Spring break mythology

So I am a lot late in posting this, but I ran into two goddesses on my spring break trip to Seattle.  They were about ten minutes and five blocks away from one another.  My family and I went to the Maroon 5 concert, and in the arena they had many food vendors.  One of them immediately stuck out to me, and it was the Ceres Roasting Company.

I had never heard of this company before, but I think the name is appropriate.  As we all should know, Ceres is the goddess of Agriculture.

And about ten minutes later, we walked into a QFC grocery store for bottled water, and there right in front of my eyes is Athena.

I had never heard of Athena water before, but there it was! It was the world wanting me to remember mythology on my vacation. 

Displacement story

One Friday evening, John was put in charge of watching his younger sister, Marilyn, while their parents went out for dinner.  John didn't really care to watch Marilyn; he thought she was old enough to take care of herself. He would much rather hang out with his friends on a Friday night. He was frightened of his father, but nothing would happen. Once mom and dad left, John invited a couple of his friends over and they blasted music in his room for a while.  When his friends left a while later, it was quiet inside the house and Marilyn's light was off, so John went to sleep.

John abruptly awoke to screaming.  Marilyn was missing from her bed, looking as if an intruder had kidnapped her.  Dad grabbed John by both arms and slammed him up against the wall.  "If you do not go out and find her, don't bother coming back," Johns father said angrily.  "I know you had your punk friends over, so maybe they can help you out of this one!"  With that, John packed his things and left his comfortable home  for a life on the road, with his friends for help.

He searched for his sister everywhere he could think of possible, but Marilyn was nowhere to be found.  The police were having no luck as well.  So one night, John sat down in a dark alley somewhere in Denver, Colorado preparing for sleep.  He placed his hands together and prayed, "Marilyn is gone for good, and now I cannot return home. What should I do? Where should I live now? Please help me Lord." God spoke to John in a dream that night.  He told John to find the countryside with his friends and build themselves a house; they could live off the land this way together.

The next day, the gang set off for the country of Colorado. They found perfect land to build on, and even received permission from the land owner to share crop and meat. John played the lost, and possibly dead, sister card to make that happen. It was getting close to nighttime, so John stayed to pitch a tent for now and sent his friends to find water for the next couple days. As night grew darker, John became worried about his friends. They had been gone for hours.  He grabbed his hunting knife and searched the area, and found them being torn apart by a wolf.  With the wolf distracted by his meal, John plunged the knife into the wolf's neck.

For the next few months, John mourned the death of his friends while he built his home. It was difficult being exiled from his family, but soon John fell in love with the land owner's daughter and they married. He made new friends and bore many children. He became the happiest man alive.

The Caduceus, again!

So I went home for a little while during spring break and saw my sister drink one of these dream waters right before bed.  I was curious as to what it was or how it worked exactly.  She has trouble falling asleep at night, so my mother thought these would help. As I was reading the information on the bottle, I found the caduceus symbol towards the bottom. I wouldn't have thought anything of it, or even knew what the significance behind the caduceus is, if it was not for this mythology class.  I find it very cool to see mythology in my life without even seeking it out!

My interpretation of The Spinners

Art is definitely not a strong suit of mine, so I am just going to tell it like I see it. Now if I were to just see this painting without knowing the story of Arachne and Minerva (which I did not before this class), I would have said that I enjoyed the painting within the painting, or the story within the story aspect. I love paintings that have many things going on at once. I feel like they are more exciting that way.

When I first glanced at the painting, I was studying the foreground scene. My interpretation is that Minerva is spinning on the left, with Arachne weaving between the beams on the right. It appears as if Arachne's aid to her right is treading lightly, afraid of what Minerva will do to her. The woman in the red skirt looks upset as well, like she would rather be anywhere else.  Minerva's aid on the other hand appears very loyal. The look they are exchanging tells me that Minerva is saying something along the lines of, "Get ready to close the curtain on this show!"

In the background story, Arachne is presenting her work. I can see the story of Europa and the frame of flowers and ivy that she wove. Arachne is the woman standing in the front of the loom, looking very proud of her accomplishment.  Minerva is to her left, wearing her helmet and armor. It looks as if she is pointing something at Arachne's weave, or almost shooting a beam of light at it. I know in the story that Minerva struck at the loom and destroyed it, so she might be doing that in this scene. Lastly, I want to comment on the spectator to the far right. She is looking towards the foreground scene, almost as if she would rather be there, or peering at what started the whole thing.

The peacocks are stalking me!

I was at work this weekend, and I swear that there were peacocks everywhere I turned. It's as if mythology was following me and reminding me of Juno placing Argos' eyes on the feathers of her bird. I found the first when I was reorganizing the candles, and the paintings were right there on the wall to the left when I turned my head! The other picture was hanging in the women's bathroom, and I found the last peacock when I was color-coordinating the scarfs. It was the strangest thing; I couldn't ignore it, so I took pictures of each incident. Mythology really is everywhere, if we are open to seeing it.

                   Peacock on the side of a candle box                           Paintings of peacocks

                 Peacock on a scarf                                                           Another picture of a peacock

Learning to be a mythological detective

Before talking with Dr. Sexson yesterday, I had misplaced the fact that our blog is for the main purpose of writing about our findings of mythology in our daily lives. Up to this point, I haven't seen much in my life pertaining to myth, but now I am reconsidering. I now think that I just wasn't open to seeing the mythological clues.

Last night, I was going over all the notes from class and researching what I couldn't remember, when I came across something that I hadn't seen since in eight years. I looked up "memory palaces" and along with some images of old architecture popped up a painting that I instantly recognized.

      The Persistence of Memory       Artist: Salvador Dali

In 8th grade art class, our assignment was to pick an oil painting and paint an exact replica to the best of our ability, also downsized on a 4 by 6 inch card. I chose this piece because of the melting clocks; I thought they were very cool and hadn't seen anything like it before. When I saw this picture last night, it brought me back to the 8th grade with all of my memories. So this painting contributes to the mythology of my life, almost as if it was kept in a "memory palace" deep in my mind, as I'm sure this painting held meaning for the artist about his life and mythology. 

Initiation with pain and suffering

In class on Wednesday, Professor Sexson assigned us to find an initiation myth with pain and suffering involved to present to the class. I personally cannot stand pain and suffering when I read about it, or see it. There are movies that have gore and war, and I love them! But once you step into the realm of torture and suffering, that is the material I can do without. This is why I have never seen the Saw movies! Anyway, this assignment reminded me of two things: a movie that I have seen, and also a story from Ovid's Metamorphoses.

The movie is Seven starring Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman. This is the only pain and suffering movie I like and it is definitely worth watching if you haven't seen it, and worth owning. In the movie, there are two homicide detectives investigating murders that correspond to the seven deadly sins. The initiation myth assignment reminded me of this movie due to the sadistic nature of the killings. One man is forced to literally eat himself to death, representing gluttony. Another is a prostitute, forced to be brutally raped by a knife, representing lust. I won't give anything else away for those who haven't seen it, but it only becomes more painful and torturous from there.

After remembering this movie, the lust killing had me thinking about the story of Tereus, Procne, and Philomela (on page 153). Not the same situation, but similar in the ability to shock me with it's suffering. In this story, Tereus marries Procne, becoming the tyrant of Thrace and they bear a child Itys. Soon after, Procne pleaded with Tereus to bring her sister, Philomela to Thrace so she could visit her. Tereus did this, but instead hauled her to a cabin in the forest and raped her. Afterwords, Philomela told him, "you shall find just payment for your crimes, I'll tell the world how you have ravished me." To this, she prepared for death, but instead he cut off her tongue and had her imprisoned to the cabin. Little did he know that she weaved her story on the loom and sent it to her sister. Procne enraged, set free her sister, and together for revenge, killed Itys and fed him to Tereus. I didn't go into the painful details here, but when I read this story, my jaw literally dropped in horror. I have a feeling that this will happen again in class on presentation day.

Tereus cutting off Philomela's tongue.