LL's Official Autumn Newsletter
Samhain, Diwali, Día de los Muertos has just passed and the start of November is the beginning of Native American Heritage Month. Of course, we also had an election here in the U.S. recently. Life has been full of things and so I’m late to the newsletter game this month.
Recently I was watering my plants outside, thinking about getting back to writing this and realized part of my delay has been a way to accept that I need the entirety of November to consider what Samhain is to me.
It’s pronounced “sow-en”. Some folx see it as the witch’s new year. Because of its closeness to the start of the school year and my many years as a student and now as a teacher, it makes sense for me to feel this as the start of a new cycle.
It’s when we start considering winter- meaning it’s the time when we start to need our stored supplies; what we have harvested from the spring and summer, whether literal or symbolic.
On this side of the hemisphere, It’s getting colder and for us, the time has “fallen” back an hour. More darkness than light.
October thirty-first to November first is when the veil is thin, but I feel this time extends a bit from there as I start to feel the shift in the weather and light. I need some extra time to sit with the idea of energies that have transitioned and may be able to communicate or return in some kind of form. The whole Halloween thing as we know it is fun, but for me it’s distracting. Getting through it is like getting the kids settled in bed before I get to have some “me” time.
The “veil” I mentioned is what divides the realm of the living and the dead. Ancestors, spirits, energies… whatever you choose to consider during this time, if you choose to embrace this sort of perception, can come through to where we are, or we can communicate between realms. We may simply just honor memories and meditate on lives of the beloved gone. Beliefs are varied and I believe it all can be personalized. I consider elements of Samhain and Dia de los Muertos and now even Diwali, as well as the quality of air, light and greenery (or lack thereof) the season of autumn gives us, until the next sabbat (that I celebrate), which is Yule (the winter solstice).
Nature matters. What lives behind day-to-day concerns matter. The day-to-day also matters, especially considering how we engage in our social systems and the ways we do our personal best to make this reality one where all people are hopefully safe, secure, kind, and free. (Everyone’s situation is different.)
I know that while considering our communities and systems of government, we can’t just rely on ceremony and prayer and asking spirits for their assistance, but this newsletter of mine is something I use to remind myself of the liminal, and I need reminding. I’ve decided that the mysteries of living here on this floating rock in space must not be ignored, even if I really don’t know and will never really know what it is I’m working to pay attention to.
TAROT
One morning, just before Samhain, I pulled three tarot cards from my not-traditional tarot deck that I learned about and found in 2023. After concentrating on what I wanted to ask, I chose three cards- one for the past, one for the present and one, the future. Before I could start, one card exited the deck on its own. I was about to return it to the pile but decided I should keep it out as a sort of “bonus” card to perhaps sum up the reading.
Many times I’ll choose one of these extra cards intentionally. The fact that it exited on its own accord this time is something I chose to perceive as a sort of “needed” message. Who wouldn’t?
The first thing I try to remember to do when reading cards is study the imagery on each one pulled and feel what it all means to me, relative to its place as representing the past or the present or the future. After that is when I read about the cards in the guidebook, to find more meaning and connect my “read” to the author/illustrator’s intentions. It’s so often a knee-jerk reaction to just head for the book before seeing and feeling what the cards mean to me. As I mentioned, this deck is not in the usual format (which I never really had enthusiasm to learn to read), and as I mentioned, it’s relatively new to me. This book offers a lot more than many traditional tarot deck guides do. I plan on spending many years with it before forgoing the use of the included text.
If the written description about the card doesn’t meet up with what I perceived from the imagery, I may put less weight on the “rules” of the book and accept my own understanding of it, relative to experiences I’ve had, or elements I view as personal and spiritual “signs.” Sometimes the book will expose me to ideas I hadn’t had before, and I realize I’m meant to consider a different viewpoint.
What I asked about during this reading was personal and not something I wish to share here but I do wish to share how I use this sort of tool in my life. Perhaps it might be useful to you, dear reader.
AGING. HAPPY BIRTHDAY KAREN.
A few months ago, during a walk back from my local auto mechanic after dropping my car off for its regular maintenance, I checked out a neighborhood tiny library that I always check out and have donated to.
This time I found and chose Nora Ephron’s “nationwide best seller” called I FEEL BAD ABOUT MY NECK AND OTHER THOUGHTS ON BEING A WOMAN.
I had been listening to audio versions of biographies of people like Parker Posey and Martin Short, who both included Ms Ephron in their stories. They both love her. I’ve heard from several other “celebrity-guested” podcasts about how valuable she has been to so many and how professional and truly talented she was, so I decided to grab the book.
As well, I have been experiencing the literal change that occurs to our necks as we age- I mean, I’m experiencing what happens to our necks as I am lucky enough to find myself still here, aging and changing.
Part of my chosen way to “evolve” has to do with changing perceptions I was brought up with. Both in the toxicity of our culture, mostly in regard to gender, and also in the toxicity of my upbringing and youthful attachments and connections.
I’ve written here before about my day job as a teacher of teens. I get to work with them one-to-one and through my many years in that role, I have learned that I need to be a living example of my beliefs; that we are wasting time if we aren’t mixing into our self-care a true appreciation and acceptance of who we are, as we are.
I admit that the ways adults, peers and family members have scrutinized my changing hair-color, chosen hairstyles, weight, frown-lines, body hair, fashion choices, life choices and even my often confusing facial expressions (did I get it all?) during my youth has made me a sort of charging bull when it comes facing and embracing natural change at this stage of living. That said, it’s a topic that I can share with confidence that most teenagers, whether or not they feel connected to a particular gender- have questions about.
Many are baffled when they bring up the subject of getting older and I share my perception that makes such obvious sense when spoken in a matter-of-fact way. We all age, unless we are no longer alive and I’m super-stoked to experience this and super-stoked to be a model of someone who fights against silly, silly rules that some people make for others to follow.
Sometimes these rules are made up to keep a corporation or billionaire rolling in dough, and sometimes it’s a way a singular person justifies self-hatred and fear. I have come to believe these individuals are saying without words or even awareness, “Come with me on this ride I’m on because it’s lonely here in my misery.” I have had enough time being a passenger and companion to others on that train. I found a way to leap off and make a run for it.
So when I cracked open my first Nora Ephron book, featuring a first blank page with handwritten messages from what seems like a group of co-workers wishing “Karen” a happy fiftieth birthday on November fifth, 2006- I expected to dive into thoughtful and humorous wisdom from the sage I had learned this writer and director to have been.
*Note: I stopped writing here as I was about to share my feelings from the first section of the book, which I was disappointed by. I realized that I could not discuss my feelings without having continued with and hopefully completed the short book, so I did.
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Okay, I read the whole book and it wasn’t what I initially thought.
Yes, she writes that she thinks people who state they are enjoying the changes of age are lying because youth is better- but when continuing with this book, I learned she did so as a way to express herself honestly; as a way to share how we are all afraid of death. The mystery that lies ahead. Ephron, herself, would die of complications from an uncommon type of Leukemia in 2012.
As well as being honest, her writing is so good and funny and her stories are interesting. In the end she discusses death- that of her best friend who died of cancer. I feel this light-hearted bit of writing ends up as a sort of meditation on the gift of being a person inhabiting a body on this wild ride of what we call, living. It leads the reader to consider the people we meet and experiences we have that make up our story. It’s clear that these mattered to Ephron more than her wrinkly neck.
As a matter of fact, I think her admitting how she spends a fortune on things to “fix” her aging skin is a way for her to address the reality of our so-often shared beliefs and it led me to realize there may be something limiting by trying to completely embody a totally “age-positive” perspective.
It’s okay to miss the body systems that used to do one thing, but now do another. It’s also okay to take a closer look and understand the value in some of the changes needing to occur in order for others, like wisdom and self-assurance, to hatch their way out.
Speaking of something “hatching their way out,” I just watched the film The Substance. I bought it, since it was the same cost as watching it, and I had heard good things. It’s something I’m going to watch again as I feel there is a lot there to feel and catch and investigate. Like a lot of people, I’m very pleased to see Demi Moore taking on this role. As a pop-culture figure on social media, she hasn’t been very inspiring to me in regard to how she publicly presents herself in a way that seems to have latched, tooth and nail, onto the illusion of youth. But, much like what I learned from Nora Ephron’s expression of frustration with aging, and her neck, I am pleased to see the actress put herself into this role and thereby ask us questions about this issue I’m very engaged in exploring right now.
I had a funny reaction as well, when the film showed Moore’s character (a 1980’s sort of Jane Fonda-style workout queen) in her exercise show, stating “You got this” or something like that as her catch-phrase. I don’t think I’m spoiling anything when we see the “new” version of herself in the “new” version of the show in the film presenting exercise in a way that really was the essence of the 1980’s “Let’s Get Physical” style of televised fitness- all about sex.
I found myself thinking “Ugh, yes- this is like social media, it’s so gross and not about exercise at all. She’s not even saying anything to motivate the audience.” But of course the “future” version just gets more to the point of what this capitalistic “package” was always meant for, which is nothing but to sell the public what they will buy and buy and buy again. Besides, the 80’s stuff was pretty obvious. I just caught myself in the trap of “Back in my day…”.
Since it’s a movie I can’t quite wrap my finger around very easily, I decided to look up some reviews and chose one from Slate to read, because the critic, Dana Stevens, did not like the film and was critical of things like references within The Substance to films of the past. I did notice that was a part of it (I kept noticing Kubrick and of course Cronenberg), but my personal interest lies in what the over-the-top relationship the character has with “herselves” within the world she lives in and has created a sense of power within. I guess that’s the more common read. I’m sure I’ll feel more things about this film the more it has time to sink in.
WOMAN OF THE HOUR
The other evening I watched the actor, Anna Kendrick’s directorial debut on Netflix and while it was a relatively short film, I believe it packed a punch.
It’s about a serial killer who made his way onto the show, The Dating Game, in 1978- but it’s not about him, which is something I appreciate.
It starts with his brutality, yes. But we quickly move into the realm of Cheryl- a fictionalized version of the young woman, Sheryl Bradshaw, who chose him as a contestant on the actual game show.
After seeing the film I wanted to write on social media that this is for everyone who has made choices others wanted them to make because it was easier than saying no. That it’s for everyone who has had moments of clear understanding that the police don't care about or believe what happened to you. That it’s for everyone who had to go along with something dangerous in order to survive.
It’s for women to recognize many unspeakable things- in how the character of Cheryl and the female server at the tiki bar communicate, how the makeup women share with her, how Cheryl doubts her feelings of discomfort around her boundary-disrespecting male neighbor and finds herself in a situation she was trying to avoid. She needed a friend, which he said he was, but her intuition was correct- he had no interest in that and was just as repulsive as she thought.
The whole movie’s structure felt like sections of code. A very obvious but also subversive reminder of how bad it once was and also a shock to the system to consider how bad it still is, and how much worse it could very well be.
In reading online articles about it, I liked that it’s recognized as being a movie about a killer that didn’t dive into the “whys” of the killer’s path- in some cases. In looking this morning I see a lot more written online about his story.
My takeaway from the film is that he’s just an extreme embodiment of something insidious and everywhere.
I’M LEMONADING
The other night while winding down, I mindlessly turned on Netflix and watched the episode of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt where the villainous captor called Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne (played by Jon Hamm) is in jail for keeping several women in a bunker underground for several years, including Ms Schmidt. We learn that a young famous DJ who is not really talented but very internet famous, is searching for the Reverend because it turns out Wayne was his DJ inspiration back when he was a kid and Hamm’s character was a Yelp-reviewed-as-terrible wedding DJ called DJ Slizzard. The young DJ “Fingablast” finds himself dumped by his fiancé and on a mission to free the misunderstood reverend/DJ who he sees as wrongly incarcerated, and he’s decided to make a documentary of this process.
The show is a comedy but whenever they feature Jon Hamm’s character, it is hard for me to watch and I don’t think that means it should not be watched. It very much should. I feel it's something not really explored before- such horrific stuff examined through this comedic lens in the realm of episodic TV. Through the lens of subversive humor, it takes into consideration the very real effects of damage done by predators and misogynistic criminals and how a victim might process through it all and into life. *It’s also worth it to experience the comedic genius of Titus Burgess who plays Kimmy’s roommate, Titus Andromedon.
Interestingly, in this episode, we see the footage of the reverend with a completely “appropriate” haircut for the character, on a 1990’s dating TV show not unlike the dating game- making us laugh but also giving (at least some of) us chills to think of how the character would in the future become a cult leader who trapped women underground in order to abuse them. I’m sure the connection to the situation that happened on The Dating Game in 1978 was not lost on those involved in the production of Kimmy Schmidt. (What is funny is that the footage comes from Jon Hamm’s real experience on a game show from that era called The Big Date, where he was not chosen.)
There is the charm-disguise of the narcissist which the killer in the Woman of the Hour and Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne seem to possess, but there is also the demonstration of an insidious devaluing (by all gender identities) of those who are targets of these overt examples of patriarchal rule (in regard to Kimmy Schmidt, it’s clearly in the episode I’m describing above called Party Monster), to the point where it can lead (often) women (but not always women) to second guess when people are doing things to us that we do not wish to have done to us, as is the case in the scenarios we see demonstrated by Cheryl and the other victims of the killer in the 2024 film, Woman of the Hour.
As well, I was moved by the depiction of the teen runaway’s character on Woman of the Hour, in how she knew how to manipulate her rapist and terrorizer so that she could survive and have a chance to escape, which she did.
It’s heartbreaking to realize through her part of the story that she must have suffered a lifetime of abuse during her very young life, in order to be so aware in the midst of being brutalized and act as she did.
I appreciate all stories that can reach out to a wide audience to open up and explore larger, nuanced and varied scenarios that can hopefully answer the question victims of abuse get asked time and again, which is, “Why didn’t you just leave?”.
WAKING THE WITCH
Trauma made me a witch.
Well, it made me embrace being one.
I found something in me when escaping abuse that connected to magic, in part as a method to survive, but I adhere to a belief of it as an awakening to the mystical or mysteries or whatever-
And here I am, twenty-one years later, having enough sense to know that I most likely had a psychotic break. I know that if I stayed fully within the esoteric and truly sublime and scary existence my mind dropped me into as a means of survival, I would not have the life I treasure right now, where I make my own choices and do the very real work that provides me with a home and a sense of reward and connection to community. Loosening my grip on those mad but magical reins that saved me has brought me to a place where I write and make art in order to try and find ways to remember and put it all into words and images so that I can share the “capital T truth” I found once. Because it was good stuff. Loosening my grip has led me to life; to pragmatic rewards that (who knew) honor the witch in me. I’m engaging in it all and I’m also laser-focused on working toward remembering to hold even harder than ever to those reigns once again when it’s my time to die, and I hope that won’t happen for a long, long time.
So if you catch me gathering redwood twigs from a parking lot or wild sagebrush near the beach or hear my partner sharing that it’s a regular occurrence for him to find me staring into the flames from our fire-pit in the backyard, know there is no need for concern. It’s just my way to stay balanced on the fulcrum of two “realities.”
ART
As far as art goes, I’ve been feeling a little “betwixt” lately. Not having enough time to dive deep into things.
I’m re-engaging with a piece that I once thought was complete, but suddenly came to understand it needed something more.
Last week I brought this mixed media painting to my classroom and intentionally shared my thoughts about it and asked some students for their input. I was very pleased to hear how these teens engaged with my questions and the work. They are a whole new generation of viewing audience with creative inspirations I can’t easily engage with, but it turns out they could connect with the amount of time I put into this object as well as the imagery, which is more playful and humorous than what they might have expected from someone my age.
I respect my students and engage with their art in a serious manner, and didn’t share this work with students who I didn’t think would get something out of it for their own creative processes. It was very rewarding to see how these kids reciprocated that respect when looking at my painting.
As well, I received some insights that are incredibly helpful! Critique is good. As much as I personally got from this exchange, I do hope they learned something about the importance of sharing their work and asking others for constructive input.
CAR
I had to do it. I had to trade in the car my father left me when he died. It was a funny looking thing, and I never expected it to last as long as it did. It served me well.
Some of you may have seen my commute videos, which I started when I first moved back to the Monterey Peninsula and began my long drive to and from my teaching job.
I had been taking the train and busses in L.A. and sometimes captured images I thought were interesting along my work commute. I wrote and illustrated the experiences from time-to-time in my What I Did Last Month web series.
I found that being in a car for an extended period of time was not so bad. Especially after having been surrounded by so many people, without physical boundaries, while commuting to work on public transit. In this car I got to embrace a view I missed very much, filled with redwood, eucalyptus and oak trees, to name a few. I drove over the ocean via a slough that empties out into an underwater canyon. I said hello again to egret, pelicans, seagulls, fishing boats, sea otters, farm fields and mountains. Not to mention roads I drove on during the entire decade of my twenties, when life seemed to hold the potential for so many adventures I’d eventually find myself on.
Also, I had time to listen to music.
I got myself a little phone holder to clip onto the car’s air vent and one day when JJ Fad’s Supersonic came on the radio, I thought it would be funny to film myself driving while listening to this song that reminded me so much of my time as a teen in the same area, driving for the first time, in various cars my dad bought for me, two of which were used and always broke down.
Soon I started to realize that a part of this commute would involve regular pockets of traffic, and so I began switching the video camera, on and off, for certain lengths of time, when it was safe to do so.
Upon posting these moments to Instagram, I soon learned about stickers that were animated (at first I drew on my videos, which I thought was super-cool) and it made me think that I was a real life person engaging in one of my favorite toys as a kid- Colorforms. Remember them? I can still smell the plastic of the little figures from Scooby Doo or The Smurfs that you could place in various areas around a laminated cardboard landscape.
I could collage myself AND do this to music I enjoyed or found fitting of the scene I created.
I thought the parameters of the car and the long drive were perfect to continue this non-project project of mine.
Now I have a brand new car and hopefully someone who doesn’t have to commute so far will own and enjoy my weird little Chevy. I took very good care of it, but if we continued as things were going, the vehicle would have been a lost cause, and I might have found myself in a bad situation.
So, my last commute video (see above for image and link) features me in the Halloween costume I wore to school. I was a scarecrow, practicing making scary faces to try and scare an animated “sticker” of a crow, perched atop of my rear passenger car seat. I was embodying a truly scary and very Samhain situation- as in the past, if the crops were eaten by the crows or other critters before the weather turned, there would not be food stored up for the barren winter. Of course in my situation the crow was more of a companion on my commute, listening to a very 80’s sounding Goth song made in 2024 called The Style is Death. I thought that was funny.
Anyway, my new car doesn’t need my phone to be clipped up to where I can view a map signaling traffic jams with a dark red and sometimes yellow line, so I’ve decided that I’m done with commute videos. Somehow that experience was about the car and my dad, as much as it was about things that make me laugh or songs I think are cool.
This was a used car he bought and paid off before getting too sick to drive. He used it only to drive from home to a diner and back again each day- less than a mile each way. He gave it to me while on his death bed along with the words, “It’s probably no good anymore but maybe you can sell it and get a little money.”
In gathering the materials for my recent car purchase, I saw that the old car had 44,000 miles on it when my name was put on the registration, in 2017. By the time I traded it in it had over 153,000 miles.
The veil was thin and I got a new car. Maybe my dad was able to peek through worlds and let me know that the time had come. Maybe his spirit will be with the person who drives it next. Maybe they will be compelled to smoke, like he did, or fly remote controlled planes or maybe, just maybe, they will take silly videos of themselves while driving and post them on Instagram.
That’s it for now and I realize I didn’t even talk about seeing PJ Harvey and Kara Walker’s phenomenal installation in San Francisco! I also rode in a driverless car! I suppose I’ll have to save that for next time.
Thanks for reading.