Am I a Trickster?

As we were talking about tricksters today in class, the question got posed, "Who is the trickster in your world?" This got me thinking, I do seem to fit most of the qualities of the trickster, similar to Hermes. We have learned 6 traits the define a trickster, 1) ambiguous personality, 2) deceiver-trick player, 3) shape shifter, 4) situation inverter, 5) messenger/imitator of the gods, and 6) bricoleur. Now, I don't fit all of these traits exactly, but some of my personality seems to lean towards the trickster. I have been known to persuade people into doing crazy things. I myself tend to do a lot of crazy, some might say "taboo" things, like jump off bridges and off of cliffs, etc. Some may consider this fearlessness, others (like my mother) say it is stupidity. I have been told I do this stuff because I have no sense of judgement stemming from a recent head injury ( I know, I have one traumatic brain injury in the bag and I still risk my life whenever I get the chance, maybe I am not so intelligent). I just think I am an adrenaline junkie, and there is nothing wrong with that. So when other people see these not-normal things and are skeptical about doing them, I am usually there to talk them into doing it, and 99% of the time, they are glad they did it after its all said and done. Another trait of mine that goes hand in hand with persuading is that, I will admit, I am a pretty good bull-sh*tter. I mean, I got paid to BS tourists near Mount Rushmore for two summers (check out cosmosmysteryarea.com) . If you ask my dad, he will tell you I have been BSing since day one (there is proof in our home videos). Basically, I like to stir the pot and cause debate, and make people think about things that are out of the ordinary. Since I was young, I have loved to pull pranks on people, especially my sister. She was way too easy to scare, and I enjoyed it every time. I am not a messenger to the gods, and I can not change my shape, although I have been known to dress up in costume for parties and things like that, but I would definately call myself a bicoleur (DIYer). If you ask my ex girlfriend, I am way too independent (I never saw this a bad thing). I just like to make things and get things done on my own. Although I am not a full-blown trickster by the standards of those 6 traits, I would call myself the trickster in my world, and the world of those around me. I tend to do things that others see as out-of-the-ordinary, and (not to toot my own horn), I would say I have a way with words.

sinister southpaws

We talked about tricksters today in class. One thing we learned about tricksters is that they are left sided, or left handed. I decided to look into this a little bit. The classical latin word for left is sinistra, which translates also to mean evil or unlucky, and it looks and sounds a lot like the word sinister. This makes sense because the trickster often performs acts and deeds that are sinister, or at least seem sinister when they go against the social norms. (obscene acts) My younger brother is a southpaw. Although, we raised him to be right handed because we never had any left handed baseball gloves or other sports equipment for leftys. Maybe we did this because subconsciously we knew what being left handed actually meant. Although, I think his left handed roots have stayed with him, he is a little punk, some might say sinister at times.

Man, I am glad I am a man

To all of the women out there, I am sorry. I just read the story about the agdos rock for class today, and in this story, Nana, the virgin daughter of the king gets knocked up.... by a fruit. She simply picks a fruit off of a particularly tasty looking tree, and sets the fruit in her lap. Little did she know that the fecundator of this tree happened to be the blood and torn-off member from the monster Agdistis. Low and behold, Nana gets pregnant. This type of impregnation happens in other myths we have read. For instance, a woman bending over and getting knocked up by the wind. Would this be considered rape? I mean, these poor girls are just minding their own business and, just like that, they are pregnant against their own knowing/will. All in all, I feel sorry for women. They can't even enjoy a nice fresh fruit or walk around on a breezy day without the fear of getting knocked up. I will never know the pain of childbirth, but I have heard it is definitely no picnic. So ladies, you have my sympathies.

Aeolus, the unrelenting tormenter

I just got back from a 3 day backcountry ski trip in the Swan Mountains up by Kalispell. It was a great trip, except for the fact that Aeolus, the Greek god of winds, would not let us forget about him. It was so windy while we were up there. I think our tent might have lifted off the ground a couple time the first night. Aeolus was throwing all of his winds at us too so we couldn't get away from him. The winds just swirled through this basin and blew snow all around. Speaking of blowing snow around, Aeolus was just picking the snow up and carrying it everywhere, especially the backside of the ridge-tops, where the skiing would be the best. But, thanks to the great wind god, we couldn't ski the steep fun-looking slopes. He just threw too much snow around and increased the avalanche danger to uncomfortable levels. Also, he forced us to move camp over the the adjacent basin the second night because of a big storm that was suppose to hit us. If we had gotten the 16 inches of predicted snow, Aeolus would have thrown this around and around, and we could have easily gotten stranded back in the mountains. I don't think Aeolus knows just how troublesome he can be. He didn't ruin my trip, I still had an epic time on this adventure, but he certainly did not improve my trip either.

Humans, the Pawns of the Gods

As I was reading these myths and studying them for the quiz, I realized something, the gods seem to have total control over everything (obviously). But when you look into this more, it seems like the gods just have their way with the human race. Yes, the humans pray to the gods for favors, but when you step back and look at it, it seems like it ends up being one god against another, using the humans as pawns, like a chess game. This is especially apparent in times of war. One story where this really stood out to me was the Aeneid. In the Aeneid, Aeneas is trying to lead a group of Trojans to Italy after they were defeated in Troy by the Greeks. Juno doesn't like this and she sends many trials and troubles his way to make his Journey difficult. During these trials, Aeneas is praying to other gods, in particular, Jupiter. So when you step back and look at this, there is one god causing trouble and another god helping, basically retaliating against the other god through the human. And in the end of the story, Jupiter goes to Juno and says "Enough is enough, lets stop this already!", and boom, just like that, Aeneas' troubles are over. Why couldn't Jupiter just do that in the first place? Maybe its the fact that the gods are just enjoying a nice, semi-competitive game of chess where the humans are the pawns and the world is their chess board.

CERBERUS

Cerberus is the three headed dog that guards the gates to the underworld and keeps the living from entering the world of the dead. Psyche had to pass this dog on her journey to get the beauty lotion from Proserpina. Cerberus shows up in a couple places that are familiar to everybody. First of which would be in Hercules. Hercules had to capture the dog and bring him back to King Eurystheus.
Another place in modern culture where we see the three headed beast is in Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone. In this book, Harry, the hero, has to go through many trials to get to the Sorcerer's Stone, a stone that gives everlasting life. In a way, this is like going into the Underworld because he is going down below the castle. And wouldn't you know it, he has to get past a big three headed dog that just so happens to be blocking the trap door (gate) to the stone. The dog in Harry Potter is affectionately named Fluffy.

I thought it was interesting how Harry Potter incorporated the three headed dog on the journey to the underworld.

Here is a link to another blog that talks alot about Cerberus and his different forms if you are interested.

http://www.slice-o-life.com/creepbox/?startpos=5

Cupid And Psyche

The Golden Ass brings us into the story of Cupid and Psyche a little late. It starts off with Venus on an angry, desperate search for Psyche. So what happened before this, and why is Venus so mad?
Cupid is the son of Venus. He does her bidding of shooting people with his arrows and making people fall in love. As I blogged about earlier, Cupid has two kinds of arrows, a golden tipped one that makes people fall in love, and an arrow with a lead tip that brings about hatred in a person.
It turns out that Cupid was suppose to shoot Psyche with a golden arrow, and Venus was going to put a horrible creature in front of her so that Psyche fell in love with the creature. Why would Venus do such a mean thing? Well, Psyche happened to be one smokin' hottie with a slammin' body, and this made Venus jealous.
However, all did not go according to plan. Cupid, the clumsy little guy, got startled when psyche woke up and poked himself with the golden arrow. Who happened to be the first person he saw after getting poked? Psyche. Oh boy. Little Cupid caught by his own tricks started to fall madly in love with Psyche. Venus was not stoked on this. She cursed Psyche so that she could not meet a husband. Cupid revolts against Venus and quits his job of shooting people and creating love in the world. This means that no one is praising Venus, and Venus is not stoked on this either. She is so un-stoked that she lifts the curse from Psyche, allowing Cupid to go meet her. However, Cupid does not want her to know his identity, so he sleeps with her in the dark, and forbids Psyche to turn a light on and reveal who her lover is. As you may have guessed, sleeping together in the dark leads to one thing and another (if you don't know what I am getting at, ask your parents to give you the birds and the bees talk) and Psyche gets knocked up.
Well give it some time, and Psyche's evil sisters make her curious enough to shed a light on her lover one night and try to kill him, for he is suppose to be an evil serpent. When Psyche turns on the light, she gets stuck by one of the golden tipped arrows, and wouldn't you know it, falls madly in love with the guy laying next to her, her baby-daddy, Cupid. Bad news though, Cupid wakes up and scrams.
This is where the Golden Ass picks up, Psyche's search for her love.