Post by calluna on Jun 18, 2015 22:21:23 GMT -6
Please move if this is in the wrong spot. I wasn't sure if I should put it here or in the syncretic form.
Apparently everyone wants my attention this month. First, Grandmother Bhéara starts poking me in warmish, maternal ways, as Allec can attest, and now Sara-e-Kali is invading my dreams. While I've always incorporated some form of Shaktism (in the Romani can't worship a male without some female concept there type) and I did accompany my mother to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer when she did her pilgrimage there to see Kali-Mata and do her ritual bath, I've been so divorced from Romani culture since she died, that I don't know what to do.
As someone with a non-Romani father and Scots-Irish pale skin, wasn't exactly welcomed with open arms to start with. No one on my mother's side even contacted me when my grandfather passed away until a cousin found out I didn't know, and emailed me the day of the funeral, and I was cut from the "grandchildren" count in the obituary.
I feel like Sarah-Kali-Mata wants something of me, but I don't know all the laws to purify my home as spiritually clean (wuzho) enough to approach her. I was so young when my Mum died that all I really remember is burning things, you can never undo flicking your skirts at someone, and how the laundry is done. It's not like there are any books I can read or anyone whom I know I can ask.
And, it's to the point now where I remember so little, beyond little charms and protections, that it almost feels appropriative. I don't wear my dowry out anymore because a.) Pennsatucky b.) I know I must be ritually unclean nine different ways and c.) While I'm half-Romani, I look like the whitest white girl on the block, save for my eye shape that it feels like I'm making it look like it's okay for white people with no heritage to walk around with "g**sy coin belts" and "g**sy skirts" and headscarves. I feel like it doesn't belong to me anymore, that it's another thing I lost with my mother and her grandmother (who accepted me fully).
I don't really know what to do. According to my mother marime law is derived from, possibly even the same as, Hindu purity law, but I don't know what if anything is the same. Does anyone have any ideas? I feel really stuck, like I'm being pulled sideways.
[And if Scáthach starts being nicey-nice, instead of her usual "Don't be an idiot, daughter" and "What do you think you are doing? Wrong! Again! Do it better" routine, I am going to start writing my will, because I'm getting creeped out.]
Apparently everyone wants my attention this month. First, Grandmother Bhéara starts poking me in warmish, maternal ways, as Allec can attest, and now Sara-e-Kali is invading my dreams. While I've always incorporated some form of Shaktism (in the Romani can't worship a male without some female concept there type) and I did accompany my mother to Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer when she did her pilgrimage there to see Kali-Mata and do her ritual bath, I've been so divorced from Romani culture since she died, that I don't know what to do.
As someone with a non-Romani father and Scots-Irish pale skin, wasn't exactly welcomed with open arms to start with. No one on my mother's side even contacted me when my grandfather passed away until a cousin found out I didn't know, and emailed me the day of the funeral, and I was cut from the "grandchildren" count in the obituary.
I feel like Sarah-Kali-Mata wants something of me, but I don't know all the laws to purify my home as spiritually clean (wuzho) enough to approach her. I was so young when my Mum died that all I really remember is burning things, you can never undo flicking your skirts at someone, and how the laundry is done. It's not like there are any books I can read or anyone whom I know I can ask.
And, it's to the point now where I remember so little, beyond little charms and protections, that it almost feels appropriative. I don't wear my dowry out anymore because a.) Pennsatucky b.) I know I must be ritually unclean nine different ways and c.) While I'm half-Romani, I look like the whitest white girl on the block, save for my eye shape that it feels like I'm making it look like it's okay for white people with no heritage to walk around with "g**sy coin belts" and "g**sy skirts" and headscarves. I feel like it doesn't belong to me anymore, that it's another thing I lost with my mother and her grandmother (who accepted me fully).
I don't really know what to do. According to my mother marime law is derived from, possibly even the same as, Hindu purity law, but I don't know what if anything is the same. Does anyone have any ideas? I feel really stuck, like I'm being pulled sideways.
[And if Scáthach starts being nicey-nice, instead of her usual "Don't be an idiot, daughter" and "What do you think you are doing? Wrong! Again! Do it better" routine, I am going to start writing my will, because I'm getting creeped out.]
