A lady’s calling card:

Within the last 48 hours the temperature had risen from -28 centigrade with howling winds and deep snowdrifts to + 9, with freezing rain, that transformed the landscape into an endless, dull, foggy skating ring.

On this rain-soaked morning I was listlessly putting on my way too tight woollen socks and while I pulled hard I was glancing out the rain-spattered living room window and saw her:

On the other side of the creek, trotting quickly from puddle to puddle over the still frozen ice.

A Wolf!

Large, a bit skinny, probably due more to the wet fur than malnutrition. She rolled in one of the last patches of snow – She-Wolves do that, when they are in heat – leaving scent marks, invitations – tantalizing…..

Then she jumped up and ran over to a Muskrat pile that is now protruding through the ice. She squatted, peed on it, to make sure, everyone got the message…..

Off to the old abandoned Beaver lodge – repeat task, then loop on – down the creek and into the rolling fog…….

May she be well.

May she connect…..

May there be pups in the rendezvous site come autumn!

 

Feather Work:

This post is just a couple of pictures about what is now happening to my feathers:

Here is the latest crop of Feather Earrings:

Normally I make some quite involved Prayer Feathers like these:

But for these I just wanted to keep it simple. They just have to find someone who loves and uses them.

The Large one is from “Vulture Woman”

Then there is a Raven. Of course it is dressed in white Deer leather, because of the Siberian story, that in the Beginning the Raven was white….

Have I told that legend?

The Owl feathers and the Hawk are some of the ones I brought back – see last post….

 

We are in the midst of the Market and Craft Show season and we both are trying to keep up with making Jewellery for our booth and of course I am having some of my Shaman Art there as well. 

Here are 2 Rattles .

They are painted rawhide and Deer leather  and of course some feathers:

Law versus Spirit

“Stop!!!!!”

Peter hated it, when I yelled that at the top of my lungs, – while we were driving top speed along one of the US Interstate highways, 18 wheelers roaring behind us and past us even faster with NO WAY to hit the breaks, pull over and survive……

But in most cases Peter managed to stop – in spite of it all – usually a mile or so further down the Hwy. Then I would grab a plastic bag and get out and track back along the shoulder of the roadway towards my often distant target. I usually had seen it only for a fraction of a second in the corner of my visual field, but I KNEW, what it was and that I had to “go get it”.

An Owl.

What else?

This is me, you are reading about, so this most likely has to do something with Owls, right?

While I stumbled along the road shoulder I most often passed other unlucky road victims: Deer, sometimes more than one, Coyotes, that had come to feed and became victims too, Badgers, Foxes, Vultures, Dogs, anything…..

Horrrrible!!!!!

By the time I reached , what I had seen, I usually was in tears.

Horrrrrible.

But these Owls I could not just leave here, they had to be carefully taken up and a more dignified last Resting place had to be found. A song, a chant, for these Owls, their mates and for all the others, that I had to pass and had to leave there…..

Oftentimes there was a suitable place nearby in a field, under a Tree, facing East, out of wind and sun. Often there was not and I trudged back to the “Turtle” carrying my sad burden along a trail of death and sadness.

We then had to get off the hwy – fast- before …. the smell, you know…..

Find that little clearing with some Trees or Mesquit brush…..

On time, I “found” a Long Eared Owl just at the turnoff to a busy rest area and proceeded to carry him into the nearby woods, under the highest Tree. When I put him there, I discovered Owl Pellets. This was HIS Tree! Where he had roosted during the day and dropped his pellets. I was indescribably unravelled, emotionally, and cried for the better part of an hour…….

Yes, I also took some feathers, promising to create something beautiful and lasting in honour of all these Creature – and all that lived and died along with them.

But, having wild Bird feathers is prohibited in the US.

So there was – always will be the conundrum:

Law versus Spirit.

In instances like this, I HAVE to go with Spirit.

It is the VOICE OF THE SPIRIT, that showed me where that Owl was to be found, and to take a few feathers……..

And I am not the only one, that votes for Spirit and against the tight fist of the law:

On my sad walks to and from “my Owls” I also passed by Raptors.

Red Tailed Hawks, Swainson’s Hawks, Kestrels,…..

The large Raptors most often had the tail and large wing feathers missing. – So someone was here. Native Americans most likely, because sometimes there was a fistful of crumbled up cigarets beside or underneath the Bird. A gift in reciprocity for the feathers taken.

Often all I had to give in exchange was a chant and a more dignified resting place, sometimes a few Cedar twigs, collected for this purpose.

Another time, during a lonely drive on Hwy 87 from Clayton to Des Moines in New Mexico, Peter struggggeling to hold on, to force the motorhome forward against a blasting 40 miles/ hour West wind, white knuckled hands clamped around the steering wheel, the Turtle shaking like a bucking bronco, when I SAW HER!

Wrapped around a road sign post.

Stoppppppp!!!!

He did and I ran back.

She was still warm.

She was absolutely beautiful.

Large, well preened beautiful feather dress, silky soft.

Broken neck.

I cradled her in my arms like a baby, my tears dropping onto her perfect feathers.

When I laid her out on the floor of the Turtle, Peter cried too.

What to do.

Gently straightening out her broken neck and singing it back together, singing her back to LIFE.

– If only shamanism and shamanic ways were like this, like in the books and fancy multicoloured magazines, in the tall tales of some practitioners……

But it is not. Death is our last friend, for all of us.

Death is her friend too.

Better like this, than slowly starving in the ditch with a broken wing.

We agonized over her for the better part of the afternoon. We could not bring her to some taxidermist to treat her and send her to Ontario. We could not, in this climate take her perfect wings and claws and do the work ourselves. We could only take a few feathers and then try and find a bush to put her under or into, away from the sand-blasting winds. It took 30 miles, to find such a place at the foot of Carpulin Volcano.

A Cedar bush, away from the murderous road and the murderous winds.

Through my tears I sang for her.

I also sang for a Fox or Brother Coyote, to come find her – for a meal for the Little Ones in the den……

After this gut wrenching encounter, the Spirits must have thought, that “I had enough”.

Enought tears shed and definitely enough feathers – in fact, waaay more, than I could handle, and so for the next month or so the “sightings” and the “Stop screams” ceased.

But, there were other “second sight” , that were happening. I will be back to bring these to (virtual ) paper.

What did I do with my feather treasures?

I have a few trusted students living in the US, that got strange parcels with mummified Hawk claws, Fox Skulls and of course Owl feathers. I also know quite a few First Nations leaders, that live and work in large cities and appreciate Hawk feathers for sprucing up their Gustowes and for the Feather Dance for the kids they teach.

 

A few treasured Owl feathers I send home.

They now eagerly await me working on/ with them.

Ultimately they wait for YOU, to own and treasure them as I do.

Fisher Medicine Guide?

After the previous post appeared, I was asked; When I do see a Fisher – or in this case Mathilda, in a shamanic sense, what does that mean to me?

What Medicine wisdom does Mathilda – or any other Fisher carry – or point towards?

For me personally a Fisher has the connotation of “adversity” living , dealing and overcoming adversity – and reaping the rewards of that.

How come?

It has its roots in how my neighbours see and HATE Fishers, How I fear MR Fisher and his appetite for Raccoon babies, how I remember the tears when “Midnight” my friend Barb’s cat got taken by a Fisher……

So when we moved here learned to despise Fishers…..

But then, about 10 years ago I had a friend come to see me – as a client – with the thread of a a rather nasty and debilitating condition hanging over her head. She is a gifted healer herself and this “thing” was threatening her independence and her livelihood. So we got to work on what was causing it and send it packing! As Medicine Gifts for that healing help she gave me a Fisher foot and a Bear Claw. During the “workings” I called on the Spirit of that Fisher to please forgive the trespass on his life and also asked, iffff he was willing to help getting rid of that problem. He was, and over all these years did a good job.

Since then that Fisher foot is on my Client Altar to help, keep my friend safe.

But soon / about a week after this shamanic session the first Fisher showed herself to me- in Animal form. I think, somewhere on this blog there is a post about it…. I have to look….

Anyway, that one we named Bissiger Beisse = “BB” = the Sharp-toothed Biting One”.

Soon after, even her mate appeared at the door. He is about twice as big as “BB” and had NO Fear of us at all and after only a day or 2 he took food from my hand, carefully keeping his sharp teeth in check.

Often he sat at the sliding door, waiting for me, to give him a treat.

Peter thought this was soooo extraordinary, that he made for me an FFO = A “Fisher Feeding Order, complete with a staff, a Fisher head-shot and a bunch of chocolate Easter eggs, for which Mr Fisher developed a craving……

When the snow melted, both Fishers disappeared back into the forest- and our Raccoons all re-emerged from their hibernation trees.

So we now have a positive relationship with the wild Fishers of our surrounding forest and the Ee’ren of the Fishers = the Manitou of them sometimes helps me on trance journeys, pointing out adversities a client faces but is not conscious about.

Is he one of my Miahanits?

No, He is one of my friend’s Miahanits for sure, although I am not sure if she, as an Anishinaabe lady would see it that way……

She is a reader here and I wonder, ifff she will speak to the matter……♥!

As I said, she is a gifted healer and I would love to beat the “word of mouth drum” for her.

We neeeeeeed many more like her.

Mathilda Mustelide

It is that time of year again. Mathilda is pregnant – and hungry.

 

So she takes the trek across the frozen Beaver dam and along the well established wildlife path through bushes and dead falls up the slope and over, to our house.

At dusk she digs in the packed snow beneath the Bird feeders for the old lost sunflower seed – and for the Voles, that dare to come up once it is dark. It must be worth her while, because she is there for hours. I leave a light on, next to the living room window and then I can watch her. At first, when she hears me moving in the house, she runs away, back down the path, but soon she gets used to the sounds of movement in the house. She also can hear my voice. Once she gets used to that, I can go out onto the deck, call her – and toss her a turkey sausage.

She soon gets the hang of that!

I should “hate “ her, but I do not.

See, she is a Fisher. Many Canadians hate fishers and blame them for killing their Cats and small Dogs. Fishers also kill and eat Raccoons.

Our Raccoons, the kids from Cassey and her sisters, that, come spring, we treat to a morsel of Cat food…… ( see: https://shamanicdrumm.wordpress.com/2014/04/18/cassey-writes-to-lynn-and-john/

Yes, Fishers are considered a vermin, but in the end, they are a part of Nature and the food chain.

So, no, I do not “hate” Mathilda at al l- or any other Being for that matter…..

To the contrary, when I bring our garbage and recycling to the dump containers this Sunday, I pick up a nice Chicken for her.

Yes, the weekend cottagers here are extremely wasteful.

-Imagine that Chicken. Its life in a confined mass farming place, never being outside to scratch in the Earth, its death, the processing, and then – been tossed in the garbage 3 days after being bought – Yes, the receipt was still in the paper bag….

Well, some of the cottagers are considerate enough to put such morsels behind the garbage bins – for the Foxes and Coyotes. There is still LOTS of things there….. So this chicken can be missed.

I put it beneath the Bird feeder.

Then I cook my own Chicken – that one from our grocer in town…. (just in case you asked…)

Around 8.30 pm, when I remember to check, the Chicken is gone.

There are fresh Fisher tracks in the snow.

Mathilda is having a feast today.

 

To find our more about Mathilda and her kind:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisher_(animal)

Bird Food

Every 2 weeks the large wast containers at the crossroads down by Kawpakwakog river are getting emptied. During the winter months all the locals bring their garbage there. The Ravens know that. They are lurking around, high on top of the surrounding trees, hoping for a spilled morsel. So when I went there last Sunday to bring our recycles and other stuff, I was not surprised to see them. When they see me, they caw a ruckus and come down to the lowest branches. They know me well and know, that ifff there by chance is a morsel in easy reach, I will feed them.

 

They were VERY agitated , so I in turn knew, that there was something, that they could smell and they WANTED IT!

Oh, right! Yet again we had lost the “hydro” = electricity a few days ago, due to a snow storm. This is a sad, but rather regular occurrence here. The overland line neeeeeds to get fixed, but the city does not want to spend the money….

When we loose power, all the cottagers usually throw out, whatever was in their fridges and freezers.

No wonder, the Ravens were going “nuts”

Yes, there was a whole chicken, a leg of lamb, still sealed in cellophane, best before date march 2017 and lots of other goodies. I got a knife, opened some stuff and tossed it into the bush behind the large containers. The Ravens descended onto their feast…..

You are welcome, guys! What you can not drag away, the Foxes will get and that in turn will save the lives of a few Snowshoe Hares and a dozen Mice. Mice however are food for Owls and as you all know…. me and Owls…..

OK, back home – But wait!??

Why is this there plastic bag “shimmering and glimmering” in this all soooo very familiar shaman sight way?

What is inside?

More Raven food?

Oh! yes and NO!

Inside the wall mart bag is a little lost Soul.

A local one.

A little Green Winged Teal.

Shot right through the chest.

Stuffed into the bag – for what?

And now- thrown away.

Still beautiful in its very own sad way.

 

“Poor little Duck” I said. “Maybe I should take you home. Thaw you out, take your wings and make something beautiful, then put your body outside for Dilgi, our local Fox….

I did.

A day later a Spirit Release ceremony took place in our kitchen.

Then I took the wings, stretched them out and mounted them on a piece of Styrofoam to dry them.

It will take at least 6 months, until I can get to work on them.

I will report back, when that time comes.

For now,fly well little Green Duck! ♥

Run!!!!

Coming home from last night’s Haudenosaunee Harvest Social there was a freshly killed Snowshoe Hare in the middle of the Road. Dinner for our Raccoon family? It was still warm and so we decided, that the Raccoons would have to share with us. So this morning I first sang a “Soul returning Home” chant and then butchered the Rabbit. There was lots of goodies for the coons; head, lower legs, rib cage and innards, but we do not much like bloody smeary messes on our upper deck, so I brought these out to our organic composting place.

Something was rattling inside the large black bin.

I carefully opened the lid, expecting one of our Coons, but a little baby Bear jumped out, right at me and then scampered of into the bush.

I knew, what THAT meant:

MOM!!!!!!!

And sure enough a large black hulk appeared between the low bushes, huffed at me and proceeded to chase me halfway back to the house…..

 

I ran!

.

This was NOT Windwalker, the Lady Bear who knows me/ us, but one of her now adult daughters, now a mother herself, probably for the first time.

Best, to teach her in no uncertain ways, that she ALWAYS will have the “right of way” here on our land and that we are not a thread to her and her cub.

This will assure us, that later, she will simply ignore us when we accidentally meet up somewhere in the bush.

Eagle Power 130 000 years ago!

I just can not resist to post this  exiting find here!

Neanderthals were creating and wearing Eagle talon jewellery!

It speaks not only to their undoubted intelligence and sophistication but also gives us a glimpse into their belief system.

http://news.ku.edu/2015/02/12/neanderthal-jewlery-discovery-sheds-new-light-cognitive-abilities-human-predecessors

Eagles were special – to at least some of them.

As they are for my ancestors in Siberia.

Still today some of the hunters of the Siberian and Mongolian steppes use Eagles as hunting companions.

From an Eagle’s nest only ever the smallest, the runt, the “spare” was taken. The one usually hacked to death by its older siblings or being starved…..

That one my People took and hand raised and trained to hunt for Foxes, Rabbits, Pheasants, Birds and other small game.

When the Eagle was with the family for 12 winters, it was the ritual to let him/ her go free the following spring.

So the bird could mate and raise a family of its own.

From its nest the smallest chick, the runt was taken…… 

… not before a food offering was placed where the adult Birds would easily find it.

This tradition is ancient – and maybe even crossed from our Ancestor Elders over to our Human Elders.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Of Medicine Bags and Anti Matter:

Well, we all know by now, what a Medicine Bag is.

New Year Birthing Pouch

I do have – and daily use – several of them.

Crystal Pouch Black Beaver Fur

I also make some – for others on the path – you have seen the pictures and there are several that I am working on right now….

Maybe you have one as well, a Medicine Bag, for the things, that matter…..

But –

Oh boy! Friends are coming over and I better clean up!

There is dirt and what not EVERYWHERE!!!!!!

So out comes the vacuum cleaner! Mine is oooooold – and scruffy and shamefully dirty. He – he makes a lot of noise and so he is a “He”

He is from the first days, when we build our log house, when we did not even have inside walls and doors and no money for buying insulation….. 1992 . He was young and shiny then. So was I. To be honest, on an every day morning the 2 of us look a lot alike! Scruffy!

He is the one in charge of Anti Matter! With a loud howling sound he swallows everything that I allow him to – and then some….

In his belly is the bag of Anti Matter!

So, what exactly is it, that I consider “bad” what do I neeed to get rid of in a hurry, before my friends are coming?

Lets see, I say and just pick up, whatever is on the – once white and now muddled grey wool carpet from behind the couch.

A perfect example:

A Wolf hair!

I am working on another Wolf Pouch, but by falling off my project this hair changed from Sacred matter to – ?dirt?

That can’t be right…..??

Then there is a small piece of Cedar twig,

several Spruce needles,

hair from my white mohair sweater,

a loooooong windy grey hair – from me.

Some small pieces of wood – from the wood Peter brings into the house every day to keep us warm.

One is Maple bark and the other is some mushy pulp from the centre of a hollow log.

Listed like this you sense, each and every one of these has some Medicine Powers!

Just imagine, what kind of magical spell could be worked with these ingredients!

Well let’s face it, there is also a Mouse turd. 😦

Honestly, I have NO idea, how many Beings live in this house!

OK, there are Peter and me,

at least 3 Flying Squirrels in the attic,

4 or 5 Spiders – so far.

We get them inside with the wood where they have hibernated and when in the warmth of the living room they wake up and crawl about sleepily. Hopefully they do, because otherwise we might not see them and…. (every piece of wood gets inspected, before it goes into the stove….)

If we see spider or other critter on the wood, it ends up downstairs in Peter’s workshop in Fran’s flowers,

Apropos Beings in the house: There are our winter guests = Fran’s monstrous flowers which we keep for her so they do not die on her veranda. Then there are some of our “over winterers” and all the plant beings on the window sill in the living room. I have not counted them – (leaves pooooooter to do just that…)

– Well, as of right now, there are 49 Plant Beings living in this house.

And yes, I am avoiding the subject of how many Mouse Beings…..

Usually we catch them in life traps and bring them – per car (= gas money) about 4 km away to the meadow of an abandoned farm and let them go there.

But in winter that is not an option. They would have neither food stores nor a nest and would freeze to death, so usually catch them and keep them in a terrarium until April. But Mice do often not like mice from other families and then they fight in there until the death of one fraction. So to avoid that we in other years had up to 3 terrariums with different mouse families… BUT:

When one Mouse is not scent marking her territory (because we caught it..) another Mouse moves in and so there will ALWAYS be one mouse family in the house…..This year I decided, not to catch them and see… So far so good.

A turd here or there, but otherwise no sign of any secret house inhabitants…..

So, back to the matter of the Anti Matter:

A medicine bag full of my/ our specific Anti matter contains almost no an-organics like plastic or metal – well, maybe the odd bead that rolled of my beading table and did not get picked up….

So when the belly of the Hoover Monster is full, where will I put its contents?

Open it up and release the Anti Matter back to where it matters= next to the organic compost, where it too can return to being – – just Matter.

 

A box with wings:

 

A little warning:

This is a rather bloody post, so iffff you are a bit squeamish, please skip this one…..

I am putting it here mainly for all my international students to get an idea, as to how to preserver the Birds wings that you so often see dressed up and used as smudging fans in my shamanic art posts.

Owl wing wand

Usually, you – or we drive down the country road – and there, on the side is a traffic victim, a little bloody, but in all rather fresh and you wonder, how you could save its feathers. .

Well, you will have to get a plastic bag and start plucking ….. and then respectfully put the remains aside for brother Fox to find the coming night. But what, if you want to preserve and use the magnificent wings?

Sure you could take your find home and then work on it there…. But so often I hear: ”Yeah, we found a Hawk, but we were on a road trip and we could only take a few feathers instead of the full wings and talons……”

First of all, equip your car with what you will need:

1 sharp poultry shears

2. a hefty end cutter

3. a sharp knife

4. large styrofoam plates – the ones from the meat department of the grocery store or from Styrofoam packing material you have recycled.

5. a box with medium sized safety pins – to pin down wings and talons onto the styrofoam plate- or, if need be, the carpet of your car……

6. some kind of string – to straighten out talons

7. rubber bands – to straighten out talons

8 .assorted sizes of plastic bags – for fresh items – and for feathers

9. bungee cords – to tie something onto the roof or the back bumper

This will become your Bird tool kit and come in handy for other “finds” as well.

On the little trip to Manitoulin Island that I talked about in the previous post,

leaving the Pow Wow and driving south we found first a Sharp Shinned Hawk.

Into a large bag he went and with bungee cords tied to the roof rack. Only minutes later there was another Bird on the road:

A perfectly beautiful Merlin! Only he was dead:(

We bagged him as well.

In the motel I went to work:

Sage and cedar for a fare well and a chant to find home and to come back 7 generations from now, in a little egg in a nest… grow up healthy and strong… far away from any cars and road traffic…..

Then, tears aside, out came the shears and the promise to make something beautiful and honourable from the parts I take……

I cut the wings right at the shoulder joints

plucked from breast and back feathers what I knew I could use,

plucked the tail feathers

cut the legs at the knee joints

took some cedar boughs from outside and drove to the next secluded wood lot to bury the remains facing East

Yes, there was another chant and some more tears…..

Then, back at the motel I went to work.

I washed the blood of wings and feathers and dried them off

We would be on the road for the next few days and so now I needed a secure place, where to pin the wings and where they could stay – undisturbed.

Out of the back hatch came all our stuff. Cars are upholstered these days and there was carpet material in/ on the bottom of the trunk. Into this I pinned my fully stretched out wings using the safety pins = one at the bottom of the first primary and one into the lower back skin, so the wing stretches straight out.

I put some newspaper over the wings and a floor mat on top of that. Then all our luggage and stuff could go on top and would not make any damage.

The talons need stretching.

Pin then into the styrofoam tray. 3 front claws , on back claw. Then attach a string to the upper part of the leg bone and straighten it 90 degrees. with a safety pin peg the string so this position is secured. You also can use rubber bands as I did later with my “wing box”

At home of course you have to retrieve your wings and pin them to styrofoam or stiff cardboard. When I got home I used my pinning box – an old styrofoam ice chest.

Inside the box you see the perfect Merlin wings at the sides and the smaller reddish wings of a female Kestrel, that, sadly,we found the next day. One of her wings is quite damaged and what I will do with it I will see, when all is dry. In the middle all the talons are straightened out using a central chop stick and string as well as rubber bands.

On the outside of the box I pinned the Sharp Shinned Hawk wings.

It will take at least 3 months, until the wings are dried enough to be worked on and inserted into a decorated wooden handle can begin their life as a smudging fan.

The talons may even take a bit longer and may then adorn a Hawk Medicine Staff

The feathers I harvest, I always put into a plastic bag and then they go into the freezer for 48 hours, to kill off any mites and other “critters” that live in feathers. After that they are ready to use.

 

Hawk Staff