Uncle Thor’s Lessons, Anecdotes and Humor

One of the National Guardsmen who just returned from Iraq was at our Post last night. He presented us with a flag that flew over the US Embassy in Baghdad.

The man made quite a sacrifice for the good of others. He gave up his civilian life to go into a war zone. Temperatures there can reach 130 degrees. On top of that, the year in Iraq cost him in other ways. Among them, his girlfriend broke up with him while he was overseas, and his job was gone when he got home. He lost this as a result of being called to serve. He was not bitter about it. He said that if there was one thing he had to do, it was serve in Iraq.

By the way, our National Guardsman is no kid. He is a year or two over fifty.

As we start this Fourth of July holiday weekend, let us reflect on those who make sacrifices in service to us. Let them know that we do not forget them. One of the thing the Guardsman told us was that they had few amenities where he was stationed. No USO, No Post Exchange (PX), no similar facilities. The troops were happy to receive boxes from home. Think about that. This weekend would be a good time to deduct a few dollars from the beer and barbecue money and give it to one of the causes that supports the troops. It shows that we care and it does a lot of good to people who are making sacrifices on our behalf.

This Rune is a mystery. We are not sure if it is a bow, a staff weapon, a shield, armor or war saddle. Like the story of Weyland the Smith, it was so well known at the time it was written that nobody wrote down a full description. My own work with the Rune has shown it to be a token of safe passage. For the traveler, it seems to ward off trouble at a distance.

Exercise 1: Yr has the power to assure safe passage. It fends off problems at a distance. A good way to get a feel for the Rune is to look to your own experiences. Get your pen and paper. Think about instances when you were traveling and you expected to run into an obstacle, delay or other trouble. It might have been a traffic jam, delay for road or bridge repair, a lengthy detour or some other obstacle. Now, think of instances where you expected the obstacle, but instead found smooth sailing. The usual traffic jam did not happen, the road work did not cause problems, the detour was gone, etc. You can also use examples when riding a boat or aircraft. Write down those instances where the expected problem never happened, thereby allowing you a smooth journey.

Look over the list. Think of how you felt in each of these circumstances. Consider the instant where you saw that the expected problem was gone, and you had an open road ahead. That feeling and that perception is where you personally felt some of the Yr Rune. By comparing your various experiences, can you get a feel for what they all had in common? Again, that is an example of your personal experience related to Yr.

Exercise 2: Modern travel is safe. The average journey of an hour or more passes over many things that would have been obstacles at one time. A paved road may pass over streams, swamps, and a river or two. It may go around or through a mountain, pass easily through a forest and skirt many another hazard. In effect, modern roads create a state harmonious with the Yr rune.

The next time you take a extended trip for an hour or more, be it by car, bus or train, count some of the obstacles that the road traverses. You can be sure that every bridge and overpass likely takes you over some hazard or obstacle, be it a waterway, ravine or another road. Look at the things that your journey passes, which would have been a serious impediment a century or so ago. This will give you a sense of Yr as safe passage. It is your experience of the Rune through the use of modern roads.

Alternate Exercise: Have you ever ridden in an armored vehicle? It may have been a tank, armored personnel carrier, self-propelled gun, armored car or armored amphibious tractor. Even in the most peaceful of situations, there is a feeling of safety which comes of having all that armor around you. It may even be stronger today. (In my day, it was M113s APCs, M109 SP guns. M48 and M60 tanks. Today’s Bradleys and Abrams tanks, as well of as vehicles used by other NATO countries have better armor than we did.) Do you feel different when riding in a armored vehicle as opposed to an unarmored one? Armor gives a sense of the Yr Rune, as it fends off danger. It is hard to describe the feeling to someone who has never had the experience of a ride in a tank, APC or SP gun.

Alternate exercise: Yr has the potential to deflect problems before they get close enough for discomfort. We might call it “nipping them in the bud.” A good example is planning a trip. In picking the route, you also face and handle potential obstacles. For instance, having an alternate route allows you to make changes if the original route becomes difficult or untenable. You will likely pick stops on the route to eat, relax, and refuel. That wards off hunger, fatigue and lack of fuel. For very long trips taking two or more days, you will select motels and other accommodations. This prevents the problem of seeking shelter and comfort.

Look at instances in your experience where planning prevents problems. Your ability to plan and thereby make a safe and easy passage is an application of the Yr Rune. Planning can expedite and at the same time prevent problems.

If you make Runes for divination, you have many choices. My original sets were small sticks, about three inches long with a Rune carved on one side. There was a time I did not have Runes with me. In a pinch, I took stones from the beach, rinsed them, let them dry, and marked them with a marker. They worked just as well.

A friend made me a painted set of cherrywood. I also have one of shaped round chips. I had made it in a pinch, and it has served me for over 20 years. There are about ten Rune sets out that there I had made with shaped pieces of wood. Some are round, and for some I used heart-shaped chips that I had gotten. Each of these sets has the Runes marked over pictures I painted. For instance, the Ken Runes have lighthouses. Most of the painted sets were gifts.

I like to use the cherrywood Runes and the shaped round chips.

The point: there are not hard and fast rules for making your reading Runes. Choose a material and shape that appeals to you. Keep in mind that in a pinch, you can improvise. Your Runes, your choice.

What do you do when you need to read Runes, but your usual set is absent? Find a deck of regular playing cards. Take the number cards Ace through Eight of the Clubs, Spades and Diamonds suits. (Use the Hearts if you also use the Anglo-Saxon additional Runes. You can use up to nine of them, if you wish.)

Use the suit of Clubs for the first Aett, Spades for the second and Diamonds for the third. The number gives the position of the Rune in each row. For example, the Four of Spades is Jer, the three of Clubs is Thurs, and the Six of Diamonds is Ing. Shuffle them and draw cards. Use them the same way you would Runes. This is a good little trick when you are in a pinch.

The household games chest can help. For instance, those home bingo games with the numbers stamped on little wood chips can be used. Just take the number 1 to 24 for the Elder Futhark, or more if you use a larger Futhark. Shake, roll or draw. One such bingo game had a wheel that was rolled to pick a random ball. Pick them as you would Runes. The number relates to the number of the Rune, reading from 1st Rune on the 1st Aett to last Rune on the last Aett. For instance, 18 would be Bjork, 8 would be Wunjo and 12 would be Jera if you use the Elder Futhark.

If none of these are available, use bingo chips, beach stones or even coins. Just mark each piece with a Rune. You can use a pen or marker. Instant Rune set! Rune sets do not have to be fancy. If you do not have the set you want, use the one you can improvise.

Our talk of Burdens and the use of that Tarot image brought up a coincidence. In the suit of Wands from the Tarot deck, the Seven and Nine cards cross into our discussion of Aesc.

There are Tarot symbols that ring an accord with some of our work. In terms of the Anglo Saxon Additional Rune Aesc, it shares a few things in common with two of the cards. Aesc is the ability to stand firm and resist opposition. The Seven of Wands depicts a young man atop of hill, fending off all who approach. The Nine of Wands symbolizes endurance, persistance and resistance. It alludes more to the result of fending off opposition. In effect, the Seven and Nine of Wands are the act of resistance and the result of having resisted successfully.

Different systems see the same things differently. The Aesc and the two Tarot cards are different ways of seeing a similar thing. They are not a tight fit for each other. The Additional Runes see one thing where Tarot sees at least two.

Contrast has its uses, and the contrast between the Tarot cards and the Anglo Saxon Rune can be useful. It reveals a little more of the thing to which the symbols allude.

Different systems are not made to fit together. However, there are places where they converge. We can get a different perspective at those points. They can be useful in gaining more insight.

Audrey and I watch a lot of baseball. We watch the Yankees and the Mets. We feel especially good when they beat the Red Sox, Phillies, and Atlanta. Usually, we watch the Yankees on the YES network and Mets on SNY. On weekends, the games shift to WPIX. WOR and FOX. Sometimes they shift to ESPN.

There are excellent announcers. The Mets have Ron Darling, Keith Hernandez and Gary Cohen. They are always on SNY and usually covering Mets games when the game is on other channels. The Yankees have Al Leiter, David Cone, Paul O’Neil and Ken Singleton. They do for the Yankees what Ron, Keith and Gary do for the Mets. Al and David had played for both Mets and Yankees during their careers. These are all superb announcers and commentators. They add a lot to the game. They can all be proud of their work as announcers. Keep in mind that Keith, Ron, Al, David and Paul had equally proud careers playing baseball.

Unfortunately, at least once on the weekend, one of the teams is covered by ESPN. We hate it because the ESPN announcers give the term “lame” new dimensions in meaning. Worst is the most talkative of the three, a fat old bald guy who speaks in partial sentences. This loudmouth has a voice better suited to a kiddie show than sports. He is slow and unenthusiastic. He also does not know the New York teams well. You can count on at least three stupid comments per inning from Fatso.

We turn down the sound when the games are on ESPN because of their announcers, especially the fat old man. They are so pathetic we do not even stay around to find out their names. It is a shame that an otherwise good baseball game is tarnished by such ill-sounding and misinformed announcing.

This has nothing to do with Heathenism, or lessons, or anecdotes, and it certainly is not humor. After three hours of hearing ESPN last night, we have had enough!

The pictorial Tarot deck is a vast collection of symbolism. There are twenty-two Major cards and four Minor suits, each with four face cards and ten numbered cards. It matters not if you work with Tarot or not. The imagery itself is interesting, especially when the deck is designed by a gifted artist. While much of the art is peculiar to Tarot itself, some has a wider application.

In many of the pictorial decks, the Ten of Wands depicts a man carrying a heavy burden. On his shoulder he bears a bundle of wooden staves. His back is bent by the weight. In a word, the card’s meaning is Burdens. In practice, it can be the weight of a burden, taking up a burden, or letting go a burden.

Burdens are something we all know. If you have ever marched with a full pack and gear, lugged sacks of concrete or tried to wrestle bags of groceries from your car’s trunk to the kitchen, you know a burden. It is the bulk and weight that presses down. It adds a dimension of discomfort to what might otherwise be a walk from one point to another.

You know what it is to take up a burden. You know the relief you feel when you set it down.

For many of us, there are burdens of the mind as well as physical burdens. Many people bear burdens of past guilt, past anger, past shame, past fears and past relationships. Many are burdened by second guessing their past decisions. We might call that a debilitating case of the “what ifs.” Any of these burdens are enough to slow us down, even if the original event occurred far in the past. Many a life has been slowed by their weight.

For what?

The burdens are memories that have been wrapped around emotions. They are nothing more than thoughts. Old thoughts. They are thoughts that have been allowed to become heavier than a ninety-pound sack of gravel.

Release those thoughts. It is easy. Think of the feeling of letting go a burden. Think of how it feels to slip off that pack, drop that sack, and set the packages down. Think of how easy it is to let it go. Look at your mental burdens in the same spirit. You do not fight with them. You do not argue with them. You merely slip out from under them and let them fall of their own weight. The fighting and fretting and arguing only prolong their existence. Without you to prop them up, your burdens will dissolve into their own nothingness.

It can be as easy as letting a sack fall off your shoulder!

Try it. Let those old burdens slip away into nothing. The result will be a freedom and lightness you have not felt in years.

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The Rune of Burdens is Naud. Letting go of such burdens is called “slipping the Naud.” It is a feeling of slipping out from under the weight.

I ran into a situation today that reminded me of an incident from over twenty years ago. The incident happened in a burger joint in northern New Jersey. Some people came in whom I knew, and I said hello as they passed my table. Three said hello, and one walked by trying to ignore me. I asked one of the fellows why the one man was obviously angry at me. Angry? He really held a grudge!

Here is what transpired:

The incident had happened ten years prior . The man was in a bar, and a woman came in and sat down. In his mind, he had her “staked out” and was gathering the courage to talk to her. I came in about that time and started talking to her. Then I went outside to get something out of my car. While I was gone, this fellow came to talk to her. She replied that she was not interested. He walked away, feeling rejected.

I came back, sat beside the woman and she and I had a couple of drinks before leaving together.

That man was seething. He felt he had her staked out, and that I was stealing his future girlfriend.

There is more to the story. That woman did not idly walk into that bar. She was supposed to meet me there. I was a few minutes late. The fellow never had a chance, because she was with me before she even walked in the door

As you can see, all of it was in his own head. The man held a very real grudge for all those years. He might still be angry at me. I never had an inkling that anything was wrong.

When I heard this, I was baffled and amused and a bit appalled. If you put it in perspective, here was a man who hated me because my girlfriend got to the bar before I did.

If you hold grudges, consider this. You might be resenting someone who does not even know there is a problem. Here you are nursing that grudge and resenting his very existence while he is walking around without a care in the world. There is a saying for that:

You are letting him live in your head, rent-free.

Those grudges get heavy!

Forget the grudge and get on with the business of living. The more time you spend embroiled in resentment, the less time you enjoy living.

In the place I worked many years ago, the boss belonged to a group. Every so often, several of the members would get together in a spare room. Their usual activity was stuffing envelopes. If there was a need to buy anything while they were working, they went for their wallets. These men were willing to do tedious work and to pay out of their own pockets. Obviously, they cared about what they hoped to accomplish.

When it comes to any endeavor for a group or cause, there are plenty of people for the “glory jobs.” Folks come out of the woodwork if they are going to be seen. But how many of those people will readily open their wallets to back their cause? I can tell you for a fact that many may show for the glory work, but getting folks to do the tedious jobs is like pulling hen’s teeth. Stuffing envelopes is boring. Sticking labels and stamps on envelopes is boring. Collating is tedious. Nonetheless, these jobs are essential. They are as important as the glory jobs.

There are measures of a person’s commitment. In my younger days, I thought it foolish to equate dedication with money. Over the years, I learned that a sure sign of dedication is the willingness of an individual to open his wallet. The people who care most are the ones most willing to back it with their money. I also learned that the folks who are truly devoted to a thing are the ones who will do the most tedious and mundane work. You will find the true believers stuffing envelopes, collating forms and sweeping the floor.

What is the measure of your belief? Are you willing to chip in your work? Your money? Are you committed enough to your belief that you would stuff envelopes and staple forms together? That is a real measure of a person’s devotion.

The first of the Anglo Saxon Runes for which we provided exercises are Ac and Aesc. They are named for the Oak and the Ash trees, respectively. Both are trees known for their longevity, adamance and strength. Odin is connected to both. The Oak and Ash figures often in Nordic, Germanic and English lore.

The Aesc Rune is pretty much the Ash Tree itself, while the Ac rune can be both the tree and a sturdy boat. The idea fo a strong boat plowing through waves was common in the North Sea countries. If you have eve seen one of the genuine replicas of Viking ships, you can see why Ac is apporpriate.

As magickal symbols, Ac and Aesc have a similar nature. Even a novice can see that first and foremost, both are the strong trees of the North. They were the choice of warriors and builders. Oak provided shields and Ash made handles for spears and axes. Oak and Ash also provided the raw materials for boats, houses and furniture. They even figure in our language. We speak of things “as strong as oak“ or a stubborn person “as dense as oak.” I think the ancient Englishmen were wise in making Ac and Aesc the first and most prominent amomg their additional Runes.

Ac and Aesc have a shared nature. There is a stability implied in both. Ac is the stability of a sturdy ship plowing through the surf. It is a forward motion that is undeterred, sweeping aside anything that might otherwise impede it. Aesc is a stable motion that holds its place. Both partake of Urus, for they are applications of strength. Ac resists that which might otherwise slow or stop it. Aesc resists all attempts to overturn or move it. In both cases, Strength is the resisting and stabilizing force. Ac also has a touch of Radio and Eh, being mobile, and Thurs because of its force in splitting waves. Aesc is somewhat like the other Tree Runes, though its force is neither the natural upward expansion of Bjork nor the downward rooting and flexibility of the Yew.

The essential element in both Ac and Aesc is Strength. Strength is the force to hold and resist, to fend off and stand tall. Ac implies a strong ship that resists and Aesc is the strong foundation and anchor. Theses additional Runes are not really Runes, but specialized applications of Runes. In the case of both, the predominant element is Urus: Strength. Ac and Aesc are two applications of strength. Ac is the Mobile and Aesc is the stable. They can stand as reciprocals as well as variations of the same Runic principle.

With these ideas as a starting point, the student of the Anglo Saxon Additional Runes will find Ac and Aesc a worthy pair for further investigation. The rest of us find useful applications of Urus for more specific intentions. You do not have to be an Anglo Saxon traditionalist to benefit from Ac and Aesc.