Exorcising the Specter of the Patriarchy: The Apple and the Talking Snake Find it at: https://open.library.ubc.ca/cIRcle/collections/ubctheses/24/items/1.0055250
“For the first time in history, enormous numbers of women are traveling through the gate of menopause and looking forward to a life span of some 30 more years. And we women have certain hard-won wisdom, gleaned through consciously processing the experiences of our long and fruitful lives. What are we going to do with this wisdom? Play golf? Get our hair done? We begin to glimpse the opportunity, and the responsibility.” Ann Kreilkamp, Founder of Crone Chronicles
I am following up on some work from yesterday and last evening’s Dream Readers’ Myth Circle Check out that page for the latest!
I find two stock writing books for any who want to Write! Draw! Sculpt! and many other Creative Expression of Crone Wisdom.
Just turned 40? Or 41? 49? I was 43 when my life fell into pieces, I healed clinical depression and slowly put together a new life over 7 sacred years. Today I search out Julie Cameron’s, The Artist’s Way. I find a delightful “literary anthropology” in the margins. And the date April 12, 1996, on the cover page. I also find Tristine Rainer, Your Life as Story. And so, with renewed zest, off I go. For I am post-post-menopausal. First item in my FB feed this morning? Loralee Scott, The Sophia Center, posted an article about Whale Pod Leaders. https://getpocket.com/explore/item/after-menopause-killer-whale-moms-become-pod-leaders
All day I think about Crone Chronicles. and Pod Leaders.
I am drawn back to stand again in a new spot just a little to the edge of 43, it’s 1988. I had a dream. (see I, the Woman, Planted the Tree: A Journey through Dreams to the Feminine, Gregor 2018, p. 44).
For seven sacred years I work through dreams, journaling, meditation and prayer to heal my inner world.
My husband, Bill, died suddenly in September 2000. Life at age 55 changed drastically and irrevocably. Then, in January 2004 I am knocking on Dennis Sumara’s office door at the University. And then, it’s a beautiful fall day in October 2008 on the campus at UBC. I have just successfully defended my doctoral dissertation! And, Dennis says, “Now I guess I can tell you the story.” And …. I learn that both sexism and agism were alive and very well while living at the University of Alberta. And despite the denial of so many, I cannot forget the deep betrayal I feel from that miserable damn story.
“It’s all in your imagination.” Well. Not. Listen again.
“Have you put your application in for the doctoral program? I hope so. You should. Your work is amazing. In fact, have you chosen an advisor?”
“No, I am not even accepted yet. I applied but I haven’t heard anything.”
“Oh! Well, I’ll find out about your status.”
A few days later, I was formally admitted to the Ph.d program at the University. I loved the program. I was 60 when I entered and 63 when I finished and after the Graduation Ceremony, Dennis asked, “Remember when I asked about your doctoral application and said I’d check into it? I did. I went to the chair of the committee (he named a respected professor from the University. T. told me that you were too old for admittance. Obviously, I disagreed.”
And so, Crones, some things are meant to be. My doctorate was one of them. Crones know. In my journal I have many entries about that doctorate! “T.” never had a chance against the Universe and Crones.
Now? Next? Gregor, Calling all Crones! Calling all Dreamers!
Sometimes Crone Stories start with a Dream just ask Ann Kreilkamp, founder of Crone Chronicles and Crone Magazine. You can read further at https://www.cronemagazine.com/cc_origins.html
Listen as Ann Kreilkamp tells of her dream, “The Crone archetype startled me into action in July, 1989, when I experienced Her energy in a numinous life-changing dream. Though I don’t remember the dream itself, I do remember being roughly shaken awake from behind by a huge black bird. The situation felt urgent. She cawed (or crowed?) at me, “
Wake Up! Wake Up! It’s Time! It’s Time!”
Though shocked at her roughness, I was not surprised by the message. The Crone energy is so powerful, so magical, and has been so long buried in the collective unconscious, that once aroused, I knew She would wake up the world-or bury it in Her fury.
For several decades prior to the dream, I was fascinated by the energy which I identified as “Crone,” and would make jokes to my younger friends about how I was turning into one. Yet even as a child I remember telling any adult who would listen that I couldn’t wait to be 65 years old. I knew with a kind of precocious certainty that only when I was old would I be released from the nonsense that goes along with being female in this society. I couldn’t wait to be freed from the focus on “appearances,” so that I could become fully myself, inside and out.”
According to the science, “One way post-reproductive females may boost the survival of their kin is through the transfer of ecological knowledge,” says Lauren Brent of the University of Exeter. “The value gained from the wisdom of elders can help explain why female killer whales and humans continue to live long after they have stopped reproducing.” Be sure to read the whole story. It is very instructive.
Also, you can read the whole story of Crone Chronicles and subscribe to Crone Magazine at https://www.cronemagazine.com/cc_origins.html
