Whatever Floats Your Boat

I haven't been posting this week except for my Issue of the Week on my herbal blog because my 'sweetie' has been visiting from Mexico where he lives on his boat. This the fulfillment of his life's dream. He wanted me to go with him, but I couldn't hack living on a boat. So.... I've been down there twice this year and he's been up here twice.

Anyway, I wanted to write a bit about the conference I'm going to in San Francisco Halloween weekend. 2012 Conference, San Francisco - Shift Happens.

Many years ago, I was working on a PhD. in Mayan Studies at Tulane University in New Orleans. I have been interested in the Maya for at least 40 years. I taught courses on Mayan Hieroglyphs and Mayan Culture through the Extension program at Sonoma State University.

Because of my academic background, I was always skeptical of "2012" stuff. I knew it was the end of a calender period of 5125 years, but it was the end of a cycle within many many cycles and so, as such, no more significant than the end of a millennium for us. Of course, each time a millennium ends, people in modern culture have predicted an 'end of the world'.

I'm not sure why I decided to check out a book by John Major Jenkins entitled 'Maya Cosmogenesis: 2012'. I don't recall the chain of events right now. This led me to an Internet search, which led me to this conference, which I have decided to attend.

The book is incredible. He has integrated the anthropological and archaeological information with astronomy and some 'New Age' teachings. In some cases, he makes logical leaps that are not necessarily appropriate, but in the long run, his results make total sense to me.

He makes the case that the Maya knew about the precession of the equinoxes and rather than designing their calender on a historical or mythological beginning, they worked backwards from an 'end date', Dec. 21, 2012. This is when the Sun will line up with the Galactic Center of our Milky Way Galaxy and this will be visible just before sunrise at particular latitudes.

His argument is well backed up by data and it is convincing. So what? you might well say. Scientists have determined that the center of our galaxy is a 'black hole'.

Wikipedia has this to say:
"A black hole is a theoretical region of space in which the gravitational field is so powerful that nothing, not even electromagnetic radiation (e.g. visible light), can escape its pull after having fallen past its event horizon. The term derives from the fact that the absorption of visible light renders the hole's interior invisible, and indistinguishable from the black space around it."

The Maya saw this black hole as the womb of the Great Mother, thus the place of Creation. The Sun was the Father. Thus when the Sun and the GC came together, Creation happened. This occurs every 26,000 years.

In light of this information and the scientific data regarding black holes, we may well ask ourselves what will happen. According to Jenkins, it is not just a finite period of one day, but rather of years leading up to and following the actual alignment. We are already in that period of years. In addition, in Mayan calendrics, time cycles overlap. They don't just end and begin. It is not 2007 on Dec. 31 and 2008 on Jan. 1. Rather there is a period of time toward the end of the year that overlaps with the beginning of the next year. Time is seen as cyclic, not linear.

Could all the upheaval that is occurring in society at this time be part of the "Shift"? I think so. Many institutions have been under scrutiny and some are crumbling or changing. Many people are living in fear these days about their future. The Earth itself is undergoing rapid change due to Global Warming. Where will it all lead?

I invite your comments.

Faubourg Treme

Sunday I went to see a film at the Sonoma Film Institute, which is located on the Sonoma State University Campus. It was called "Faubourg Tremé: The Untold Story of Black New Orleans". Here's the synopsis they wrote:

"This first-person documentary by New Orleans natives Dawn Logsdon and Lolis Eric Elie brings alive the long history of Black New Orleans through an in-depth look at one historic neighborhood, the Faubourg Tremé. Elie, an award-winning New Orleans newspaperman, bought a dilapidated house in Tremé in the 1990's, and through the process of renovation became obsessed with the area's mysterious and neglected past. Progressive and racially mixed from its founding in the late 1700s, Tremé represented the largest community of free Black people in the antebellum Deep South. Elie interviews residents, artists, scholars, even a few historical reenactors to uncover Tremé's prominent place in the national struggle for civil rights. Shot largely before Hurricane Katrina and edited afterwards, the film is both celebratory and elegiac in tone." (2008, 79 min.)
It can be ordered from the website.

It was a great film. Well worth seeing. In fact, I will probably buy a copy. It truly captured the community spirit that exists throughout the area. Treme is now known as the 6th Ward.

There are many small neighborhoods within the larger suburban area. They are often named after a street or subdivision name. Within those neighborhoods, families have lived for generations. They don't leave. Where else is there to go? Part of the tragedy of Katrina is that these traditions which have lasted for sometimes more than 100 years, were disrupted in such a way that they can never be regained. In some ways they limited people, because it's hard to break away from family. These neighborhoods functioned like traditional villages. Everyone had their place. Secure, yes - Progressive, usually not. They had a culture all their own which was rich and unique.

I lived in New Orleans and nearby suburbs for 8 years from 1981-1989. It was quite an experience and one I will never forget. For part of the time, I lived across the river in Westwego, a small township at the end of the Huey Long Bridge. Though minuscule in size, it had it's own court and judge, and police department. If you lived there you had to pay for a special sticker for your car. I was surrounded by people who considered me a 'Yankee.' One of the customs was that as family members matured and married, they just moved into the house across the street or next door to their parents and so just yelled out to each other when they wanted to talk. My husband, from New England, and I had a lot of trouble with this.

There were many little parades which started from the parking lot of the Catholic Church at the end of the block and wound through the 5 or 6 square blocks of the town. They had bands and tiny floats and threw candy at you. Mardi Gras behavior happens frequently down there.

Westwego was segregated with blacks on one street and whites on another. When my husband and I rented to a black family, the neighbors called the police every day until our tenants just couldn't stand it any more and moved. One time I had a tenant (white) who didn't pay his rent. I went to the 'judge' who ordered an eviction, then came to the house in person, opened the door of the apartment and proceeded to throw the tenant's furniture out into the street. I couldn't believe it. This would never happen in California. I protested that this was not okay with me, but the judge said it was entirely within the law.

I never thought I would be able to leave New Orleans because it grabs hold of you in a way that cannot be described. I felt glad to leave when I did. But....I have always missed it for a quality that is way beyond words. It's a feeling, a sensation. With the destruction of these neighborhoods, the dispersal of all these people and whatever 'they' decide to put there in place of what was .... it is over. On the other hand, New Orleans being a very Plutonic place, has risen out of the ashes (read floodwaters) like the phoenix, many times before. It won't be the same, but it could be wonderful.