Spent the afternoon writing essays, poems, and monologues. I aimed to post a few here. Sat down at the keyboard and froze.
Fear.
Fear of being laughed at. Fear of someone raging/trolling on the hint of vulnerability I have exposed. Fear of speaking my opinion and watching helplessly as someone shits on it with a huge “You’re WRONG! STFU!”
In my favorite forums, I have the status of professional lurker. I want to participate. But too many times, my voice is ignored or the reply is “that’s not the popular consensus so it’s stupid”.
Or the worse (private) reply of “You may wish to keep that to yourself to avoid being accused of flamebaiting and trolling.” A reply when I spoke up in a public thread about the idea of a deity “owning” a person. I owe Loki a debt, and the pissy bastard is starting to grow on me. His rough man-handling has taught me how to stand up for myself. He’s been a positive influence in my life, or would if I admitted it. *laughs* *sighs* But the idea of being owned by a deity is not the general consensus. That Loki is involved is even worse.
I try to participate on runes and seidhr related forums. I want to learn more than “just” the runes, but the lore and sagas that surround them. So Asatru/Heathen forum diving I go. There are three main camps of sources, and may Hel hide you if you dare to cross boundaries! I’ve found valuable information in two of the camps, but I dare not mention this. I do not understand how a forum centered on seidhrwork can downvalue or even REJECT UPG (unverifiable personal gnosis), because what the seidhrworker has seen/experienced can not be 100% backed up in the Sagas. I refer not to myself here. (Not a seidhrwoman, not sure if I want to be, sure that I’m going to be, dragging kicking and screaming, I’m sure.) I refer to a seidhrwoman with decades of experience and documentation, who has been sorely and thoroughly denounced as a fraud and deceiver, because her writings do not toe the Saga line.
Step outside the pre-drawn lines and instead of communication, you can expect sharp correction. I have a geas on me. Really simple. Do not use the runes for divination. See, that’s pretty easy to comprehend. What will happen if I defy that? I have no idea. I just know the geas was laid down in a journeywalk one day, by an old guy in a blue-grey cloak the color of weathered slate, a wiiiiide brim leather floppy hat, a large walking stick that looked more like an ass-whipping dispenser, and a milky right eye that sees through you. Something tells me, not to buck that old man on this.
I mentioned that in a forum… and the number of replies that jumped on me about that was staggering. It wasn’t a proper journeywalk, I wasn’t facing north. Odin would never appear like that. Odin would never restrict how a person used the runes as long as the person was abiding by the Nine Virtues. He would never appear to a woman, he would use a male to speak for him. You can’t learn the runes properly unless you use them for divination because that is how the runes’ energy soaks into you. YOU CAN’T EVEN LEARN THE RUNES IF YOU ARE NOT ASATRU. Oh, how many times did I get that struck about the ears.
This segues into my Number One complaint with Asatru/Heathen oriented forums. The moment I let slip that I am not white, I can *hear* the lines of communication forcibly disconnecting. So many forums brag of how color-blind they are. And it’s all words. (This is NOT an invitation for you, dear reader, to message me of how open your fav forum is. I’m venting, let me breathe.)
I’m raging and hammering the keyboard because I have allowed myself to be intimidated by all the dickweeds, fucktards, and asshats on the internet. I am afraid to speak up and out because of the inevitable trolling that will follow. I am not able to speak of these things with my family and (offline) friends, but that is a different shackle to pick apart. This Silence is tearing me to pieces, as there are many things I wish to share, but the Fear has broken my hands and sown up my lips.
My beliefs are challenging, and dare I say, offensive. I’m the perpetual outsider. And while usually, being the Other doesn’t bother me. (Dare, I say, I revel in it!) But today, being the Other has hit me pretty damn hard. I’m ready to put my fist through the screen and be done with it. But with the exception of two people, this is the only way I can speak, listen, teach, and learn about the spiritual things that mean So. Damn. Much. to me.
Fuck this… I’m getting a beer.