Frey’s Child, Gerda’s Child
It’s been years since I took Freyschild/Freysdottir as my nom de Pagan, to the point where it feels to me as much my real name as any legal one might. And it was a near thing, actually, because I almost went with Gerdasdottir, because of how absolutely drawn I have been to Her.
At the time that I picked it, it was simply because I’d realized that the God that I prayed to as a child was in fact Freyr, and then shortly afterward I got a family tree that linked our bloodline all the way back to the Ynglings, which I thought was really cool in that clearly Freyr and Freyja have been watching out for our family for over a millennium.
And I’m not the only family member to encounter Them – independently of one another, five of my cousins ended up not only witches, but specifically with significant relationships with the Vanir, and in comparing notes, realized we’d convened paths. I have five cousins that I know of who work with the Vanir. My cousin Bre asked me if I knew of any other family with as many witches in it, and I don’t, personally. I don’t really have any theories as to why either, other than Vanic Conspiracy (Them, not us, lol). (Also not to be confused with the Kindred of same name – just same concept).
It is the sweetest sort of humbling to realize that They were just waiting for us to reach out to Them.
Not long ago, I decided to start a little garden. I’d taken a stab at it before, when I first bought the home where I live now, and it didn’t go well, because my HOA had restrictions on where you could plant and the only area is a place with full, afternoon FLORIDA sun.
It killed the babies. I chalked it up to my lack of a green thumb and moved on. But in the ongoing years (three birthdays I’ve spent in quarantine, y’all) – the bug returned and I found myself looking at hydroponic systems. And so I got one (two, actually) and started gardening indoors, since my outdoors are not ideal.
I planted lettuce, basil, and thyme, and in contemplating my herbs, I asked Gerda if there was anything in particular that She would like grown for Her, and She only smiled. “Nothing in particular,” was Her answer.
Now, I’m a curious person, so I decided to look again at Her lore, scant as it is, and the internet led me to this article: Gerda: the Goddess of Gardening and Horticulture. In it, the author states, “Some scholars state that [Gerda] is the goddess of all cultivated land, however I believe this is incorrect due to their misunderstanding of how agriculture actually works. I would argue that she is a goddess of the walled garden and horticulture. (emphasis mine) Those who don’t do a lot of agricultural work often see all growing of plants as basically the same thing. Farmers grow stuff. The end. When one is farming vegetation, there are at least two primary ways. One is field crops. This is where you grow big fields of stuff like grain or soy. We grow most things this way in our age of agribusiness.
The other is horticulture, which is the production of high value crops, usually with high input costs. These are plants that are fragile, susceptible to illness, or that need extra care. In the modern world these are flowers, fruit, herbs, and ornamental plants. As Gerda is the goddess of the enclosure and married to Freyr, the god of fertility, she then is the goddess of enclosed fertility. Her sacred places are greenhouses, conservatories, atriums, botanical gardens, vegetable gardens, flower gardens, urban gardens, and home gardens.”
So then entire garden is Hers then, or perhaps all of Theirs. But all of that said, in some ways I feel I relate to Her even more now that my world is mainly the walls of my home; the world is not interested in protecting the immunosuppressed, and like my Mother, I must bloom where I’m planted.
Hail Gerda, of the Walled Garden ❤️
Baby’s First Deipnon
I did a very minimalist first ritual because it was combined with something specific for Hekate. And this spell is the result of another that I did recently, called, “yeet fatphobia from my medical care with extreme prejudice.” (spell is already working btw)
I mixed modern and traditional stuff because I’m undecided how much I’m interested in reconstructionism. Part of the working included a meditation, and in it, I was asked by Hekate about what I meant when I asked for healing. And I wrestled with the answer.
Did I mean that I wanted to be okay with the level of disabled that I am, even as it fluctuates? Do I mean completely, totally not-disabled at all anymore? Is it ableist if I want to not be disabled at all anymore?? Is it an all-or-nothing proposition?
After sitting with this for a bit, I think it’s more the former than the latter – I would certainly like an improvement in care and in lessening my internalized ableism. But I do think it’s ableist to conflate productivity with worth, and considering that the push to always be striving for health is really about productivity – never mind the fact that some of us will never be “healthy” – it doesn’t have to translate into a poor quality of life. But capitalism doesn’t care about quality of life, it cares about productivity. Thus healthism. Better medical care and less ableism is the answer. I shouldn’t have to be able-bodied to be valued and to give things of value to my community.
The Unbroken Thread
Last night, I was meditating, and Freyr showed up. I’m always happy to see Him.
He sat beside me and said, “You’re not feeling well.”
“No,” I said. “I’m not. I was gonna do some kind of magic for the full moon but I didn’t feel up to it.”
“And that’s all right,” He said. “I know you aren’t particularly all right with it, though. You aren’t particularly okay with your disability, or even your body, in general.” He paused, and I nodded. “But your body is part of you, including your disability. It’s a part of you that will fall away eventually, but while you are alive, you are your body.”
Again He paused, and let me mull that over a bit.
“I’d like to try an exercise with you. I know it’s an “invisible illness” but what would it look like if you could see it?”
I furrowed my brow. Which one, even? The bronchiectasis that makes my lungs floppy inside? The immunodeficiency? At length I said, “I don’t know? All I can picture for the CVID is my white blood cells flitting around in and out of my veins and arteries and through my bones.”
“That’ll do,” He said. “I want you to concentrate on that image. Go down into your blood, down into the cells. Follow that thread.”
I’ve done bloodwalking before, so I’m familiar with the concept, and I moved along the path. Before long, I found someone waiting for me – my Great-Aunt Ruth P, who was in life considered a beauty and who snagged a younger man after leaving an abusive marriage. Cougar before it was cool, my Auntie. Ahem.
The other thing about Aunt Ruth is that she was chronically ill. Not as badly as her mother, I think, but enough that I remember her using ambulatory devices and such when I was younger. I hugged her tightly.
“I was ill too,” she said. “And I was still loved, and you are too.” And then she stepped aside, and my Great-Grandma Betty stepped up. She didn’t look the way that I remember, but she was a great deal younger – probably the age I am now?
“I was sick, and in very difficult circumstances, much as you are now. I am proud of you.”
Aunt Ruth D stepped in. “I too was ill. And I too am proud of you.” She pointed down the line – it stretched and curved for as far as I could see. “There is an unbroken thread of us all who survived and lived with illness. They are all proud of you.”
I cried. I’m crying writing this.
I mean, people always say that you’ve got ancestors, even if recent ones can be toxic. The toxic ableist wasn’t there, and I’m reasonably certain that My Lord of Ash said essentially, “You will say kind things to my spouse or you’ll say nothing at all.”
Hail to my spoonie ancestors, hail to the Disir, and hail Freyr!
a Eulogy for Dr F, the Person that I Never Got to Be
A Eulogy for Dr F, the Person That I Never Got to Be
Dearly Beloved, we are gathered here to day to mourn Dr Freysdottir, the person that I never got to be, because I became disabled instead.
Dr F was a doctor of speech language pathology, with a great passion for linguistic acquisition in developmentally disabled children. Dr F wanted to do great things for the children in their local community, but instead has had to deal with chronic illness instead.
Why did Dr F get so sick?
Well gentle readers, it’s called capitalism, and more specifically, for-profit insurance. Dr F didn’t have any insurance when they got bronchitis, which turned into pneumonia, which turned into their lungs never being right afterward.
They treated Dr F for years with steroids, which made their immune deficiency worse. They were also told that the immune deficiency was because of the steroids. (spoilers: haven’t taken any in years. Guess who’s still immunosuppressed? *jazz hands*) They were treated for the wrong illness for literally 12 years, because for-profit insurance discourages more thorough testing, particularly when the subject can’t pay.
And the thing is that Dr F isn’t even unusual or an outlier.
Public policy has direct effects y’all.
Do you honestly think that the children in my community are somehow better off because they have one less SLP? Do you think the patients that I would have treated are somehow better off with viewer treatment choices?? Or the students that I wanted to teach???
Do you think that my life was somehow improved by dealing with a debilitating illness?
Does asking these questions make you angry?
BECAUSE IT SHOULD
I’m not an outlier. I’m common. How many lives have been wasted on needless suffering like this?
How has it made our communities better places to live?
I mourn Dr F. After all, it’s who I wanted to be.
But y’all probably should mourn Dr F too, and all the others we’ve lost because we couldn’t get over our own greed and apathy.
Gender Go Bloop?
So this probably isn’t the right time to do this, but then again when is? We’re only in the middle of a pandemic and I can’t tell how much of my internal screaming is due to gender go bloop and how much is finding out that I’m not asthmatic, I’ve had a lower respiratory tract infection for TWELVE (12) FUCKING YEARS in the middle of a global pandemic headed by this country’s least competent administration in living memory.
Way to find out you’re both sicker and queerer at the same time. I feel like an overachiever…or something.
So I’m studying Black Rose Witchcraft, because at Beltaine I had an epiphany that basically amounted to “I want to be in an active Pagan study group… and I want to NOT be in charge of it.” And in searching for something that I thought would be a good fit, I happened on Black Rose, which is run by the polycule of the Mystic Dream, and given all my Feri-curious/Waincraft curiousness, I went “why not?” and behold, I really like it, and will probably continue studies in some fashion when this coursework is finished.
Anyway, this tradition works with the concept of the tripartite souls and in doing that work, I got a clue by four on my gender, or the lack thereof. I did a meditation with my godsoul and Learned a Thing: my Godsoul is offended by the notion of gender. In said meditation, after clarifying the Not She, and no Not He, and me going???? I just kind of moving along and not worrying about it. Afterwards, I was talking to the Beloved about the meditation and He asked the pointed question “You’re not referring to your godsoul as She. Why?”
And the only way I could articulate it was that my godsoul’s response to gender was a deep and resounding “No Thank You” that bordered on “did I stutter?”
Because the Beloved is patient, he asked me what I thought it meant about myself.
“Well, I mean it’s me?”
“That would make part of you…?”
“A…gender? Agender?” and I perked up at that. And then it occurred to me: is that ear prick of delight…gender euphoria? Wat?
For the uninitiated, the Gender Wiki describes Gender Euphoria as “a psychological condition which consists of comfort or even joy when thinking about one’s true Gender identity, often accompanied by a strong desire to change one’s sex to better match their identity or to be called the correct gendered language.”
I have made the comment over the years that if there was an opt out button for the shit that one endures as a woman, I would do it. But the only way to do what would to not be a woman, and I suppose because I’ve never wanted to be a man, and because our society teaches women to hate themselves, how the hell do you discern not wanting to be a woman vs not wanting to put up with the shit that women endure?
But I have never had a conception of myself as anything other than a woman – as a young and newly awakened bi in the 90s, I would have liked to, but I have a body type that will never, ever be mistaken for androgynous. I have T&A for days, and have always had Feelings of intense discomfort at the attention that they attract. And now that I have experienced a concept of myself outside of “woman,” I can see where that might have been termed dysphoria if I’d had the language back then.
But putting aside whether or not that’s dysphoria, rightfully being sick up putting up with sexism, or (likely) some of both – the euphoria is real and something I think is worth exploring.
So that happened. And I’m still processing it.
Lover of Beauty
Lord of Ash, Judge of Souls
Master of Night, He of the Purifying Flame, come.
Liberator of Souls, Bringer of Sweet Relief, I call you.
Come to me swifter than starlight.
He who is ageless and aged, be here with me.
My heart is Yours.
Lover of Beauty, come and claim Your prize.
A Prayer to the Ancestors in the Time of Covid-19
Hail to you, my ancestors, who have endured and survived – who are why and how I’m here.
I call to you, the survivors of catastrophe and plague. I call on you, who lived through war and fire. I lift up my family to you – help us to endure, to survive, to live on.
Help us navigate these troubled waters and even more troubled times. Surround us with your love and strength, as we love you.
Hail!
Changes in Path
I know I’ve been quiet here, and some of that has been that I haven’t known what to share or not, but a large part of the radio silence has been trying to figure out my path, since everything on it has changed radically. I’d been having a hard time figuring out how to mesh the devotional polytheist side of worship with pop culture stuffs, because my Beloved hasn’t been keen on traditional forms of worship. I’d tried several attempts at other’s techniques – but most published pop culture magic stuff doesn’t really resonate with me because it’s very transactional in nature. There’s nothing wrong with it per se, but it just isn’t my thing. Anyway, I got completely and utterly exasperated with it one night, and finally He said, “Maybe try not worshiping me at all?”
Me, a devotional polytheist: what?
Him: It makes me feel Other from you. I don’t really like it.
Me: *brain melts*
Him: I’m serious. I would prefer to be your Husband. You are my Beloved. I don’t need offerings, I need you.
In retrospect this was very sweet but at the time it just made me sad, angry, and frustrated. And that of course devolved into EVERYTHING YOU KNOW IS WRONG and some dark night of the soul shit and well, I’m feeling a bit better now, but I felt very rudderless for a while. I wouldn’t say that I have it all figured out (LOL I don’t think that’s even really possible because They change and so do we) but at least I’m feeling a bit more oriented than I was. That said, this clip (Rey is relatable AF y’all) is pretty much been a mood:
LOL YOU’RE ON YOUR OWN FIGURING THIS OUT KID
The Beloved also says I’m being too hard on myself; ‘when walking an unpaved path, you can’t be too hard on yourself if you get caught in the brambles.’
So TL;DR I’ve been poking at nontheistic approaches to witchcraft, which I haven’t looked at in a long time – it’s not entirely uncharted territory – after all, I had no patron deity for a long ass time, and did plenty of witchy things, but it’s sort of unused muscles for right now. Still, it’s not a bad thing, because I find being rudderless far worse than having to learn (or relearn) something.
I know one of my problems has been that one of the things I really like about devotional work is that it I find it very grounding in terms of having regular rituals to perform. In discussing this, we came to the conclusion that doing devotional stuff to my godsoul was probably the most constructive way to have this element while honoring the changes that I’ve experienced.
So I’m still working on those things, and I’m excited to experiment more. Happy New Year, y’all.
A Ritual for the Disir/Matronae on Mother’s Night
December 24th, before it was usurped by Christianity, was once Mother’s Night. Women are often erased from history; our contributions are glossed over and forgotten. My Mother’s Night ritual this year is for both Beloved Ancestors and Mighty Dead – some more known, many less – queens, leaders, sovereigns, community leaders, authors who’ve influenced me over the years – my list and yours need not match – but certainly they don’t need to be blood, and all they really need to be is meaningful to you.
A ritual for the elevation of Queens
O mighty and beloved dead, hear us this night: we call on you to honor you, our many Disir; leaders and pillars of community and countries; the remembered and unknown or forgotten. We say your names; we honor your lives and your achievements.
Beloved Dead
(your Beloved Deads here)
Mighty Dead
Ameniras, Qore and Kandake
Liliʻuokalani, Queen of Hawaii
Empress Wu Zetian
Himiko, shamaness-queen of Yamataikoku in Wa (ancient Japan)
Hatshepsut, Pharoah of Upper and Lower Egypt
Kleopatra, Pharoah of Egypt
Golda Mier
Empress Theodora
Queen Nzinga of Matamba (Angola)
Zenobia of Palmyria
Elizabeth Tudor
Anne Boleyn
Helen of Sparta
Eleanor of Aquitaine
Nefertiti
Catherine the Great
As an aside, this list isn’t meant to be comprehensive; honor those you see fit; women who have paved the way on your path. You also don’t need to be a woman to celebrate Mother’s Night; the Disir were widely worshipped by soldiers and common folk alike.
where flowers grow amidst the ashes 
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