And so I turn 33...

Yes, today is my birthday and I'm 33.

Rod woke earlier than I did and surreptitiously left two wrapped books beside my pillow so that when I turned in my sleep (as I do repeatedly, all night) I woke to two presents. He got me a copy of Best Buddhist Writings of 2005 and Merlin Stone's famous (or infamous, depending on who you're talking to) When God Was A Woman.

I'm particularly interested in Stone's book for two reasons: 1) I've been hearing about her for years but have yet to read any of her stuff. She's been accused of doing the sort of shoddy scholarship that runs rampant in certain parts of the neo-goddess movement. (The myth that a group of kind generous mother-goddess worshiping peoples were invaded and subjucated by angry male invaders turns out to not really be entirely true. But I'm sure I'll go into that more later.) In some ways her antithesis is Jeanne Davis-Kimball, who I have to admit I have a sort of scholarly crush on. For those interested her Warrior Women Is Phenomenal.)

But the second reason I'm interested is I think the book will help me (along with my growing library of goddess books) in my blog-project for the next year: A Year of Goddesses. Each month I'm going to talk about a specific goddess--the history of her worship; her principle myths; how people now think of her, etc. I'm also going to try to couple yoga asanas (or poses) with each goddess but I don't know how well that's going to work. I'll probably just end up having an ansana of the month.

So this month's goddess is Inanna: Sumerian Queen of Heaven.

Tomorrow I'll talk about her principle myth: Inanna passes through seven gates to descend to the underworld where she visits her sister-self, Ereshkigel. Good stuff.

New Teacher For 6:30 Vinyasa @ Yoga People

Her name is Leah and so far she seems pretty interesting: a full time Anthropology (with Archeology minor) student @ NYU, she spends her summers in Belize & Texas on digs.

Poetry Readings Online

Anyone who's been to a reading know there's nothing quite like hearing a poem or a piece of prose read aloud--whether it's by the author herself or by another. I think it feeds into some sort of primitive child-pleasure: I myself remember being curled up on the sofa next to my sister while our mother read to us from an illustrated version of Heidi. (They were crude ink drawings, but I remember them in startling detail). But listening to a reading also evokes that old tribe-around-the-campire feeling.

At any rate, there's a great program at my alma mater, U Penn, devoted to uploading millions (yes: millions) of recordings of authors. From HD reading "Helen In Egypt" to Paul Auster reading from, and talking about, The Book Of Illusions, PennSound is worth a visit, or at least a click-through.

Creeping Into 2006

I'm beset by sloth. Tonight, though: two hours at the gym once I get done with work.

And I'll start posting again tomorrow.

Other news: I got a cool green feather toy for the cats and I think they dig it. (Well, two of them could care less; one is mildly interested; and the fourth sat beside it, her paw lightly touching the plastic stem, for about 15 minutes.)