Black Cats, Halloween & Healing

One of my wonderful art collectors lost her beloved black cat this week, Mr. Meeshka. He lived a long and happy life (15 I believe) and from what I know about him he was a pretty cool and laid back cat.

Superstitions. A Witches familiar.....

In Europe a black cat crossing your path is bad luck. In Japan it is good luck. In Scotland a strange black cat appearing on your porch is an omen as well but a good one. It means that prosperity is on the way. If you hear a cat sneeze in Italy then you are in for a streak of good luck.Cats are not allowed in the room if family is having a private talk in the Netherlands. The fear is that the cat will spread gossip all over town, and the family secrets will be out. Don’t be too hard on the cat in Ireland, however killing a cat there brings 17 years of bad luck.

I think there's something great about black cats! I've never met one that I didn't like. They look at you with a knowing of the depth of your soul. They are playful and mellow, alert and smart. Unfortunately, they are targets for strange pranks around Halloween.

The first cat I owned in my adult life was black and chose me and my husband as its owners. It used to follow us into our apartment at night and because it was black, we didn't notice it until about 15 minutes after we were in the apartment. The first meal we fed her was collard greens (the only thing we had in the fridge) and she ate every bite. We knew then that she was a stray. After about a week of following us around we decided to keep her and named her Mystic. She really lived up to her name! The first mysterious thing we found while giving her a flea bath was a tattoo on her stomach. It wasn't a number, or a name, it was a symbol. It was the female symbol with

a 6 pointed star in the circle part of the symbol. We were quite shocked by this and I went to the library to look for answers. I really didn't find anything except a reference that the symbol may be used as part of witchcraft ceremonies. A few year later, a psychic friend of mine put Mystic on her lap and intuitively saw that she had been part of a Halloween ceremony, perhaps a satanic ritual and had gotten the tattoo that way.  Mystic somehow had gotten away before the ritual was complete.

Mystic was pretty smart and would play hide n' seek with us. She would also, always eat and eat just about anything you sat in front of her.

When my mother was home with hospice, dying of breast cancer, Mystic would not leave her side, except to eat or go to the bathroom. It was only on the day of her death that Mystic left the room and then did not return until she has passed. She lived to the good age of 13, fat and happy. At that age she began to have seizures. Alarmed we took her to the vet who said she had an advanced stage of cancer and should be put down right away. It was a shock to us and my poor husband helped Mystic in the end, as I could not bear to see her go.

Scientists now believe that a cats purr may be healing or a self-healing mechanism. Cats purr during both inhalation and exhalation with a consistent pattern and frequency between 25 and 150 Hertz. investigations have shown that sound frequencies in this range can improve bone density and promote healing.

Is it a coincidence that Mystic had cancer, as did my mother? Does it just say that our environment is screwed up? Was her presence helpful to my mother and her illness? I was to me at least. Will there be rituals and ceremonies performed on black cats this Halloween? Will it be bad luck or good luck the next time  a black cat crosses your path?

Zombies

I've been reading tarot cards for 21 years. Wow! That makes me feel old. I never thought I could do anything continuously for 20 years. Tarot, meditation and other spiritual matters/musings help you focus on the world differently. You begin to see signs in everyday life, synchronicities and serendipities that are like magic! You see Jung's collective unconscious on TV, in books and in national events, even words spoken by friends. For the last few months I've seen a lot of zombie symbols and decided to talk a little about them. Maybe I'm exercising the zombie in me? What is the collective unconscious?

The collective unconscious, originally defined by Carl Jung, refers to a segment of the deepest unconscious mind. As opposed to the personal unconscious, which is composed of long-forgotten memories and experiences, the collective unconscious consists of archetypes that represent an inherited set of beliefs and understandings. These archetypes exist to varying degrees in all humans. Many believe that over time, the collective unconscious evolves and changes to incorporate new information that is globally recognized and accepted. Some believe that their may be a genetic memory that collective unconscious that ties into and it helps our evolution and our survival as a species.

Zombies are a product of our modern collective conscience. This archetype is so prevalent currently, with the popular AMC series Walking Dead. (I love that gory show, although I am behind in viewing the second season.) We even have an example of the myth coming to life and the 6 o'clock news with the Miami man who viciously attacked and chewed on the face of an older homeless man. Tests showed that he only had marijuana in his system. Was he operating on a mental level that allowed the zombie archetype to express itself through him? We will probably never know why he preformed such a horrific crime.

Originally zombies came from an ancient African voodoo belief that a corpse could be put under the spell of a sorcerer who reanimate it and control it like a mindless automation. many say the practice still goes on it Haiti today. George Romero gave Zombies a scarier twist in "Night of the Living Dead" (1968) by retaining the "rising from the grave" element but losing the idea of the controlling sorcerer. Romero also introduced the idea of a "bite" turning people into zombies and that there was no controlling force or reason/explanation for their existence. That gave the archetype a modern twist and power.

So we have to ask ourselves what are zombies trying to tell us? What is our "collective unconscious" trying to tell us, with so many zombie examples around us? It seems to me that zombies are a symbol for the great indifference of our population, to our politics, to our gas prices, to our wars, to our everyday automaton 9 to 5 life. We are the protagonists but we are also the zombies. Our deepest unconscious minds are telling us to "wake up."