andy Scott (Falkirk ‘Kelpies’) will feature his steel-shard Leopard sculpture, ‘Poised’ within a glass dome enclosure on pedestrian Broad Street.
Focus of the street-wide atrium, Scott’s two-ton steel 42-foot high big cat artwork perches atop a plinth inside a ‘conservatory’ style greenhouse geared to capture light in multi fragment panes of glass.
Former 14-storey city council offices-demolished 2014-make way for white [Chinese import] granite facades of new glass-enclosed Broad St.-Marischal Square. Old Marischal College, home to @UofAbCollections became new council offices; a view of their previous ugly 1970s building brightened by closed George Street, pedestrian Belmont Street; a walk up Schoolhill to Art Gallery.
Broad St. may have lost its granite ‘cassie setts’ during development but commercial and entertainment retail properties—hotels, restaurants, a casino and art venues are available for sale and rental in 21stC attempt to balance the books. Among new residents in the complex are the DC Thompson Group, publisher of Aberdeen Press & Journal.
Marischal College, Archibald Simpson’s 1836-1844 world’s second-largest granite building* didn’t bankcrupt anyone. It holds University of Aberdeen’s fine archaeological collections from Moray, Buchan and Cairngorms. Interior leads to illuminated ceiling of Mitchell Tower. All granite.
* First in Europe-world’s largest granite buildiing is El Real Monasterio de El Escorial, Madrid.
Leopard Poised to Pounce May Know Secret Password
Leopard emblem of ‘silver city with golden sands’ has its origin in early mediaeval heraldic design, pictured top middle right, as the city’s coat-of-arms: two cats sinister/dexter support Auld Alliance slogan Bon Accord dating from 1561-68 Mary Queen of Scots’ progresses to her royal Aberdonian Moray and Buchan palaces.
The city’s long-standing stalwart of Northeast life, Leopard Magazine has published locally since it was established in 1974. Owned and published by Lindy Cheyne and Ian Hamilton for last 12 years, it has been taken under wing of University of Aberdeen. Early Leopard archives are held by the University. This writer and colleague Ann Tweedy were early contributors to historic files.
Andy Scott has created pieces for other cities including New York, Chicago and Sydney. Commissioned by Muse Developers and Aviva Investors’ board of directors to come up with a piece of public artwork for the site, he favoured the city’s preoccupation with the local cat. He spent hours chatting to Kelly’s remaining Cats on Union Bridge before plunging into steel.
Following Andy’s lead in wry humour, we [insecure scribes, emerge with Muse in tow from PersonCave preparing to pit ourselves against a spring NaNoWriMo writing workshop] might add a fictitious note: especially apt in Pictish NE Scotland (not a Gael in sight; everyone spiks the Doric derivative of a P-Celtic language, shuns the Gaelic (Gàidhlig, pronounced ‘gaa-lik’ in Highland west). ‘Unpronouncable gibberish’ to quote one extinct Aberdonian. So homegrown gaelic/garlic pun…
Andy’s Cat perches on its plinth in rarefied art environment designed to dominate its little people below. Calling it ‘Poised’ triggered the East Coast Pictish heathen in me: I saw ‘Poised’ as a foreign creature, already possessing its own spirit. It became Gael. ‘poisaed’ pron. “pussy”.
That’s not a rude American pun; that’s Brit for pussycat, Am. kitty. Gettit? Purr-purr. ‘In like a lion’ is code password. ©2022MarianYoungblood
Springing Out of Winter Mindset into a New Lunar Year—Groundhog Style
SPRINGING OUT OF WINTER MINDSET into A NEW LUNAR YEAR SERPENT/GROUNDHOG STYLE
EXTRACTING THE (WRITING) DIGIT AND HAULING ONESELF OUT OF OUR (INSECURE) WRITER’S CAVE— FIRST WEDNESDAY OF THE TIGER DECADE
Prelude to Year of Change
Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, lunar Tigresses—Candlemas [February new moon, Imbolc, Feast of Bride, “return of the Light” Pagan quarter day, pagan Chinese new year] is U.S. Groundhog wrapped in a snow pig’s-blanket—or a signal to get back underground and hole up for another six weeks of winter.
"On the Feast Day of Bride the Serpent shall come from its hole. "I shall not molest the Serpent nor shall the Serpent molest me." 1860 Carmina Gadelica Highland Beliefs
Tiger, tiger, burning bright In the forests of the night; What immortal hand or eye could frame thy dreadful symmetry?
William Blake
Tiger is the third of 12 zodiac animal signs associated with the Asian lunar calendar celebrated by Korea, Vietnam, China, Tibet, Mongolia, Malaysia and Filipino islands. If born during a Tiger Year you may be seen as brave, confident and well-liked. Lucky colours—blue, orange, grey; yellow lilies and cineraria are lucky flowers.
Reverse Resolutions better for Psychic Status{Quo}
Traditionally, first new moon of February in the Western World dictated timing for Roman & Protestant Easter—70 days from now—”late” this year. February 1st 2022 new moon happened in purrfeck timing for Tigers, but New Orleans’ Mardi Gras, rt. will have to wait another month—for March 1st new moon. Six weeks (till Equinox) to ponder outdoor-related, earth-nurturing garden & landscape restoring plans.
Not pie-in-the-sky any more.
During lockdown local neighbourhoods, garden clubs, community dig-a-thons and joint Trust-volunteer groups have flourished, resulting in phenomenal fresh vegetable/floral food gifts to charities in 2021.
Below, left remarkable similarity between Humboldt Co. Redwood Coast natural headland tree growth used in some introduced plantings, Scotland with success; rt,up Mardi Gras next month! mid Mildenhall treasure sometimes thought of as Brittonic calendar; lower rt. Loch Craignish Argyll success story by (rewilding) Oyster Boys using centuries-old regeneration beds—rewild both land and sea. Bottom, plant diversity in pinus sylvatica Caledonian pine woodland exclosure groupings, rural Buchan Aberdeenshire.
New Initiative—not Baby-Bathwater Conundrum
WWarII Veterans’ Dig-for-Victory Attitude: Like Getting Hands in Earth, Oldie Tip: Don’t Discard
Just sometimes us #vintage Boomers-&-beyond have a little something worth sharing. In city parks, university and campus allotments in Yorkshire, Durham & Northern Borders, locals are being taught the beauty/benefit of pre-Industrial hoe and rake! tho’ horse-drawn plough and mini tractor discs allowed.
Century-old oaks and beech trees were rescued 2021 by a Basingstoke village-resident association encouraged by HRH Duchess of York in Home Counties after threatened by Council removal for a road and storage upgrade.
Many individual primary and elementary schools in Scotland—since COP26 Summit—encourage local tree-planting initiatives where children dig and plant ‘shade’ areas in gardens of nursing and retirement homes, encouraged by residents. Reused veggie allotments have appeared with free food.
Vintage Landowning and Land working a “high value” experience
Some airlines have joined bona fide charitable donation/investment enterprises, like Carbonfund.org in a bid to reduce passenger carbon emissions by 20% in one year. Western governments now use a system in place for investing CO2 offset levies in sustainable regeneration charitable funds which pay into rewilding, regeneration and restoration tree and hedgerow planting.
Eurobloc nations like Germany’s Schwarzwald, Czech Republic, Norway have limitless multi-age forest cover, supporting wondrous original wildlife. Great Britain lags behind with a staggering miniscule 1% left of its prehistoric giant trees—medieval Royals pillaging and burning wrapping up the last of Scotland’s Caledonian Pine Forest, in 1308. A [German] Royal shot the last Wolf in Scotland in 1722.
Royals are English Landlord—In Scotland, the Laird Rules
Royals do indeed play a rôle in 2022—mopping up after misbehaving ancestors both North and South of the Border. The Crown owns 1.4% of England. This includes the Crown Estates, the Queen’s personal residence at Sandringham, Norfolk, and the Duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster, which provide income for family members; with multiple properties, gardens and Palaces in Central London maintained by her.
A small number of ultra-wealthy individuals have traditionally owned land in Scotland. A Scottish Land Commission review conducted 2020, found that big landowners behaved like monopolies across large areas of rural Scotland with power over land use, economic investment and local communities. Conservation charities, like the National Trust and Woodland Trust, collectively own 2% of England. The Church has 0.5%.
Grouse moor ownership and access in Scotland are a law unto themselves.
Way Into the Baronial Heart—the Three Cs
While the Right to Roam Act 2003 covers England and Wales, convention, courtesy and courage are rules for approaching prickly pathways in rural Scotland: ancient domain of hereditary ‘superior’ lairds. Descended from pre-Independence Royalty of an earlier Pictish lineage, landowners are unaccustomed to having their ‘ways’ questioned.
Contrarily, by tradition the local “laird will provide”—for farmer tenants in times of hardship—is a ‘given.’ Not to be confused with the far North Clearances in Caithness and Sutherland, Aberdeenshire and N.E. Scotland’s agriculture tradition maintains rich productive coastal plain stretching to the central ridge of Cairngorms National Park, beyond Royal Deeside, Balmoral, Mar Lodge, to Ben Nevis and the West. Traditions here include Generosity of the Laird, but also his Rightful Domain aka baronial privilege.
Privilege Preferable to Pool Parties with Foreign Carbon Offsetters
Sadly over the last century, stone properties in Scotland have seen a decline—former hospitals, wartime youth centres, neglected then abandoned chapels, farm steadings, even castles. Drone photography has recently highlighted such hidden gems of heritage with uncertain future. Should current legislation on property ownership in Scotland remain unchanged, these (usually) isolated properties become a target for ‘Offsetters’—absentee (city) investment alliances with sights set on ‘owning’ a treescape/rewilding property thus legitimizing carbon emissions released daily in their ‘other job’. They give out coupons for treading a smaller (carbon) footprint!
Chief economist of Institute for Public Policy Research thinktank, Carys Roberts is NOT in favour of foreign ‘investment’ of this type. She thinks concentration of land in a few hands is reason enough for wealth as a whole being unequal in Scotland, without competing with incomers who care less about their community, just as they prevent those without land from generating more income.
“We have this idea that class structures have changed so that the aristocracy is not as important as it used to be. What this demonstrates is the continuing importance of the aristocracy in terms of wealth and power in our society.” She said one effect of the sale of public land was public loss of democratic control of that land so it could not then be used, e.g. for housing or environmental improvements.
Food for future thought. Yet how long dare we keep thinking before we have to do something about it.
As many #vintage traditions being reexamined, May we be guided well through this February starGATE.
any shortcomings please forgive—novacaine [sp.] erythromycin or plain ibuprofen take blame
tku Walk-In Island Ohana Dental Hilo, HI
©2022 Marian Youngblood
New ‘Roaring Twenties’ Generations Breathe Life into Past from a Futurist Perspective
NEW ‘ROARING TWENTIES’ GENERATIONS Breathe Life into Past from a Futurist Perspective—Create Multi-linguistic Multiculture
FIRST (WRITING) WEDNESDAY OF NEW YEAR NEW DECADE-EMERGENCE FROM (INSECURE) SCRIBE CAVE OPTIONAL
New Multi-linguistix Multiculture Shares Subconscious Synchronicities with Fans
Throughout our human past, future generations were traditionally the ones we ‘prepared the way for’, ‘made allowances for, (Boomers) ‘scrimped and saved for’ (pre-WWII) ‘did without so they could have… Several decades down the line, WWII is a distant memory for Oldies; an historical event for Millennials, iGens, GenZs. Yet, there’s full complement of #NewTweenties totally unaware of its political influence in Vintage-gen lives.
Internationally, from a social-media-altered perspective—fueled by two years’ isolation, health concerns and personal angst—the internet has developed/become a huge market for media, news, entertainment and (crucially) under-age teens’ ‘stuff’—ENHYPEN’s seven-crew member dance moves troupe, above, an ‘influencer’ group that skyrocketed to stardom over last twenty months.
Be Prepared
Be prepared!
One of many new groups surfacing through a (suppressed) creative interlude during world isolation, Korean-born Enhypen speak Korean, Japanese, Taiwanese and English. Their age range is from 16-20.
If you’re a Baby Boomer, you’ll recall the Beatles started playing in Liverpool as teenagers. (Sir) Ringo Starr is Richard Starkey, and Macca is short for Paul McCartney—technically pre-Boom (b.1940) oldies. Both still perform.
If you’re a Baby Boomer, you’ll recall the Beatles started in a local Liverpool skiffle group as teenagers, 1963. Boomer British nicknames were all the rage then: Sir Ringo Starr (rt.) is Richard Starkey; performing with Macca (l.) Paul McCartney in 2019
Tweenties Stage a Visual Revolution in 2022
With medical resources and technology being shared globally in the current situation, culture and language barriers seem to melt: Native American knowledge revealed, Asian multilanguage interchange commonplace. Differences in generations, too, have a chance to cross (former) boundaries.
In this peripatetic iPhone world, communication by visuals rather than text becomes the norm—sacred realm of Social Media kings/queens familiar to iGens, Tweens and some six-year olds.
While Boomers (and even pre-Boomer Vintage pros) may deign to tweet occasionally (biz, professional, sports, less personal, more oldie), hardcore iGens have Twitter accounts. They also dabble in TikTok, Pinterest, Instagram and possibly also have a YouTube account to show their wares, e.g. artwork, meme graphics, cartoon and classic video art, movies, travel selfies and, most recently, drone footage from the world’s classic locations, never-before seen elevations of ancient strongholds from an angel’s view.
“When the Condor of the South flies together with the Eagle of the North, the spirit of Mother Earth—Pacha Mama—will awaken.
Then She will wake millions of her children.
This will be the Resurrection of the Dead.”
Quechua Inca Prophecy
Baby Condor reintroduction Klamath, CA
Prehistoric Landscape Remembered in Folklore Tradition
Newbie selfies are an attempt by tweens to join a venerable bunch of (#Vintage) bloggers like me—tapping out keys since 2009—described in psychiatric terms as ‘essential journaling accessories’ in maintaining mental health, by Columbia University neuropsychologist Sanam Hafeez. Also adequate sleep and ‘happy-feel’ activities, particularly outdoors, promote serotonin which produces calm within.
Focus has turned on Mother Nature. Renewed commitment is high priority in Cairngorms to ‘save the Earth’, rewilding and restoring former natural pine, hazel and birch forest lost over centuries of careless husbandry. Scotland in particular has lost 90% of its former ‘wild’ Caledonian Forest—plus rainforest— c.f. Pacific redwood old growth stands sprouting 1000-year-old pine needles; rowans as old as Perth’s Fortingall yew; casualty of the Clearances: guilt added to landowner anxiety=restore, replant, rewild.
Some ancestral memory still exists from that distant time when Scotland’s Highlands, Islands and (even) Lowlands were covered in thick ancient pines (Pinus sylvatica) supporting rich arboreal/fungal understorey. Even before the Herschip o’ Buchan, 1308 burn by Bruce, when people remembered trees burning for 30 years, some isolated villages remain where ancient tree spirits are celebrated and given gifts, respect—offerings in pagan tradition.
Glen Lyon, the longest completely enclosed mountain loch in Perthshire, source of the River Tay, is held sacred by local (prefer anonymity) guardians of the Cailleach(Old Woman) and Bodach(Old Man) stone altars, especially through winter until released to grow wild again on February 2nd, ancient Candlemas.
The Old Woman—Cailleach—original creator deity of Caledonia—Roman North Britain—was celebrated in the Western and Northern Isles (now treeless and devoid of any growing medium but sheep, grouse and heather moor) as an entity disguised as a raincloud (prehistoric rainforest—are rewilders ready for extra rainfall that goes with it?) who flew in anger, dropping lightning bolts into forest canopy, starting forest fires. Shades of Pacific NW forest fires where trees burn for square miles in summer, impervious to H20.
Difficult to imagine the Old Woman gathering her skirts to set the Cairngorms alight—only heather. But time will tell.
Rewilding aka Allowing Nature to Do What She Does Best: Growth
Despite political shenanigans surrounding land ownership, traditional (post Highland Clearances) moor management (burning heather, shooting grouse), some landowners allow access to this treeless land in an attempt to encourage interest in new tree-grow projects. Scotland’s Right-to-Roam Act complicates matters in giving an impression that hiking is legal everywhere—more signs get erected in an attempt to clarify who is allowed where.
Meanwhile back in Rainforest Alley aka Underground Word & Verbage Cavern camouflaged as Writing Cave Subterranean Style, we (insecure) writers have a Plan. Plant More Trees; write more stories; keep the Door (to the Future) Open. You never know who may walk right in.
Angels, Dragons, Fire & Rain, ancient ways to pick up our (writing)skirts and fly. Happy New Year 2022. ©2022 Marian Youngblood
Autumnal Wisdom: Time to Call on Ancestors for Help
AUTUMNAL WISDOM: TIME TO CALL ON ANCESTORS FOR HELP
November (Writing) Storms Wakeup Call for Humans to Gird Our Loins Before Things get Messy
It’s that time of year again. In Europe they light bonfires, set off fireworks, summon agricultural roots. It’s pre-Celtic Samhainn, after all, start of the ancient year. In Scotland children go ‘guising’ dressed like leftover scarecrows with neep lanterns and songs to sing. This converts in America to ‘trick or treating’—slightly more scary as most houses kids visit give them candy treats—by the bushel—but no fireworks. Ancestors on both continents are on standby—listening raptly—speaking in our dreams.
“Cranking up the temperature of the entire globe by around 1.2ºC on average within little more than a century is extraordinary, with the oceans alone absorbing the heat equivalent of five Hiroshima atomic bombs dropping into the water every second.” Unprecedented temperature rise in world temperature in just 100 years—since the car replaced the horse and cart—can’t go on.” Katharine Hayhoe, climate scientist Texas Tech U; also chief scientist at Nature Conservancy.
Stage props for Climate Leaders: photos clockwise from top l. Colosseum in Ancient Rome; arrival via climate-controlled Airbus British PM Boris Johnson & wife Carrie cut travel costs; Romans sacrificed goose in lieu of (New World) turkey to go with their fermented grape sauce over hypocaust-heated parsnip (ketchup & fries)—pun intended—remembering the poor pedestrian Roman never knew New World pleasures of potatoes, tomatoes, had to make do with homegrown olives, peaches, Persian pomegranates) sinister-dexter-sinister-dexter #chattinLatin; PM Boris uses 2100-year-old stage to demonstrate his (lack of) historical memory as he prepared to speak up for (bottom left) endangered capercaillie aka black grouse removal from Cairngorms and Highland glens
G20 Summit Leaders Save Fuel on Travel Rome to Glasgow for COP26 Summit
Private jet used by Britain’s prime minister top rt. is an Airbus chartered from Titan Airways, producing less than half C02 emissions of RAF Voyager that PM sometimes uses for foreign travel. Round trip charter London Heathrow to Rome, to Glasgow Prestwick, return to London “cheaper than rail”, more efficient, given PM’s heavy schedule.
“One of the most carbon-efficient planes of its size in the world, producing 50% fewer C02 emissions than larger RAF Voyager sometimes used by PM. It runs on ‘special mix’ of 35% sustainable aviation fuel mixed with 65% ‘normal’ fuel—the maximum allowed. Prime Minister will off course offset all emissions.”
Downing St. British parliamentary spokesman
Throwing a coin into Rome's Trevi fountain ensures good fortune—and secret assignation to return with the same companions—Mutti knows this—don't think the others do! l.-rt. Boris Johnson, MP, M Emmanuel Macron of France, Italian host Mario Draghi and German Chancellor Angela Merkel G20 2021 Summit
Most of the world’s government leaders have been getting together in unprecedented intensity over last week. European leaders hosted their international counterparts in Rome end October; with a follow-up exceedingly more crucial rendezvous in Glasgow in Scotland’s west industrial belt for COP26 first week November 2021. Prime ministers, premiers, princes and presidents posed for photo calls, using world media as a means to get their combined message across: reduce world temperature rise to 1.2ºC/1.8ºF.
Hate to say, but some of the hi-five elbow bumping goings on between political ‘buddies’ on the climate leadership circuit are huge reminder of #cool-hip-gangsta ‘Turkey!’—stage-version:element of surprise usually part of the embrace. Turkey, left above, isn’t: he’s Scotland’s emblem of grousemoors, a black grouse male displaying red eyebrows and chortling love-call.
Hallowe’en a Broken Dream, November Remember Virtual Turkeys Yet to Come
World leaders—political, business, charitable and entertainment heads—get to speak during first week of the United Nations Glasgow conference with bureaucratic follow-up after they leave. November in West of Scotland is pretty basic. Icy Cold. Where the city’s homeless may be sheltering under the airport overpass, HRH Prince Charles, Jeff Bezos, President Biden and Frau Merkel will stay cozy in their upper-storey overheated hotel suites. HM the Queen, most sensibly, addressed the throng by video.
Perhaps of all the great-&-good worldwide who choose this time to gather together and share a single commitment—with the eyes of the world upon them—HM the Queen may be closest to keeping her word. Not one year of her life has gone by without her planting a tree or unveiling a naturalized parkland. Her royal estates are dedicated to natural growth and management. Crown lands include 135,000 acre Duchy of Cornwall—Duketh Kernow—run using ancestral ways. Following on from Malta’s Commonwealth QCC initiative in 2015, she’s proudly touting her Platinum Jubilee Queen’s Green Canopy for 2022.
And she’s 95. Rôle model par excellence. God Save the Queen. She chats with the Ancestors all the time.
It’s been said Virtual Reality acts as a substitute for real life in the many worlds inhabited by our younger generations: the so-called post-Boomer years occupied by iGens, GenXs, Millennials and now Meta-gens ❤
If all the world around is virtual—as some families have experienced in these last two tumultuous years—there may be an answer: WRITE IT DOWN!
Amid the Frivolity, Spare a Thought for NaNo Writing Marathoners
Daily journaling has been known for decades to be a self-healing mind-releasing blow-by-blow therapy. By writing each day—thoughts, feelings, encounters or just personal epiphanies—our mind-body dualistic strangers come together: communicate: and we writers feel better for it.
That’s NOT to say everyone has it in them to be a NaNoWriMo marathon junkie: writing as many words per day for 30 days as their physical body (+refrgerator pre-cooked stored camp-out food) will allow. I know. I’ve done it. But not everyone can be a runner. Sometimes it’s good just to walk. Day by day, with a little journaling to cap off the evening. p.s. blogging does this well.
After all, patron of writers, large & small, famous or insecure, Egyptian god Thoth, the Ibis-headed scribe who writes down all our deeds both good and bad and weighs them to see if we can enter the Afterlife—he is probably our best ally-Ancestor.
Writerly advice: if you ‘got’ it, enjoy it. Set off virtual fireworks in the brain: who’s to say the Ancestors aren’t enjoying the show. ©2021 Marian Youngblood
The Stellar Perspective- Time to Tempt Humans to Act like Telosians—Delving Deep Within to Discover our Origins As Star-People
- Canticle for a lost Nation—Pictish Roots Surface in Stone, Royal Forests & Names
- The Janus Effect—Riding into the New on an Old Horse
- Boudicca: Great Queen of the Iceni
- 2020 Backward Take on 2012: Stargate Portal to Final Quarter
- Volcanic Surprise: Take your Toys and Go Home
- 11:11:11 Spark in the Park~ Collective Ascension
- Silver People on the Shoreline Let Us Be
- Event Horizon for the Human Race—Moving Beyond Our Own Boundaries
- Canticle for a Lost Nation—Unlocking Ancient Interlace Woven into Cultural Myth
Solar & Geomagnetic field indicator (NOAA)
From n3kl.orgSolar X-rays:
Geomagnetic Field:
- Derilea’s Dream: Pictish essentials
Shakeout prepared
Picosecond Pulse Ripples Gold on Glass
Vibrational sound in picoseconds
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Marian’s SHASTA:Critical Mass
Earth speaks wolves listen—a New Age tale
bumpy ride ahead
‘Phantom’s Child’
Nano 2011 win
SHASTA: backstory
Circlemakers
Enceladus 2017
Enchantment
ShakeOut preparedness
Bourtie Kirk: 800 Years
Geometry code
- Devorguilablog: view from Pictish Citadel
cosmic consciousness
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