BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

Okay, so this blog isn’t going to be about Firefly or Serenity, but I am a fan and I love that line…Plus, Wacky Fun was definitely had…

Yesterday (Sat. 1/27/07) I drove out to Columbia, Missouri. For those of you not familiar with this Midwestern parcel of dirt, Columbia is right around the middle of the “show me” state. It is a college town, built up around the University of Missouri, Columbia. (One of the finest Journalism schools in the country, among other subjects)…Anyhow, it is also home to a thriving pagan community and an annual wintertime gathering known as “Magickal Hibernation” sponsored, put together, organized, and otherwise presented by Ozark Avalon. This was my third year as a guest speaker at this event, and as always it was a great time. While the gathering isn’t huge by any means, there is a respectable attendance. They set up at a local hotel where a ballroom is set aside for vendors and conference rooms are set aside for workshops and a hospitality suite. Registration is positioned in the lobby, and everyone from the con staff right down to the attendees are wonderful, friendly, and a joy to hang out with.

This year, Author Ellen Dugan, Artist Mickie Mueller, and Author Mike Nichols were headlining the event as well, so we all presented workshops on everything ranging from Wicca’s Wonder Years (a witchcraft and pop culture seminar by Mike) to Spells for Love (Ellen), as well as  Magical Body Art (Mickie) to Magick in the Trenches: No Fluff, No Sparkle, Just Results (yours truly)… But, enough about them…this is all about me! (Just kidding…sort of…It IS all about ME, but believe me, the above listed are all good friends, colleagues, and wonderful folks; each of them. And, I love them all dearly.)

But, back to me …

I presented two workshops, the above listed as well as the Unconscious Magick workshop which has now been made available on Youtube (watch it via the link above). Both were well attended, but the Magick in the Trenches seminar definitely ended up being a full house. I wasn’t sure what to expect because this particular workshop is somewhat controversial, and when Dorothy Morrison and I have done it in tandem we have actually upset a few individuals with our view on “no fluff, no sparkle”…However, I was met with a wonderfully open minded and curious crowd. We discussed various aspects of magick, and I even enlightened the group on a few things. (Something tells me a few folks are probably going to be visiting cemeteries and asking ancestors to borrow a bit of dirt in the near future…If you don’t know what I mean by that you need to see the workshop!)

So, anyway, in addition to getting to hang out with great folks, wear my voice out trying to talk over a band that was playing next to the workshop area, and getting my picture taken with THE Smokin’ Hottie Babe of the Pagan Art World (Mickie), I also had another bizarre and wonderful experience…What was that you ask? Well, I’ll tell you.

Two long time fans, one of whom I had met at a past booksigning, and another with whom I had only corresponded via email, were in attendance. Now, these two folks are insane, I have to tell you. But, they are insane in a good way (read: same kind of general insanity from which I also suffer…) They had warned me that they would be there and that they had a surprise in store. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect out of these two, as I had yet to discover just exactly how wacky they really are. Fortunately for me, the surprise didn’t involve the plot of Stephen King’s Misery.

However, these two wingnuts DID come dressed as stalkers…How did they do that, you ask? Well, just check out the picture below….

Left to right: Johnny “Force Majeure”, me, and Tasialue

So, as you can see, not only did these two nutcases come dressed as stalkers, but they also presented me with my own sweatshirt which readily identified me as the object of their stalking…

Like I said… Wacky Fun!

Now, I have to get back to writing, so till the next time!

MR

Thirty-odd years ago, I found a cassette tape recorder under the Yule tree with my name on it. Now remember, I said thirty-odd years ago, so we are talking about the bulky recorder which, even though it was state of the art in its day, was about the size of a dinner plate and as thick as a half dozen said plates stacked together. This item was something I had wanted for some time, as it would allow me to record my thoughts fairly rapidly, and I didn’t yet know how to type. Little did I know that this tape recorder, long since relegated to a junk pile somewhere, would be the source of a very special memory, bittersweet in its content.

But, before we get to that memory, allow me to bore you a bit more. This season used to be my absolute favorite time of year. Up until 2003, with the exception of a few years of struggle, I was like a kid whenever the holidays rolled around. The lights, the Yule tree, the eggnog (yes, I’ve blogged about my beloved eggnog before)…all of it. At the risk of being cliche, yes it was magickal for me.

My first stumble with regard to the holidays came in 1987. My wife and I were married on Samhain (Halloween for you non-Pagans) that year, so that Christmas should have been infinitely special…But, shortly after our wedding, the week before Thanksgiving in fact, I received a call from a local police department requesting that I come down and identify my Mother’s body. I won’t go into details about that here. Perhaps another time. Suffice it to say, the holidays meant very little to me that year, and for a few years after that.

I managed to pull out of the slump to an extent, although the season was never as bright nor anywhere near as magickal as it had been for me in the past. I continued at that pace for a number of years, until 2003. Mid October, while I was appearing at a festival, my father crossed over- suddenly, unexpectedly, and very quickly. I didn’t find out until I returned to St. Louis, because my extended family had lost my publicist’s business card, and my wife and daughter were with me at the fest, so there was no way to get in contact.

Again, the holidays lost their magick. In all honesty, were it not for my wife and daughter, I would likely not celebrate them at all. So, by way of explanation for this boring recitation of the past, I can only surmise that I suffer from a mild form of SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder)…A depression more induced from life altering trauma than a lack of light, but very real nonetheless.

But, I have digressed a bit…I started this off with the memory of a tape recorder, and I should get back to that. The tape recorder itself, long gone and clunky in this day even if it still existed, is really more the source of the memory than the memory itself. You see, that particular Christmas, thirty-odd years ago, my maternal Grandfather, Elvis Babb insisted that all of the kids and grandkids come home for the holidays–home being, Fulton, Kentucky. A tiny spot on the road town, overlapping the state line between Kentucky and Tennessee, and bordering the farming community of Water Valley. This was the place of my birth…the home of the Fulton Banana Festival, small town values, and the Hornbeak Funeral Chapel–a place I have spent more hours than I care to remember, both as a child and since as an adult. I suspect I will visit its interior a few more times before my own crossing…

No one was quite sure why my Grandfather was so adamant about everyone returning home for Christmas, but he fought against all objections, and saw to it that everyone gathered there in that little house on Grymes Avenue. So, my family made the short trek from St. Louis on Christmas morning, arriving in Fulton to spend a few days with everyone. As usual there was more food than anyone could possibly eat, a roaring fire in the wood burning stove that occupied one corner of the living room, and a sense of happiness that made everything special–yes, magickal.

Of course, all of the family being from that small town, there were other relatives to visit, and that we did. However, there was a particular day when I was left at the house on Grymes…me, my younger sister, and my Grandfather, sitting next to that roaring fire. My sister, being several years younger and somewhat oblivious due to her age, occupied herself with one or more of the toys she had received only a day or so before. Me, I sat and listened to my Grandfather tell me about a fishing trip we were going to take when summer rolled around once again. Little did I know that we were taking that fishing trip right then and there in his imagination, and lovingly painted in words for me to experience with him. In later years, when that realization hit me, I committed that story to paper…Perhaps someday I will feel self important enough to publish it in an autobiography…but then, maybe not. I guess we’ll see…

But, there I go digressing again…On the heels of the story, my Grandfather asked me to go get my shiny, new tape recorder. When I returned with it, he had in his hand a harmonica. This harmonica had been a source of entertainment for the family in years past as this man could play it like nobody’s business. I started a fresh tape, and there, beside the fire, we created an impromptu recording studio while he made the musical instrument talk, sing, cry, and even morph into a freight train that sounded far too real for words. I should note that at that point in time, Elvis was suffering from Emphysema, having been a heavy smoker since his youth, and was having trouble catching his wind, but for several minutes that afternoon, his lungs worked fine, and he made that harmonica speak.

Fast forward a few months. The frantic call came for all of the family to return to Fulton once again, but this time, not for holiday celebration. Elvis was ill and in the hospital. It was only shortly after everyone arrived that he crossed over. I was too young to be allowed into the hospital for a visit at the time, whether that was their rule or my parents I am still unclear, but I never got to say goodbye. It took me years to realize that the fireside fishing trip was our goodbye, and how he wanted me to remember him. How clear hindsight can be…would that our foresight was as crystal.

In any event, I have that harmonica. I found it back in 2003 while charged with the task of going through my father’s things at his home after his death. Though my parents had divorced around the time I graduated high school, Dad had kept some things stored away for Mom. After her death, I suppose he simply forgot about them as they were cloistered away in boxes, residing in a dark corner of the basement. Even so, I remembered that my mother had been given the harmonica, and upon finding it in the box it was like a Holy Grail of sorts. An artifact that may mean nothing to most anyone else, but meant the world to me. Now, it has been handed down to me, and will one day be passed on to my daughter. For the moment, it sits atop its box, displayed like a jewel in our curio cabinet.

But, this doesn’t really explain why I am suddenly pouring this memory out onto the page does it? Well, there was this tape. The tape I made of my Granfather pushing that harmonica to its limits and beyond. Copies were made of it and sent out to all of the family, but unfortunately, though my parents had retained the original, I was never able to find it after either of their deaths. I simply assumed that it was a piece of my history that would be lost forever. And, without that tape, and considering the fact that my daughter wasn’t even an inkling of a thought when her great-grandfather Babb crossed over, it is doubtful that the harmonica will mean much to her–other than perhaps her knowing how much in meant to me.

Fast forward yet again…

This past summer there was a Babb family reunion. We gathered from all corners of the country. Of course, both my parents are gone, but I can see my mother in my relatives. And, time, as always, has done what it will inevitably do…my aunts and uncles have now become the Grandparents, all of us neices/nephews/cousins have become our parents, and our children have become us. That bejeweled double helix that guarantees our immortality, passed along through the generations.

Elvis Babb can been easily seen in his son, my uncle, Steve Babb. He is a dead ringer for him. And, there is no doubt where a portion of my DNA came from as my uncle and I could pass for brothers…I just happen to have hair.

But again, there I go down another branch of the tree…back to the recording. During that reunion I discovered that my aunt in Nevada still had a copy…and, that my uncle had ported it in to his computer and put it onto CD.

And that my dear and patient readers is the trigger for this memory. Amidst the holiday cards, catalogs, and mail order gifts I collected from the box this morning was a simple package, addressed to me, and hailing from Nevada. Within, the packaged contained a CD, simply labeled “Grandaddy Babb”.

I’ve listened to it several times now, and my eyes still aren’t dry…

MR