Category: Musings

Child, Heal Thyself: Angels, Ancestors, & Spirits of Place

Reverend JanglebonesLeave a comment

When I first began sputtering out heretical medieval prayers in dim candlelight over poorly drawn copies of differently poorly drawn abstract squiggles and trying myself in knots straining to relax my mind enough to make out the subtlest of angelic imagery and messages, I genuinely had no idea what the hell I was doing.

When I first set up an ancestor shrine and began an elevation with no preparations or research other than the gut feeling that it needed done and that first night when that bowl of soup, by that time lukewarm for hours, split down the middle with a soul shattering crack– I had no idea what the hell I was doing or getting myself into then, either.

And those times in the end it all worked out. I learned a lot. There have been plenty of other times though, where it didn’t quite work out so well, times when I was afraid to utter even a prayer for months and swore off any intentional spirit contact whatsoever. But I also lost a lot of time, not from my mistakes, or these quiet periods of healing in between bruises, but from the innumerable opportunities for progression which I simply didn’t have the bandwidth to notice. Likely thanks to a constant assessment of whether or not I was doing it right and the energy spent on the continuous search for someone else by which to measure these repeating assessments.

The truth turned out to be much simpler than I imagined. Once upon a time there was an anxiety leading up to every ritual which was mostly based on assumptions about how things should go while doing my magic. I used to be afraid to leave where I stood or break my attention away from what I was doing, even for a minute. Perhaps I was mistaking everything but grimoire spirits for grimoire spirits? It’s hard to say. But nowadays I don’t even hesitate to catch the planetary prayer to open the ritual with five minutes to spare then take a break to prepare should the need arise, and it often does because these days I run a lot on intuition and instinct. In fact the one thing I am now sure of that I wish like hell I had figured out way earlier is that almost every time I was worried that I hadn’t prayed enough lately, that I had been slacking on the attention I had been giving spirits, that I wasn’t a real magician if I wasn’t doing this way or that way, that a lot of these times in question the spirits involved absolutely could not give a shit one way or another what the fuck I was doing.

After long enough, I started sinking into myself more, figuring out that I still have to be me. Even when I’m at my best. And that’s, well, it’s something all right.

Worrying that I hadn’t prayed enough lately came from the false belief that there is some sort of pious expectation that exists in the world independent of my unique relationship to prayer and the spirits to whom I pray, which is understandable for someone with a Christian upbringing, but also objectively insane, at the worst, and at best simply not a functional, relational, animist way of thinking.

Worrying that I had been slacking on the attention I had been giving the spirits with whom I worked came from a couple of places- The first and most obvious being the classic fear of abandonment, as it is the plight of those terrified of being left in the dust who distort themselves in order to keep the company of another. And the second source of this projection came from the fear that doing what I now know and practice as correct, that is the intuitive freedom of relinquishing all expectations of consistency, would get me into trouble due to an unnoticed discrepancy between what is expected and what is given. I was scared my spirits would feel cheated and be mad, but it’s more than that. This is a fear of being replaceable and unimportant, even to those one works with intimately. Which sounds a lot like retail or the service industry, to be quite honest.

This is the demon of anxiety that possesses us at the crossroads where the affects of the industrial revolution and 40+ years of psyop and MK research meet up in the commercial breaks in our Saturday morning cartoons. These roads, paved before we arrived, host the car crash of our expectations and our lives of infinite dreams and limited servitude. The result of this, aside from general malaise, is the norm that we do not understand what is expected of us until it is too late.

This is the mechanism of bureaucracy. This is a picture of an authoritarian abuse cycle and, not merely poorly drawn and maintained personal boundaries and comprehension of one’s expectations, but also the overseers systemically assuring that these metaphysics could not thrive even if they were somehow brought into the light of day as realities- That is to say, we don’t ever feel we know what is expected and the consequences of admitting that could be worse than pretending. I was projecting this mess onto my spirits and worrying that they weren’t getting enough frankincense. Seriously, I must’ve looked like a metaphysical ball of yarn.

Which brings me to one of the most important messages I ever received from an angel: Child, heal thyself. Which has been pretty much what I have been doing for several years now. Just cleaning out pipes and gutters in the temple of my life, all the charged moments that hold a person back from being here, now.

A lot of those were mine, but in equal measure they have turned out to be the moments, the wounds of the dead. Not just those blood-related to me, but also those with whom I share land and place. It was a process with no guardrails and no one with a method that worked for me as most required journeying in one’s mind, but with the sheer volume of spiritual and emotional static I was subject to on the daily there was no hope of me successfully doing the necessary work through these methods. What followed was, when etched out with other techniques and areas of practice and out of sheer necessity, became my Magical Fortitude: Ancestors & Place course which I have been facilitating for over a year now in private groups.

The idea that one single source of one’s unease may exist is almost surely a wrong one, thus it becomes necessary for us to cover our bases if we want to exist in a state of mental peace, stability, and equanimity. Another immutable aspect of this full-spectrum relationship-mending process is our relationship to the often already abused and ignored spirits of the land. This troubled aspect can be daunting, however as strong and foreign as they can be there seems to be an element of them simply wishing to exist in the wider human perception, a strikingly understandable desire.

Not long ago my wife, the priest of this parish, and I went for a walk out on the path behind our house. There had been machines going all day long, clearing brush and doing their seasonal trimming. She had a lot on her mind that day and the conversation, and our minds, were focused on very human things. So much so that we didn’t even notice one of our cats mewing at the ground as if he was in mourning, with such sadness, and pissing little trickles on all the cut ivy and wildflowers, just a bit at a time, as if an offering or a medicine.

We walked past the 800+ year-old church where she performs services and down the long lane with giant old trees flanking either side and talked about how shitty it was that they cut down one of the trees back there behind the house. How it was an older one and it definitely wasn’t something that had to go. We talked about how she was the caretaker of the people here and I was learning to be the caretaker of the spirits, how we made the perfect team.

Later that evening while watching TV I had deja vu. Instead of letting it pass it was surprisingly easy to sort of grab it like I often do when a fragment of a dream memory flashes across my mind and follow it. The oddest thing happened then. I followed it, not to somewhere in the imaginal, or to some invisible abstraction from another place, but through our very living room and to the front door of our house. When my attention arrived there I was overwhelmed with the feeling of both an old friend and a callous enemy who cared nothing for our well being, simultaneously.

My eyes began to stream tears and my whole body perked up with goosebumps. My wife’s wide eyes mirrored my own and she was crying too. She described to me the exact same scene and feeling and action that I was experiencing- Someone barging into our home with zero regard for our existence.

This kept repeating as if stuck in a time loop, as if the moment was trying to fully happen and couldn’t. Just there in limbo, with our space being violated.

And then it hit us. The tree, the cat, the proclamation that I was a caretaker of this place and it’s spirits.

I shifted my attention to the felled tree and the meadow behind our house and everything else also shifted. The anger turned in an instant into utter anguish. It was the consolation-less agony of one who was deeply wronged and remained invisible, the feeling of being stepped on and forgotten.

What came through me was entirely out of my control. It was a moaning, a wailig. I wept like a mother who lost a child with emotions which were not my own. They came hard and fast, but they were not angry or violent as they had initially threatened. The immense release that came through me was a deep purple-black, like the ashes of royalty.

And then it was over- A fact that was almost just as unbelievable as it happening in the first place.

My wife was watching, breathless. I told her with puffy face and a scope of perspective which I am still processing now, two months later, that “It just needed to be seen.” And she immediately put the rest together. That we must have felt just like the spirit of the meadow did, intruded upon, disregarded, with someone busting down our door and nobody giving a shit how horrible that was for us. That it registered as a frightening alien and also an old friend simultaneously, echoing the lost relationship between the people here and it’s spirits of place and the resulting apocalyptic landscaping. That in it’s moment of need all logic would suggest the spirit of the land would, when in duress, seek out as witness (and a release valve for their trauma) the person who not only believes in them, but also regularly gives offerings and thanks to them. And that even if someone is bigger, stronger, and unfathomably older than you, sometimes even they just need to be seen, heard, held.

And going back, what would have happened if my mind had been so cluttered with self doubt and logical assessments of progress that I had missed that deja vu altogether? At the very least it would make me a sub-par caretaker.

There is no manual for this experience. No matter how many more books I made myself read I could not have been prepared for this experience, and it seems that most of the worthwhile ones show up in a similar fashion.

I’ve tried to run with this idea in the course work, providing a sort of fuzzy formula while encouraging personal alterations and insisting that the individual trusts their intuition as the final say. While there are formulaic methods provided in the course which are tried and true for elevating the dead, caring for a cairn to the land spirits, and cutting out unhelpful spirits, the experience of feeling out what works for you and what doesn’t (with community support and without anyone telling you you’re wrong) can be just as valuable as the actual work itself.

If you’re interested in cutting out some of the unhelpful static and intrusive thoughts, or if you feel called to commune with the land, or even if you just want a framework by which to improve your fundamentals of practice, myself and a slew of other course graduates and participants are here with open arms and ears to witness one another go through the process of healing thyself. Because when I think back on how uptight I was about everything, and how badly I wish someone would have just told me it was cool, that I could relax and do whatever moved me because the heart is a magnet, and not everything was trying to eat me, well it’s difficult to want to do anything else.

MAGICAL FORTITUDE: ANCESTORS & PLACE

(Post art by Kazuki Okuda)

The Mirage of Failure ; Thai Occult Reflections Pt. 2

Reverend JanglebonesLeave a comment

One of the most surprising and profound aspects of stepping into the currents of the Thai occult lies not in the power of the magic or amulets themselves, but the slow realization that there is no separation between the practices aimed at achieving results and those aimed at improving the devotee’s character and cultivating their virtues. Even the act of praising a ghost with whom one works contains within an element of Bhakti-esque adoration and gratitude. It is not so impersonal a relationship as that of an employee to whom one assigns a task, nor are the exchanges exclusively transactional in nature. 

As Jenx discusses in his guest appearance on Nightbird Radio Podcast, the magic of amulets open opportunities to us which we are then beckoned to grow into. The doors opened by the magic of amulets do not take the effort out of living, but push us to put forth even more through the new possibilities which unfold before us. This and the central dynamics of Merit, as discussed in my previous post, create a system which encourages virtue and kindness as a means to bettering oneself and actually making the magic work better, which is consciously for the sake of primarily the self however the necessary actions and changes in thinking this brings to one’s life has far more profound and far reaching effects. For the self, yes, but more importantly these changes unavoidably have a positive impact on those in our lives and communities. 

This perfectly illustrates the illusory colonial categorizing which draws a defining line through our Western practices based on the intent of the practitioner rather than the objective effect. If one improves their life through the use of purely results based magic and this alleviates suffering, providing the practitioner has a sense of connectedness and gratitude, does their comfort and joy not then radiate to those in their vicinity? Does a removal of hardship combined with the co presence of awe not create a sort of grace?

And on the other hand, does the theurge and alchemist not improve their luck by toiling in their inner work, shedding layers of trauma, static, and illusion? Does anyone actually believe that this doesn’t have dramatic life improving effects for both the individual and their relationships as well as the success of their magic? By clearing out the static of overactive egos, excessive thoughts and self reflections, are not all the results desired in life closer to reach?

The categorical split between theurgy and thaumaturgy seems, upon examination, to be yet another useless, excessive categorization which only further confuses our dynamic with the living world. Thinking in these terms is subtly suggestive in that it preemptively limits potential. The attitude and archetype of “make things happen for me” is, if not embedded, at least connected by cultural context within the concept of pure thaumaturgy. Perhaps not inherently, but when woven together with a Western psyche so shaped by commerce, commercial, and marketing that many of our first words were from TV, the danger of missing out on valuable lessons for the assumption that they do not exist within the current chosen modality, like a shadow beneath the colossus of capitalist selfishness, is a very real and present malaise.

Lessons exist anywhere we are willing to find them. And even more so with spirit work. Failure can only be measured by one’s inability to learn from the unexpected. Failure is literally just the unexpected happening to a person and their inability to address the invaluable data which is presenting itself. If one is capable of learning from each of their experiences, the concept of failure itself is a fallacy, as one advances more through the insight gained through the unexpected than when things go as intended. 

This is always true.

One must consider that these unexpected experiences may be gifts and our framing of them may prevent our acceptance and comprehension thereof. Which in a living world seems sort of rude, if we’re being honest. 

In the Thai occult, many Ajarns were ordained and trained as monks before embarking upon their magical training for the simple and obvious reason that it makes their magic work better. Here we have a total lack of imaginary line drawn between these two modalities. This is not an example of future thaumaturges dabbling in theurgy as it may seem, as monks are masters of many practices us Westerners would not hesitate to refer to as magic. This is about future magicians learning virtues and wisdom, connecting to higher deities, and developing their skills through practices that are undeniably worthwhile. This does not improve their magic, but the entire self. 

To be more capable, less vulnerable, and possess equanimity, combined with practices which improve intensity and duration of focus poises a future Ajarn to train under many masters without the ego preventing their progress. They have the stability to learn from mistakes without the ego knocking them off course. Their emotional tranquility prevents them from making enemies unnecessarily and closing off potential opportunities to them. And their intimate understanding of the very real metaphysics of Merit and Karma maintain their helpful nature and prevent them from taking advantage of others through their power.

To attempt to draw a line here between two types of practice would not only be silly, but damaging. It seems important to consider how far into our minds and metaphysics our subtle cultural and economic norms and resting philosophies have woven their tendrils. For our sake, and that of our neighbors.

Making Merit ; Thai Occult Reflections Pt. 1

Reverend Janglebones1 Comment

    Within the various interweaving strands of the Thai occult as illuminated through the bold and groundbreaking hands-on work of Peter Jenx there can be found a seemingly endless variety of spirits, ghosts, amulets, lineages, and knowledge. These widely reaching and sometimes drastically differing techniques and teachings can, however, be linked by a metaphysical common denominator which not only creates a medium for the individual parts to interact seamlessly as one unified system, but additionally causes this overarching umbrella to become, at least generally speaking, benefic.

    Buddhism is that common denominator in many ways, but a specifically metaphysical analysis proves more effective for the purpose of identifying and rehabilitating of our own magical blind spots, the wounds we cannot see until reflecting back from outside our own culture and mindset.

    In Western Magic, meant primarily as shorthand for the colonizing world’ and it’s European tributaries’ magical descendants, can be found a historically clinical or transactional view of spirit interactions and magic, one which is likely an unfortunate artifact of both reductionist logic and materialist machine-world philosophy. Animist views are not entirely absent in the West, and far less so with the passing of recent years, though it still seems to be a far less relational, vulnerable, and cooperative modality which gets represented in our literature, teachings, and thinking when compared to those of cultures whose animist roots have remained intact as a part of both their philosophy and identity, such as with Thailand and Burma as represented in Jenx’s work, as in Japan with Shinto, or some of the later intrusions by the Roman Catholic church upon indigenous lifeways in which cases little was removed from the indigenous practices when compared to earlier crusades.

    In the case of the Thai occult there is one element which is so simple, so obvious once it has been understood, and so liberating once it has been employed, that one almost feels as if waking from a long dark dream, a pessimist’s facsimile of life. This single metaphysical component to the Thai occult systems can have such profound impacts on the individual that if one were to hypothesize that all those amulets were just a trick to seed the idea of this single element into the minds of Westerners through a trojan horse of desire, I would say amen and hallelujah.

The concept of Merit is not entirely foreign to us Westerners. The Catholic Church teaches that a reward in heaven is promised for meritorious works, however they unsurprisingly complicate things by breaking this down into three distinct types, getting together with Lutherans and arguing about it until the whole thing was presumably more trouble than it was ever worth to them. But the idea of good deeds as spiritual currency remains, well, meritorious.

We can find this concept employed as magical technology within prayers to the dead, Anima Sola, and in the invocations following Christian prayer and evocation which invoke the “Merits of Jesus Christ,” of which there are presumed to be a great many, in order to persuade and command spirits. When a spirit is being cajoled by Merits rather than offerings or even the blood of the Savior, this alone should inform us of the power and potency of this non-substance in the realm of spirit, and perhaps a renegotiation of our definition of “heaven” could assist us in providing the above Roman Catholic sentiment on the subject with some much needed immediacy of application. 

Heaven, when seen as an analog for the spirit realm which exists in, with, and through the physical (here in the present rather than in an abstraction of the future) becomes suddenly and miraculously liberated from inaction and comes to rest comfortably within a sound, living, active, and most importantly immediate mystical logic.

In the Thai occult and it’s “funny sort of Buddhism” as Jenx lovingly refers to it, the concept and practice of making Merit is central. Within an animist culture, where belief in the unseen is common, the idea of a spiritual record of one’s deeds would seem more tangible, less ethereal. Adding to that the Buddhist understanding of Karma places the idea of Merit further into the real world than you or I can likely comprehend.

I can recall, as a child, being in touch with my true heart’s desires. Mostly I wanted to help and be included. I wanted to give, to do good. It was simple. But over time the disenchanted denizens of the world impressed their ways upon me, seeding fear into my soil. Fear that a good deed unnoticed truly counts for nothing, and that generosity will be met with selfishness in equal measure as a rule.

To put it simply, the fear of getting fucked wormed its way into my heart.

The underlying and under examined materialist philosophy which supported these patterns of thought and action acted as a setting agent in the concrete wall so carefully constructed around a once generous soul. Because if nobody up there was keeping score, the whole thing was a damn wash. The same bureaucratic bone grinder that runs the human world must be in charge of the whole thing.

The thing about all this is, it’s fucking wrong.

If you don’t believe me, go do something nice for someone, go home to your altar, think of the good deed in your mind while pulling in a spirit friend, and offer the good deed to them. Feed the moment of the act to your spirit ally with a generous heart. Hold that shape for a moment and you will feel a response. Try it. Try it with your ancestors. Try it with the land spirits. The inherent truth in merit as spiritual currency is self evident in practice.

We live in one world, with each explanation for how it all works being its own sort of true. But here we have a clear an obvious universal metaphysical technology, one which shows up in multiple places and times and functions cross culturally and beyond borders of tradition or lifeways. The implications of this are staggering and liberating.

No longer does that voice in the back of my head that nags about getting either rewarded or screwed over have an audience with me. The rug has been swept clean out from under that prick, and he absolutely had it coming. The rug is rolling up around him in layer after layer of surrender and lovingkindness.

I encourage everyone to try this.

Go out on a limb: be kind.

Even if just to prove me wrong.

Different for Necro Nerds?

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When we moved to Northern Germany, two gravediggers from my wife’s parish helped us move south just across the border. We had been denied our Family Reunification in Denmark and so this Priest and Wizard couple were forced to relocate to stick together.

My wife, who officiates funerals, and myself, who facilitates a course that teaches ancestral healing and working with the dead, were literally carried by graveyard attendants to the south and across a border during a Mercury retrograde.

Now, over half a year later, we have finally been approved to move home to Denmark and to the quiet village we call home. Interestingly, the approval news came upon Danish Liberation Day, a significant nod from the spirits during these tyrannical times, which also happens to be beloved Danish philosopher and father of existentialism Søren Kirkegaard’s birthday. This is especially significant to us, as he has always been important to my wife and I was reading him when I first visited Denmark at age 17- I didn’t even know he was Danish and I had gone on a walk by the sea when I discovered a giant stone memorial to him, blowing my little mind.

So standing here, looking at everything and the kitchen sync, and getting ready to move again during retrograde, I’m forced to ask myself, honestly; Is it different for necromancers?

It’s impossible to say how much of the following is because of any given factor, but I find the shape of it worth glancing at here. As someone who has debilitating ADD, I notice different frequencies of thought fairly acutely. In a similar fashion to the way a pure sativa will send your thoughts into an electric, active, bristling dynamism but indica will create a dreamy slow, hungry, smooth, deep river, so do I experience rational thought and emotional thought as high and low. One is in the head, one is in the belly and heart. 

This experience of thought spectrum is useful. If I think too many thinky thoughts I get overloaded, my momentum spins out of control (what my parents would call getting wound up when I was little, which still feels right to this day) and this can be instigated by just too much sensory input.

So what I’ve noticed in MercRx is that those high frequency logic thoughts simply don’t get as loud and out of hand as they usually do. And that the lower frequencies are all dialed up. And I fucking like this. 

If communication feels like too much of a struggle I just give up, stop trying. Feel things out in that lower register instead. That’s often the state I’m already reaching for in daily prayer, there’s just less static to slough off in Rx times.

I like it here.

So I’m just wondering, am I the only one? Am I the only weirdo out there who moves during retrograde, who prefers his thoughts to break down easily and communication to be forced into a more earthy, bodily modality? 

And is this because I feel so pulled to working with the dead, or is my pull to the dead because of my ADD? 

I have no answers. 

Only stories and questions.

Ahriman & Cyprian

Reverend Janglebones1 Comment

Two conversations I listened to recently got me buzzing inside in that way that most things don’t after a certain age. It was one of those ideas that takes your current mode of thought and crumbles it calmly in its hand and stares at you blankly, indifferent to your reactionary protests. The talks in mind were both featuring everybody’s favorite sex-positive theosophist Conner Habib (once on his own show with Alkistis Dimech and Peter Grey, the other on Rune Soup as a guest) and feature some difficult concepts relating to Rudolph Steiner’s work on a being called Ahriman. Now, I’m no Steinerite nor am I even well-versed in his work, however the characteristics of Ahriman are a matter I believe most of us can identify as alive and active in the world today. There is something about the personification and inspiriting-through-myth of these forces in the persona of Ahriman that somehow makes the task of grappling with such dark and mechanistic powers a bit more manageable.

Ahriman is a far older being than Steiner’s work, though his prophecy and interpretation seems to have pulled this being from the abstractions of ancient (or the reinterpretations present-day) Zoroastrianism into a practically-applicable contemporary relevance. Steiner’s vision of Ahriman is one of a being who possesses no framework or capacity for empathy or compassion, meaning there is a deficit in its ability to relate. For a being that is conscious and alive, having no ability to form a sense of realness or aliveness in relation to the Other would reduce the possibilities of interaction so acutely that self-expression would necessarily be limited to such truly meaningless and contextless acts as the application of force, increase of efficiency, volume, output, or any other factor which is void of a deeper relational meaning but have a visible, measurable, material impact on the world. Complex expression relies upon the way one identifies, relates, and adapts with the Other, therefore without empathy one would likely exist in a world where everything (and everyone) else is perceived as unconscious, un-aware. All feedback data relating to the nuance of well-being, coherence, sentiment, joy, pain, or trauma would all be purged as irrelevant and the being in question would never respond to cries of pain, unless these data indicated that they were disrupting its self-expression or efficiency, or could be employed as manipulative tools to increase these factors over time. 

Now, if this shape is beginning to set off some alarms, bouncing off of literally everything you know about financial tycoons, late-stage capitalism, and the frenzied conversion of earth-matter into profit then I’d say your’re getting the picture. These tangible phenomena seem to be the impact of Ahriman expressing itself in our world via technological and human means, though as with the tyrannical uber rich who pull the strings behind the scenes- you can’t really fight these forces head-on, lest you find yourself destroyed by them, or worse, subsumed. 

Regardless of which version you’re familiar with, the essential structure of the hagiography of Saint Cyprian remains in place. A powerful character, Cyprian, finds great gains in being capable of manipulating the world through the force of magic, presumably making his living and enjoying notoriety, but primarily the satisfaction of being somehow superior to others. A full commitment to being powerful enabled him to disregard other human concerns and become a magic-learning machine, until he encountered an anomaly. The faithful Saint Justina was able to thwart the very best of Cyprian’s sorcery with nothing more than faith and the sign of the cross, an act that should have, by his accounts, been impossible. This was far more than a simple defeat; this was an existential crisis. Cyprian had gladly given himself to the Devil in exchange for power and there had yet to be an instance in which this power fell short. This was a restructuring of Cyprian’s cosmology to include the impossible, to adapt to the idea that the most powerful being he had ever encountered may have been a small fry, and the subsequent awe and humility one cannot escape from following a reality disruption of this magnitude.

Now, currently we are experiencing Ahriman hard at work in zee fourth industrial revolution. It is mining all of our data, creating digital twins of us to be used in predictive simulations for social and carbon credit systems, predetermined education and career paths, advertising, law enforcement, military training and psyops, and the creation of new human futures markets which literally make us livestock. This means that as someone watches their marriage fall apart, or slips into addiction, or becomes suicidal due to the ever-unfolding consequences of lockdowns, job loss, foreclosures, closed businesses, and mysterious lingering health issues, every change in behavior from social media scrolling to their phone microphone may as well be the eyes and ears of Ahriman observing, learning, and formulating new strategies to make the world better (by force) through future manipulations. As stated, this isn’t the kind of thing one can wage war on, so what do we do? 

And this brings us to Conner’s point about our human responsibility to humanize this being which has made its firm arrival into our world. We have an obligation to our realm to be a living example of that which is both irrational and illogical, but inherently human. Conner shared in those talks that he had come to understand that the only option is for us humans to grow Ahriman a heart. If we can’t fight it, and we can’t make it go away, logic dictates that we must somehow learn to live with it. This idea was the aforementioned hand that crumbled up my previous mode of thought and watched it sift through fingers to the floor. In the Rune Soup episode, he said he wasn’t quite ready for the task. And me neither, not directly. But it also got me thinking of practically how we would go about this work of offering compassion to an enemy. How do we do the thing?

We do this by defying Ahriman’s expectations. We find our center and we dig deep for calm and compassion when we don’t feel up to it. Like when we’ve been stuck in the house with the same person(s) for weeks at a time and we speak kindly when we want to scream. Like when everyone around you is a toxic mess who doesn’t deserve your respect and you give it to them anyway. Like when the future seems incredibly dark and we still find it in our hearts to whistle as we stroll, to lose ourselves in the resplendent joy of being. Like when a mechanistic intelligence from another world is invading yours and you throw a wrench in its gears by being the compassionate outlier, the factor that won’t behave predictably and selfishly. Because the anomalies will not be ignored by this being. When by all accounts you should break, but you don’t, it breaks the predictive logic of the machine. It suggests that there is another power at play, one it hadn’t considered formidable, or hadn’t considered at all. This power is very much invisible and it is an absolute mystery. It is the same power that Justina found in her savior, the one she imbued in the triple cross. The very same that thwarted Cyprian and the Devil thrice, the anomaly that makes saints of scoundrels and adheres that which would otherwise be desiccated. It is the power that restructured Cyprian’s understanding of, and relationship with, power itself. It is the anomalous expression of this power which will, over time, force Ahriman to include factors in its computations which it currently deems irrelevant. It is this power that saves us all, but is reduced by its compartmentalized verbal utterance, therefore I care not to say it outright here. It doesn’t need to be mentioned. It’s more of a thing to be done.

Redefine, Man..

Reverend Janglebones2 Comments

I never much identified with other boys or men growing up, at least not any that I met in the waking world of direct and tangible consequences. Sure, I spent some of the countless daydreaming hours of childhood in roles that were decidedly masculine such as saving princesses or leveling battlefields single-handedly, but in most cases I was riding my dragon friend, exploring fantastic new worlds, hanging on every moment of my imaginal high-adventures and even in those hetero-boy dreams the enemies I was leveling were representations of phenomena I was gleaming from waking life observations about human habit and character, and the princess was almost always a swashbuckler like myself. It was not uncommon for me to imagine myself being saved by said princess-wizard or princess-witch, or even princess lizard-warrior-person; whatever I was into that week. I think it was about the intimacy of trust and surrender, more than anything; things I couldn’t find in waking life when I was young.

My brief foray into team sports was forced upon me and consisted of a constant barrage of the very worst of homophobic slurs and hate-speech and a whole lot of chewed-up sunflower seeds projectile-launched into my hair and face, all straight from the mouths of creatures who called themselves “boys” but seemed to me more like mistakes that we had collectively made as a species and a prime directive for birth control for future generations of forward thinkers. Yes, I was that cynical when I was twelve.

Years went by and there was a brief time when I thought it reasoned out for me to forego the title of “man” altogether. Gender-fluidity is an attractive creature. We are all a compilation, an unique master-cut gem composed of varying quantities of elements and minerals, forever blessed with striking the eye differently depending on the light, depending on the angle. In this sense gender fluidity is more honest and more accurate for every human person, but eventually it occurred to me that this distinction is only necessary due to the horrific reduction of “male” and “female” down to an harmful obtuseness, an archetype to which autocratic control of the idea is relinquished.

I mean to say that I could take a stance on the way “men” are overwhelmingly problematic by refusing to identify as one, but therein lies a failure on my part be active within the solution: I disagree with, and take offense to, the common conception of what a “man” looks and acts like, but when I choose to identify as something else all my efforts to re-pattern are no longer working towards the reformation of that definition of man. In essence, it’s just easier for me to abandon the man-ship than it is to fight that current and stand for a better idea of what men can be, how they can think of themselves, and how they can be nurturers as well as protectors. Hell, they can even still engage in psychologically healthy, culturally sensitive, well-placed violence when another man is giving us decent broheims a bad name, whether that be through physical conflict (which is another area seeming to lack an abundance of nuanced non fear-based analysis/thinking) or through strategic blog-posts and simply living well and treating others with respect and consideration (but with that secretly satisfying internal victory over all those who threw abuse in my general direction and expected me to become like them.)

I’m not asking anyone to change anything, to be clear. I just feel that this thought process has something worthwhile therein. The areas that need the most attention are the easiest to abandon, and I get that the concept of imagining a better male archetype is not a one-person job. It’s not even a one-generation job, but it’s one that inevitably needs to be done or I presume the collective spiritually conscious “we” will always be fighting the “men” in one way or another. We may not be able to change hearts and minds, but we are certainly familiar with working with ideas as living things. Perhaps that is an apt place to start. I’m not super comfortable with the versions of male archetypes that are running around in minds at-large these days and I’ll bet you’re not either, but if you believe like it do that the imaginal is a real place that is ever-presently interactive with the tangible, then we have a responsibility to start enforcing better ideas. If we abandon the masculine to the erroneous masses, we allow those archetypes to continue thrashing about throwing tantrums disguised as chivalry unchallenged and unchecked throughout the unconscious. We magicians have the upper hand in the realm because we know it’s real. Use it. Feed the good “guys.”

I know for myself Serapis has been a place to begin because, as it turns out in most cases, the fewer stories there are about a male deity the less there is to dislike.

I would love to hear about your own grapplings with masculinity in the comments. No rules just right.

Anyway, it feels good to talk about this. Because as much as I would love to just opt-out, the facts remain that I’m Man. Now it’s a question of how to nurture a non-toxic version of that and manifest it here in waking life as a collective activism and a living example to the emotionally underdeveloped, the testosterone-tweaked, and the just plain ignorant. Every domino that falls may knock two more down. Every time a decent man can show strength in vulnerability, he does the others a favor in striving for balance and providing an example. If enough of us acted as such, the tyrants could find no purchase on the climb to dominance. 

All Those Felonies Saved My Life

Reverend Janglebones2 Comments

Ever since Nixon was in office, the hippies were hugging, and various black-ops projects on psy research were chugging along full-steam, perspective enhancing substances (whether or not they themselves are alive and have agency) have been on the shelf labeled “DO NOT TOUCH” and “POISON.” Two audacious proclamations; The first, a command that seems antithetical in a world full of plants presumed by most lawmakers to have been created by an omnipotent deity. The second, a lie. 

Propaganda, to be more precise. But we now know, as almost common household knowledge, that hallucinogens (a problematic term) can be, essentially, miracle drugs in some cases. 

Appropriate set-and-setting in harmony with appropriate dosage of entheogens (a far better term, thanks Wasson/Hoffman/Ruck et al.) is proving clinically and empirically to treat depression, PTSD, and addiction.

This is where I come in. Two years ago from this very point in time I was regularly using heroin and crack; an almost entirely unrecognizable human creature from the one writing this today. And most of the perspective needed to undertake the unimaginable amounts of healing and growth I had to face when choosing a better reality was made possible because of mushrooms.

Obviously, they don’t get all the credit. I mean, I did have to lose everything in the wake of the walking disaster that was myself in order to prompt the realization that my reality could, in fact, change. But when your brain is literally damaged and you don’t remember what it’s like to feel much of anything outside of a small spectrum, that initial epiphany is not enough to maintain a path toward health. And 12-step meetings, for me, were always torture. Hearing stories from dudes still kicking in the meeting was always just a window into a world where the high still existed, and could thus be acquired. I mean, hell, that guy had some yesterday. Cognitively re-living the same horror did not lead me to freedom, so I didn’t go back this time.

I have since found that I don’t need them to maintain my perspective anymore, but for the crucial stages of recovery, mushrooms it was. I would mostly microdose to get a sense of being “beside myself” in order to gleam a glance at patterns that needed changing. I could work on them if I could see them. And every once in a while it seemed necessary to undergo a more intense communion with the fungus. 

After we had made a significant amount of progress together they quite literally arranged a meeting, to my utter surprise, between myself and Kali Ma. The deconstruction and reconstruction process since has been far smoother, if not just as difficult, but I feel safe, loved, and cared for by a being that has proven her existence beyond time. That’s something!

I find it endlessly fascinating that the fungi introduced me to exactly who I needed to meet. Saturn, Venus, Mercury, and Pluto are in Scorpio on my birth chart (and my natal Sun is only a day from the cusp,) I steam from the ears when women are disrespected (even in that innocent-negligence way, bruh,) and I do not learn quickly or easily; I have to touch the iron myself. The powerful and fearsome body-parts-as-clothing four-armed demon-slaying goddess of Shakti was the teacher I needed and the mushrooms presented me to her without my prompting them for anything other than whatever they thought was best at the time.

I also find it endlessly fascinating that all of this, the healing of my family relationships, starting college for the first time, getting back into my spiritual practice, writing this blog, owning up to my “life-contracts” (as in the ones we make before we come here,) this metamorphosis was all made possible by a thousand little felonies.

I was a criminal when I was useless, and I had to remain one to get better. 

And nobody can change the irrefutable fact that all those felonies saved my life.

❤

Passover to Panspermia in One Very Hot Take

Reverend Janglebones1 Comment

“Man should not live on bread alone. And also sometimes, fuck bread.” -God.

Growing up in a Christian cult, I was lucky enough to participate in many an Old Testament holiday. That’s right; Christmas, Halloween, Easter, birthdays, and anything remotely glistening with festive innocence was dragged kicking and screaming into the spotlight of historical and dogmatic scrutiny and deemed pagan and forbidden. Because nothing says childhood like cynical asceticism. No, I didn’t get fun holidays. I got things like fasting.

This would have all been a boon to my ritually-inclined side if there had been any sort of coherence to the logic behind these rituals that seemed to serve no purpose other than self-punishment, but for little-bitty-Brian, there were no such reasons. I was offered no explanation that fasting, for instance, induced altered states, but instead given a flimsy logic involving frailty and dependence. There was never any sign in my father or mother’s eyes that it made sense to them, only a sense of duty and expectation. Like with taxes.

Even now that I am fully-grown and have my own practice full of ritual, I thought it might provide a way-in to a means of understanding these customs, but Passover was two nights ago and as I helped my grandmother put all the leavened food in a trash bag (one that would not go into the compost pile due to nuanced biblical law but be sent to the landfill to rot amongst non-biodegradables) I couldn’t help but fall into analysis.

The idea of this holy holiday, as I was always taught, is that yeast represents our sin and that for the sake of a ritual exercise, we will expel all sin from our property and lives in order to better understand what it will be like when Christ returns. Now, even if I ignore the irrefutable fact that from a cognitive sensory perspective this essentially equates Jesus’ comeback story with a removal of variety and enjoyment, I cannot ignore the audacity of both referring to something as ubiquitous and ethereally present as yeast as “sin” nor can I fathom what possesses the keepers of this holiday into thinking that something floating in the air around us all the time can ever be purged. You’re literally breathing it, even when you choose to eat flatbread for one week.

Yeast is our friend. The baker is it’s business partner and many of yeasts’ relatives keep your belly producing the right amounts of dopamine. Yeasts are actually fungi and I could literally write a  book (and I am) about the occult relationship between humans and fungi, and I’m not even talking about psilocybin here. Just fungi. The stuff that almost definitely came here from space and transmuted the rock into nutrients for bacteria and eventually plants to thrive on. I’m supposed to equate that with sin? 

In my mind, the numerous myths about the earth-mother or goddess sending forth a spirit to shape the land, a spirit of breath or air, does little in the way of excluding yeast from this perfect world when we consider that it’s ancestors likely shaped this world for us. There is a popular theory that water first came to Earth in the form of a giant frozen ice-cube, we already know that spores can survive being frozen, and some can even survive the vacuum of space. So let’s take a look at a popular story amongst practitioners of this yeast-banishing holiday, just for the sake of occulted perspective, from the viewpoint of the consciousness of the fungi itself, just floating in a block of ice near it’s spores and looking for a place to create a world. Remember ‘waters’ can be frozen and ‘without form and void’ could easily describe the planet pre-H2O.

“In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”

Now what happens when that consciousness in a chunk of ice careening towards our solar system feels the warmth of our sun? After all, you can’t have biological life without heat as far as we know.

“And God saw the light, that it was good. And God divided the light from the darkness.”

Now, if you are floating in space, it would always be daytime. But the second you descend to earth, from your perspective, you would have “created” night and day by “separating” the light from the dark through a change in vantage point.

Then, skipping to verse 6, we get some insight into what it would have been like in the very first days of mushy, water-filled Earth. Hundreds of thousands of years of chemical reactions, gasses forming and expelling, water sinking deeper into the earth before boiling back up into the atmosphere. This was one of the most violent and crazy times on the face of this planet, as the water cycle found its groove.

“And God said, let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.”

And now we have rain, snow, clouds, etc. Due to some findings in 2019, scientists are fairly certain that fungi crawled onto the land long before the beginnings of plants or animals did thus juxtaposing my Genesis thought-experiment with the various messages transmitted to Terrence McKenna by the mushroom consciousness telling the exact same story. Look it up.

Feel free to follow the rest of genesis through the evolution of plants, then animals, and then finally the break in ice ages with God “resting,” and all the while it’s far too easy to imagine yeast’s common ancestor observing the whole thing unfolding through an experience of time that is wholly unlike our own. Anyone who has communed with mushrooms knows that time is not the same for them and they enjoy showing this off to us monkeys.

All it would take is one person on a meal’s worth of psilocybe asking to be shown where we came from, then passing that story on orally until it became doctrine many generations after it was first told. I probably would have called the voice “God” too after an experience like that.

Back to here and now, as I watched the yeasts being demonized and my grandparents seeming to act more out of obligation to rules they don’t need to understand in order to follow, I realized exactly what ritual means to me. The occulted relationships between us and other living things, like yeasts, already have stories present. Vast, rich stories that tell the true-true of our relationality. When we go ascribing meaning all willy-nilly it’s no different than interspecies racism.

Truly, and above everything else, ritual is about what makes sense to me and making a pariah out of the being that may have actually done all that legwork just doesn’t. The spirit of the power of the air just might be the same one that makes your bread rise. 

Put that in your animist pipe and smoke to your heart’s content.

Thanks for listening. 

Jailbreaking St. Benedict

Reverend Janglebones1 Comment

It ain’t always easy being into what I’ve affectionately coined Christianimism as there are few sources worth pulling from that don’t bleed into, or borrow from, traditions that I’ve no business adopting. A lot of magic involving the saints comes from Afro-Caribbean traditions in which there are often other spirits using the forms of the saints and their iconography to interact with the peoples with whom they have relations. This is generally a bad idea for a white midwestern boy that has no authority with those potentially dangerous spirits, nor any idea what their relational protocol might be. 

There aren’t a lot of saints in hoodoo, and the Catholics in North America refuse to admit to their magical acts of devotion so there is a whole lot of trial-and-error, research, and creative magical thinking that has to come into play to adequately explore this most fascinating of Western magical traditions.

After reading up on the saints I was interested in and setting them up on my altar, of course I get contacted very strongly by two I had yet to even research or find interest in. This time in the blogosphere I want to talk about the occulting or jailbreaking of just one of those two pious characters; Saint Benedict.

It seems safe to think of St. Benedict as a Saturnian influence based solely on the nature of his miracles. He took sickness away from people, avoided sinister plots against him that would have resulted in him “dying before his time,” has a special protective nature against poisons and for the home, performed exorcisms, and had authority over whether or not stuff was physically broken. He also had a way of seeing deep down to one’s true motivations and exposing them for what they were. If that isn’t Saturnian, I truly do not know what is.

It is certainly worth mentioning here, however, that the majority of these miracles were performed by him through prayer, and while he believed very strongly that students should rarely speak and casual discourse was a path to sin, this most strict among brothers also built into his order that different prayers should be repeated for specific times of day, and repeated often. 

He believed strongly in the power of oratory prayer and this makes him a wonderful ally to be called upon to join one in a ceremony of prayer. This is also indicative of a Mercurial current that carries forth as a more minor accent, as well as a Jupiterian one in his renovation of monasticism that carries on to this day. 

So if you are trying to build a community and find self-discipline, he just may be the saint you’ve been looking for. Just remember, it was Benedict of Nursia himself who told his would-be underlings when they begged of him his leadership that they would only regret their request of his authority, for he would be too strict for their tastes in short time. To which they replied, “Nay! We will have you as our leader!” Attempting, of course, to kill him via poison not long after his acquiescence.

Turns out he was right.

He also became uncomfortable with being noticed for his miracles and disappeared into solitude a couple times throughout his life. One of which times was spent in a cave, mostly fasting, and could thus be an ally if one needs to spend a lot of time in solitude. Potentially if, say, quarantined.

I’ve saved you the trouble of reading The Life of St. Benedict and made a list of potentially magically relevant miracles and plot-points to consider both in the sense of narrative and apparent metaphysics. 

  • Fixed a broken sieve through prayer.
  • Dramatically threw a glass bottle out a high window to make a point to a monk, and because his cause was just, the bottle did not break – thus preserving the small amount of oil that remained.
  • Raised a boy from the dead.
  • Returned a dead zombie boy to his grave after he arose from it (different boy, probably.)
  • Cured folks of leprosy.
  • Discovered wine hidden by his brothers.
  • Multiplied food.
  • Multiplied Oil.
  • Prayed over a bowl/glass in which poison had been slipped in a conspiracy to kill him. Upon making the sign of the cross the dish cracked in two, spilling the contents and saving his life.
  • Avoided notoriety like the plague, knew when to walk away without shame, and made the most of his alone-time.
  • Patron saint of cavers and probably the influence for Tarot’s the Hermit.
  • Untied the knots of a bound captive with just a will and a glance.
  • Exorcised a monk who had lost his way by hitting him with a “wand.” – That’s so wizard.
  • He seemed to be able to tell when things would end through prophecy and vision, including the monastery he built as well as, down to the day God told him it would happen, his own life.
  • Had visions. And I mean visions. Check this out: “Benedict, being diligent in watching, rose up before the night office and stood at the window making his prayer to Almighty God about midnight, when suddenly, looking forth, he was a light glancing from above, so bright and resplendent that it not only dispersed the darkness of the night, but shined more clear than the day itself. Upon this sight a marvellous strange thing followed, for, as he afterwards related, the whole world, compacted as it were together, was represented to his eyes in one ray of light. As the venerable Father had his eyes fixed upon this glorious lustre, he beheld the soul of Germanus, Bishop of Capua, carried by angels to Heaven in a fiery globe. Then, for the testimony of so great a miracle, with a loud voice he called upon Servandus the Deacon, twice or thrice by his name, who, troubled at such an unusual crying out of the man of God, came up, looked forth, and saw a little stream of light then disappearing, and wondered greatly at this miracle. Whereupon the man of God told him in order all that he had seen, and sent presently to Theoprobus, a Religious man in the town of Casino, ordering him to go the same night to Capua, and learn what had happened to Germanus the Bishop. It fell out so, that he who was sent found the most reverend Bishop Germanus dead, and on enquiring more exactly, he learned that his departure was the very same moment in which the man of God had seen him ascend.”
  • He was also made psychically aware of a boy getting carried away by a stream, which he then telepathically communicated to brother Maurus, who was so motivated and justified by his psychic hero-mission that he didn’t even notice himself running on the water to save this kid by the scruff. Consider the shape of this, metaphysically. Perhaps he’s the kind of saint that will help you out in an emergency, to exceed your own limits and rise to impossible tasks with single-mindedness. 
  • When one of his monks decided to leave the monastery he began to pray for him. Upon leaving the monastery the monk saw a great dragon which frightened him into remaining with Benedict in the pious life. This sort of manipulation for positive influence is morally tenuous, and truly fascinating tactically. 
  • Consider this story for inspiration on emergency St. Benedict petitions for finance: “So he came to the Monastery, where finding the servant of Almighty God, told him how he was extremely urged by his creditor for the payment of twelve shillings. The venerable father answered him that, in very deed, he had not twelve shillings, but yet he comforted his want with good words, saying: “Go, and after two days return hither again for today I have it not to give thee.” These two days, as his custom was, he spent in prayer, and, on the third day, when the poor debtor came again, thirteen shillings were found upon a chest of the Monastery that as full of corn. These the man of God caused to be brought to him, and gave them to the distressed man, saying that he might pay twelve, and have one to defray his charges.”
  • Or this one if you live off-grid “…went up to the rock and there prayed a long time. Having ended his prayers, he put three stones for a mark in the same place, and so unknown to all he returned to his Monastery. Next day, when the Brethren came again to him for want of water he said: “Go, and on the rock where you shall find three stones one upon another, dig a little, for Almighty God is able to make water spring from the top of that mountain, that you may be eased of this labour.” When they had made a hollow in that place, it was immediately filled with water, which issueth forth so plentifully that to this day it continueth running down to the floor of the mountain.”
  • There is also a known cunning tradition of burying a St. Benedict coin at each of the four corners of a property for protection and fortification.
  • His iconography includes a raven, lending his appearance to sometimes resemble Odin when coupled with his staff and hooded robe. Saturn and Mercury, indeed.
  • Other Benedictine symbols include a broken vessel and book, though anything could be used from these narratives if they resonate with you, in theory.

Bringing up these narrative points as a means to consider potential ways of collaborating with St. Benedict is my sole intention, as I am only beginning to actually get to know him myself. I claim no authority on the matter and should very much like to hear from anyone who has worked with this saint.

One last point to consider:

PETER. I would know whether he obtained these great miracles always by prayer, or did they some times only by the intimation of his will? 

GREGORY. They who are perfectly united with God, when necessity requireth, work miracles both ways, sometimes they do wonders by prayer, sometimes by power. For since St. John saith: “As many as received Him, to them He gave power to become sons of God.” What wonder is it if they have the privilege and power to work miracles who are exalted to the dignity of children of God. And that they work miracles in both ways is manifest in St. Peter, who by prayer, raised Tabitha from death, and punished with death Ananias and Sapphira for their falsehood. For we do not read that he prayed when they fell down dead, but only that he rebuked them for their fault committed. It is evident therefore that these things are done sometimes by power, sometimes by petition; since that by reproof he deprived these of their life, and by prayer revived the other.

Experiment away, wyrdos. ❤

Thought For Food

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How often do you wonder where your food comes from? Don’t worry, this isn’t going to be a piece on GMOs, or even health at all. No, friends, this is a piece on the character of your cuisine. This is about the stories we eat everyday without reading.

Throughout the course of the 20th century humans have industrialized, commercialized, migrated and globalized both our economy, as well as our eats. And as our cultures have intermingled and our trade routes turned into chain restaurants and Amazon boxes, the foodstuffs that we grew up with have become a source of identity and pride. Whether that be from your far-away native land, or a few blocks down the street. 

Either way, the chances are, nobody makes it like your grandmother.

When you’re out there in the world, and something you find tastes like home, there’s simply nothing else like it. The intermingling of cultures means that our chances of running into familiar fare are greater these days than ever before. This also means that we have the opportunity to try and share so much more between cultures. And with delivery services you don’t even have to leave the park (or Netflix if we’re being very, very honest.)

The evolution of food items are also fascinating to follow in some cases. The ubiquitous Nacho, for instance, was actually invented by Ignacio “El Nacho” Anya for a couple of U.S. soldier-wives when they tried to eat at a mexican border hotel-restaurant which had already closed for the day. Clearly white-girl dining etiquette has undergone little evolution since 1943.

By tricking the intrusive patrons into enjoying a no-preparation plate of chips with cheese tossed on top, they had unknowingly created what would become one of the most beloved snack foods of all time.

The fortune cookie, the blessed poor man’s prophecy, actually originated from a modification of the I Ching called the Ling Qi Xing which featured a form of divination that was outlawed in its region of origin. That’s right, the fortune cookie was an illegal outcast in its own home. But those semi-sweet starchy vaginas of fate became immigrants as well, flourishing in their new land and into American strip malls from sea to shining sea.

There’s always the fanatically documented yet widely misunderstood history of the evolutionary lineages and delineations of pizza, with no end in sight to the hot debate on proper crust depth. And you can bet your best mozzarella that debate is heated by a wood fire. Ask anybody who cares about pizza. They will all tell you something different and exactly why everyone else is an idiot. It’s beautiful. The spirit of pizza is clearly an elitist, purist, blue-collar hero, peerless among the cool-guys of consumables.

And while we’re at it, I have a particular love for the story of the lobster. Yes, that deliciously expensive high-society dish that we now drown in butter but the British once referred to as the “cockroach of the sea.” 

When the British inquired of the natives on the coast of Maine what possible function these hideous creatures could possibly have, the natives then kindly instructed the British on how to crush the lobsters into a fluid and fertilize their crops with them.

Everybody agreed.

Lobsters weren’t food.

Until the railroad stretched across the U.S. and changed everyone’s lives forever (especially the lobsters’.) I don’t mean the pillaging and massacres of the “civilizing” west, I mean canned goods!

That’s right, before the settlers out west were, well, settled they needed protein to keep them going. Hunting and farming and murdering the indigenous is hard when you’re living in a tent next to a steam engine running all hours of the day (with hammers swinging), so we did the only American thing: We canned and shipped them sea-roaches fer eat’n reasons!

A few years later affluent gold-prospecting families were taking trips of novelty out East to try the famous lobstrosities fresh from the sea, and the rest, as they say, is industry.

If you find yourself remembering this article the next time you’ve got hand-to-mouth disease, stop. Take a second. Look at what you’re eating, and do a quick search. Both in your soul and maybe also on the internet.

You just might find an occult adventure taking place inside your mouth.

Bon appétit.