Convocation '09
I think I'm the last one finally getting around to making the expected festival-in-review post. It's been an obnoxious week that I will talk about in the next post.
In previous years Teresa and we just cobbled together accommodation plans that included things like staying a local friend's houses, staying off-site in discount hotels and of course usually ending up on Jason & Ari's room couch on Saturday night. This year we decided to suck it up and get a room for all three nights. It is a far superior option for us, as it eliminates the constant problem of Teresa and I having very different nighttime tolerances; I'm a late-night conversation person, she's a morning workshop person. It worked out well. mehgary ended up sharing the room with us due to Green Spiral drama (as it turned out, a prevailing theme for the weekend).
I attended three workshops and one ritual total. M. Macha Nightmare wasn't as good as I'd hoped she'd be, mostly because she opened the room up to introductions before she started talking. The 40 people in the room took 30 minutes of a 90 minute block to ramble on about how big of fish they are in their small local eclectic Pagan ponds. She then allowed people to jump in with their own contributions since the topic was "Intrafaith Community Building"... but again, people talked more about themselves than about the successful intrafaith work they've seen. In the "Aleister Crowley: Mountain Climbing Devil!" talk by David Melton, Teresa and I were the only two people in the room. He's one of Teresa's favourite presenters at Con, and he had very interesting material. j_daddy's presentation on the Devil was plagued by a blurry projector that made it difficult to concentrate -- trying to decipher the images gave me a headache, so I ended up updating Facebook from my cell phone during most of the talk. His Pan ritual was as good as it could be in the PG-13 ConVocation environment. The nymphs looked great, including ari_moonchild (of course), and the first time but looking like an experienced natural artista_kat .
I tried to go to the Baphomet ritual, but got bored after it took over an hour for the presenter to get everyone into the room. I ended up talking with mangolyn's boyfriend Chris while he was working security for the drum circle. Chris is staunchly Republican and excruciatingly Catholic; hence, not the type you'd expect to find at an eclectic Pagan convention. He did really well there though, despite just coming off a personally frustrating week professionally. It is obvious he cares about Mandy a great deal, willing to put himself into odd situations so he can better understand her friends and interests. He sat through a workshop on the Devil, and an O.T.O. meet and greet. I know a lot of Pagans who can't/won't do that -- the boy deserves a medal.
I was glad to find Merlin RavenSong, the head of Wayne State University's Full Moon Circle, after the Pan ritual. I invited him to come up to The Scotch Room that evening to talk with some of the Green Spiral officers about potentially working together and sharing resources/presenters. Both groups could use some help -- Green Spiral is suffering from a dwindling membership and their officers graduating soon, and Full Moon Circle is very much a cult of personality with Merlin being the center of all things in the group. Merlin can give GS recommendations how to survive through the thin membership times by using non-students and community resources, and GS might be able to help FMC with some variety in new speakers and influences.
After staying up very late Saturday night, Teresa and I were ready to head out the door early Sunday morning. We were home by 1:30pm, even before the closing ritual was over. Unfortunately, the next day I learned we should have just stayed down there for the day considering we were headed back to Detroit a mere 36 hours later...
In previous years Teresa and we just cobbled together accommodation plans that included things like staying a local friend's houses, staying off-site in discount hotels and of course usually ending up on Jason & Ari's room couch on Saturday night. This year we decided to suck it up and get a room for all three nights. It is a far superior option for us, as it eliminates the constant problem of Teresa and I having very different nighttime tolerances; I'm a late-night conversation person, she's a morning workshop person. It worked out well. mehgary ended up sharing the room with us due to Green Spiral drama (as it turned out, a prevailing theme for the weekend).
I attended three workshops and one ritual total. M. Macha Nightmare wasn't as good as I'd hoped she'd be, mostly because she opened the room up to introductions before she started talking. The 40 people in the room took 30 minutes of a 90 minute block to ramble on about how big of fish they are in their small local eclectic Pagan ponds. She then allowed people to jump in with their own contributions since the topic was "Intrafaith Community Building"... but again, people talked more about themselves than about the successful intrafaith work they've seen. In the "Aleister Crowley: Mountain Climbing Devil!" talk by David Melton, Teresa and I were the only two people in the room. He's one of Teresa's favourite presenters at Con, and he had very interesting material. j_daddy's presentation on the Devil was plagued by a blurry projector that made it difficult to concentrate -- trying to decipher the images gave me a headache, so I ended up updating Facebook from my cell phone during most of the talk. His Pan ritual was as good as it could be in the PG-13 ConVocation environment. The nymphs looked great, including ari_moonchild (of course), and the first time but looking like an experienced natural artista_kat .
I tried to go to the Baphomet ritual, but got bored after it took over an hour for the presenter to get everyone into the room. I ended up talking with mangolyn's boyfriend Chris while he was working security for the drum circle. Chris is staunchly Republican and excruciatingly Catholic; hence, not the type you'd expect to find at an eclectic Pagan convention. He did really well there though, despite just coming off a personally frustrating week professionally. It is obvious he cares about Mandy a great deal, willing to put himself into odd situations so he can better understand her friends and interests. He sat through a workshop on the Devil, and an O.T.O. meet and greet. I know a lot of Pagans who can't/won't do that -- the boy deserves a medal.
I was glad to find Merlin RavenSong, the head of Wayne State University's Full Moon Circle, after the Pan ritual. I invited him to come up to The Scotch Room that evening to talk with some of the Green Spiral officers about potentially working together and sharing resources/presenters. Both groups could use some help -- Green Spiral is suffering from a dwindling membership and their officers graduating soon, and Full Moon Circle is very much a cult of personality with Merlin being the center of all things in the group. Merlin can give GS recommendations how to survive through the thin membership times by using non-students and community resources, and GS might be able to help FMC with some variety in new speakers and influences.
After staying up very late Saturday night, Teresa and I were ready to head out the door early Sunday morning. We were home by 1:30pm, even before the closing ritual was over. Unfortunately, the next day I learned we should have just stayed down there for the day considering we were headed back to Detroit a mere 36 hours later...