The Ashes of Community

The ashes you’ve taken from the remnants of the ritual fire were introduced to it in the spirit of community. By tradition, ashes are gathered from one ritual fire and sprinkled into the flames of subsequent fires.

Bring them to any ritual of the Pagan community that will utilize a fire. With permission of the priest, priestess, or other officiant, sprinkle the ashes into the flames.

If more than one participant brings ashes to the fire, the histories of the ashes are pooled into a list showing the dates, events, and places represented by those ashes.

By tradition these ashes should only be given to those who attended the fire from which they were drawn. They represent the shared spirituality of all those people who have honored their gods at these ritual fires.

The cleansing nature of fire allows us to draw our rituals together without fear of negative energy being introduced. These ashes cannot transfer the essential energies raised by one ritual into the next, only the spirit of community.

The ashes have been part of:

• 67 ritual fires in 7 of the United States of America over 18 years

• 2 familiar cremations

• 2 handfastings

1990	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisconsin	Summer Solstice Ritual
1991	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisconsin	Men’s Ritual
1992	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisconsin	Summer Solstice Ritual
1993	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisconsin	Men’s Ritual
1994	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisconsin	Summer Solstice Ritual
1995	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisconsin	Men’s Ritual
1995	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisconsin	Summer Solstice Ritual
1996	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisconsin	Men’s Ritual
1997	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Ritual
1997	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Ritual
1998	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Ritual
1998	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Ritual
Lughnasad 1998	Coven of the Rising Sun	Middletown, New York
Samhaim 1998	Daughters of Chango	Middletown, New York
1999	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Ritual
1999	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Ritual
Samhain 1999	Coven of the Rising Sun	Middletown, New York
May 13, 2000		Big Hill Shelter, Suffern-Bear Mountain Trail and Long Path, Harriman State Park, New York	Honoring the Lightning
Summer Solstice 2000		North South Lake Campground, Catskill Mountains, New York	Fire fueled by lightning-downed pine
2000	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Ritual
2000	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Ritual
February 16, 2001		Long Island, New York	Celebration and cremains of Biff, beloved familiar of Voyager, August 1983 – February 23, 2000
February 20, 2001		Fahnestock State Park, New York	Celebration of snow
2001	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Ritual
2001	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Ritual
October 6, 2001		Slide Mountain, New Hampshire	In memory of the fallen of 9/11/01
June 8-9, 2002	Laurelin Reteat Center	Bethel, Vermont	Cherry Hill Seminary Summer Intensive
Summer Solstice 2002		Dry River Falls, New Hampshire
2002	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Ritual
2002	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Ritual
September 11, 2002		Bridge Bay Campground, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming	In memory of the fallen of 9/11/01
September 12, 2002		Grant Village Campground, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming	Celebration of the Earth
Beltaine 2003		Balsam Lake Trail, Catskill Mountains, New York
Beltaine 2003		Eddyville, New York
Summer Solstice 2003	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Ritual
2003	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Ritual
Lughnasad 2003	Circle Sanctuary	Wisconsin
Lughnasad 2003	Temple of the Old Gods	Hudson, New York
Full Moon, August 2003	Gaiaped Alliance	Mud Lake Shelter, Northville-Placid Trail, Adirondack Mountains, New York	Naming Ceremony: Gaiaped Alliance
Full Moon, October 2003	Gaiaped Alliance	Canary Pond, Northville-Placid Trail, Adirondack Mountains, New York
October 12, 2003	Gaiaped Alliance	Mud Lake Shelter, Northville-Placid Trail, Adirondack Mountains, New York
November 8, 2003		Eddyville, New York	Lunar Eclipse Cremation of Mina, companion of River and Basia, ? – September, 2003
Yule 2003		Highland, New York
June 20, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Opening Ritual
Summer Solstice 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Handfasting of Sunnie and Robin
Summer Solstice 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Morning Ritual
Summer Solstice 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Bonfire Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Tribal Drum & Dance Ritual
June 22, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Bonfire Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Handfasting of Draig & Truth
June 22, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Hickory Grove, Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Rite of Passage Initiation
June 22-23, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Candlelight Labyrinth
June 23-27, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Chaos Camp, Wisteria, Ohio	Sacred Fire
June 23, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Women’s Ritual
June 23, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Hickory Grove, Wisteria, Ohio	Men’s Ritual
June 24, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Hickory Grove, Wisteria, Ohio	Pagan Military Ritual
June 24, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Bornless Rite
June 24-25, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Hickory Grove, Wisteria, Ohio	Sacred Hunt
June 25, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Hickory Grove, Wisteria, Ohio	Rite of Offering to Pomona
June 25, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Bacchanalia
June 26, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Bast Cat Ritual
June 26, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Stone Circle, Wisteria, Ohio	Summer Solstice Community Ritual and Wicker Sun Burning
June 27, 2004	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Town Green, Wisteria, Ohio	Closing Ritual
October 9-10, 2004	Gaiaped Alliance	Glastenbury Mountain, Vermont	New Beginnings Ritual
June, 2005	Pagan Spirit Gathering	Wisteria, Ohio	Stone Circle, Town Green, and Drumming Circle Rituals
July 5, 2007	Gaiaped Fellowship	Baxter State Park, Maine	Pilgrimage
July 25-29, 2007	Laurelin Retreat Center	Bethel, Vermont	Lughnasad Festival
May 23-25, 2008	Laurelin Retreat Center	Bethel, Vermont	Beltaine
May 26, 2008		Town of Ulster, New York	S’moranalia

Finding Tom

I always enjoy the workshops and rituals availed to me at Laurelin Retreat, but sometimes it's the unscheduled times that are the most educational.

On a personal note, my family is having a housewarming party coming up, and because the owners of Laurelin would not be able to attend, I asked if they could give me what we've been asking for as a gift regardless: a stone, no smaller than two fists.

Laurelin is fifty-six acres of rolling woods and farmland, crisscrossed with stone walls that now or formerly marked arbitrary boundaries and, like any good New England soil, will yield two good crops of rock a year. There are a lot of stones at Laurelin, and finding the right one for my yard was probably going to take some doing.

Fortune smiled upon me by giving me a companion, Noodleman, who was in need of a Fool's Errand to complete. My plan had been to supply any number of pictures and make this into a photojournal of our quest. However, I lost the camera immediately after returning home, finding it again in time for a party, only to have it vanish once again, so I don't expect to be able to give that thousand-to-one ratio promised by pictures. It's been a week and this post isn't finished, so I'm just going to have to do this with words alone.

One of the things that's nice about Laurelin is the plethora of stone walls. Any old agrarian area is going to have them, and central Vermont is no exception. Farmers and landsmen of all sorts learned the art of stacking irregular stones in such a way as to make sturdy boundaries between fields, both marking territory and relocating stones out of plow's way. I've been trying to relearn those skills in the past few days with the stones I've been discovering in my compost pile.

None of the stone walls held my interest, and the searching up and down the various streams didn't find a stone that called out an interest in moving to the Hudson Valley. Finally, we cleared our heads with a solid period of time sitting upon a soft carpet of moss, with no stones in reach.

When we did decide to return to camp, the first stone to catch my eye was perfect. It was sitting on a stone wall along the old road, its top half covered in moss that was populated by inch-long, rust hairs among the bright green carpet. It was in a dry area which was well-shaded, the types of conditions that are abundant in my yard, and particularly in the place where I'm cultivating my moss garden.

"His name is Tom," Noodleman told me.

Fool's Errand

I took a Fool's Errand this weekend while I was attending Beltaine at Laurelin Retreat. A Fool's Errand often has a specific task, but the way one goes about accomplishing the task is anything but linear.

I took along a companion for this Fool's Errand, a youth whom I shall call Noodleman. Noodleman has a certain bubbling, mirthful chaos in his personality, and I am very curious if this trait is going to settle out as he becomes a man, or if he has the makings of a Fool.

We were searching for a stone and we didn't look particularly hard for it. When we did find it, we ended up leaving the stone someplace where we promised each other we wouldn't forget about it, and ended up returning by another way and forgot it just the same. The stone was not offended, for stones do best when permitted to watch and wait.

But I did take Noodleman's measure as thoroughly as a priestess with a skein of yarn might. I learned about how his thoughts were organized in his head, and I carefully shared some of the mysteries of Foolishness to see how he would respond. Foolish mysteries tend to be right out there in the open, but they're so fnordward-thinking that few people ever notice them. The natural Fool will intuitively understand the rules that a Fool lives by.

Not every Fool's Errand that I have undertaken has been with a companion, and most of my companions are not, and never will be, Fools. As a "Mentor in Mayhem" (dubbed thus by a mother to be named later) I am thrilled if a Fool's Errand can be a rite of passage and a journey of discovery like it was for Noodleman.

So is Noodleman a Fool? Only his hairdresser knows for sure.