It was a cold and blustery night 15 years ago. Teisha and Paul (who would go on to be the force behind the Sacred Paths Center) gathered with their first daughter (who was still a toddler at the time) and one other person at Susan's Coffee Shop, next door to Evenstar Bookstore. This was the first gathering of Coffee Cauldron.

Today Coffee Cauldron is the oldest and most popular Pagan gathering in the Twin Cities. On the first and third Wednesday's of every month, an average of 30 to 60 local Pagans gather to hang-out, chat, play games, network, make plans, perform spiritual healings, knit, work on chain-mail, or whatever they feel like doing.

The event defies structure. Early on there were attempts to have themes for the gatherings, but they never worked, attendees preferring to just hang-out. When asked for really good Coffee Cauldron stories, people tended to be at a loss. There were maybe a couple stories, but the event isn't about generating monumental occurrences, but rather about friends coming together and sharing the joys of their lives. New-born children are introduced to the community, as are new partners, new jewelry, new tools, new toys … stories are told at the gathering rather than stories being told about the gathering.

The Time Line of Coffee Cauldron

For Paul and Teisha, the history of Coffee Cauldron is interwoven with the history of their lives together. The dates their children were born are the landmarks to remember the timeline of Coffee Cauldron.

• January 1995 — The gathering started  the same year they were handfasted. The next year their second daughter was born.
• Winter of 1997– there was a fire at Susan's Coffee Shop and Coffee Cauldron moved across the street to Giovanna's artists studio. Attendees had to pitch in to supply the coffee and cookies each month. That was just before the birth of their third daughter.
• July of 1999 — an open mic night, and had a great turnout with lots of poetry read.
• Summer of 2001 — Susan's Coffee Shop reopened as Prairies Star and Coffee Cauldron moved back next door to Evenstar.
• Spring of 2002, there were scheduling problems with Prairie Star and Coffee Cauldron moved across the street to Roasting Stones. That was just a few months before their son was born. 
• Summer of 2004, Roasting Stones closed, and Coffee Cauldron moved to Cupcake, about a mile west on University.
• August of 2004, after 9 years hosting the event (and the birth of four children) Teisha and Paul pass the hosting of Coffee Cauldron over to Earth House.
• Fall of 2005, Coffee Cauldron moved back next door to Evenstar due to arrangements with the new owners of the coffee shop. The coffee shop was renamed The Artists' Grind, was sold and renamed The Edge, but Coffee Cauldron continued.
• As 2008 ended, so did Evenstar, but within a couple months The Sacred Paths Center opened around the corner, and all the while Coffee Cauldron continued.

According to Teisha, "Fifteen years ago when we created Coffee Cauldron, that was pretty much the first step on the path toward creating The Sacred Paths Center." These days participants spend as much time at The Sacred Paths Center as they do at the coffee shop. There was even one night when the person scheduled to work at the coffee shop called in sick and they closed early, and Coffee Cauldron simply met at The Sacred Paths Center and continued without a hitch.

Celebrating 15 Years

To celebrate the fifteenth anniversary, there was a cake. Other than that, it was pretty much a typical Coffee Cauldron. At one point a group stood around in a circle (it was noted that we're Pagan, and we like circles) and reflected on the last fifteen years of Coffee Cauldron.

Paul talked about how as he and Teisha entered the community there was a group which was trying to work toward having a community center which fell apart. Of this, Paul said, "They said the community isn't ready. So we said fine, let's change the community." All these years later we finally have a community center. "We're patient."

Teisha said, "Remember that time we tried the poetry night. Long dark poems. Notice we never did that again."

There were discussions of "gang reiki". Any given Coffee Cauldron, there are at least six reiki practitioners, so if anyone has an ailment, they are able to get a group experience of reiki healing.

This lead to the one memorable Coffee Cauldron Reiki story:

Coffee Cauldron is hosted by Earth House, who also host a midsummer camping festival. One of the regulars at the midsummer gathering is known as Catgut (so called because of her abilities as a fiddle player). She lives way into Wisconsin and far from here. Catgut was hospitalized with an infection and things were not going well. The only thing which made her life tolerable were chemical cooling pads. Catgut's nurse was annoyed by this because the pads were in a different department, which meant time out of her schedule, and walking to get the pads. To activate the pads, they had to be twisted to break open the chemicals, and then the pad would cool where needed. A group of 11 reiki practitioners raised energy at Coffee Cauldron, and then sent it all at once to Catgut as a reiki bomb. Luckily they noted the time that the reiki bomb was sent so that later they could verify that at that exact same moment the not-very-nice nurse was activating a cooling pad which spontaneously exploded all over the room, but mostly all over the nurse. She checked around and no one had ever heard of these pads bursting before. The nurse became much nicer after that, and Catgut quickly recovered.

Like many Coffee Cauldrons, people laughed. New people were welcomed into the circle. People said goodnight. Some went out to eat afterwards.

Omega Artworks is owned and operated by Gary and Suzy Zahradka. All work is done by us in our studio in St. Paul, Minnesota. For over 25 years we have been designing unique and original swords, knives and sculpture. We offer a wide range of options for custom designed swords and knives, but also maintain an inventory of items you can purchase today!

Our objective is to combine beauty with functionality — to create a work of art that is beautiful to the eye, thrilling to the hand and inspiring to the imagination. As you look through our website let you imagination go, then contact us and let us know what you are thinking.

We're thankful to see they are working again!

I also have to mention that there is also a Pagan Forge which has been firing up the forge, training up apprentices, and creating ritual tools which you may have seen at various festivals or at Pagan Pride.  Founded and guided by long-time priest and smith Ken Ra, it's called Underhill, and we will be doing a full feature on them in the coming months.

A more appropriate photo of Stonehenge was taken recently by Corrine Kenner, local author of numerous Tarot books.  She was just in England for some big Tarot conference. I thought I'd throw that image in to clear the palette, so to speak.

Snatching up the remote, I paused the show at that moment and went to go get one of my baby name books (always good for finding names for characters when you’re a writer) and soon discovered that the name “Roswell” is actually Old English for “field of roses.” The minute I read that, the odd feeling turned into an overwhelming “yes!” sensation and I knew then that it was no coincidence that this particular “UFO crash” had happened at Roswell. I knew that it had happened for a reason and that this reason was both symbolic and also related in some fashion with the forces at work in that region, in particular the ley lines that exist in America and the power nodes that connect them, the currents that flow through and empower this land.

Of course, the concept of a “field of roses” has appeared before in relation to the past and to the Craft. Carlo Ginzburg wrote about the Benandanti in his books, a folk who went in spirit four times during the year to battle for the fertility of the land, once “over the wheat and all the other grains, another time over the livestock, and at other times over the vineyard.”2 There, they “fought, played, leaped about, and rode various animals, and did different things amongst themselves; and…the women beat the men who were with them with sorghum stalks, while the men had only bunches of fennel.”1 The place they went to they sometimes called the Field of Josafat and it was said to be the “meadow of the dead overflowing with roses.”3

It seems a common theme and idea that roses are linked to the Craft. Roses of the past were pink rather than red—much like the wild rose which remains today—and had only five petals. Thus, they symbolized the five-pointed star, the Four Quarters plus the center. Earth, air, fire, water, and spirit. Roses are also ancient symbols of love and of sacrifice; roses were special to Venus and red roses represented the fallen blood of Adonis. Roses also symbolize both life and death and the Rose of the Winds is drawn as a circle enclosing a double cross, thus displaying eight directions. While, in Rosicrucian belief, the rose placed in the center of the cross becomes the unity between the four elements.

Years ago, oddly enough, we had once asked the Goddess about the incident at Roswell. We were discussing the faery at the time and how they relate to us, the witches. The Goddess seemed both proud and sad at the same time when She spoke about the incident, and there was this feeling that it had involved a sacrifice of some sort on the behalf of the faeries. (Faeries being the same kind of being as the “aliens” that people see today, just under another guise.) She gave the impression that in Roswell there had been a reaching out in some way, a testing of the waters, so to speak, about whether people were really ready to deal with them.

A close reading of the Whitley Streiber book about the incident at Roswell, “Majestic,” gives much the same impression. Definitely, it seems that there was a reaching out at that time from the Otherworld, from beyond the veil, and the people of the day—mostly government and military folks—had been found wanting. Perhaps, mostly of having open minds?

Instead of an alien crash, what really happened back on that fateful day and the days immediately afterward, was more of an attempt at a kind of spiritual awakening and connection to other planes of existence (like most “alien abduction” experiences, despite the media portrayal of them and UFO fanatics sometimes paranoid thoughts of rectal probes, wars in space between “greys” and “Nordics,” human-alien hybrid experiments, organ harvesting, etc, you take your pick). Unfortunately, the people of the day simply couldn’t handle it and so it transformed itself into something that they could understand: aliens and spaceships and invasion scenarios and super-advanced technology.

Be that as it may, the fact that Roswell means “field of roses,” makes it seem likely that the whole experience of what happened there had more to do with sacrifice and the Otherworld and making those kinds of connections. It was intended as a flowering of sorts, and so it had much more to do with symbolism than in some actual spaceship crashing out there in the desert and the government ending up with some alien bodies to autopsy (or not).

According to Whitley Streiber’s book, some spiritual/metaphysical experience did seem to be going on at the time with those involved, as of a door being partially opened, and it was only closed again when it was realized that they couldn’t deal with it, that they weren’t ready for it. Or, maybe, it was only intended to plant the seed for some eventual and hopeful future. One where connection with the Otherworld and with those called the faery/aliens could happen and not have people freak out.

Shortly after this, back in the 50’s, all those movies started coming out with bad and evil aliens starring in them, which was probably the inevitable knee-jerk reaction to what happened in Roswell and all the UFO sightings which happened around that time. People just weren’t ready to deal. However, by the 60’s and 70’s, the science fiction movies and television shows that began to be released had more to do with nice aliens than bad ones, or aliens at the very least who had very human impulses and emotions and could end up being either friends or enemies. ET comes to mind, and Star Trek, Star Wars, and Enemy Mine, just to name a few. Aliens were no longer just feared because they were alien.

This transformation of perception seems pretty typical. When UFO’s first appeared back in the 40’s, they seemed more cigar-shaped to those who spotted them. Then someone claimed that they looked more like plates or saucers in an article and the term “flying saucer” was born and rapidly caught on. The UFO’s seen after this article appeared then tended more towards this shape instead. Expectation had altered the experience. Or, in other words, the things and beings of the Otherworld had changed to match how people thought they should see them, or how they could perceive them.

Faery or alien or angel…the shape that those of the Otherworld take on changes and changes again. William Butler Yeats found this out when he went around the Irish countryside collecting tales about faeries and ghosts in order to publish them before they were lost forever. One old woman he talked to said that the faery could be either tall or small and that it was all in the eye of the beholder as to how they appeared. Whitley Streiber also mentions how those alien beings he came into contact with could transform to match or deliberately contradict what he was thinking about them, mostly in order to sooth his fears or to prove a point or make a statement that needed making.

So when those faeries or “aliens” appeared to the government and the military people back in the 40’s, they were perceived through that particular lens—the lens of men who had just come through World War II and were terrified and paranoid of Communism and had acquired, or were in the process of acquiring, the Cold War mentality. They were afraid of the new and different and so saw what happened as a threat and responded to it as a threat. They weren’t ready or able to handle a spiritual transformation or revelation, an opening of the mind and heart and soul which is needed to forge a bridge to Other. Not then, and probably not now either.

Except that times have changed and are still changing; even if the government remains behind the times and isn’t ready to believe, there are many who are. Roswell has been a hotspot for years now, drawing in folks from all over the world, folks seeking to have some sort of experience or vision. Of course, many of them probably don’t know what they are really asking or looking for, but the first step is that they are looking…and might, just might, one day find something else looking back.

The television show Roswell was yet another link in the chain, another step along the road towards acceptance. I doubt that it’s a coincidence that the aliens in the program, along with their human friends, were the “good guys” and that the government officials were seen primarily as being the “bad guys.” Or that the alien kids and humans were portrayed as forming close relationships and working to both protect each other and to discover their origin. Or that they could even fall in love with each other.

If this was some sort of experiment on the part of the faeries, then there are probably multiple meanings to it and it was never just any one thing. But, to be sure, something important happened out in the desert of Roswell, New Mexico back in the late 40’s. Something that people are still investigating and fixated on and arguing about and going on pilgrimages for today, about sixty years later. Of all the so-called UFO experiences, it is the one which is most remembered and the one that seems to have had lasting repercussions on the human race.

Obviously, it was a pivot point of some kind. And finding out the origin of the name, what it means, only lends credence to that concept—that of the ancient and Otherworldly field of roses, the field of the dead, where spiritual battles are fought that will have a powerful and lasting impact upon the world of men. Where flowers spring up from sacrifice. Where there was an attempt to make a connection that still has its echoes today. A field of roses in the middle of the desert, a flowering where none should be—how symbolic is that?

1 large head cabbage

1 cup brown basmati rice

½-1 teaspoon salt

olive oil

1 large onion, minced

2 carrots, shredded

2 stalks celery, shredded

1 bunch parsley, minced

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 package soysage (LiteLife’s “Gimme Lean” is the best, in my opinion)

½-1 cup roasted almonds, chopped

2 large cans tomatoes (or 3-4 pounds fresh tomatoes, peeled and chopped)

tamari

turbinado sugar

lemon juice

black pepper

To prepare the cabbage:

Give the bottom of the cabbage a good solid thonk on the floor and, with a knife, remove as much of the core as possible. Steam the cabbage, whole, in a covered pot with about 1 inch of boiling water in the bottom. As the outer leaves soften, remove them (you can usually take off 3-4 at a time) and set them aside to cool. Watch your hands on the hot steam and be careful not to tear the leaves. When the leaves get to be smaller than the palm of your hand, take what’s left of the head out of the pot, halve and core it, and shred it into sauerkraut-sized shreds. Reserve the cabbage water.

When the leaves have cooled a bit, pare off the big vein on the outside, being careful not to cut through the leaf itself.

To prepare the rice:

Dry-roast the brown basmati in a skillet until it begins to toast and pop. It will smell delicious. Cook as usual with 2 cups water (you can use some of the cabbage water here) and salt, if desired.

To prepare the stuffing:

Saute the onion in olive oil until it begins to wilt. Add shredded carrot and celery and sauté until they begin to brown. Crumble soysage into the pan and continue sautéing a few minutes. Add the rice, parsley, oregano, and almonds, and stir until everything is well-mixed. Add 1-2 cups tomatoes, with juice, and stir until most of the liquid is absorbed. Season to taste with pepper and tamari.

To stuff the cabbage leaves:

Put a cabbage leaf in the palm of your hand, with the outer side down. Dollop 1-3 tablespoons of filling into the middle of the leaf (the amount will depend on how big the leaf is.) Pull the stem end of the leaf over until it completely covers the filling. Then fold in the sides, and roll towards the top of the leaf. You should have a nice, tight little package with no stuffing showing at all. Place in baking dish or casserole (be sure to use one with a cover) and continue until you’ve used up all of the filling or all the cabbage leaves, whichever comes first. (There’s no need to oil the baking dish.)

If there are extra cabbage leaves, shred them now and strew them with the rest of the shredded cabbage over top of the cabbage rolls. If there’s extra filling, eat it for lunch.

To prepare the tomato topping:

Mix the remaining chopped tomatoes with sugar, lemon juice, tamari, and pepper to taste.

It should be fairly juicy; add cabbage water if it’s too dry. Pour over top of the cabbage rolls. Bake, covered, at 350° for 1½-2 hours. Check periodically towards the end of the baking period; add water if necessary.

The cabbage rolls are done when you can pierce them easily with the tines of a fork.

Serves 13 (of course).

The Sacred Hunt is an intense ritual for all involved. Hunters fast all day, go to a sweat before sunrise, go without sleep, and dedicate themselves to achieving complete exhaustion before the ritual so as to attain the needed altered state of consciousness for this magickal working. They are watched over by Villagers who aid them in their hunt. They are energized by drummers. The sacred space is protected by guardians. It is an intensely powerful ritual. Everyone who goes through the ritual experiences profound personal transformation.For instance, in 2008 I hunted for my place in a strong community and went on to create the most influential Pagan network in Paganistan (which wasn't my goal, that's just how the universe unfolded in the year after SHF). After the hunt, there is a feast. They used to just have a makeshift meal for the hunters, which was a bit anti-climactic after such an intense ritual. They tried having the feast be a huge potluck for the entire festival at the conclusion of the hunt with the entire community honoring the participants, but the hunt often doesn't get done until about midnight, and that's a long time for the rest of the festival to wait for a potluck. This year they held a festival potluck during the hunt, and held back items for the participants of the hunt. So after the hunt the participants were greeted by a happy and well fed community congratulating them on a successful hunt.

As part of the Hunt, the Hunters go into the woods to prepare before coming out to make their kill. At this point, Coyote spirit lives in the woods and adds chaos to the intensity. This year, Coyote took his toll. After the hunt 3 participants spontaneously lost their voices, one person injured his ankle purely due to a lack of pre-hunt stretching, and assorted other nuisance injuries. One of the people to lose her voice was the narrator for Friday's ritual play. Three hours before the show, she happened into the Wyld Women camp needing healing. If SHF is like a village, then the Wyld Women are like the women on the outskirts of the village who people tell rumors about, but who people go to when they need something a little more intense than what they get from the mainstream. The Wyld Women surrounded her with healing techniques as one journeyed to a rhythmic drum and constant tone of a singing bowl to find what would appease Coyote. What she found was that Coyote wanted rum and … grain. Grain, what like bread? no, more like gruel or oatmeal. Would an oatmeal cookie work? Yes, but it needs to be warm. Immediately one of the Wyld Women rushed to their kitchen to pan fry a cookie, which the narrator ate and washed down with rum. Afterward, the Wyld women joked that Coyote was just seeing if they'd do it and next time he'd probably ask for Champagne and grits.

At showtime, the narrators voice had returned and the play went off without a hitch. It was a light hearted ritual drama presented by Shades of Gray, about the turning of the year from the point of view of several deities, and set in a bar. It truly captured the them of this year's festival, Living the Wheel, Mirth and Reverence in Everyday Life. Actually, all of the rituals managed to capture the theme in their own way (with the exception of the Sacred Hunt which is an annual tradition and a stand-alone ritual). The first official open ritual of the festival was Saturday's "Barge of Heaven" which for me was dominated by my wife who personified Earth in the ritual, but for others was about the courtship of a God and Goddess to turn the wheel. Sunday Lodge Yggdrasil performed a powerful ritual which people might forget the details, but are likely to remember the power in their gut which appeals to the most honorable part of who they are.

Monday was the ritual of the 13 moons in which participants were broken into 12 groups and, group by group, were led through a magickal working themed to each astrological sign, and then the ritual closed with the blue moon. I led people through an Aquarius ritual to break the bonds holding them back. I demonstrated this 12 times and each time my intent was for the house we are trying to buy. In the weeks since, everything has quickly fallen into place for the purchase of the house.

Tuesday was a coming out ritual in honor of our community's homosexuals (unfortunately I was working a volunteer shift at this time so I can't report on it other than to say that I heard it was very well received). Wednesday was the Hunt, and also Pie Day for which people relax and eat pie. Thursday was the Rangoli, for which elaborate designs were created around the heart fire and then danced into the earth to manifest their magickal intent and as proof that Coyote had worked his way into the festival, this year there were as many people dancing the Rangoli widdershins as deosil. Friday was the aforementioned ritual play.

For Saturday they had designed an elaborate ritual with ropes tied to a wheel suspended over a fire so people could tie prayer flags to the ropes, wind them ropes around the wheel, and then drop them into the fire, then a rain came down of unforeseen intensity and an abbreviated version of the ritual was conducted in which people read the prayers and cast them into the fire, but the ritual did go on! Sunday was the closing ritual which was composed entirely of pop songs. Okay, I was the one who facilitated the pop song ritual. It's a goofy ritual, and just fun. It was also the only ritual which did not require multiple people to erect any elaborate props, or a large number of people to facilitate, or elaborately dressed facilitators. (traits which are becoming trademarks of the SHF rituals). All I had to do was to pass out song books, we all co-created the ritual by singing it, and then went back to packing up to go home.

The idea was that it worked with the theme by bridging the sacred and the mundane. For instance we invoked the Goddess with the Styx song Lady and dismissed her with Aint No Sunshine When She's Gone. The hope is that now when people hear these mundane songs (possible listening to the radio on the way home) they will be reminded of something much less mundane. I had pitched the idea as a fun ritual for Pie Day, but it was put as the closing. It seemed to be generally well received. Similarly, Lydia Crabtree, one of this year's guest speakers, had a ritual made up entirely of candy. That was a very yummy ritual which really brought out the kid in all of the participants. Lydia actually took on a featured role in several of the rituals. She was a tremendously good sport. When Saturday's ritual got rained out, many people retreated to the Shades of Gray camp because they had a huge tarp structure, and began drumming and dancing. Lydia was right there from the beginning dancing with them.

Lydia is the author of a book about family covens, which is currently in editing with Llewelyn. She definitely fit in well with the family friendly nature of the festival. Many attendees would love to see Lydia move to Paganistan. There were also some excellent musical guests including the crowd pleasing Joe Credits, Bella Wyck ( I missed their performance but enjoyed them socially), and the much ballyhooed no-talent show which took place while I was at the hunt but my wife said that a lot of people performed very well, with a lot of great singing, great instruments, great kid stuff, an MC in fabulous drag, and it was all very enjoyable. Speaking of my wife, very late Friday night my wife was roasting a Peep over an open flame. She has roasted many marshmallows, so when the Peep failed to change shape or brown, she began to doubt that it was roasting, and touched it. The molten sugar bonded with her skin and she suffered a burn. Despite being the middle of the night, a score of people immediately rushed to her aid. Within minutes her wound was cleaned and attended to, and she was surrounded by reiki practitioners. Her hand is healing very well with just a few blisters. We would both like to thank the wonderful community of Sacred Harvest Fest for taking such good care of her. She has said many times since then that she would prefer to not be injured, but if she is to be injured, she couldn't imagine a better place to have it happen.

Day 1 – Get your Toes Wet at the Guthrie

Begin your adventures on Wednesday, November 4th with the somewhat tame, but still other-worldly splash at the Guthrie Theater:

Northern Lights, Southern Cross, and according to their blurb, it’s

“the epic story of an ordinary man. Kevin Kling is a regular Minnesota guy, until his motorcycle hits the asphalt and his injured brain wakes him up on the other side of the world. Guided by Aboriginal artists, members of the Twin Cities Community Gospel Choir, and members of Native Pride Dancers, Kling’s journey home is rooted in cultural mythology, storytelling, ritual dance and music, the humor of the tricksters and the healing sense of place.”

Sounds very cool and Shamanic.  Though the pictures for the play have everyone in clown noses and makeup which worries me somewhat. But there will be authentic ritual dance and didgeridoo in an entirely unexpected venue. Okay, so this show isn’t just for one night, in fact it plays from October 22 – November 08, 2009, but the Wednesday night price is $22 vs. the Friday or Saturday price of $30.

Day 2 – Crossing the Drop-off into the Deep End

Then take a trip to the Asylum with Emilie Autumn at the Varsity on Thursday, November 5th. If you haven’t heard her, your are missing out on devilishly dark lyrics, metal-shredding violin solos, and an industrial-strength voice. EA reinvents “gothic” for the masses, and goths have never had so much fun. Chosen by Interview Magazine as one of their “14 Artists to Watch,” EA’s theatrical stage show is a sexy circus of gothic burlesque backed by her all-girl band known underground as the Bloody Crumpets.

If you’re used to Minnesota Nice, Emily Autumn promises to shift your paradigm quite, well, not-nicely but very, very powerfully. It’s an 18+ show and tickets are $15, available online from Ticketmaster.

Day 3 – Swimming to the Beyond

From there, go to Bar Fly on November 6 for a Gothic Festival (Carpe Noctum) starring Voltaire. This even is being called an epic ceremony of sensual decadence and dark irony. You can buy tickets for Carpe Noctum online at vitalculture.com for just $12. Voltaire is often described as a modern day renaissance man. He is a singer/ performer, creator of comic books, animation and toys. Voltaire’s live shows, whether solo or with his skeletal orchestra, are highly theatrical -full of stories and games. The theatrical quality of his performances is not surprising; Voltaire has been directing commercials and animating short films for the last twenty years.

As a musician, he is a songwriter whose music can best be described as a collection of murder ballads, tongue-in-cheek exercises in the macabre, with just enough bawdy songs about Star Trek and Star Wars to keep a Con audience rolling in the aisles. Many know him for his song “Brains!” from the Cartoon Network show “The Grim Adventures of Billy And Mandy”.

Any one of those three days provides a nice setup to get through the Thanksgiving Family Culture Shock, don’t you think? Ya, you betcha.

When I decided to begin a daily meditation practice,  I was intimidated at the thought of clearing my mind. Being an artist has gifted me with an active imagination, which made the idea of shutting it down completely a seemingly impossible task. If the thought of emptying your mind intimidates you – learn to focus your thoughts on a single subject – your focal point.

Many people find this approach to meditation easy to learn, and the possibilities for personal transformation are endless. By pointing your mind in a single direction, you are practicing mindfulness, which with practice, flows into your daily life. It becomes a habit with repetition, an oasis you can call upon in the midst of a storm.

When I was learning to paint, a mentor of mine told me that nobody gets it right the first time, it’s just a matter of being willing to redo it until it works for you. I applied that knowledge to my goal. Over the past year, I have learned to harness that overactive imagination and channel it into a meditation practice.

Finding Your Focus
Finding your subject can be as easy as lighting a candle, holding a crystal, or writing a word on a slip of paper. Chanting a mantra is a type of focal point meditation. The important thing is to begin with a purpose, and explore that purpose for the best focal point for you. That means narrowing down all the possible focal points to the one that is most meaningful to you personally, for this particular purpose.

They key is to simplify. Maybe what you want from your daily meditation is to feel grounded, so you could use a heavy stone, a bowl of sand, a picture of the earth, or even a houseplant as your focus.

Compose Your Environment
Find a comfortable chair with back support and place your focal object in front of you. Allow all your senses to get involved, play music that reminds you of your subject, or use incense or a scented candle that helps you to relax. These are extra tools to keep your mind on your subject, so make sure that they don’t distract.

Before you Begin the Focal Point Meditation
If there is something in your environment distracting you, get rid of it and return your attention to your focal point. Go ahead and turn off your phone, and close the cats out of the room.

Let Your Subject Speak to You
Once your environment matches your intention, it’s time to start exploring your subject for its importance to you. This how your meditation is like a work of art. Ask yourself how it makes you feel, experience that feeling for as long as you like. If your mind wanders off, use your focal point to bring you back to the present. If it is an object, touch or hold it and allow your inner eye to inspire you again. Allow yourself to just be present with it for as long as you like. You are done whenever you say you are done, this isn’t a competition.

Keeping a journal can help you explore what you learn from your meditations, as you record the insights you gain from focusing all your attention on one thing. Just as it takes time and practice to create art, meditation takes the same amount of care and attention. I think of meditation as finding my focal point for the day, and I compose everything else to work along with that, supporting and directing my intention.

The form that it takes is simple: whole grains (wheat, barley, rice) boiled in liquid (milk, water, almond milk), sweetened with honey, enriched with nuts and/or dried fruits. In Poland, it’s said to date from the time “before there were mills to grind the grain.” Ancestral to England’s plum pudding (frumenty, as it was called, was an invariable part of the medieval English Yule-board), the origin of Scandinavia’s Yuletide rice puddings, the recipe surely dates back to—if not precedes—the advent of agriculture.

Remember that the ancestors didn’t get sweets very often, and probably reserved them for the highest of holidays (such as the Winter Solstice, a date of major significance to agricultural communities virtually everywhere). Then the standard boiled-grain pottage that everyone ate everyday would be embellished with a hoarded lump of honeycomb in honor of the occasion. Bear in mind also that virtually everywhere religious ritual tends to preserve archaic cultural forms that have otherwise died out in everyday usage.

So it’s more than possible—likely even—that this dish may date to Neolithic times, perhaps to the very discovery of cereal agriculture itself, more than 11,000 years ago.

Below is the version that my coven serves on Midwinter’s Eve, based originally on a Russian recipe. It’s the first dish in our thirteen-course Yule feast (one course for each moon of the coming year). By the light of a lone beeswax taper thrust into the middle of the pudding, we ritually renew our familial solidarity by together eating from the shared central bowl, just as our ancestors did more than ten thousand years ago.

Kutyá: Yule Wheat

1 cup wheat berries

2 cups blanched almonds

½ teaspoon salt

¼ cup whole blue poppy seeds

3-5 tablespoons honey

1 tablespoon rose water

Soak wheat berries overnight in water to cover. In a separate bowl, soak 1½ cups of the almonds in 3 cups of water, also overnight.

Next day, puree the soaked almonds with their soaking water. Add 3 more cups of water to the puree and strain through a cloth, wringing well to extract as much almond milk as possible (I use an old pillowcase). Discard almond pulp.

In a non-reactive pan, bring drained wheat berries and almond milk to a simmer. Lower heat and continue cooking until wheat berries become tender (this is likely to take 2-3 hours, depending on the age and variety of the wheat berries). You’ll need to stir frequently (sunwise only, please!), especially towards the end of the cooking as the almond milk thickens. When the wheat berries are tooth-tender, add poppy seeds and salt, and cook 15-20 minutes more.

During the cooking, dry roast the remaining ½ cup almonds until golden brown, either in a skillet (stirring constantly) or in a 325° oven; this will take approximately 5 to 7 minutes.

Sweeten the kutya with honey to taste, and stir in rose water. Turn out into serving bowl, and garnish with dry-roasted almonds. Serve hot, room temperature, or chilled.

Serves 13. (Of course.)

© Steven Posch

When we think of wassail, the songs of England may come to mind. “Here we go a wassailing upon the leaves of green…” It summons the smell of cider, spices, and ale. But where did this tradition come from?

The tradition, like the word, was brought to England by Viking settlers. The word comes from Middle English waes haeil, which comes from Old Norse ves heill meaning be well. Ves (imperitive singular of vera to be) + heill healthy, 13th Century. According to legend, King Vortigern (circa 425 AD) was the first person to be “wassailed” in England. Geoffrey of Monmouth’s “History of the Kings of Britain” describes Vortigern being entertained by Hengist the Jute (who, along with his brother Horsa, was amongst the first Saxons to settle in England). Hegist’s daughter Renwein entered the room with a goblet of ale. As the Lady of the House, she would offer the drink first. Approaching Vortiegern, she curtsied and called out “Lavert king, was hail!” (Lord king, to your health). He was told that the proper response was “drink hail!”

This formalized ceremony is practiced today as blot or symbel within Heathenry. The formal order is that the head woman in a house would begin the toasting and bring the horn from the highest to the lowest of the household guests. She would assure that there was enough in the horn for each guest, that their toasts were properly said, and that there were no oaths or binding words spoken into the horn without further formality. No causal words can be spoken, no lies, and no words of enmity. The horn represents the well of wyrd of the household and of the world tree.

The concept of formal drinking ritual called “wassail” grew and changed in the passing centuries and wassailing became synonymous with any festive occasion or meeting with much drinking and pledging of healths, drinking bouts and carousing. The liquor used on such occasions, especially around Christmas or the New Year became known as wassail.

Many merry drinking songs and poems became known as wassails and the wassailer as one who wassails; a merry maker; a reveler.

Wassailing became a seasonal tradition surrounding fruit trees throughout the English countryside. With the first pressing of the apple harvest the trees are blessed with the juices of the first harvest. The date that this begins depends upon the climate, usually sometime in September. Apple traditions continue with caramel apples and the game “bobbing for apples” at Samhain.

By Yuletide, the cider has generally turned hard, or (as my great-grandmother would say) “hoopy hoppy” and the apples in the cellar are shriveled and sad looking. There are recipes for “Wassail” which include warming the hard cider (taking the edge off of its potency), adding spices and floating baked apples in the punch bowl, renewing their life. Wassail bowl is a good way to use up some of the dried and stored foods and the Yule feast includes an abundance of preserved meats, puddings which use dried berries and nuts, baked goods which use up last years flour, and the cider which has begun to turn. Spices were a rare and heavenly addition to the meal.

At Yule, the wassailing ritual was three fold. To wassail the hall is to hold a formal toast at the table, with guests and family around you. To wassail the house was to go from door to door with the drink. The revelers would receive food and more drink from neighbors and then bless each house with a wassail. Wassailing the orchard took the revelers and probably the whole community out to the orchard where the trees would be blessed, sung to, and libated. This last wassailing often took place on Twelfth Night, January 6th and signaled the end to the Christmas “days of feasting,” a last hurrah. Or should I say a last wassail?

In my family, we like to wassail the hall, house, and orchard on Twelfth Night. It gives us hopefulness as we ask the trees to bear well in the spring. The following are some old rhymes, songs, and recipes for you to enjoy this season.

To your health!

Kari and Jim

The Rhymes of Apple Wassail

1.
Wassail the trees, that they may bear
You many a plum, and many a pear:
For more or less fruits they will bring,
As you do give them wassailing.

-Robert Herrick (1591-1674) “Ceremonies of Christmas Eve”

2.

Here’s to thee, old apple tree,
Whence thou mayst bud
And whence thou mayst blow!
And whence thou mayst bear apples enow!
Hats full! Caps full!
Bushel–bushel–sacks full,
And my pockets full too! Huzza!

South Hams of Devon, 1871

3.

Huzza, Huzza, in our good town
The bread shall be white, and the liquor be brown
So here my old fellow I drink to thee
And the very health of each other tree.
Well may ye blow, well may ye bear
Blossom and fruit both apple and pear.
So that every bough and every twig
May bend with a burden both fair and big
May ye bear us and yield us fruit such a stors
That the bags and chambers and house run o’er.

Cornworthy, Devon, 1805

4.

Stand fast root, bear well top
Pray the God send us a howling good crop.
Every twig, apples big.
Every bough, apples now.

-19th century Sussex, Surrey

5.

Apple-tree, apple-tree,
Bear good fruit,
Or down with your top
And up with your root.

-19th century S. Hams.

6.

Bud well, bear well
God send you fare well;
Every sprig and every spray
A bushel of apples next New Year Day.

-19th century Worcestershire

Source: The Stations of the Sun by Ronald Hutton
7.

Blowe, blowe, bear well,
Spring well in April,
Every sprig and every spray
Bear a bushel of apples against
Next new year’s day

-Painswick in Gloucestershire

8.

Health to thee, good apple tree,
Well to bear pocket fulls, hat fulls,
Peck fulls, bushel bag fulls

Hats full! Caps full!
Bushel – bushel – sacks full
And my pockets full too! Huzza!

-1791 The Gentleman’s Magazine South Devon

9.

Old apple tree, we’ll wassail thee,
And hoping thou wilt bear.
The Lord does know where we shall be
To be merry another year.
To blow well and to bear well,
And so merry let us be;
Let ev’ry man drink up his cup
And health to the apple tree.

Apple Tree we greet you now

With highest honors to endow
As you lay sleeping this winter’s day

Dream of bud and fruit

Full branches and deep root

10.

Apple, plum, and pear tree grow
Your roots are warm beneath the snow
When springtime does appear
Sprout leaf and bloom call honey bee
Oh loving tree, we will greet thee
And honor you once more

-          Tauring, Minneapolis 2000

Wassail, Tauring ©1999

1. F, C

Wassail Wassail all over the town.  The snow it is white and the Ale it is brown.

The mistletoe’s hung and the oak log is round, so sing we this Solstice around and around.

2.

The pudding is baking the turkey is fine.  The ham is all smoked and there’s fish on the line.

The tree is all dressed with the candles sublime.  So now all we need is the Wassail and Wine.

Wassail

Recipes

Jim’s Quick Wassail

Take any good hot spiced non-alcoholic cider and mix 3 parts cider with 1 part cinnamon schapps.

Kari’s Quick Wassail

Same as above only add 1 shot of dark rum.

Wassail

1 gallon hard apple cider                     12 small apples, peeled with cores removed

½ cup sugar if cider is tart                  2 Tablespoons brown sugar

1/8 tsp. ground nutmeg                       2 cups heavy whipping cream

¼ tsp powdered cinnamon                  ¼ tsp. salt

½ tsp powdered ginger                       2 Tbsp. brown sugar

In a large enameled pot, slowly heat ¾ of the cider until warm but not boiling. In another enameled pot, pour remaining cider and add apples, sugar, spices and bring to a boil.

Vigorously simmer the apples until they lose their shape and become “frothy”. Combine the two liquids and pour into a heatproof bowl. Whip the cream with salt and brown sugar until it peaks. Spoon the cream onto the wassail or add the cream to each tankard as it is served. Apple cider listed can be substituted by dry white wine, light ale or stout beer.

Glogg

The Scandinavian mulled drink – if you want to get back to the roots of the occasion!

2 (750 milliliter) bottles red wine

2 ounces dried orange zest

2 ounces cinnamon sticks

20 whole cardamom seeds

25 whole cloves

1 pound blanched almonds

1 pound raisins

1 pound sugar cubes

5 fluid ounces brandy

Pour wine into a large pot. Bring to a boil over medium high heat. Wrap orange zest, cinnamon sticks, cardamom and cloves in cheesecloth, tie with kitchen string and put into pot. Let boil for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in almonds and raisins and continue to boil for 15 more minutes. Remove from heat.

Place a wire grill over the pot and cover with sugar cubes. Slowly pour on brandy, making sure to completely saturate the sugar. Light sugar with a match and let it flame. When sugar has melted, cover pot with lid to extinguish flame.

Stir and remove spice bag. Serve hot in cups with a few almonds and raisins.

Glogg (less fancy kind)

1 1/2 cups Brandy
1/2 bottle Red Wine
4 Hole Cloves
2 Cardamom Pods – crushed
1 Cinnamon Stick
1/2 cup Raisins
1/2 cup Blanched Almonds
3/4 cup Sugar
2 tsp. Brown Sugar

Combine everything in a saucepan. Warm over medium heat, stir often to dissolve the sugar.
Once heated thoroughly reduce heat to low. Serve Warm.