autumnal joys

Kind readers,

I have been preparing myself for a tranquil period of hibernation. This has included several trips to IKEA and joyful nesting activities.

I have expanded my library space by adding new bookcases in the dining room… Here is one of them:

I have also gotten lovely pillows for the living room couch, and have been beautifying several areas in my beloved home. It needed a little reorganization here and there, and a couple of cozying touches.

I have been good to myself.

I continue visiting my long neglected favorite old haunts, such as Memories which you can see below, and partaking of delicious meals…

This fall, I shall be working on Blessed: how to be a joyful mystic, I shall be painting again, I shall be studying the wisdom of the tarot in depth. My understanding of the tarot is much more mystical, therapeutic and alchemical than it was ten years ago; it has been a great benefit, a healing balm upon my heart, to reacquaint myself with this spiritual tool. I have also been reading wonderful books like Jesus Through Pagan Eyes: Bridging Neopagan Perspectives with a Progressive Vision of Christ by Reverend Mark Townsend, and only yesterday ordered a copy of Buddha, Christ, Merlin: Three Wise Men For Our Age by Christopher Penczak.

I want to work on another collaboration with my talented friend Ben Wu as well.

And there will be some new ink. I had been too tired to get more pieces done, but now I am almost ready.

I am also currently debating whether or not to speak again, this time at MISTI-Con. The odds are I may well decide to submit a proposal. The paper would no doubt be based in part on material contained in my latest book, The Severus Snape Paradigm: Outcast, Rebel, Hero.