Signs You Might Be An ELDER Pagan ...

In response to this page here, I thought I'd come up with a list of signs that you might be a bit more advanced, a lot wiser and a lot more powerful than the younger and more impetuous Pagans from the above article, with the fire still in their eyes:-

Signs that you might be an ELDER Pagan:-

- When you're sworn in to court, you swear on yourself because, as an oral traditionalist, you are your own grimoire;

- You talk to wasps and bees - and the Hive sings back to you;

- When asked if you believe in God, you say 'I'm more concerned about the ones that believe in me - Loki, Hel, Hekate, Kali, Morrigan ...';

- Your kids insist on going widdershins round the roundabouts in the playground, just like their proud parent;

- You've been busted twice for the contents of your spice cabinet;

- You run the local antiquarian bookstore- and other pagans come to you first because you keep all the best ones round the back;

- Other people think your writing makes you a cultural icon;

- Your guests come to visit the altar;

- Your Beltane parties are a bigger hit than Yuletide - and you've been busted twice for them, too;

- You know that Christmas trees became popular in Victorian times, which is why you leave them to grow in the forest to let Nature have its own Christmas trees, and you just decorate your altar with holly and ivy instead;

- You have Icelander friends who say that they are elves. Well, yeah. What's odd about that?;

- You don't commit blasphemy. The gods and goddesses know about sex and stuff; what can you say that could possibly offend them?;

- Upon dying, the afterlife goes "Oh, no, not again!";

- When you say Chaos, you don't mean it as a metaphor;

- Gaia reminds you of James Lovelock's books, and you'll do anything to prevent her becoming as barren as Luna;

- You don't have a religious text. And those who look to you for guidance train under you to be their own grimoires as well, so they don't need them either;

- You've never read The Mists of Avalon. You've bloody well been there and it's nothing like the book;

- In Religion 100, you were ever so grateful that they didn't cover YOUR gods, because you prefer your mundane classmates sane;

- You know that there is no such thing as "the right way around" to a pentacle, and you could make a pentacle shape at any time by just cutting an apple across its equator;

- You've spent the last year and a half interviewing potential familiars, and the queue forms twice round the block still;

- Trees initiate the conversations;

- You know dragons and fae exist. They're on your Facebook f'list;

- Painting yourself blue, spiking your hair and dancing round the bonfire is something you leave to your youthful, vigorous apprentices to enjoy, as if their right - as was your right once, despite the cops' saying otherwise, twice. What you do nowadays is much more fun;

- The only thing you agree on in The Craft is the line about the weirdoes. Except, when you're getting off the bus and the guy says "Watch out for the weirdoes," you reply "Not a problem; they're all still on the bus.";

- You understand the symbolism behind a vesica piscis, and pronounce the "v" in "vesica" as if it was a "w";

- Your phone conversations end in Welsh;

- Your kids go around telling people "Cthulhu fhtagn";

- You consider humans an endangered species;

- You commonly refer to the months of the year as Corn Moon, Cold Moon, Wolf Moon, Harvest Moon etc.;

- You know exactly what year this is, from the size of tree growth and the position of Polaris relative to the polar axis of rotation, and the exact position of the Moon in its 19 year lunar cycle. You don't even need a watch to tell the time. Just put a stick in the ground and the length of the shadow is all you need to know;

- When someone says they have a headache, you tell them "You'll live";

- You wonder why, if the Pope is so concerned with selling you real estate in Heaven, that he has commissioned a bulletproof tank of a car to try and stay away from Heaven as long as possible;

- and whether or not it might be that Heaven is full of children, meaning that he and his priestly friends might have the hardest time of them all actually getting into Heaven when they do go there;

- You adapted your vision to live in low light conditions;

- Your electronics are in a secure place where the interference from the rest of your house can't mess with them - and the world they are connected to;

- You feel inclined to berate the idiot who built that campfire for not building it properly;
- Other Pagans come visiting your place on their pilgrimages;

- You are so pleased that the Faeries are hiding from you. Not after what you did to them last time they came around souring your milk;

- Your Christian accusers suddenly and inexplicably find themselves on the run when their own dark deeds, long considered buried, mysteriously start surfacing spontaneously, and the parents of the victims are all mad as hell;

- You like The Matrix because it was a fun movie;

- You dislike the Christian Bible because you've read the earlier translations, in Latin, Greek and Aramaic, and the Talmud, and even some Babylonian myths that somehow sneaked into the book; and what they have to say is nothing like what the English Vulgate Bible says;

- Your neighbours have stopped being Fundies. Not after those dreams they had for seven weeks in a row ...;

- You never have to wonder why all the decent folks are in hiding. They aren't; we are right there in front of you, hiding in plain sight all along, which is why it is an Invisible College;

- You don't need to blow out the candles on the birthday cake. You dismiss the flames with gratitude;

- You keep your hammer in the toolbox, where it belongs;

- Your Jehovah's Witness friends come to you for solace in their hour of need - and you inexplicably know just the right words to give them the strength to carry on when their fancy words have failed them. You give them pamphlets to take home with them;

- Your friends don't speak of "Witchcraft" or the "Occult." They speak of "work";

- (males) At least you're not like those poor sods in IT. When a woman invites you over, you're not there to exorcise some demon - and you're not there to fix her bloody computer, either ;) ;

- You don't need to come over all meta and giggle at the self-referential joke;

- You are living evidence for the acceptance of Paganism as one of many mainstream religions;

- Pat Robertson and Rush Limbaugh have never heard of you or yours, and never will, even those who work in their offices right under their noses;

- You write philosophy papers comparing Stoicism to Buddhism;

- When people ask "What's Wicca?" you tell them "Something they make baskets and hats out of";

- You ask why God would want to bless America, after the shocking things they have done in his name;

- You no longer return calls made by Silver Ravenwolf;

- Your home doubles as a home, an occasonal cat sanctuary and the place that carries the reputation of The Safest House In The Street for kids who want to get away for a bit when their Dad comes home drunk and screaming, or running away from that bastard with the candy van that occasionally comes around - that twat never learns;

- You know Ragnarok was a myth invented by Christians;

- You keep referring to The Bible as "just a book";

- You speak in Aramaic around Yuletide. That poor carpenter's son got a raw deal, so once in a while you pay respect to the wee bairn, calling him by his true name - Attis;

- You sigh when pople tell you that your religion has little or no connection with ancient Pagan religions, by telling them "The land's still the land. The stars and moon are still the stars and moon.";

- You laugh when people revere Marylin Manson as an icon of rebellion;

- You say 'I haven't found Christ. Are you sure this is the last place he was seen?';

- You consider Marcus Aurelius Antoninus the greatest Roman Emperor, and still read his Stoic text Meditations;

- You call yourself a citizen of the universe;

- You don't have to explain that Satan is a Christian invention because you've trained those you love to do that on your behalf;

- You don't care about the difference between Heathens and Neo-Pagans;

- You can trace your ancestry back to the Olduvai Gorge;

- You speak in Old Norse, Icelandc, Welsh, Irish Gaelic, Scots Gaelic, Breton, Manx, Latin, Greek, Aramaic and Klingon - often in the same conversation with the same five other people;

- You keep your hammer necklace hanging over your altar, where it belongs. You can separate your priestly duties to Thor when you;ve got shopping and material stuff to do;

- You argue that time is an illusion caused by the breakdown of the bicameral mind;

- You keep an old pre-nazi swastika as a sunwheel, and discreetly cover it and hide it away if visitors come around;

- The phrase "It's Hammer Time!" brings up thoughts of "You can't touch this!";

- When people ask you about Christmas and Easter, you remind them that there was always a Christmas, and an Easter, and ask them why it is that Christ's supposed to have died in March one year, and early April the next, and why he's always born on December 25th - when there are lambs around - meaning that spring had come three months early;

- You don't refer to your religion. At all;

- When a Christian asks if you've found the Lord, you just ask "Have you tried calling his cellphone?";

- When someone else cries out "Oh God" or "Oh Lord," you just say "Aw, crap.";

- You could run a New Age bookshop from your home;
- ... and you're putting the actual New Age shops out of business;
- ... and they don't care;

- The last time a screaming, foaming Christian fundie told you were going to hell was twenty years ago. They don't come near you after what happened to the last one, and they still have nightmares about it;

- People look at the way you're dressed and say "How stylish!";

- Somebody asks you what time it is and you tell them without looking at the sky or a watch - just the big church clock at the far end of the street;

- Last time you heard a Pentecostal Christian speak in tongues, you wondered why this page was populated by so much Christian symbolism;

- When you hear people speaking in tongues, you just monitor them to make sure they don't hurt themselves or get violent;

- People no longer introduce you as a practicing witch. They know you're not practicing any more, and you're just getting on with it;

- That funny feeling you got in the pit of your stomach when you went to church was a sign - a sign that the damned priest was going to try and put his slimy paws on your bloody knee again;

- You see people reading Pagan literature and feel compelled to let well enough alone;

- You find suspicious hints in all of Disney's early feature animations;

- You think Glinda the "Good Witch" was a manipulative bitch;

- You wonder why they've never done a South Park episode making fun of Wiccans, and then you realise why, and then you laugh louder than you ever did watching South Park;

- ... and your friends get it when you tell them;

- The Mormons and the Jehovah's Witnesses huddle together in the same pub and exchange terrified stories of their encounters with you, while downing pints of cider;

- You're given a wide berth every Halloween by the news stations, who really do know better by now, and who only send in young and inexperienced journalists to interview you so you can break them in;
- ... and after the interview, you give out your email address and they know to use it only in the most dire circumstances;

- The local church keep asking you to bring in cookies for their bake sale, because they are so popular, and they raised enough money in one night to get that kidney machine for the kids' hospital thanks to you;

- When people ask you if you're a good witch or an evil one, you show them your two pentacles, one pointing up, one pointing down, and smile;

- People rely on you to tell them if they'll need rain gear or bikinis in the garden, and they invite you to all their barbecues because it never rains when you're there;

- If getting wet isn't an option, you catch a bus or a taxi, or drive your own car;

- Your co-workers don't have to ask you for binding spells, because you've already driven all the obnoxious ones away with harmless banishing blessings ... or successfully shown them the way to be not so obnoxious.