The Worm Has Turned

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Lord Mango

*-TOO MUCH INFORMATION

We had Ostara today and they changed stuff, Pat and Tom and Emily they changed it all around. Usually we choose parts just before. I haven't been able to go to a ritual in a long time. I had a second job and I was working really hard and I was really looking forward to today, to being part of a ritual, part of our grove that I helped found and they changed it.

I think they did it yesterday, Lori said it was very short notice, said it was yesterday or the day before. Tom had called Pat, or maybe he talked to Em first or whatever, but the decided to split up all the parts and designate a Priest (which Pat had already agreed to do anyway), Warrior (Tom), and Producer (Em). A certain section of parts to each. I think this is supposed to be a representation of the Indo-European caste system. I say I think because nobody bothered to explain anything to me.

I get there, we had it at the Unitarian church. We all arrive and get the food table and the altar set up and everything looks beautiful and Pat hands out the sheets and they're only two pages and I'm confused. Usually they're five at least. Well, since there was only Lori and me and then one other visitor besides the three of them, I didn't know we weren't going to do it the regular way. I'm looking at the sheet and I can't figure out what's going on, because most of the ritual wasn't on there. But I get ready to assign parts, I get my pen out to write mine down and Pat said, "What are you going to write down?" As if I'm doing something silly. And I asked, "Aren't we going to do the briefing part?" And so Pat says, "Do we really need it?" Then Lori says the visitor, her name was Betty, that she'd like it, to know what's going on. So he launches into the explanation but he's still not asking for volunteers for parts. While he's doing that I go over to Em and ask what's going, why isn't the whole ritual on here? She says, "because it's on here," or something to that effect and she shows me these notecards she brought. The cards have a some of the parts on them, handwritten. I hand them back to her. Then she points to the top of the sheet I have and it says, "repsonses and songs."

"That's your part," she says. "These are our parts," and waves the cards a bit. Our parts? Whose parts?

Right then Pat's finished and starts the ritual and I'm still confused. I'm trying to figure it out in my head, did I miss something at the last meeting? Did I miss an e-mail? When did we decide we were doing this? The had divided up all the speaking parts between the three of them and Lori and I and Betty were only supposed to watch and join in on the songs. Join in on the fucking songs, like some sort of fucking congregation. I felt absolutely no connection to the ritual. Nothing. I tried, tried hard to make the connection but I couldn't feel it. I had nothing to do but wait to sing. This is supposed to be a rejoice of the returning fertility of the earth and I felt as cold as I do in the dead of winter.

After the ritual the three of them are all congratulatory to each other, all saying how wonderful it was and I'm still trying to figure this out in my own head. What did I miss?

We went to Nick's Pizza afterwards (not Betty) and everyone, even Lori, is saying how wonderful it all was, how it flowed better. Yeah? Well I didn't feel any goddamn flow.

And they asked me how I liked it. I said, politely, "Did I miss something at the meeting? I didn't know we were changing anything." No, I hadn't missed anything. The three of them together decided they would change it around. Like, the day before or something. They planned everything out. I told them I didn't like it, I didn't like not having a part, I had been looking forward to it. "Oh, sorry Jess." And yes I can have a part in a future ritual but that's not the point. Nobody ASKED me THIS time. And they ask me what caste I think I'd be drawn to, Warrior, Priest (or Priestess) or Producer? And I don't fucking know. Why do I have to choose at all? This isn't ancient times. The truth is I don't feel like I'm any of them.

I don't have any other friends. I don't have a boyfriend, or even anybody looking at me, flirting with me. It would be nice to be noticed even a little. I don't have a fulfilling job, I can't even pay all my bills. I don't go out and do things even by myself because I can't afford it. I can't afford school. I don't have a nice house. My kids have troubles in school and I can't even help them. The teachers call me, send me emails send reports home and their father thinks the solution is to yell louder. I look at their homework and I can't figure it out. I don't have anyway to help them. My mind is going, I can't even figure out eighth grade homework.

And I hadn't been to a ritual in so, so long. I had missed it terribly and I was really looking forward to being able to do my part and they just took it away from me. I know they didn't do it on purpose, or to be mean, but nobody asked me if I minded, nobody even TOLD me it was going to be done. Not when we got there and were setting up, not even just before, nobody gave me any time to adjust to anything. Nobody even THOUGHT about it. I wasn't even an afterthought. And that's made me so mad.

The parts I like to do, Honoring the Earth Mother and the Morrigan, Opening the Gate, they're under the Warrior now. I'm not a Warrior. I'm not a Producer or a Priest either. So I'm left with nothing. I can't be the whiny princess who says, "But I don't want to do it this way!" And I won't be some damn choir member. I'm so mad about this, so incredibly mad. They're just not going to get it, they all love it, and I don't know what to do.

And I'm wondering...is this supposed to be some sign for me. Emily, Pat, and Lori all went to ConVocation together at the end of February and took workshops on energy work with Micheller Belanger and all came back glowing and talking how they wanted to do more of this work and incorporate it into the rituals. And this is just NOT something I am interested in. If I want to work with energy, I see that as a private thing, personal. It's my own. I don't want to do some groupthink thing. My energy is chaotic and I know it's foolish, but I like it that way. I would have to be under such tight control in a group, I don't want to have to do that.

This isn't making a bit of sense to any of you, is it?