Vacation Phase 4: Mamoorials

Jul15

Today is my grandma’s birthday and so it seems fitting that I’ve coincidentally reached the point in my vacation recap of writing about her memorial services. We called my grandma Mamoo and so I refer to her committal and Celebration of Life events as her Mamoorials and these were the real reason we went to California in the first place. When I tell people that my grandma died, I’ve noticed two common responses: “How old was she?” and “Were you close?” It is as if people are evaluating how “sorry” to be or much condolences to offer, with the older the person, the more appropriate the loss, or something like that. Anyway, she would have been 84 today. She has a beautifully long and vibrant life that was full of activity and experiences right up until the end. However, I had great-grandmas of my own until my late teen years and I fully and completely expected my kids to have the same experience. I heard from my mom that my grandma’s life insurance company still had her life expectancy at 15 more years, so forget the “how old” question and believe me when I say that her death came as an unexpected shock, even if it was in the “right” generational order and even though she was “old enough” that it doesn’t count as tragic. Since we always lived far away from each other and thus often went six months without seeing her, it is easy to forget that she’s gone and not at her home in California volunteering at the zoo and working in her sewing room. There is a definite sense of her life being “cut short,” regardless of her actual age. When we were at the beach following her Mamoorials, Zander found a whole tiny crab. He saved it and took it back to the condo saying as we walked, “I’m saving this for Mamoo! She’s going to love it!” (She did the children’s program at the zoo and she often carted strange artifacts of the natural world back to California from her visits to Missouri, including a whole donkey skull, but also things like a turtle shell and a hummingbird’s nest, and a whole well-preserved stag beetle. My dad often saved weird, dead things for her and she was always happy to receive them and add to the zoo’s demo collection.)

When I left off my vacation recapping last we had finished a fab stint at Legoland and were still in Carlsbad, California, which is about a six hour drive from Fresno, where my grandma lived. We opted, perhaps bizarrely perhaps geniusly, to fly to Fresno from San Diego, rather than making a long car trip. Tickets were only $60 each between the two and it seemed worth it to us. However, in my frenzy before leaving, I neglected to notice the difference between AM and PM on the tickets and accidentally booked a 10:00 PM flight to Fresno. After some intense lamenting that actually involved flinging myself on the bed and sobbing hysterically and then yelling about my own stupidity and what kind of IDIOT does that?!?! Someone who is too busy and MUST QUIT EVERYTHING AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, I decided to then, again perhaps bizarrely and perhaps geniusly, to buy new plane tickets for the correct AM flight, thus completely wasting $300, but restoring the “rightful” order of my plans. I tried to never think about it again, though as we enjoyed pizza with our extended family that evening in Fresno and rehearsed for the Mamoorial, I wondered if they were paging us for our PM flight back in San Diego…(why not switch tickets you ask, because there was a $200 penalty per ticket for doing so? I may not be a genius, but I can do enough math to realize that paying $200 to change a $60 ticket is not a realistic option).

The San Diego flight was awesome and easy and we got to Fresno right at 11:00 (a.m. 😉 ) and my dad picked us up at the airport in my grandma’s car. I knew as we started to descend into the Fresno airport and saw those so familiar flat, flat, flat squares of irrigated desert farmland, but without my grandma waiting there to meet us for the first time in my entire life, that I had significantly underestimated how difficult this was going to be. Getting into her familiar boat of a car that smelled like her and that had her sunglasses under the seat and her water bottle in the console with her name tidily written on it with Sharpie was hideous. Pulling into her little condo was even worse, but going inside was the worsest. My aunt and mom and sister were already there and had been there since the night before and they had a sort of rhythm and plan going on with sorting through my grandma’s things. The “bandaid had already been ripped off” in their case, as my aunt put it. I, however, was a complete mess. I could NOT believe how awful it was to be there and see her home without her in it. Again, there was that sense of her life cut short—her mousepad by the computer, her zoo jacket hanging on the door, her calendar on the wall with her writing on it, her exercise video in the VCR. So familiar and so over. I cried and cried and felt sort of stupid and also “drama queenish,” because everyone else was so busy and methodical and I felt like I was all like, “but look at me, I’m totally sad!” My aunt sat with me and then suggested I go ahead and keep ripping the bandaid by advance-watching the memorial slideshow for the Celebration of Life luncheon the next day. This was a spectacularly good idea and really helped. Her house was so full of things familiar to me from my childhood and it was also remarkably and beautifully full of us, pictures of my kids all over, things I made for her on walls and shelves. It was a mirror experience of what I already observed at my own home on the day that she died:

…it is amazing to think about all the ways her presence is woven through my days even though she lives 2000 miles away–the sweater I put on every morning is one she knit for me, her quilts are on my kids’ bedroom walls and on all our beds, magazine subscriptions she gifts us with are in the car and bathroom…we’re connected in many ways and I don’t know what life will look like without her in it.

Dinner with cousins/siblings.

via Goodbye | Talk Birth.

After losing it with all the pictures and memories, I then sort of helped my mom, sister, aunt, and sister-in-law go through my grandma’s things. Later we checked into our hotel and Mark took the kids down to the pool while I rehearsed for my Mamoorial speeches/service. I cried and cried as I practiced my speech until my eyes were horribly puffy and I looked awful. “At least I’m getting this out before tomorrow!” I thought optimistically. I texted my mom that my plan for the next day was “teary-eyed and with a tasteful catch in my voice” rather than the wreck I was today. We had a family dinner that night at a cousin’s house and while there, I enlisted my cousins in a plan for a grandchild responsive reading of a version of “Song of the Open Road” at the first Mamoorial. We actually had a really fun time laughing and rehearsing our poem.

At least the kids hitched a ride on a luggage cart.

We stayed a horrible hotel with the worst breakfast in the history of hotel breakfasts. We so missed our beloved Drury Inns on this trip!

We headed over to the Chapel of the Light where Mamoo’s ashes were to be placed in the above-ground chamber in which my grandpa is interred. I was asked to officiate at a brief committal service before we placed the ashes and this ceremony was attended by only close relatives. After my grandpa died in 1989, my grandma remarried so my step-grandfather and most of his children and their children were there. Mamoo always kept our families kind of separate, even though she was married for more than 20 years to this “new” husband. It was easy for me to forget that she had another life with a whole set of other local grandchildren that I didn’t have a lot of contact with, but for whom she was the only grandmother, the only Mamoo, they’d ever known too. I quickly enlisted the aid of these grandchildren as well for my Song of the Open Road plan. The service I planned went well, but the grandchildren piece was the highlight, in my opinion. I’m not sure if other people specifically liked it, but it was so important to me that each grandchild’s voice be represented during the ceremony. While I don’t know that she liked Walt Whitman at all, my grandma was a traveler and so this poem felt absolutely perfect to me. My grandpa loved his boat and they used to go on boat trips together as well and so the section about taking to the seas, to me, felt like this perfect tie-in to our return of the remains of her body to his:

Song of the Open Road (responsive)

(modified from Walt Whitman)

Riding an elephant in Africa

Afoot and light-hearted, I take to the open road
Healthy, free, the world before me.

Henceforth, I ask not good fortune—
I myself am good-forturne
Strong and content
I travel the open road.

I inhale great draughts of space;
the east and the west are mine,
and the north and the south are mine.

All seems beautiful to me;
I can repeat over to men and women,
You have done such good to me,
I would do the same to you.

Ready to hit the road!

Whoever you are, come travel with me!
However sweet these laid-up stores—
however convenient this dwelling,
we cannot remain here;

However sheltered this port,
And however calm these waters,
We must not anchor here;

Together! The inducements shall be greater;
We will sail pathless and wild seas;

We will go where winds blow,
Waves dash, and the Yankee clipper
Speeds by under full sail.

Forward! After the great companions!
And to belong to them!
They too are on the road!

Onward! To that which is endless,
As it was beginningless,
To undergo much, journeys of days,
Rests of nights,

To look up or down no road

As I made Mamoo's name, I thought about how I hadn't had any "signs" from her. Then, in the middle of that thought, I looked down and right by the "M" in her name was this rock. I held it all through the memorial service I did at the internment of her ashes and all through my speech at her Celebration of Life luncheon.

I held this stone all through the memorial service I did at the internment of her ashes and all through my speech at her Celebration of Life luncheon.

But it stretches and waits for you—

To know the universe itself as a road—
As many roads—
As roads for traveling souls…

It was a lot of pressure to be responsible for this ceremony. I wanted it to be perfect. I wanted it to be what she deserved. I wanted it to “speak” to every person there. I wanted it to be worthy of her. I hope it was enough.

Before she died, Mamoo got some details l all planned out with my aunt. She wanted a specific banquet center for a celebration of life lunch with chicken salad, no traditional funeral. She wanted the theme music from Out of Africa played and she wanted chocolate chip ice cream bon bons (which was the only thing that couldn’t be worked out–we had chocolate chip cookies instead and the rest was just like she asked for). After the committal service, we went to Tornino’s banquet center for the Celebration of Life. People came and came and came. We exceeded the capacity of the banquet room and emergency additional food had to be prepared. She didn’t want a “funeral service” type of feeling and it wasn’t. The slideshow played, the theme music from Out of Africa played, we ate chicken salad and visited with distant relatives and friends. My aunt spoke briefly and explained the planning of the event. She did a beautiful job honoring my grandma’s wishes and planning an special, lovely lunch in her honor. My grandma’s stepson read a poem written by my step-grandpa about “My Lyla, My Lyla.” It was heart-rending and I suddenly realized I might have made a huge mistake in saying I’d be the last speaker. My grandma’s stepdaughter spoke. My uncle spoke. And, then it was my turn. I was speaking on behalf of all the grandkids, each had sent me a favorite Mamoo memory to share. Remember my plan for the tasteful, teary-eyes? Yeah, that. Instead, I failed to even see the handy Kleenex on the podium and instead wiped my nose with my hand while I was talking. There were 260 people there, which is a much larger group than I’ve spoken before in the past. I didn’t feel nervous really, but I did feel sad and I cried much more than I’d wanted to or expected to. People afterward told me they’d never experienced anything like what I’d said at a memorial before and they hoped someone would do the same for them someday. I apparently talked really fast, but that is not a big surprise. It was hard, but I did it.

For the story from my boys for the speech, they had this to say: Mamoo was really epic.

And, she was.

For my own memory contribution I shared that I picture her in a little jacket and jaunty scarf and zoo necklace and her ball ring, with slightly bent knees and open arms ready for a hug of greeting and she’d smile in that welcoming way. We got too big to be greeted in that way, but I saw her do it again with my own kids. And, I shared what I wrote in my last card to her:

I’ve always been proud of you—your smart, creative, adeventuresome self. Best. Grandma. Ever. You’ve been a beautiful example to us of how to live, both in the practical sense in terms of being frugal and in the more esoteric sense of how to be of service to the community, to take risks, to be productive, and to age gracefully and with a neverending zest for new experiences. We’re grateful to you also for her generosity over the years, particularly for the gift of my college education and the debt-free legacy that left for us and our children. I don’t know that I can ever explain in full what a potent gift that was—one that lasts our lifetime.

I closed with a slightly edited version of a poem I originally shared here:

Last Words

We learned from you
we loved with you
we heard you
we saw you
we hugged you
and held you
we mourned with you
we mourned for you
we have been dazzled by your radiance
inspired by your adventures
and touched by your generosity.

Three generations of people
sat in your lap as children
were covered by your quilts
and zipped into your sweaters
you carried each of us on your hip
and held us each in your heart

We respect you
we cherish you
we appreciate you
we’ve learned so much from you
we’ve laughed with you
and lived with you
and traveled with you

and now
we open up our hands
we open up our hearts
and we let you go.
Be free.
Continue your travels
on the currents of time and space…

Go in peace
go in love
and go knowing that you have left behind
something beautiful
something marvelous
something that matters
The fabric of a life well-lived
the hearth of a family well-tended
the heart of a community strengthened
and a never-ending chain of generations
unbroken.

You’re our Mamoo

You’re our grandmother
and we say goodbye
and thank you.

Sink deeply
and gently
into the arms and lap
of time
the great mother of us all

She holds you now.
We let go

Then, we left the Mamoorial and headed out for the beach, a little over three-hour drive. We drove her car…

When we got home from California, the Mamoorial blue hydrangea we’d planted was blooming beautifully!

One of my earliest memories of Mamoo is of sitting on her lap and playing with a gold ball ring on her finger. I don’t know the story behind that ring, I feel as if I should, but from the time I was a tiny girl she always wore it when she visited her grandchildren and we all liked to play with it. I imagine it was a coincidence that she wore it around a grandchild in the first place, but then it became a thing that she did and that all of us associated with her. When my aunt and mom were going through her jewelry they asked if there was something I wanted and I asked for the ring. Later, my two sisters both mentioned it as well and I feel guilty or selfish for being the one to get it. At this point, I can’t wear it. It makes me feel awful to see it on my own hand. Its hers. It belongs on her hand. The whole reason I wanted it was because it was something that reminds me very concretely of her, but that is the exact same reason that I can’t wear it right now. I hope my own grandchildren will play with it though when I wear it to meet them. It fits on the same finger on my hand that it fit on hers.

They also gave me her Hitty doll. Hitty: Her First Hundred Years is a classic children’s novel by Rachel Field. It was published in 1929 and was one of my grandma’s favorite books. Hitty is a small ashwood doll who travels the world. In 1997, my grandma bought her own Hitty replica and did, in fact, take Hitty with her on some travels as her travel doll. My dad made replicas of Hitty’s key furniture pieces for my grandma and they were all set up as a display in her house, along with a tiny wooden peg person Hitty I’d made for my grandma, but completely forgotten about. I sat the ball ring on a Hitty’s lap for a while and then ended up putting it into a little shadow box with her on the replica of Hitty’s bench that my dad made for my grandma and a set of my grandma’s Dionne Quintuplet dolls. Those who know me in real life may puzzle somewhat over my extensive and non-frugal American Girl doll collection, but I come by this doll thing genetically, I swear. It is in my blood! I remember the Dionne Quintuplet dolls from when I was a little girl. They were my grandma’s when she was a girl herself and she was fascinated by the story of the Quints.

Last month, I took the ring to the woods and wrote a sort of “poem” about it, excerpted below. After doing so, I became obsessed with finding a picture of her wearing the ring, because suddenly I worried that I’d imagined or exaggerated that she always wore it to see us. Indeed, I don’t know if she ever wore at other times, but around the grandchildren, it was a fixture. And, I did readily locate pictures from her eightieth birthday party in which you can see the ring on her hand where it belongs and pictures from when I was younger and pictures from when she came to meet Alaina.

…Ball ring
has been a lot of places
told a lot of stories
seen a lot of things
and it is still here
a reminder
of what has gone before.

Thank you.

(6/6/13)

I had to include this picture even though I, personally, look like a mutant, because Mamoo is so cute in it!

She passed along her smile to my whole family! 🙂

This is the kind of picture that really twists my heart, because she looks like Alaina in it and the world spins so fast…

Happy birthday, Mamoo! My mom sent me a text to tell me that your birthday club friends went out to lunch for your birthday. They’ve been going out to lunch on birthdays for 50 years.

And, today the investment statements came from the college funds you set up for my kids. Thank you.

Rites of Passage… Celebrating Real Women’s Wisdom

May30

“Woman-to-woman help through the rites of passage that are important in every birth has significance not only for the individuals directly involved, but for the whole community. The task in which the women are engaged is political. It forms the warp and weft of society.” –Sheila Kitzinger (Rediscovering Birth)

“I love and respect birth. The body is a temple, it creates its own rites, its own prayers…all we must do is listen. With the labor and birth of my daughter I went so deep down, so far into the underworld that I had to crawl my way out. I did this only by surrendering. I did this by trusting the goddess in my bones. She moved through me and has left her power in me.” ~Lea B., Fairfax, CA via Mama Birth)

Summary of Article: How do today’s women prepare for major life changes such as becoming a mother? Have our once meaningful rites of passage been trivialised, and if so at what cost? Kat Skarbek looks at ways to reclaim what we have lost.

Permission is given to publish this story on the web (thanks to Women’s Mysteries Teacher Circle e-journal).

Without wishing to appear overly dramatic, I think that our society may be in danger of becoming devoid of any important spiritually nourishing rites of passage. Women no longer seem to know how to celebrate important transitions. We have fallen into the horrible habit of treating life-changing events in trite and meaningless ways and as a result, we are cheating ourselves out of the powerful positive effects that these rites of passage can bring us.

For women, menstruation, puberty, marriage, pregnancy & birth, menopause, death – even divorce and separation, all need to be properly acknowledged when passing through these stages of life. Instead we either ignore them completely as in the case of puberty, first menses and divorce, which sends the message that they are both shameful and unworthy of celebration. Or we use the opportunity to get drunk, act like strippers and carry out questionable tasks which would make a sober person question why she would want to get married in the first place – as on your average hen night. At a friend’s baby shower recently I watched with sinking heart as one of the most important events in a woman’s life was celebrated with games involving stealing pegs from other women’s clothing the minute they unconsciously crossed their legs, guessing the baby’s weight and answering questions such as did she have ‘an inney or an outey’ bellybutton? How, I found myself asking, does this in any way prepare a woman to deal with the rigours of labour and birthing and the demands of the first year of motherhood? Why are we so seemingly unaware that our accepted celebrations offer absolutely nothing to women except a bunch of baby clothes? At standard baby showers there is no wisdom shared, no loving support offered and no nourishment given (unless you count cupcakes!).

How did it come to this?

What happened to our once vital and spiritually awakening rites of passage? The easy (and heavily feminist) answer is 500 years or more of patriarchy. Prior to this and from the earliest records of society, it has been apparent that there were very well observed, meaningful and symbolic rituals to mark just about any occasion. Rituals existed for everything from simple agricultural celebrations of the changing seasons and giving thanks for food and supplies, to complex marriage and birthing rituals that eased newlyweds into their new roles and prepared the way for women to birth with dignity and power. Women in particular carried enormous wisdom about the cyclical nature of life and shared nourishing rites of passage, which enabled them to marry in confidence and with awareness, birth without fear and to die with dignity and grace. Once patriarchy became established it began the systematic erasure (or appropriation) of many of these important rites and in particular it diminished the roles and experiences of women so that they went from being important and respected members of their communities, with power over land, name and children to women whose only role was to birth heirs and to be subservient to their men. Even in today’s changing society the roles of ‘wife’ and ‘mother’ are still considered less important than the roles of ‘career woman’ and ‘breadwinner’. We have higher rates of divorce, higher rates of birth intervention and subsequent post-natal depression and more difficult menopauses now than women experienced 50 years ago. I believe that this is directly linked to the fact that we are now expected to just ‘get on with it’ and disappear into these changes without the proper observances being made. I’m not suggesting that women to disappear into mud huts every time they bleed or to give birth in fields as we did in the tribal days, but I do think that we need to pay more attention to our needs at these powerful times of change. Menstruation is not a curse, it’s a promise of our life-giving ability to come. Menopause is not a loss of youth and sex appeal, it’s a vital gateway to the enormous power of our wisdom years. And pregnancy, birth and marriage are life-changing experiences that need to be embraced and celebrated with something more nourishing than ‘Mr December’ and his overstuffed banana hammock.

A graceful acceptance of our changing roles and an awareness of the power that these changes bring, gives us huge personal freedom. Freedom from the current obsession with youth and aging, freedom to explore our new shapes, our new lives and the possibilities they hold. Isn’t that worth exploring?

Reclaiming simple rites of passage

So how can today’s modern goddesses, and in particular mammas-to-be, prepare themselves for life’s many transitions? A good starting point is to create your own rite of passage for whatever transition you may be going through. Pregnant women could change their planned baby shower to a Mother Shower (also known as a Blessingway). Mother Showers celebrate and nurture the mother rather than focusing exclusively on the child and are a growing trend amongst women. They offer pregnant women a chance to honour their pregnancy journey, to enjoy symbolic rituals of preparation for the labour and birthing ahead and indulge in an afternoon of loving, nourishing attention from their closest friends and family. And yes, there are still cupcakes! During one of these afternoons a pregnant woman can expect to be waited on hand and foot – often quite literally. Celebrations often include some kind of pampering for the mamma-to-be such as a foot and hand massage with beautiful, pregnancy-safe essential oils. She might choose to have her belly, hands or feet hennaed as a recognition of her changing status. She might enjoy creating a beautiful ‘labour necklace’ created out of beads gifted by each woman present and blessed with all of their best wishes for a wonderful birth. These necklaces can be used as a powerful focusing tool during the darkest hours of her labour and can become a beautiful heirloom that gets passed on from mother to daughter, or even from woman to woman within her community, with each subsequent pregnancy adding more beads to the necklace.

What you can do

There are a number of meaningful activities that you could include in your celebration. You could even combine elements of a traditional baby shower with elements from a mother shower by adding in any of the following:

A Fear Releasing Ceremony. Writing down your fears on a piece of paper and ritually burning them can help you rid your unconscious mind of any impediments to an easy and positive birth.
Belly Casting. Creating and painting a belly cast (a 3D plaster cast of the beautiful pregnant belly) can be a wonderful meditative tool to connect you more consciously with your body and your baby.
Guided Meditation or Visualisations. If there is a group of you, each woman can place a loving hand on the mamma-to-be, while another guides her into a place of deep relaxation where she can communicate with her unborn child or any guides or angels she feels drawn to, in order to receive information or just reassurance.
Plant a Tree. Buy a beautiful fruit tree to plant in honour of your newborn. You can tie birth blessings and wishes to its branches until after the baby is born.
Give gifts to nurture the mind, body or soul of the mamma-to-be. Most women won’t get the opportunity to enjoy a spot of luxury once the baby is born, so instead of yet more baby clothes why not spoil the mamma with something indulgent such as a pregnancy massage, a hair appointment, a manicure or pedicure or simply some beautiful skin cream to minimise stretchmarks? You can even buy her a gift for after the birth such as a post- natal spa voucher, to give her some ‘me’ time to look forward to when she needs it most.
Share Birthing Stories (no horror stories please!). Poetry, singing or chanting can also be a very uplifting way of connecting with your wise inner goddess.
Create a Phone-Tree. When labour is established, each woman is called and lights a candle for the birthing mamma to re-create the loving circle of support present on the day and send her thoughts of courage and strength.
Provide Nourishing Food and Drink. Each woman present can contribute a meal to be frozen for after the birth.
Pledge an Act of Support for after the Birth. Each woman offers one tangible act of support for after the birth when the mother and child are getting to know one another. It can be something simple like providing a home cooked meal, offering to take care of an older child for an afternoon so that the mamma can get some rest, taking the dog for a walk or taking the newborn off her hands so the she can have a recuperative bath.
The Baby Moon (or a month of ‘lying in’ with the newborn) is still observed in many cultures and offers a chance for the infant and mother to really bond and get to know one another without the usual worries about cooking, cleaning and taking care of other children. I think it would be very beneficial to women to reclaim this particular tradition.

Finding our way back home.

On the day that a baby is born, so too is a mother. Without properly acknowledging our changing lives in these beautiful and memorable ways, we go into motherhood unprepared for the challenges it may bring. No amount of reading can bring you the kind of self-knowledge needed to be a good mother. No amount of beautiful nursery furniture can enable you to trust in your mothering instincts when you are frightened of making a mistake with your precious little bundle. These things all take time. Reclaiming our rites of passage, no matter in how small a way, can help restore to women something vital for their spiritual and emotional wellbeing. And if you are worried that it might be boring or heavy, you needn’t. Celebrations are just that, a joyous coming together of loved ones to honour something wonderful. Keep that in mind and enjoy the many wonderful ways of celebrating this amazing and challenging time in a woman’s life. Choose the things that work for you, that you will enjoy and that will really give you the space to recognise the momentous changes that are happening and offer you some genuine support and acknowledgement of this special time.

More information about alternative pregnancy celebrations can be found in books such as Mother Rising by Yana Cortlund, Barb Lucke and Donna Miller Watelet (OK) and Blessingways, A Guide to Mother-Centred Baby Showers by Shari Maser (OK).
If published on the web please include the following contact details: Website: www.thedivinefeminine.com.au Email: info@thedivinefeminine.com.au Phone: 0439 636 958

Kat Skarbek
www.thedivinefeminine.com.au
About Kat Skarbek…
Kat Skarbek is a writer, presenter of the Shamballa Spirit Show on 3MDR 97.1FM and the Head Honcho of The Divine Feminine (www.thedivinefeminine.com.au) which specialises in creating unique and spiritually nourishing transitional celebrations and events for women. These include alternative Hen Nights and Mother Showers for pregnant women. She is a proud survivor of the first two years of motherhood and a visit from the PND Fairy.
Phone: 0439 636 958
Email: info@thedivinefeminine.com.au

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Previous posts about rites of passage and women’s mysteries:

Rites of Passage Resources for Daughters & Sons

Birth as a Rite of Passage & ‘Digging Deeper’

Blessingways and the role of ritual

Blessingways / Women’s Programs

Red Tent Resources

Blog Circle: Tender Mercies, Unexpected Gifts

Apr18

The Amethyst Network blog circle for April is on the subject of Tender Mercies:

Blessings, Magic, Tender Mercies, Grace, whatever you call it, there are these moments, times and experience of light in the darkness. Sometimes they are very small. Just a moment where you see a little bit of magic, or a blessing wrapped in the grief. Sometimes it is significant, like close friendships made with people you may never have had the chance to meet otherwise.

For our Blog Circle this month (April) please share your own experiences of grace, tender mercies, magic, blessings, or gifts that your miscarriage has given you. If you have not experienced a miscarriage, please feel free to participate. We all know someone who has miscarried and therefore have been touched by miscarriage in some way.

via April Blog Circle ~ Blessings, Magic, Tender Mercies, Grace… » The Amethyst Network.

As soon as this theme was picked, I knew what I wanted to write about. It was the experience of an unexpected gift from my little baby Noah. It was one of the only moments of “communication” I ever felt from him after his death-birth. I sort of expected or hoped to have some dreams or some other sorts of “metaphysical” sorts of experiences with him, but I didn’t have that, he was simply gone. I did, however, have this one little gift (originally posted about on August 11, 2010)…

This past weekend [August, 2010]…We went to visit my friend M whose baby recently died and was born at a similar gestation point to Noah. While we were there, she showed us the memory box she’d put together for her baby and then she brought out the folder she’d received from Angel Whispers (source of the birth certificate that I got for Noah and that I like so much). She held it out to me silently, and printed on the front was, “this folder was made possible by a donation in memory of sweet baby Noah Remer, November 7, 2009.” Oh. My. Goodness. How could it be that I made a donation to Angel Whispers back in May ([2010] for my due date), the check traveling all the way to Canada, and yet, this folder somehow finding its way back into my life and into the hands of my dear, grieving friend? It was an amazing feeling.

I sent a donation to cover three folders. I wonder who has received the other two? We came up with all kinds of possible reasons for this “coincidence,” but none of them were very logical (she lives in IL, I live in MO-–it isn’t like they saw our addresses and though, “ah ha! We’ll send this one!”) and we were left with the only option to be just to marvel at this simple little gift.

In more current tender mercies, Noah’s memorial tulip tree is about to bloom!

It is in a shaded area behind the house and thus is a little off-schedule from the rest of the trees like this in the area. My parents have a matching tree and theirs is fully blooming now:

Seeing these flowers each year is really meaningful to me and that’s why I used a photo of the flowers as the cover image on my miscarriage memoir. Thinking about this post made me dig around in my archived photos where I found some not-often-before-shared photos of the ritual my mom and friends had for me near my birthday (Noah’s due date), during which we planted said tulip tree. Under the tree I buried the embryo from my second miscarriage and also the hospital bracelet from my ER trip following Noah’s birth. At the time of these photos I was tentatively hoping I might possibly be pregnant again and, in fact, I was justatinybitpregnant with the future Alaina!

Placing the tree in a barely scratched out dip in the rocky soil!

My mom adds a scoop of dirt.

My doula!

I feel lucky to have a supportive mom who does things like this for me! 🙂

And, after I prepped and scheduled this post, I took this photo of the almost opening bloom…

And then, the day before it was scheduled to post…YAY! A full flower!

Not picked, just stabilized for photo op.

Red Tent Resources

Mar3

“Blood Mysteries recall the immense power of the bleeding woman. Power enough to share in great nourishing give-aways. Give-away from woman womb to earth womb, give-away from mother to matrix, give-away of nourisher to nourisher…bleeding freely, we know ourselves as women, as nourishers of life…” –Susan Weed

International Women’s Day is coming up on March 8th and I signed up for a cool sounding free online class about working with your moon cycle. I’m loving the focus and I hope to learn some useful things:

“What you do on the first day of your cycle radically affects your health and happiness for the next 30 (or so) days. It impacts your relationships, creativity, energy, spiritual connectedness, and self-confidence, just to name a few things…”

This class is part of a free online 28 day event about honoring our moon cycles that is already in progress—I wish I would have learned about it a little earlier!

Also, on International Women’s Day is a Red Tent Activation offering from Deanna L’am:

We’ve Birthed The world We Want To Live In…

Lets Re-Member, Re-Activate & Re-claim
Our cellular memories of The Red Tent!

I do a lot of work with women already. I have provided breastfeeding support and counseling for eight years now. I’ve been teaching and writing about birth and doing birth activism for just about as long. I help plan blessingway/rite of passage ceremonies and facilitate workshops and lead rituals (and occasionally, I do weddings). I hold quarterly women’s retreats and this year I’m doing a year-long monthly women’s spirituality class. But, I still want to do more! I envision having a fabulous red yurt out in the field that would always be available to any woman who wanted to come to it. I envision a “Women’s Temple” and nurturing, enriching, replenishing WomanSpace. I envision monthly full moon circles and seasonal ceremonies and plenty of time for celebration of Women’s Mysteries…

I also really, really want to host a screening of the Red Tent Movie (this is totally within my capacity for this year at least!)

While I also have a whole collection of favorite women’s temple/women’s mysteries resources, some of my favorite Red Tent specific resources on Facebook are:

Occupy Menstruation (my total favorite)

Your period is a vehicle for greater compassion in the world at large.

Your period is a universal language.

Yet, it’s one of the least understood by women today.

It’s one of the topics that is least talked about in our modern culture…

—Pleasurable Periods

Ceremony Preparations!

Nov3

My brother got married at my parents’ house early last month and it involved a surprisingly huge amount of work and preparation even though it was a small wedding. Now, we’re getting ready for an overnight women’s retreat at the same location and it feels like almost the same amount of prep work! I’ve been planning and facilitating quarterly women’s spirituality retreats locally for two years. Early this year, we decided to have a special “SageWoman” ceremony in the fall to honor our Queen/Crone members of the circle. It will be similar to a coming of age ceremony for a maiden or a mother blessing ceremony for a pregnant woman. My own mother has already been celebrated multiple times, but the other four honorees have never had a blessingway ceremony—not for coming of age or for pregnancy. (Side note regarding my own mom: she has already been a part of a group ceremony like this for wise women and then through two blessingways during her own pregnancies–I’m one of the only people I know whose mom who was also given blessingways during her pregnancies. I think sometimes the current generation feels like they “invented” them, but there were plenty of awesome women who paved the way to ritually acknowledging the power of the transition to motherhood. In fact, I feel like in many ways, it was my mom who “brought back” the mother blessing to my own circle of friends when she hosted a ceremony for me during my own first pregnancy. Before that, the local women were no longer holding the kinds of ceremonies they’d held during the 80’s.)

We’re having an overnight retreat and planning to have a nighttime ceremony of awesomeness with candlelight and a fire and the deep tones of my new community drum. That’s right, after being totally entranced by the large powwow/community drums at the Goddess festival I attended in Kansas in Sept, I spent way too much money and bought one of my own! We’ve often tried drumming as a group, but just can’t quite get it going. The community drum is going to change all that by involving multiple people on the same drum. Plus, we learned cool chants! I’ve been drumming and singing with my husband since the powwow drum arrived. There is something about the deep sound and the rhythm and the energy of drumming together on the same drum that makes you feel like you are great and could take this show on the road! (I’m not really musically skilled at all, quite the opposite, but the community drum changes that feel of arthymic tone-deafness into awesomeness.)

It is thankfulness-every-day month on Facebook and on Nov. first I shared the following:

Today I’m thankful for a husband that has spent hours and hours this week helping me make presents for MY friends (including a trip to the store today to fix a problem), staying up too late to do so (1:00 a.m. two [three] nights in a row), and patiently persevering when I said I was ready to quit! And, I’m also thankful for a dad and a good friend who spent hours this morning setting up a tipi for us to have a ceremony in this weekend. I guess behind every great women-only ritual are several helpful and awesome men 🙂

And then yesterday, my dad made a beautiful drum stand using native hardwoods (I made the drumstick in the pic, but Mark made four others for us. See what I mean about the awesome, helpful men?! And, unlike popular stereotypes, this is proof that it is possible to be both a feminist and love and appreciate your menfolk :))

Since words and ritual creation are my thing, I’ve been working hard creating what I hope will be a beautiful and meaningful ceremony. I will have the ritual outline to share and pictures of the aforementioned gifts I’ve been slaving over after they’ve actually been presented to my friends. Here are two of the readings I’ve chosen to use:

Womanspirit Rising
(an opening. Call and response)

We have come from years of pondering

Silently and alone
As we nurtured our children.

We have come from long, slow generations of women

Who knew their minds
And would not settle

We have come from the ages of pre-history,
Out of the civilizations of Mycenae and Minos
Of Lesbos and Crete.

Of the Olemecs and the Druids
Of Mesopotamia and China

We have come through the ages

Bearing the children,
Nurturing the community
In search of ourselves

We have come to know that

The rising of the womanspirit
Means the rising of humanity

Now we are discovering and re-discovering ourselves

And creating and re-creating
Our depths and our heights…

And our womanspirit is rising
And rising again…

Blessed Be.

—
*From a Unitarian Universalist Women’s meeting in Albuquerque, NM. Reprinted in the book Readings for Women’s Programs
—

Womanspirit Rising
(a closing. Call and response)

We come to stay forever

Our womanspirit is rising
Deepening
Converging

We rejoice in it and in one another

We who are many are also one
We who are one are also many

On behalf of our Sisters around the globe

We give thanks.

On behalf of our Sisters who have gone before us.

We give thanks.

On behalf of our Sisters yet to be born

We give thanks.

We are the past.

And we are the future.

We are the here

And we are the now

We are one, we are Sisters

And our womanspirit is rising
And rising again.

We rejoice in our Sisterhood.

Blessed be.

—
*From a Unitarian Universalist Women’s meeting in Albuquerque, NM . Reprinted in the book Readings for Women’s Programs

The Birthing Dance

Oct28

I saw this post go by on Facebook during the week and saved it to share, because it would make a nice mother blessing poem to share with a pregnant mama:

The Birthing Dance

Come to me, My Child
Secret longing of my inner heart
Breath of spirit
Wandering the cosmos

Choosing your next lifepath
Seeking sanctuary in my womb
Visions of you stir my dreams
Your gentle essence drifting inward
Merging into matter
Coming into consciousness
Birthing into being
Your tender wisdom speaks
The ancient knowledge
of a mother’s power
Our bodies grow together
Two as one
Turning round, in birthing dance
You lead me
Opening the circle corridor
Descending into unhindered ecstasy
Into my arms

~Judie C. McMath

Rites of Passage Resources for Daughters & Sons

Oct24

“Childbirth is a rite of passage so intense physically, psychologically, emotionally, spiritually, that most other events in a woman’s life pale next to it. In our modern lives, there are few remaining rituals of initiation, few events that challenge a person’s mettle down to the very core. Childbirth remains a primary initiatory rite for a woman.” –from the book MotherMysteries

“One of the greatest failings of our society
is that we do not have a ceremony to mark
the passage from childhood to adulthood.”

~Dr. Michael Thompson, author of Raising Cain~

As a culture, we have very few recognized rites of passage. I would suggest that perhaps marriage is the only remaining rite of passage that is acknowledged in the mainstream with celebration and ritual. We also have 18th and 21st birthdays recognized as transitional, but unfortunately only through celebrations that involve a lot of drinking. We also recognize the birth of a new baby, but the focus is on the baby and not on the transitional rite of passage for the woman and very often her needs, wishes, and feelings about the experience are trivialized, minimized, or even discouraged (i.e. a healthy baby is ALL that matters…). This summer when a friend’s son turned 13, I was looking up rites of passage for boys, and was frustrated to find the most common definition or experience of a “rite of passage” for a teenage boy was having sex for the first time or getting drunk for the first time. 😦 I would actually venture to conclude that some of the nationwide problems we experience with birth and maternity care stem from this basic lack of acknowledgement of significant rites of passage in our lives.

So, I’ve very much been enjoying my participation in a free telesummit on Rites of Passage for boys and girls, planned by DeAnna L’am of Red Moon and Janet Allison of Boys Alive (there are a variety of guest speakers from a variety of other organizations and backgrounds as well, both men and women).

The event goes on through next week, so check it out if you get a chance! Good stuff!

Rites of Passage: Skillfully Guiding Girls into Womanhood and Boys into Manhood

This same week a student asked me for resources for a mother-daughter group. I had some suggestions for her and figured I’d include them here!

The Thundering Years: Rituals and Sacred Wisdom for Teens
Amazon affiliate link included in image.

In the past, I’ve facilitated a mother-daughter group using a curriculum called Meetings at the Moon that was published by the Unitarian Universalist Association. I’m not sure if it is available any longer though because I no longer see it available on their website. I really love it. Some other resources I like are: Wild Girls which is a book by Patrician Mongahan and includes ideas for facilitating a girls’ circle; the curriculum/program Women’s Rites of Passage by Hermitra Crecraft; and the book Becoming Peers: Mentoring Girls into Womanhood by DeAnna L’am.

I’ve previously referenced some material on rites of passage and rituals from the book The Thundering Years also, which is an excellent book about creating rituals and sacred ceremonies for teenagers. The other books I mentioned are specifically for girls, but The Thundering Years is for both boys and girls.

I’d love to hear additional suggestions from readers if you have favorite resources on rites of passage celebrations or initiations for our adolescents!

And, speaking of telesummits and also my own need for self-care and rest, I also decided to treat myself to the “upgraded” version of an upcoming telesummit for women called Wild Free Beautiful You. (The basic event is free, so check it out!) More about this soon!