Kristen's quotes from GOG's 2006 Imbolc Ritual

PRE-RITUAL

"We are not doing 'how do you know it's midnight at the Pagan gathering - the 6 o clock ritual's starting.' Pre-rit in 15 minutes - sharp." (Nm)

"Everybody gets to take one hit on the -edge- because they just finally got the blessed bowl to sit flat." (Nm)

"The very main thing is that if somebody fucks it up, you can unfuck it later...or not ...it will be whatever shape it's supposed to be." (Nm)

"Is there anyone here who has not been to an ADF ritual? [hands go up - DIC starts picking the smartasses out of the crowd] Put your hand down, put your hand down, -you- can keep your hand up."

"It's pre-rit, sit down and shut up!" (Sndr)
"Well, thank you, it's so nice to see you." (Jenf, entering the room)

"-and at that point you should start seeing 'guidefires,' as it were." (Nr/DIC) "Runway lights."

"There's no room." (Eln)
"Welcome to Imbolc."
"Indeed." (Eln)

"Hit the work in progress as gently as you think will get the job done." (Nr/DIC)

"Keep some magic and mystery in it." (Nr/DIC)

"Vigile invoking will be bringing us fire from Mississippi - Mississippi, we hope will not physically be burning." (Nr/DIC)

[Passing out parts]
"I know some of your names. I can call on you if there is no class participation." (Nr/DIC)

[re: Brigid's Jig]
"You'll know it because it's a call and response and you'll hear the call."
"Please be gentle, it's my first time leading that song." (Nr/DIC)

"Some groves banish their outsiders. We don't. Half of us -are- outsiders." (Nr/DIC)
"Just half? We must be slipping." (Cr)
"We don't banish our outsiders, we just ask them to wait outside while we have the ritual." (Nm)

[To Mannanan's invoker/Ml)
"We'll serenade you... or we'll serenade -You-, which amounts to the same thing spatially today." (Nr)

"Then we'll feast-"
"You missed something. You've got to close the damn gates down sometime." (Ml)
"It was in my book. I just didn't want to admit it." (Nr/DIC)

"Please take your tools with you when you go, they love you, they want to go home with you." (Nr/DIC)

[re: Grounding]
"If you don't ground to the earth, please tell the willow that - before they ground you to the earth and give you an allergic reaction." (Nr)
"The reality is that there are a lot of you, and not everyone gives off the same indicators [when upset]. So be proactive." (Nr)

"Jack will be Brigid's escort today. She will have a date before we burn her." (Nr)

[re: What can go in the fire]
"Anything that is flammable, nontoxic, and nonexplosive.. The shrapnel should stay in your purse." (Nr)
"No flaming pants today."
"Burning paper good, burning people bad." (Sndr)

THE RITUAL
(The procession out into the hallway and around the house)
"We can all go into the closet. It's New Brunswick. It's magick. We can come back out." (Nj)
"It seems like the Thing To Do."

"You knew druids used sickles, you didn't know they were druidsicles." (Nm)

"He's clearing his throat at me!" (Jf)
"-Now- you'll behave." (Ck)
[Jf laughs]
"I'll raise my eyebrows at you." (Ck)
"The power of the brow."
"Mike Dukakis tried that and failed." (Jf)

[Meditation]
"Look around you. Feel where you are. This is sacred space, this is safe space."
"Imagine yourself on a path. It's early spring, the air is clear and sharp."
"What does your fire look like? Mine is always dim, this time of winter."
"Remember this place, whenever you feel cold, whether emotional or physical, you always have this." (Ml)

[Directions]
"Buildings grow up on frames of steel, we cross over bridges of steel in carriages of steel...we're in the center of Brigid's forge." (E)

[Well]
"The real power in the axis is that it's in us, it's a part of us. I think we should energize our root chakra. The sacred syllable is 'Gam.' " (Bl)

[Fire]
"As the hearthkeeper would kindle, with love and tenderness. Oh, Brigid of the mantles, be thou a..." (Vgl)

[Tree]
"The fire isn't alive like we're alive. The tree -is- alive like we're alive."
"The trunk, the people who taught us, until we were ready to branch out."
"If you come to a dead end, there's always another branch." (Pg)

[Manannan Mac Lir]
"Sometimes you step ashore, and it's an easy step. But when you try to go back, the tide's gone out, and the waves come up behind you and threaten you."
"The waves and winds blow you different directions and you end up not moving at all."
"And you sit on the shore and watch the birds diving in for their breakfast."
"Last anyone heard of them, they were calling home on their cell phones. The sea swallowed them up."
"Mannanan Mac Lir, master of the sea between the lands of my birth-" (Ml)

[Outsiders]
"Soo..." (conversationally) "Anybody in these gates that doesn't wanna be? Come on out." (Nr)
"Brigid, beautiful lady, bright shiny one, and all of you beautiful people, and you are - kindly remember those who are not so beautiful, in the generic sense of the word, not so shiny. ,,, Kindly remember the darkness ... There is no creation without chaos." (Nm)
"I think I'm giving you my tools too." (Nr)
"You can give us the whole damn altar - but that would be an entirely different ritual." (Nm)

[Brigid]
"Well, Brigid, we are so happy you dropped in. And we really appreciate it, and we hope you're always here to help us and inspire us. Take care." (Bty)

[Ancestors]
"What happens when you die? I don't mean where you go. I mean what happens to your body."
"My uncle tried to drag me out, but I wanted to see them take the tube out of his lungs."
"When there is too much to be said, there is nothing left to say."
"Daddy, I missed you before you were gone." (MrR)

[Nature Spirits]
"Brigid is nature's alarm clock."
"-she pulls the hot coal from her apron and sticks it under the groundhog's butt. Same with the snake, though I've never seen a snake's butt and I don't think I want to." (Crl)

[Gods and Goddesses]
"Why are we here? Well, no one else has a big enough house."
"We are lucky enough to have many gods, and they tag-team us:
'No, she's not my child this week, she's -yours-."
"The gods who escort, they have brought us here. They haven't left us here. You are in the capable hands of the gods who shelter us."
"And we will be passed over to the gods who bring life. And soon, not as long as you think, we will be in the hands of the gods of living and being. We are always in their hands." (Nj)

[Brigid]
"And if you were pumping the bellows for three years, and then by gum you learned what coal was made of."
"-And then they'd hand it to someone else, because we don't have to do the work of our lives alone."
"We've been known to pick up that hammer, see what needs shaping and molding...and hit ourselves in the head with it."
"No work's ever wasted, Brigid teaches us that."
"How many of us have a scar, a dent, from a blow we didn't expect?"
"Sometimes we hit too hard and we damage ourselves or the people we love, or even the people we don't like, and life goes on."
"But you know what? The gods do know. And they will hit us as hard as they have to and no harder."
"How to see the play of color in the dents we give each other, Brigid can teach us that." (Nr)

"Norma said it would be harder to do the rest of the ritual after your invocation, and like a fool I did not believe her." (Nr)

[Praise]
"Samhain, 15 years ago, I met my first druids. And they promptly marched into a field of dry reeds and lit a big bonfire.
This is Isaac's official ADF Brigid song. You've probably never heard it and there's a reason for that. It's damn hard to sing:
...Oh Fire of love, oh Fire of life, please Brigid come to us."(Nm)
"I was marginalizing Her as a soft pretty blonde. And as you can tell, I'm not into soft pretty blonde goddesses." (An)
"Lady Brigid, lady of the hearth, lady of the heart, healer of the soul."
"Is that a quiche?"
"Yes, for Brigid."(Alx)
"Cold fire lights the graves...l
ike snow that swirls and falls in heaps, that swirls and falls in angry waves, the ashes from her fire fanned to life the restless seeds asleep." (ed)
"So, Brigid thank you for that lesson... and I have a song for Mannanan." (laughter) "He wants a sea chanty! (Mca)
"Be joyful, the end of the winter is here."
"She circles the well three times in the rain."
"Consider the groundhog. Consider all the bullshit he has to put up with. ... Thank you for your patiences, and I apologize on behalf of all humans, and don't get hit by a car, squeak, squeak." (Bl)
"I wasn't planning on offering this, but here. Brigid, go for it." (Jf places a piece of paper on the altar) "What? It's private." (Jf)

[Omen]
"You mentioned the anchor?" (Tr)
"1st thing. I can mention it again. We have very strong anchors." (Nr)
"We are stronger than we think, and the work is more than the sum of its parts."

[Waters of Life]
"If it's not too presumptuous, may I pour?" (MML's invoker Ml)
"Can you stand?" (Nr)
"That's a different question." (Ml)

"You're double fisting?"
"You bet, I can hold my own." (Chk)

"It tastes like burning."

*Hillary confiscates the scribe's water of life and spills it all over floor* (Kr)

[Thank Yous]
"We know you're not gone away because we can't see you." (Nr/DIC)

"Mannanan, our favorite walker between worlds-"
"You want me to close the gates?"
"Can we finish thanking you first?" (Nora/DIC)
"Oh. I suppose." (MML/Ml)

[POST-RITUAL]
"It's like sex, you have to have a cigarette afterwards."

IMBOLC PHOTOS!