Ruby and the Toilet Cleaner
Lúnassa- thoughts on the harvest, making and breaking and following rules, everyday magic and the simple life.
Rules.
My initial intention for this witchy-ish blog/newsletter (aside from talking about my creative projects and inspiration) was to share how I integrate my belief system into my life and show how I take parts here and there from witchcraft and mix it around, the way I see fit, because I choose to embrace an intuitive and personal approach to this specific and “named” faith that keeps me going.
I think a lot of us are like this, no matter what system of belief we feel connected to, so I thought writing about my ways of doing such a thing might sometimes serve as an inspiration to others, although I realize I don’t share much about actual rituals or specific spell work. I suppose that’s because I don’t engage in anything that feels too “separate” from my day-to-day life. Those moments when I’m aware that I’m connected to things larger than me, it’s more like slowing down or remembering. It comes from looking at the sky, thanking trees, growing a garden, using sage, writing words down and burning them in a fire-pit, making art and writing… Sometimes I ponder objects that I have chosen to keep in my life and consider the experiences we have gone through together.
Sometimes it’s a spell with oils and words I repeat, to help foster change in my behaviors and create boundaries. “Recipes” for performing things like this are plentiful and posted online ad nauseam. I’m not one to memorize anything well enough to share magic rituals as some kind of authority. Plus it’s personal. My point is to show that this is not necessarily needed.
Example:
During the mid-to-late aughts I used to occasionally act as a sort of “fortune-teller” at public events my artist friends would hold at their art spaces. I took this very seriously and loved that the art-elements involved allowed me to do things completely based on my own practices and not via some witchy rule book. People got a lot out of my readings and I appreciated the blending of my performance art self with this part of me that needs to whole-heartedly contribute to my communities.
Because of my success as a volunteer magic person, my friends hooked me up with a job to be filmed doing a reading for a successful song-writer for a very famous pop star. She was trying to break out and into her own career and was in the middle of producing a series of Youtube episodes documenting this process. Seeing that I was going to be paid ($60, wow!) I purchased tarot cards that I thought fit into my “image” and changed the way I read. I felt I needed to do it the right way. My intuitive method, which got me the attention in the first place, was to use some magic books that are dear to me and glean information around the person sitting before me.
I would feel energies and guides surrounding the people, sometimes. Other times I shared words and ideas I intuited and I also read words that stood out to me while flipping through my books, and that information seemed to be quite helpful for my sitters.
As hard as I tried, I had no connection to the new cards I purchased (they featured unicorn art), and more than that, the future pop star I read for had strong ideas about tarot, as her mother read them or something. She could sense my lack of confidence and because of that, the experience was a disaster.
We did this at an occult shop that included fashion the artist enjoyed and purchased, and through that exchange, she connected more with the two fellas who were fans of her work and owned the shop. They acted as art directors.
I usually sat at a table with objects that were important to me, but this time they put us on the floor and I had random items from the shop placed in between us both.
While I made a very brief appearance on her web series (that episode having to do with “magical" predictions regarding her career), it served me as a lesson. At that point in my life, catering to anyone touching “celebrity” and working for pennies or for free for people who know people who know people was not going to bring me to what I needed.
After that experience, I knew that bitch (me) needed to sit on her own damn sofa and watch Columbo reruns all summer on the flatscreen TV that she bought when her tax-return check arrived in the mail. That may not sound very magical, but it was certainly spell work. I had spent too many years being a person living on the fringe of things and by the rules of others. Valuing and noticing the way I was building my own nest was the ritual or ceremony that I needed.
My “magic” needed my confidence and thereby had to be rooted in something distinctly personal, not something that would bow down to any kind of power outside of myself.
I didn’t just watch classic TV reruns- it began to take the shape of me sitting alone in silence and feeling genuine gratitude for the moment. I was being present inside of the actual embodiment of a goal I had forgotten about; one I had when I first made my way to that part of California, years before. If I didn’t stop then, it would have passed me by.
I certainly wouldn’t have come to the place I find myself at now, which is imperfect but also perfect. The simplest of things. Moments of satisfaction that I can curate (for lack of a better word) at will. Sitting still inside of that one bedroom Hollywood apartment built in the early Seventies and all of the ghosts that had to circle within it, was a reconnection and acknowledgment of the kind of magic, trust, and belief that has always been with me- unclouded and uninfluenced and untethered from any drive to get “more” or be the witch or person I think others think I should be.
LUGH, THE GOD OF CRAFTS
“In some traditions, this day honors the Celtic god, Lugh. This celebration of the god, Lugh is referred to as Lughnasadh (pronounced Loo-NAS-ah). Lugh is the god of craftsmanship…” https://www.bpl.org/blogs/post/the-origins-and-practices-of-lammas-lughnasad/
Okay, here I’m doing what I said I do (changing things to suit my perception)- my title for this section says that Lugh is the god of crafts, but if you look him up you see more about Lugh being the god of craftsmanship. I added the ellipses to the quote because it goes on to mention blacksmithing and fighting. I don’t connect to those things, especially the latter. Also, I don’t need Lugh to be male. Lugh is a god so in my personalized system of belief, Lugh is not gendered, nor human. I don’t even need to use the name, Lugh.
Back in the tiny Hollywood apartment where I watched Columbo, I also used to take walks through the neighborhoods in the Hollywood Hills that were just blocks away.
One morning I was showing my partner the walking circuit I had developed and we found an impressive vine hanging in front of us, near the OUTPOST sign on a stone wall that signaled a housing development title from the past. He reached up and pulled on the vine and it popped right off. I wound it up in my hand and took it home as a memento of a good walk.
When we returned, I decided to use the coil of vine and weave some yarn I was given by a friend into it and create a small basket I have to this day. It is like a nest and it sits on my altar and holds things involved in my spell work.
Because of the memory of the walk, and the fact that it was made when I was in the midst of my own nesting, it’s one of my most treasured objects. Also, it’s useful. It holds objects as well as my memories. It sparks meditation regarding the making of it, what that time was, and it reminds me of how I was wrapping up something I had started when I first moved to Hollywood, in 2003.
MAKING, COMPLETING
I’m currently making crafty things. Completing crafty-arty things I’ve started and for whatever reason, set aside. This is the mission I’m currently on, revisiting and finishing, with the goal of taking part in an arts festival at the end of August.
I am going to have items for sale, as well as showcasing my art-life and artworks. There is really nothing very special about having a booth at an art fair, and in writing about it here I feel like I’m making it seem like a big deal- I guess I’m doing so because this time around it’s less of a business plan and more that I’m revisiting something.
Twenty-one years ago I had my own art space and perceived my professional art-life in a way that is very rooted in being self-taught. Through that experience I found I needed to learn more, so I did, and left a lot behind. Over the years, my old creatures and colors have managed to return. Well, I never got rid of them, I just tried to make adjustments and integrated new mediums. I can’t ignore the fact that I’ve refused to take many professional paths I’ve come across, so now I’m back at it and laying it all out for myself, so that I can see what it looks like, now that I have lived more and learned.
Shop space as artwork. Ownership of space in a shared space.
In a similar vein, I started hosting a monthly private art salon based on sharing art and writing and anything that has to do with the creative end of things. No one is allowed to attend if they are not actively living life as an artist or writer. Anyone who attends must contribute to our discussions in a manner that reveals a connection to the actual “art” of it all, and it’s been so good. The community (including myself) involved has fallen right onto the track I offered as an idea and they/we are making, evolving, sharing and helping each other.
It’s not something for me to turn into an art project. Photos of the meetings are not shared on social media and this is not something I’m hoping to pivot into a money-making venture.
It was something I needed, as I had been for so long finding myself sucked into discussions surrounding the hustle of making and selling and engaging in circular bitch fests- spewing frustrations over the value others find in us, or dwelling on what is wrong with our communities. It’s so common to get into that with others, no matter what their field and it just brings me back to the place of surrendering to something outside of my trust. I’m just as guilty as the next guy- It’s a comfortable and unifying topic that has dark energy. It’s a phenomenal waste of time and I’m trying to be done with it.
Life is happening and it’s so very short.
I’VE GOT MY OWN WAY LIKE DURAN DURAN SAID
My friend, Jean Vengua has a fantastic blog on Substack (I always mention it here) and this last one in her “rabbit hole” section, she shared a blog of a poet/writer/artist called Geoff Huth who wrote about why he will no longer submit his work for potential publication and this specific portion has hit the nail on my specific and proverbial head:
“Maybe my issue has to do with time. I have only limited time, and I would rather make and show than make and submit and wait and maybe publish and maybe not.” Geoff Huth https://dbqp.blogspot.com/2019/04/why-i-will-not-submit.html
Huth writes about what the process of preparing work for submission does to him and how it makes him feel and I totally get it.
There is a poem written by Rene Ricard, whom a lot of people know for his connection to Jean-Michel Basquiat that I think about all the time. I only like the first section that I’ll share here:
All you sycophants and grant hustlers. I will never chase the rich again. Let me starve. I will never apply for a grant. Let me starve.
I found it online, years ago, in something I think having to do with his passing. It probably was this essay here, written by Ingrid Sischy: https://www.artforum.com/columns/rene-ricard-2-220101/
“I will never chase the rich again. Let me starve.” I feel those words, viscerally, but don’t know if I have the courage to truly live by them.
The conditions of grants; how the grant-giver’s reason for publicly sharing money with an artist plays a large part in determining what the artwork will be in the world makes me bonkers. How one must adjust, reword, re-feel it all, even before beginning- dehumanizing.
Bother people you respect to write yet another reference letter. Describe how your art will help our community. How will your work engage with people and make the world a better place? You have to know all that and your budget up front. And why wouldn’t you fill in those forms and start with a mission before anything is made? It’s their money after all. Ugh, power. I’m so impressed by those who can fit into these systems and come out strong.
I mean, systems and rules are not always a bad way to go- I’ve been on the other end of things, reviewing countless book submissions for publication, so I respect some of the structures in place for those who must review many works, but it’s not the only way.
That said, I am not in support of hoarding works and never sharing. Being able to show people what I do is most satisfying for me. I’m also not a fan of those who lack a sense of refinement in what they produce. Input and structures can help with that. There is also something to be said about luck, in addition to hard work and a solid sense of self. How the die was cast. Cosmic or karmic shit. Maybe.
RUBY AND THE TOILET CLEANER
I started my summer by rewatching a film that is one of my all-time favorites called Ruby in Paradise by Victor Nuñez. (I’ve written about it a few times.) It feels so revolutionary to me. It’s about living life and choosing one’s own way of living. Although I’ve long since grown a kind of distance from many of the protagonist’s youthful characteristics, I value her questioning the choices women make for the sake of “the dream.”
Recently I watched another film, Wim Wenders’ Perfect Days. It does the same thing, at least for me, as Ruby in Paradise. Choosing the kind of life that allows room for the ways an individual finds mystery, magic and beauty takes work and means making choices that might not make sense to others. I like that the character is not young. I can’t help but feel it’s a revamped version of the former film, and as I’m also now not young, it arrived just in time.
Both protagonists choose lives that seem “small” in comparison to the expectations society and others have for them, or for what life should be, in general. And of course we get to step inside of their heads and their lives through these films and in there we find something that seems to be the essence of what all of those societal expectations are meaning to get us to, but often don’t.
There is so much going around in social media and in corporate marketing strategies about slowing down- it seems it takes access to quite a lot of money and time in order to simplify. All perfectly good things, like making one’s own dyes or inks from nature, then making art with it. Or making edible things entirely from scratch and then adding that to a recipe that takes an additional amount of time… you know what I’m talking about. To me, it feels as though these activities are often excursions from a life.
The demonstrations of “simple lives” in Perfect Days and Ruby in Paradise are full embodiments. Examples. No extra cash or rulebook needed, just a kind of surrender and acceptance. As Ruby writes in her diary, “Nothing fancy here…”. If I’m not already doing what they are in some ways (I’m aware they are fictional characters), then I hope to work toward the ideal that I find in these films.
But back to Lughnasadh or Lúnassa or Lammas. I think I prefer Lúnassa. I just learned about this name via Amanda Yates Garcia’s blog post about the holiday. It’s thorough and interesting, if you wish to learn more.
Here is to the start of the harvest season!
What is the harvest season for you? In my life, this time of year usually marks the end of a resting time from my day job. It’s challenging to stay in the mindset where I know I can survive an extended amount of time without receiving a paycheck, but I’m so thankful that I work all year to budget and make this choice and that the option is available to me. Not everyone is so lucky.
Soon it will be another ten to eleven months of administration tasks, staring at computer screens, engaging in professional development workshops, attending meetings and most importantly, learning from my fellow teachers and working with much younger others, in order to show them how art and creativity fits into their lives.
Following that, once summer arrives, I once again wind down and get to making or doing the art that I must do in order to have what it takes to serve as an educator. Cleaning out and refilling the mental and spiritual hopper. I guess that is how I can view the harvest, or remind myself that it is coming.
I am also seeing the ways I’m taking unfinished projects and completing them- learning to accept things as done and potentially moving them off into the lives of others at the end of August. I’m starting to consider how the things I make with my own two hands will be “harvested,” leaving space for the new, and what comes next.
This is my witchcraft. This is why the sabbats mean something to me.
I haven't even finished reading this post, yet, but have to stop to say this all resonates with me so effing much!!! Thank you for this.