Gender, any & all.

female, cis, bi

Area location: Country with Optional State, Province etc.

USA, New Mexico, Taos

Why I wish to join The Temple & how I found out about it...

I found the Temple while searching for Crone circles online. I want to join the Temple to learn from others and share my own knowledge, to be in community with other Crones - especially a community that is a haven and includes a wide variety of people from different cultures and backgrounds.

About Myself & My Interests...

My ancestors are primarily indigenous north american (Miamia of Indiana & Eastern Band Shawnee) and Welsh, with some Swedish, French, and German folks in the way back times. I've been a professor of indigenous studies for 20+ years and have been walking a medicine path for the past decade. (I'll say more about that below.) I have two daughters, four grandchildren (2 boys, 2 girls), a long-term partner, and beloved pets (2 cats & a dog). I'm a beadworker and a gardener, a poet and writer and scholar.

My Teachers & Influences, What was it about them that influenced me?

I've been a practicing hedge witch, including divination work, since I was a young child. I belong to an intertribal indigenous longhouse in Northern Indiana and have been engaged with those teachings for most of my adult life. Anishinaabe intertribal teachings form the bedrock of all my practices. Those teachers & elders live in my head and heart, as does the central tenets of relations, reciprocity, and responsibility to community. I bring those tenets to all of the communities in which I practice. In the past decade, I began to study my celtic ancestral practices through druidry (I'm in the bardic grade of the Order of Bards, Ovates, and Druids as well as an apprentice in the Ancient Order of Druids in America) and general pagan studies. In the past two years, I've engaged in formal learning with indigenous and celtic herbalists as well.

In terms of specific teachers, my beadwork teacher, Evelyn Bellmeyer, taught me about patience and spirit, about the connection between what we think and feel and whatever kind of making we're doing in any given moment - making beadwork, making food, making relationships. The herbalist I'm apprenticing with right now, Lucy McCall, has taught be just how to BE with herbs and spirit, how to interact with the energy of plants. I always have known that plants are relatives, but now I know how to develop and cultivate those relationships in the same way I do with people or ancestor spirits. I've taken tarot teachings with Rachel Pollack that I especially appreciated because they helped me shift my orientation to tarot from a predictive stance to a more self-healing and community healing stance. Finally, my greatest teachers were my grandfather - who taught me to scry, read cards, and talk to spirits - and my great-grandmother. They supported and recognized my gifts when I was very young, encouraged me to explore and meditate, to talk to spirit and trust their would always be an answer - even if I didn't like the answer. I could go on and on about other teachers, but I feel like I've said a lot.

Authors and/or Books I appreciate:

Joy Harjo, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Rachel Pollack, Mary Greer, Leanne Simpson, Lee Maracle, Deborah Miranda, many many indigenous poets & writers. I appreciate the work of Kristopher Hughes and John Michael Greer, though it doesn't resonate with me in the same way that the essays of Dana O'Driscoll and Michelle Moine have been writing lately about modern, regional druidry. I also like the new work of Orapello & Maguire (Besom, Stang, and Sword) because of its regional focus. I do also like some of Matt Aune's & Thorn Blackwood's work as well.

Musicians and/or Music I appreciate:

So so much and so eclectic. Everything from old school 70s rock & roll to classic country (Dolly Parton, Loretta Lynn, Patsy Cline, etc.), indigenous women's music (Pura Fe, Ulali, Buffy St. Marie), 80s dance music, classic americana and bluegrass. So much. LOL

Films and/or Film-Makers & Actors I appreciate:

This is harder for me. I don't watch a lot of movies. Of course, I like things like Practical Magic (that house!) as a comfort film (even though the magic is a mess in it) but I like Hoffman's Owen's sisters books better. I'm probably more of a book person - women's, indigenous, and of color fiction and poetry as well as mystery writers like Donna Leon, Tana French, Louise Penny. When I watch TV, I tend towards contemporary British mysteries - I like the puzzles in them.

Artists and/or Art I appreciate:

I love the artists here in Taos, and the only art I own is by artists I actually know and interact with. Boni Bent, Anita Rodriguez, Rick Aragon, Daniel Ramirez, Steven Paul Judd, Bethany Yellowtail, Jessica Metcalfe, Dorothy Grant, Tammy Beauvais, Christie Bellcourt.

Website: Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest or any favourites?

http://https://www.facebook.com/malea.powell