Sara Wright – Page 11 – Feminism and Religion

The Natural History of Starlings by Sara Wright

Last week Sara wrote about her and her family’s personal connection to starling. You can read it here.

Amazingly, all the European starlings in this country descended from 100 birds that were deliberately set loose in New York’s Central Park in the 1890’s by colonists who wanted to see the birds they missed after immigrating to the US. Soon there were more than two million birds that ranged from Alaska to Mexico. All are closely related. Sometimes if a female misses the first nesting she will try to lay an egg in other bird’s nests. They are wonderful mimics learning the calls of up to 20 species of birds like the pewee, killdeer, wood thrush, red tailed hawk and robin to mention a few.

Starlings turn from spotted and white to glossy and dark each year without shedding their feathers. The new feathers that grow in have white tips. These are the spots that disappear by spring as the feathers turn dark and glossy. These birds are incredibly strong fliers as is evidenced by the extraordinary starling murmurations that still occur throughout the fall and winter all over Europe.

The Sky Dancers by Sara Wright

December is a poignant month for many people, including me. Although I find the darkness comforting, winter stillness a gift, I do not celebrate the season as others do.

I begin December by bringing in the dawn each morning (if it’s clear) by standing outdoors in the cold watching Sirius, the dog star fade…Some mornings the sky turns rose, tangerine, or gold as clouds slide over the horizon or billow up like cottony balls of fluff. The air is fresh, fragrant, and clean. I listen for the first birds, the female cardinal’s chirp, the chickadees, and doves have yet to appear – these daily ‘morning mysteries’ are spontaneous and acted out in gratitude without thought.

This month is a time of remembrance … I think of people I loved, some I did not, those I lost…

First Call to Ceremony by Sara Wright

I prepare for winter by tipping sweet balsam to make my wreath. Always an intentional undertaking, I honor all evergreens during this month and next as I weave myself into the Circle of Life with fragrant boughs…

I gather my balsam candles and put lights on my little Norfolk Island Pine in preparation for the Festival of Fire, scattering crimson cranberries around her base. Adding acorns, hemlock cones, moss and lichen attach me to ‘All There Is’.

Inside and outside are One…

“I am a lady in waiting”… I have learned that Nature decides when it’s time to engage in any ceremony that helps spin the wheel – I listen for the call.

The Dark Tunnel by Sara Wright

Recently I had a very strange experience. I had fallen and was dumped into a nursing home to ‘recover’.

Since I have written about other aspects of this terrifying experience on this blog and published some pieces elsewhere, I am turning my attention to what happened to me after being drugged senseless, and then being stripped of every aspect of personal autonomy.

After I refused the 17 drugs, I incurred hostility from some nurses and aides who blamed me for having diarrhea and many other infractions none worth mentioning (one of the consequences of stopping the drugs was loose bowels).

The one medication I needed was routinely withheld. Each time this happened I became more frightened and anxious. Shaky. These same caregivers either ignored me or intoned “all you have to do is relax, breathe”. They dismissed my PTSD/Anxiety disorder as some kind of psychological problem or were too ignorant or indifferent to care.

Archive of Silence by Sara Wright

It is well documented by conservative science how a human being deals with trauma.

Trauma first overwhelms and then destroys the body’s nervous system.

It affects cognitive ability –

the ability to translate experience into meaning –

it steals the ability to imagine a different way of being in the world.*

Trauma affects memory creating blanks – holes in the fabric that cannot be recovered except perhaps through dreams visions, sensing, intuiting, having experiences with Nature that the rational mind does its best to resist.

THE EARTH AS GRANDMOTHER by Sara Wright

I have become increasingly uncomfortable with the phrase ‘the earth is our mother’ used by so many westerners.

Indigenous peoples have been in an intimate relationship with the earth since the beginning of time so for them calling the earth “Mother” makes perfect sense (they know how to treat her with respect).

In my way of thinking westerners who appropriate the Native perspective, co -opting the sentiment to make it their own feels inauthentic and inappropriate.

The most glaring difference between the two perspectives is that Indigenous peoples consider all living beings their relatives, treating them with deep respect, honoring their individual and collective gifts and by NEVER taking more than they need, be it medicines, trees, animals, or plants for food.

Winter Solstice: Celebration of the Powers of Fire by Sara Wright

I have a problem with the belief that Winter Solstice is primarily about celebrating ‘the coming of the light.’ This one – sided thinking negates the cross-cultural reality that this is a festival during which candles are lit to light up the night and roaring fires blaze inside and out bringing warmth to all. Winter Solstice is above all else a Festival of Fire.

Fire is an ambiguous element (as all the elements are) carrying both a positive and negative charge. On one level fire brings warmth and light on cold winter nights. On the other hand, fire also incinerates, destroying everything it touches. Approaching a Festival that celebrates the Element of Fire should be done with consciousness and caution.

Lilliputian Gardening by Sara Wright

This November morning a slate gray sky sprinkled raindrops on the dogs as I stood outdoors with them at dawn. A single Blue jay peered at us from a bare maple branch with obvious interest. Hairy was absent as were the chickadees. It is warm enough today for insects to be out and about, becoming delectable protein rich food for most birds in Fern Hollow, my home. Just two days ago I had a visit from a ruby crowned kinglet when he flew in the door!

Returning to the house, ‘Mary’s Garden’ cast a warm emerald glow lighting up the kitchen, now shrouded in winter gray. My terrarium, now one year old is moving into late fall, and yet many of her plants are still growing, albeit more slowly. The tiny hemlock seedling is bristling with new needles. A few ferns still unfurl; others have disappeared. The creeping partridgeberry has kept her crimson seeds for a whole year.

THE OTHER SIDE OF THANKSGIVING by Sara Wright

THE GRANDMOTHER THREAD

November is the month when the veil is thin and permeable and it is possible to engage with the ancestors …I recently received information that for me November’s moon belongs to the grandmothers, and the liminal space in between and not to the hunter/killers. How is it that what seems so obvious was wrapped in the shroud of my unknowing?

On all hallows I crossed a threshold when the hunters moon transmuted from male to female. trusting my senses, I called up the archetypal grandmothers while grieving my lost connection to my own grandmother. I honored these elders as a powerful force of nature… and left it at that.

For the Children by Sara Wright

“What you make from a tree should be just as miraculous as what you cut down”.

Richard Powers

November is the month of endings and beginnings – I am keenly aware of all trees as they prepare for winter sleep, and this is the season during which I begin to celebrate evergreens. Most deciduous trees are a tangle of sleepy gray branches, but the conifers are still breathing life. Herein lies the Deep Forest Green Religion of Hope. Many trees, both thin barked deciduous trees and conifers are still photosynthesizing.

I love gazing into the woods beyond my brook lush with balsam, fir and hemlock knowing that the animals and birds that are left will soon be nestled in thick undercover finding nourishment and protection from winter winds and snow.