Phrases From SONG Dialogues Come To Mind

The general idea behind the books of SONG is the survival of families, nations, cultures in the face of what seem to be impossible odds.

Ringing in my ears are echoes of words long ago spoken - 

What are you going to do about it?

It's coming - you can't stop it.

Your ways are out-dated.

Comply or die.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

No.

WE SAY NO.

Corrections and Updates

For the moment at least, and hopefully for all time, the updates and corrections to the Mamm Books and DANANN are as complete as I'm going to get them.

Thankfully HELL AND HIGH WATER has relatively independent story lines (WHEW) and I'm not going to fret about them right now.

As for why I've fretted about getting these fine-edited right now, it's because I read them all over again in preparation for the writing of RICIMER and found a couple of things that I wanted fixed.

So I fixed them.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll get the new files submitted for print, and the Kindle editions will be fixed at the same time. None of the Story Lines changed, mind you - just a touch-up here and there.

When they're all ready I'll post links.

A Rambling Meander (yes I know it's redundant)

2016  12  26  random thoughts

Got home from work this morning at about 0830 or so and slept for almost eight hours straight, a change for me from the fragments I’ve been able to manage lately (as in for the past eight months or more) so I’m amazed to find myself both awake and halfway alert. It’s also a bit of a surprise to find myself inexplicably ‘tuning in’ to things that generally are reserved for the times I’m going into that ‘universal’ mode thing, whatever you want to call it.

Par for my course, my first thoughts are of my family and friends up north – they’ve got serious Winter coming down on them and I’m grateful that they’re all both smart and experienced enough to keep themselves safe.

Next on my mind comes the situation of my nation and the world in which we live in.

Then the Characters, having allowed me to think about all that other stuff for a while, come to the fore.

After that comes, briefly, a bit about mine own situation.

Stories for younglings are likely to be on our agenda, along with a bunch of short stories about whatever anyone happens to come up with.

You see, my daughter has an email account for my littlest grandling, and I get to send stories and such to her. Of course she can’t read yet as she’s only nine months old, but one day she might want to read them – and there they will be just sitting there waiting for her.

Onward.

Per the Winter that’s settled in up north – we did pray for something other than one of those ‘winters that don’t show up’ years this year, to get the outsiders to go home – and so Winter obliged. Now the prayers are for an early, cool, long, slow Spring – to minimize flooding and get all that water soaking into Earth where it can do some good.

Onward.

As for the world in which we live in – my thoughts are both hopeful and a bit worried. The thing is that I can never be quite all the way sure that my ‘thoughts’ are entirely mine own or if I’m picking up on something that’s kind of ‘free-floating’ in the air around me.

No, I’m not delusional; I’ve gotten stuck with an INFJ/P personality type, which I certainly didn’t ask for and would have most assuredly chosen a different, more ordinary one, if I HAD been given the choice.

I also have this cast of fictional Characters for whom everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING, is grist for the mill of fiction. Hence my view of the world in which I live in is always perhaps more geared toward seeing it in a context that’s quite a bit bigger than my own little bit of personal energy …

I suppose, for all practical purposes, it doesn’t really matter much does it?

Whether mine own or whatever else might be contributing, there are ‘thoughts’ that refuse to be polite enough to not come where they’re not invited.

That Hope is by far the first to come to mind, and the strongest, is a real big encouragement, I have to say. 

There are those who are in despair, which is understandable, and some of those I honestly do know and love … and hope to high heaven that they will soon pick up on the Hope part of the equation. Whether it’s mine own or our world in general, a person would have to look askance at me when I say it’s at the top of the list and dominates, but it’s definitely right there, and it is definitely dominating.

Maybe it has something to do with Hope springing eternal and all that, but for the past months, probably for the past year or more actually, it’s been powerful and growing. In the midst of it have been (thankfully brief) times of sheer and utter horror, but overall has been that sense of a swelling Light.

It’s impossible to explain but it is very much *there*.

And that, my friend, is Hope come calling in no uncertain terms. It’s associated with Healing, which is a tremendous relief; and Faith; and Peace, another huge relief although perhaps a bit puzzling given the circumstances; and its primary source seems to be something to do with the Balancing of the Spiral.

Yeah, I know that sounds kind of mystic maybe, esoteric no doubt, and probably about as unrealistic as a person can imagine.

But there you have it.

It is what it is.

Despite those who seem bound and determined to make of Earth a battleground, still the vast majority of what I’m *getting* is NOT all about fighting, or conflict, or any of the uglies that are besetting us and will continue to beset us. By far there seems to me a sense of growing determination that we (humanity) are going to find our balance and that the uglies are not going to be able to unseat it. Not permanently.

Because there are lots and lots of folks (with very loud Voices) who want it to be otherwise, mine own little Voice is going to get no attention and I’m all right with that. Because, you see, this little Voice is but a very small indicator of something that’s one heck of a lot bigger and stronger. So I’m not going to fret myself about coming across as a lunatic.

Yes there are worries – there have to be else we’d not be able to deal with what we’re going to have to deal with. The worries poke at us and keep us from falling back to sleep.

Will the United States, Russia, Israel, China, Argentina (where did that one come from – what the heck), Australia, Scandinavia, Canada, UK, India (???), and France (???) … do what? … I don’t know … do what has to be done on behalf of everyone who wants Peace?

And what will be the price of that Peace?

Again, I do not know.

What I do know is that what I have felt rising is not diminishing in either nature or intensity – and that’s good news.

Maybe it’s the Buddhists and the old Indian understandings of Peace and Unity that have been (at last) reconnecting themselves to the positive flows and exerting some of their old influence?

Maybe it’s partly a reawakening of our own North American Elder Folk’s spirit, the one that goes back to before fighting became the ‘norm’, which is a long way back indeed considering the tribes have been at war with one another for millennia.

Maybe it’s got something to do with the political situation finally prodding folk all over the world into actually paying attention to what they perhaps had come to take for granted. Asserting their own Faith in opposition to something being used for the harming of others … and I’m talking about the kind of Faith that rides deep inside, not associated with any one creed or dogma or definition.

Me being me, and our Characters being themselves, putting it in terms of the Justice, Mercy, and Peace of the Mother coming into play tends to make the most sense to me.

In other terms, there’s an inherent Balance that’s the fundamental Law of the entirety of our world, the one that stretches from infinity to infinity – the one whose fractals are part and parcel of every aspect of the whole thing, the triangles of which are immutably woven into spirals at every level, all of them moving and moving and moving from infinity to infinity in constant unremitting motion. That would be Energy, at times taking on form as Matter.

And that’s a scientific train of thought that nobody wants to follow any more than anybody wants to follow the esoteric one that is actually the exact same train of thought.

What, people want to know, can we expect in the coming Time?

Warfare, for starters.

Not what anyone wants to hear, is it?

What happened to that whole big Peace thing? What about all that Hope that’s supposedly infusing the atmosphere of our world?

Well, those things are what are behind the warfare, as always.

To get to one, you generally have to get through the other – Peace will not come on its own without conflict because there is some powerful opposition to Peace.

Otherwise, Balance would never become.

Can’t have one without the other, and that’s just the fact of the matter.

People can try to deny it, they can try to avoid it, they can try to say it doesn’t have to be that way – until the cows come home they can try to convince themselves and everyone else that there’s a different way (and I for one would dearly love to believe them) – but Pi in the Sky wishes have zero chance against PHI in the Sky reality.

Warfare is what’s coming?

Warfare is ALWAYS coming, in one form or another.

But I write fiction; I’m not a prophetess, so don’t take my word for it. I just have a hunch that what’s ahead for us isn’t going to be all that different from what’s behind us, that’s all.

We can (and we do) try to make our reality fit into the frame of what we want it to be – and that’s fine because that ability and that instinct is a gift to us and we’re obliged to use it whether we would will it or not – and so we can, for millennia on end, use that gift to help us get through what we have to get through, to do what we have to do when we have to do it, and to ultimately survive for as long as our species is going to remain viable in our world. It is not a vain pursuit but one of a more vital importance than even the most dedicated of us realize.

It is a source, for good or for ill, of the Balance which will be kept no matter what.

So yeah, to say that it’s important is something of a massive understatement. Our universe is going to continue to unfold as it should, something folks have been aware of for a lot longer than we might imagine or that many of us want to believe.

And that’s okay.

Infinity is eternal, remember.

We aren’t going to be able to wrap our heads around that concept and we don’t have to.

That doesn’t mean it isn’t the reality in which we live in.

Anyway, warfare is pretty much going to be a given – until we’ve almost destroyed this very world in which we live in, or at least our little bit of it (which is of vital importance to us because it’s the ONLY bit of it that we DO live in).

Eventually, hopefully, we’ll figure out how to exist without overt warfare.

Don’t go holding your breath on that, because it’s liable to be a long time coming and carry a price tag that we, of our time, are not going to be willing to pay.

But the time will likely come that the conflicting ideologies will indeed come to agree to disagree and warfare will just stop.

How?

Well, the only thing that comes into my fiction-oriented mind is what the most idealistic of us (including me) will not even consider. That is that the fighting will stop when Earth is divided fairly equally among the ideologies that wish to dominate the whole.

Sooner or later everyone is going to reach the conclusion that there’s no way any single choice of belief systems is going to ever be able to dominate the whole. Humankind is flat out not designed to accept any such thing.

And so the division will come, likely after a couple of things happen.

One is a no-brainer – warfare that will come to within a hair’s breadth of utterly demolishing a very hefty hunk of Earth herself.

The other is a more natural thing, and when the two come together, at the same time, there won’t be so very many of us left to come to the conclusion I just mentioned (that ‘peaceful cohabitation’ of conflicting factions is not going to happen).

And the survivors will agree to separate and to keep themselves to themselves – to develop their own ways independently of the others.

Fictionally speaking, this concept is where the world of DANANN comes from – that’s one of the books of SONG – where the Quadrants are each self-supporting and closed to the others.

We haven’t gotten into what it is exactly that each of the Quadrants is like that makes them so different from one another but I suspect it has to do with both politics and religion since those seem to be kind of the things that divide folks. Not skin color or intelligence quotients or anything else, at least not that I can think of.

People tend to fight about both territorialism and expansionism, for both political and religious reasons.

So in the end (temporarily at least, relatively speaking) it will come down to eliminating both of those concepts by giving each a ‘safe place’ in which to do whatever it is that they want to do, so long as it doesn’t interfere with or harm any of the others.

So what are the divisions going to be?

Elephino.

As I said, I write fiction; I’m not a prophetess.

My best guess would be that Northwest would be for the people who, at the time of the division, are in favor of theocracy.

Northeast might be set aside for those who are ready, willing, and able to blend many diverse cultures into one.

Southwest could provide for those who wish to live simply with Earth and with one another.

Southeast could well be where the ‘spiritual-minded’ can live unfettered as they choose, to follow whatever paths they want without being judged by anyone, so long as they do no harm.

And so the divisions are defined, borders are laid out, resources of each quadrant are assessed to be sure everyone has plenty of what they need to be self-sufficient, and the quadrants are fine with leaving everyone else alone and being left alone in return.

And so there is Peace.

There’s no trade, but no trade is necessary.

There’s no interaction or communication, but no interaction or communication are wanted.

There’s no travel between the quadrants and little within them (except for those too independent-minded to have been able to choose any of the four options and so they are assigned all of the islands of Earth for their own), but ‘no travel between quadrants’ is part of the solution that eliminates territorialism and expansionism.

Politics and religion take a little longer to deal with but they eventually end up irrelevant because there’s no real purpose in ‘preaching to the choir’.

So things change and it doesn’t really take all that many generations before the quadrants are the norm that nobody bothers to question or even wonder about.

Part of the ‘ease’ by which this whole thing is accomplished stems from the fact that, at the time, technology has begun to reign supreme.

There are no books, for one thing. What few are left by the time the near-destruction of Earth is complete are gotten rid of while everyone’s focusing on survival. Books were a big part of what caused all the trouble in the first place, or so it is perceived, so nobody wants them anyway; they’re reminders of what the survivors of humankind want to leave behind.

Technological communication is all there is, and it is naturally edited to eliminate references to anything to with the things the people of Earth so desperately want to leave behind that they agree to ‘the quadrant option’ in the first place. When the time comes that knowledge of the Histories of Earth is completely deleted from the technological system by which Earth has come to be governed, nobody even notices.

Meanwhile, technology has come up with solutions to most, if not all, of the physical and psychological ailments of humankind. They’ve all become things of the past, too – and nobody wants them back any more than they want the books back, or to be reminded of ‘the bad old days’ in any way, shape, or form. In less time than a person would expect, nobody even realizes that there ever even had been ‘before times’.

Do I think any such thing is really going to happen?

How would I know?

But I’m not going to bet against it.

Take away the reasons for conflict and give everyone what they want while replacing their need for self-governance with a set of computer-generated ‘laws’ that apply to everyone … and spend several generations ruthlessly enforcing said ‘laws’ by way of technology and electronics (so that actual people are not involved in the enforcement), with the assent of the survivors of humankind … and you’re gonna end up with Peace.

Everybody’s living in their own utopia; nothing left to fight about.

With nobody to try to convince, it won’t be long before the religions of the world won’t even have to be outlawed; they’ll die natural deaths as their followers won’t have anyone to argue with about anything and the folk will turn their minds gradually toward survival and development of the resources at their disposal within their relative quadrants.

Politics likewise. With no opposition, there’s no point.

So.

In the wake of the *theoretically inevitable catastrophe* of humankind-created all-out war (and other man-made factors) in a deadly fatal combination with to-be-expected natural events (let’s go with an impact, earthquakes, volcanic activity, climate change, tectonic plates shifting, etc.) just exactly WHO is going to come up with this ‘reasonable alternative’?

My guess would be the atheists, scientists, futurists, techs, and the Dalai Lama.

They’re probably the only ones that anybody is going to be ready, willing, and able to listen to.

Why?

Because they’ll be basically the only ‘neutral’ folks on Earth at the time, with no bones to really pick with anybody. They’re apolitical and non-religious. All they care about is having the resources they want to develop the knowledge they want, with the Dalai Lama thrown in to represent a spiritual aspect (which by that time the rest of them will have long since acknowledged as an inherent part of the whole PHI thing). They’re also the best prepared to ride out a catastrophe.

Plus, by then they’ll have developed the technology to be able to provide the neutral enforcement of the only real ‘law’ everyone has to go by: Harm None.

And they’ll succeed. For a time, they’ll have their Peace.

Yep.

And then the whole thing is going to start all over again, because it has to. That’s the deal. Balance is what makes the world go ‘round.

You know the Norse legends? Ragnarok and all that? The basic story line is, I think, probably dead on. People being people, there have to be ‘characters’ that folks can relate to and be interested enough in to keep the Story alive, but the point is always the bottom line cyclic nature of the whole.

I have a feeling that none of the story lines of our ancient myths and legends are linear as opposed to cyclic in nature.

Just as we will never be able to wrap our heads around the concept of there being no literal ‘In the Beginning’ we also cannot wrap our heads around the concept of there being no literal ‘The End’.

And really, we don’t have to wrap our heads around any such thing. I doubt much, if any, of all this stuff is going to be happening any time soon, probably not in the lifetimes of anyone who is now alive at least.

Each and all of our individual lives do have a Beginning and an End. Each and all of us are made up of energy, waves and particles, and it’s up to each and all of us to Choose to contribute the energy that belongs to us, however temporarily, to whichever ‘side’ of the Balance of all the energies of our world we want to support.

Keep in mind that both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ have to be equally represented, if that makes any sense. Keep in mind that apparently ‘good’ and ‘bad’ are relative terms. I think that the whole concept of PHI is based on opposition being a requirement for Balance. ‘Good’ and ‘bad’ don’t actually come into play at all – only ‘opposite’.

Back to politics for a moment here, can anybody be truly surprised at the response in the United States by a long-quiet (and apparently presumed dormant) population? As long as there was a relative Balance going on, said population had no reason to assert itself. When there came a threat to that relative Balance, with overt ‘we’re going to dominate and you can’t stop us’ behaviors … well … guess what.

For me, the fascinating part of this whole scenario is that we all seem to be functioning instinctively. Ask us to explain and we’re liable to come up with all kinds of ‘reasons’ for why people are as they are. They make sense only up to a point, because most of the factors have been a part of the equation for a real long time. So why NOW have those factors all of a sudden become issues?

I think it’s not so very different from any of the cycles of power our world has been through.

It’s kind of like physics, right?

Actions produce equal and opposite reactions and the chain of events spirals ‘round and ‘round ad infinitum.

Instinct kicks in on some level that we as individuals aren’t even aware of.

Aggression triggers retaliation, no matter on what scale.

If I could believe for one instant that what’s coming could be prevented or avoided, I’d be first in line to try to figure out how to do it.

But I think the best we can hope for is that, when all is said and done, the survivors will recognize the requirement for Balance, and put their energies into keeping that Balance not by the cycle of aggression and retaliation but by focusing on maintaining Balance by refusing to try to tip it.

No, I don’t see that happening, which is a sadness to me because it would be really nice to be able to believe such a thing might be possible.

Bottom line?

Because apparently there are plenty of people who are bound and determined to be aggressive, there are going to be just as many who are bound and determined to take the opposite position. Neither side is going to ‘win’. On the other hand, neither side is going to ‘lose’ either.

The cycle might, for a time, seem to favor one or the other but no matter how much jockeying for position goes on the result is going to be Balance. Even if these particular ‘sides’ annihilate one another, more will pop onto the screen and keep the cycle spinning. Even if, somewhere along the line, a time comes that Balance is kept by maintaining a fragile Peace, it ain’t gonna last. Somebody will choose aggression; retaliation will be the answer, and …

Man.

What a kind of depressing sort of thing to be thinking about, huh?

*laughing*

Depressing only because I haven’t included the multitudes of wonders and joys and beautiful times that, honestly, really do make up the bulk of what I’m *getting* from every direction.

Because, think about it, what is GOING to be the response to this deep darkness that seems to be threatening the world in which we live in?

THAT is what seems to be in its ascendency right now – that response to darkness, which is Light.

Threatened by aggressive Hatred, what is the retaliatory response going to be?

Yeah.

That wheel, it does indeed go ‘round and ‘round, doesn’t it?

For my part, the getting to Choose thing is a no-brainer.

Choosing to go with the Light when threatened by the Dark?

No-brainer, like I said.

It’s recognizing what’s coming at us, and focusing with everything we’ve got in us on the antithesis of that darkness that seems to be at work here, and it’s that focus that makes our lives truly a journey of love and peace and joy and all of the things of the Light.

The best part of the whole of it is that Light-filled journey so very many of us are sharing, whether many of us are aware of it or not.

One thing that the Dark will never understand, never ever ever, is that the harder it pushes, the stronger becomes the Light. You’d think that too would be a no-brainer, but (being as I happen to like the Light I can say this without compunction) nobody has ever accused the Dark of having the wit to figure it out.

Maybe that too is part of why the Dark seems to always want to be the aggressor, who knows? Maybe that part of the whole has just enough wit to have figured out that the Light has something the Dark is missing, and so is constantly trying to take what would be so freely shared. I reckon maybe there’s half a wit involved in that.

Did I just call half of the energies of the world half-witted?

Yes, I do believe I did.

Since everything has to balance, I suppose that means the energies of Light are blessed with having a wit and a half.

Whew.

That’s a relief.

Justice comes in all sorts of ways that may or may not make any sense to us; so does Mercy. Peace is something we all might be able to understand, but we have to go through the first two before we get there.

Justice is the Balancing. Mercy is Survival. Then (maybe) comes Peace, with or without a price tag but probably with one.

And that’s kind of a view of the world in which we live in from the unique perspective/s of our Characters.

Onward.

Mine own situation is that there are challenges but I’m managing to make it through them one by one. The losses of this past year have broken me in some ways but yammering about those losses isn't going to do the least bit of good. Better to focus on what is left to me.

Potentially Habitable Planets Right Next Door - relatively speaking ...

HERE we go!!!

click on link! It's an MIT article ... 

Who wants to go Hiving, pioneering in the stars?

Image: M. Kornmesser/ESO

And here comes a symbol you might be familiar with:

O_O

It's the one I generally use to indicate one of those 'weird coincidences' that keep popping up during the writing of this series of books.

That they're still popping up after all this time, and they're almost always pretty (or VERY) new scientific 'discoveries' that relate in some way to our story lines still strikes me as a little weird - okay maybe a lot weird, but what the heck am I supposed to do, ignore them? Can't do that, the Characters would pitch fits all over the Spiral.

In my head, we in our own time are at least a thousand years away from 'Hiving the Stars' ... or so I thought ... until today ... 

Danann takes place far in our future, as do the short stories about our 'early pioneers' ... and COME HELL AND HIGH WATER is set well over ten thousand years far in our past. I don't write about 'current events'; at least I don't intend to.

Heaven help me.

I can't hardly keep up with our Characters ... let alone today's scientists ... 

O_O

Slated to come out this year (2016) COME HELL AND HIGH WATER is fiction ... at least it's supposed to be ... but ... maybe not totally ... apparently ... 

Stephen Hawking - Black Holes - Science Comes In Handy For Fiction Writing

Stephen Hawking gives us something to think about, indeed he does. Click on his name to take you to one of the articles.

For our purposes, which is essentially a search for possible 'explanations' of some of the stuff presented in the fictional format of the Mamm Books and the rest of the books and stories associated with the SONG series, cold hard facts aren't required. Hypothesis will more than suffice.

There are scores of articles all over the place about this, so why did I pick this one?

I like the photo.

And really, it doesn't matter which of the articles you reference - they're all telling us the same thing.

Hawking's ideas might come in handy for us (which is entirely selfish but oh well) in terms of 'understanding' how certain elements of our books might be possible.

Like what?

Well, like ... what if black holes are 'memory banks' of what has been? All those deposits of energy-borne substance safely tucked away might be available for a withdrawal. What if someone comes up with the access code? Could that someone use the deposit slips (receipts) to replicate whatever the original deposit was, exactly and precisely identical to the original?

I'm thinking at the moment about Danann and Sidhelagh to represent the vague concept that's trying to form itself in my mind. Or when the Mother touches Dunnottar's Grove and Roundhouse, giving the far future exact replicas (or perhaps the originals?) of the far past's actual substance. The miracle is no less miraculous; it's just got a logical, mathematical, scientific basis for being able to occur.

For future reference in stories yet to be written, suppose some of our Characters are roaming around on the Spiral, doing what they do, and the Younglings happen on one of these banks (black holes), get curious, and want to reconstruct something that was once real but has been lost in the mists of mythology? 

It would be kind of like what they do from their Play Pretend Clearing, except those little jaunts into imagination are based on having a knowledge of the dimensions/realms of the times/places/persons/events involved in their adventures via the Clearing. In other words, they can only go to where and when they already know something about. 

Their educations would have included plenty from the past of their time, and their present, and included myths and legends we today have no idea about except for very ancient references and the findings of our archaeologists. That the dimensions of said myths and legends, fictionally speaking, were/are contemporary (embedded, so to speak) to our own realm on the 'timeline' of the Spiral makes them readily accessible to the Younglings.

That's a whole different scenario from them playing around on the Spiral, let alone traipsing along on the PHI Line that runs through the whole thing. They can't get 'lost' but boy can they run into unfamiliar territory. The Spiral covers a LOT more territory than even their extensive educations could possibly prepare them for.

See, this is what happens when somebody out there somewhere comes up with a concept we hadn't really thought about before.

Fictionally, our Characters can have fabulous adventures all over the multiverse as a consequence of one of the ideas coming from the mind of one of the smart people of our world.

The Characters don't have to understand the math or science behind the concept in order to put it to use in their fictional lives. The Younglings can get themselves into predicaments that they have to get themselves out of one way or another - and the same goes for the adult Characters.

Traveling the Spiral can take our Characters all over our planet, our solar system, our galaxy, our universe, and beyond. They have all infinity and eternity to roam around in - past, present, and future. 

Running into one of those black holes with their deposits of energy - which are observable to the Younglings (or others) - would most certainly spark their curiosity. Because these deposits of energy are different. They're not the living, moving, active dimensions and realms the Younglings use to navigate their way along the Spiral. Looking at them does not animate them. They are inert, in a sort of suspended animation, hibernating maybe, while the energy that once made them 'real' is out there in the rest of the Spiral contributing to the larger energy pool.

Something like that.

At any rate, these perfectly preserved but inanimate things would fascinate the Younglings to no end. What/who are they? Where did they come from? When did they come from? How did they get stuck there and why can't they get un-stuck?

The Younglings being the Younglings, they're bound to try to figure it out, and are bound to succeed. And of course they don't go to the adults (who would tell them in no uncertain terms to stay the heck away from those black holes) because they don't want to hear the warnings. They want to find out for themselves what these things are all about.

Yes they know it's dangerous.

They don't, however, know it's lethal.

Reconstructing one of the inanimate ghosts means re-energizing it - and the energy has to come from somewhere ... the nearest energy source would be the Younglings themselves.

This is a different scene from Danann and Sidhelagh resuming their physical forms after three thousand years. The two of them have been 'themselves' for all that time, their energy remaining intact within the Sidhe of the Ages and needing only to make the swap back into the form of energy that is their physical selves. Said energy can't be in both forms at once, you know. 

And so it is for all of the Sidhe. Their physical 'selves' are preserved around the perimeters of the black hole energy banks as de-energized forms while their life energy continues through and out again into the whole of the Spiral. Theirs, however, is not dispersed like most of the rest of the life-force energy but retains its individual identity. The Sidhe are exceptions to a lot of stuff.

Anyway, the de-energized forms the Younglings are looking at and curious about are not Sidhe. The energy required to reactivate them is not the energy of a Sidhe simply switching from one form to another. 

Now, the Younglings are not stupid. They know basically how all this stuff works. They choose one form from among the many they see, something really little and innocuous-looking, to try their experiment on. They figure it won't take much of their combined energy to 'bring it back'.

Luckily for them Brann the Honest tattles on them ahead of time so the Sidhe of the Ages are standing by, Danann and Sidhelagh among them. They let the Younglings proceed but stop them before they can get themselves into big trouble with the Holy Trinity.

Danann and Sidhelagh are there to tell them, remind them, about the consequences of meddling with stuff they aren't supposed to meddle with.

Since this happens to the original lot of Younglings, Danann and Sidhelagh are but Voices in the ears of the Younglings. 

When the Younglings want to argue the point Danann of Perth himself (Danann the Red as opposed to Danann the Gold of Dunnottar) threatens to transform back into his original mortal self and thrash the lot of them. And so he does. He doesn't thrash them but he scares them pretty good; fierce Warrior that he is, he's convincingly intimidating when he wants to be.

So they cease and desist.

Aduan and Loki, however ... ach, those trouble-makers! I have a feeling a lot of those de-energized things have been de-energized for good reason by the Will of the Trinity.

How it is that Aduan and Loki manage to not get themselves de-energized is something I haven't figured out yet but assume it has to do with the Keeping of the Balance.

*laughing*

Aduan and Loki  :  the Keepers of the Balance

Lord help us.

They'll want crowns.

An Excerpt From DANANN to the Stonehaven Fireballs

...

Now among the boxes and trunks up in the balcony is one of cedar. In it are a bunch of white clothes and robes or cloaks or some such.

Sidhelagh has Danann bring it down and they explain what these ‘dress whites’ are for.

As the white outfits hang all over the place, to get the wrinkles out, the family follows Sidhelagh to the hearth-circle.

‘You see,’ she says, ‘white is the color of the Mother. It represents Her Peace and Her Mercy. So we wear these dress whites in Her honor on special occasions – like the Winter Solstice that’s coming up. You call it Short Day and that’s as good a name as any I reckon. We’ll have a little Celebration in the Grove on that evening, and then ride – yes RIDE, so practice like crazy in the next couple of days because that’s all you’ve got and nobody better fall off in front of God and everybody in Stonehaven – yes, that’s where we’re riding to after our Celebration. They have something special planned and we’re going to be there for it.’

Brann jumps up like he’s suddenly realized he’s sitting on a tack.

‘Hey! Bard told me about that! Wait ‘til you see! Just wait!’

But he won’t tell them anything more about it no matter how they pester him to.

‘Nope. I promised not to,’ is all they get out of him.

And it just adds to their excitement.

The day of the Celebration is a quiet one.

Everybody finds a spot and spends the day thinking about a lot of stuff.

There’s plenty to think about, all things considered, and the day goes by quickly as they sort it all through in their minds.

By the time they’re in their dress whites, they’re calm and serene, at peace with themselves and with each other.

Mamm and Alaric lead the way and the couples follow by age order with the youngsters coming along behind, the eldest of them carrying the babies.

Sidhelagh and Danann are technically the oldest, but they want their own places back. They coach Mamm and Alaric about the weaving but aren’t really worried.

‘It will come to you,’ they say. ‘And we will be right behind you. This is the way it’s supposed to be; it will be fine.’

And so it is.

The Grove Celebration is relatively short, but very sweet as the Song of the Trinity weaves its medley and their Voices Sing in harmony.

Having saddled their mounts before getting in to their dress whites, it’s just a matter of getting up onto them with the long cloaks in the way.

Danann and Sidhelagh give them a hand and then it’s off to see what Stonehaven has in store for them.

I have to say they make an impressive sight as they clip clop into town.

People have already been gathering for quite a while and the crowd grows rapidly.

When Dunnottar arrives, there’s a hush as they slowly make their way through town. Dressed as they are, they seem to glow in the dark as they ride two by two with Mamm and Alaric in the lead.

Bard is going to head this special event, so it is to his house they ride.

‘Will you accompany me to the opening?’

‘Of course, if you want us to.’

‘I do.’

In the square of the town is where all gather to begin.

Bard’s Voice carries in the night air.

‘We have only just recently done battle against a foe of darkness and of cold. It was defeated by the warmth and light we helped to generate. So it’s fresh in your minds what this night is all about. Tonight we cleanse our town as we have recently helped to cleanse our world. Let us begin!’

In the center of the square a big fire suddenly springs to life.

Bard’s Voice rings.

‘The warmth and the light of this fire burns the things that have been just getting in our way!’

From out of the crowds come many with things to add to the fire.

Also from out of the crowd come others.

These are strong men and women from the town, representing all of the families, and there are quite a few of them. They have prepared packs of burnable items securely fastened into wire cages at the ends of chains. Together they form a circle around the central fire.

Bard turns to the family.

‘Who represents Dunnottar on this night?’

Everyone looks at Danann but Danann looks at Thann.

‘I’ll hold your cloak, Thann. Your ball and chain is right over there.’

Thann doesn’t bother arguing but goes to pick up the end of the chain. Gathering the length of it, he goes to stand with the others at the fire.

‘What am I supposed to do?’ he asks the man standing next to him.

‘Just do what I do,’ comes the answer. ‘We’ll light our fire-balls and then swing them, over our heads and all around about, through the town. They catch whatever bad might be in the air and take it into them as they burn. Then we heave the whole works into the harbour. It’s a cleansing of our town, getting rid of unwanted or dangerous things, giving us a clean fresh beginning.’

‘That sounds like something we all need to do now and then.’

‘That it is, but few do it. Get ready, we’re soon to start. When the Bells Sound their Voices, we’ll light our fires. People throughout the town are going to be yelling and screaming so don’t be shocked by them. They’re chasing things for the fire-balls to catch. Now listen, Thann. Listen for the Voices of the Bells.’

In a very short time every Bell in town starts ringing, tolling, striking, clanging, booming … whether there’s anyone to attend them or not, the Voices of the Bells ring out. It is Winter Solstice and the turning of the darkness.

And the fire-balls are lit while the people yell and scream like banshees.

Thann follows his new friend, but not too closely, through the streets assigned, swinging the fire-ball at the end of its chain around his head, around his body, spinning with it at times, dancing aside if it gets too close. When one arm gets tired, he switches to the other. When both get tired, he uses both for a time.

‘Whew! Glad I didn’t try this before we built that roundhouse!’

After what seems forever, they make their way to the harbour, and fire glows over the water as the balls of flame are cast into the deep and extinguished with a lot of hissing and steaming.

The screams and yells of the people turn to cheers that sound kind of hoarse – this night’s event has been as hard on their Voices as the swinging of the fire-balls has been on the bodies of those who carried them.

Danann comes to find Thann, easily seen as he is taller than everyone and dressed in white.

Thann goes to him and slides his smoky sooty self into the white of his cloak.

‘What now?’

‘Now the bonfires. All around the edges of the town are fires just lighting now, like the one in the square. People are getting rid of rubbish they don’t want any more – and it’s symbolic of getting rid of any bad feelings or whatever from inside of themselves. It all goes up in smoke, you see. We’ll start at the nearest one and make our way all the way around the town. Some people bring along things to put into each fire as they go, but we’re pretty much spectators tonight.’

‘Speak for yourself, spectator! You weren’t the one swinging that ball of fire all over the place! My arms are never going to be the same, nor the rest of me, either.’

‘It’s good for you. Wait until you see what you get to swing in the smithy!’

‘Oh goody. I’m so excited.’

Danann laughs.

‘Here are the others, and here’s your mount. You can ride and rest for a while. Each fire will want us to stop for a moment. They have warm drinks to share with us. Take them, but I warn you, sip sparingly from each. They’re potent, I tell you – and there are a lot of fires surrounding this town on this night.’

‘What about the kids?’

‘They’ll get spiced cider or hot fruit drinks of different kinds. Ours have been warned to sip sparingly as well; they’ll get belly aches if they don’t – and spend half the night having to pee.’

Now Thann’s laughter rings in the night, adding his Voice to the many who are also laughing and singing.

‘And after the round of fires?’

‘After that, we all go back to the square and make a big circle.’

‘Like the one on Northwest, I bet. What a great way to finish cleansing your town!’

‘Yes, it is. It wraps it all up. Now you know why we spend the daytime of this night quietly.’

‘If I’d known we’d be doing all this, I’d have spent it sleeping!’

Danann’s Voice grows deeper but Thann can still hear him clearly through the on-going din.

‘Stonehaven does itself proud on this night, Thann. The people, they are just doing what they do, but they are blessed. They have kept what the rest of the world has for too long been sadly lacking. They don’t realize how special they are … or maybe they do.’

‘I think they know, Danann. I think they know. Else they wouldn’t do what they do, right?’

...

Danann is for Stonehaven

And the Fireballs

Who Protect and Preserve

Things that matter

You have gifted me this book

I gift it to you in return

With respect

And admiration

Thank you Stonehaven.

Here's a link to the event that sparked DANANN - the 2015 Fireballs ...
a time lapse from the webcam - things really start moving at about five and a half minutes into the video ... :) It covers nine hours in seven minutes or so ... stonehavenfireballs.co.uk will take you to some great photos and YouTube vids. Flickr also has some terrific photos, along with scads you'll get with a simple search for them!

Here's just one:

Here's a link to another preview of DANANN, one that has a bit more of the 'story line' ... enjoy!