Hail Aurora

Her rosy-fingered dawn was particularly spectacular this morning. I pulled this from the Internet because I don't have much luck capturing these shots, so imagine a scene very much like this only with a couple of houses in the foreground instead of the mountains. The colors are much the same.

I find it interesting that I live in Aurora, a city named after the old Greek goddess of the dawn (and, of course, of spectacular light shows at the poles). A few years ago, they erected a statue of the goddess on a pillar at the top of a specially created hill, just off of I-225 at the entrance to the Aurora Mall (and the Aurora Town Center, which is on the other side of the street). Sadly, this is the only image I can find of it, but there she is, greeting all who enter Aurora. From I-225 and Alameda. Heading eastbound.

There was, predictably, some controversy when this mound and statue were erected. A few folks grumbling about putting up the symbol of a pagan goddess. Not much came of it, though, and apparently the majority decided that the city being named after her and all, it wasn't wholly inappropriate to honor her in this way.

(In all reality, I'm guessing someone just thought it would be a cool statue and didn't put much thought of goddesses into it at all. Most monotheistic believers seem to think the pagan gods are not real.)

In any case, it's interesting that I live in a city named for a pagan goddess, and one who evokes my favorite time of the day as well. In recent years I've realized that everything in my life has culminated in putting me exactly where I need to be. Maybe it's a symbolic stretch, but hear me out.

My house is on Flanders street and was previously owned by a couple named Bender. My favorite cartoons are The Simpsons and Futurama.

A block from this house is Sunrise Park. The park is connected to an elementary school and has a large open field behind it where a prairie dog colony makes its home. At the top of the hill, there's a platform marking the solstices and equinoxes. This is where I watch the sunrise on the solstices, and the sunsets at the equinoxes. (And it's not perfectly aligned, no, but the fact that it's there makes me think there was a reason we looked at 40-something houses before choosing this one.)

I am passionate about the environment and the well-being of the Earth, obviously. I landed a job with the department of health and environment. The environmental side of the department, where I work, consists of the Air Pollution, Water Quality, and Hazardous Materials divisions. I'm with Haz, protectors of Earth. I am a Fire sign - Sagittarius.

It's all coming together. Haha!

Maybe it's all coincidence, but somehow I don't think so. For the first time in my life I feel I am where I need to be. Perhaps it's just a fantastic side effect of entering my 40s and realizing that it's okay to like myself as I am, to actually enjoy my accomplishments and feel satisfied with today while striving for more, to own everything about who I am and what I believe and what I want. Perhaps this really is just something that comes with age, along with the realization that you don't need to care what others think of you too much. Because the truth is, most people aren't thinking of you. What's the joke? "Dance like nobody's watching... because they aren't... they're checking their phones."

I had a get-together yesterday for the Broncos game (victory! yay!) and would like to thank everyone who came over to hang out with an introvert who seldom wants company but feels it very keenly when she asks for it and people say "not now." So, a big thank you to my friends, who accept me as I am, and validate this crazy notion that maybe we are all okay just as we are.

Faeries: the wee folk

There is a tradition in Scotland which says that after Satan was defeated and cast out of Heaven, he turned to God and said to him - "Not all of your angels are as loyal as you think. And although they did not fight with me against you in the war for Heaven, they did not fight for you either. They are what they call on Earth, 'Neutrals.' "

When God heard this he was very angry with the angels and tried to come up with a proper punishment for each of them according to their mixed loyalties. He eventually chose to banish them from Heaven to the Earth, where they became the Faeries. And according to their disposition they remained Neutral on Earth, indifferent to men's squabbles and arguments and the never-ending debate between good and evil, light and darkness: God and the Devil.

It is said that their fate will remain unknown until the Last Judgement and the end of the world.

I'm not sure what the source is for this story, but it's certainly interesting. 

Elements

I came across a suggestion that life on Earth did not originate from the stars, but from the ocean depths. I like the notion that the Earth herself gave birth to life, that she is, in fact, the Mother of us all. From her we arose, and to her every one of us returns.

Many myths talk of the separation of the Earth from the Sky. Usually this is the Earth Mother and the Sky Father, but in the Egyptian pantheon this is reversed, with Nut the sky-goddess whose image decorates the inside of many a sarcophagus. It is in the separation of the Earth and the Sky that we humans are given a space to live.

The simplicity of the elements is so powerful and beautiful. Each of them give us life, and in turn can snatch it away. The earth on which we build our homes might tremble and erupt and swallow us whole. We can scarcely survive a week without water - but it can swell and rush and wipe out entire cities. Air, we cannot do without for even a few minutes. It animates us, gives us spirit, rips the roofs from our houses. Fire...without fire, nothing we have become would be possible. It gives warmth, light, protection; cooks our food, wards off predators, heats our shelters. We stare transfixed into its dancing flames, and it seems impossible that it is not alive.

Well, it is alive. It requires food and oxygen, just as we do.

The elements give us life; the elements are life.

Gaia Theory suggests that living organisms and their inorganic environment have evolved together in a single living system. That the Earth itself is alive - not merely the conduit of life, but a living being in its own right. Mother Nature, a living goddess...Gaia.