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Autumn Newsletter '02 By Jeannine Parvati Baker The autumn season brought Halley and I to the Northeast for our last airplane trip of the year. We have only one more Tour to Northern California for the Benefit of Nan Koehler (Www.FriendsofNan.org), midwife accused of practicing medicine without a license and the Reunion of our Mystery Schools, our Artemis and Hygieia College. As it is also the 24th wedding anniversary for Rico and I, we just may make it a family celebration in Sonoma County this November. 
This year at the glorious Herbal Gathering in Claryville, New York,
called Green Nations (organized by Pam Montgomery of Partner Earth
Center in Vermont), I taught two workshops, both soon available as
cassette tapes.Check our website on the CATALOG page this autumn for new offerings! The first was "Witches, Midwives and Herbalists" minutes after we finally arrived at the Camp. I had been thinking about this topic for many years and so was grateful to share my word medicine on this topic. The results that midwifery has gleaned for birth since the advent of licensing and the legalization on almost all states has been mixed, to say the least. I wanted the herbalists, now engaged in a debate of whether to pursue professionalism and licensure, what the midwives have endured since they did. "Astrology for Plant Lovers": I do believe it is the very best talk I have given on this topic. It was distilled word tincture for beginners learning astrology and how it is relevant to the healing arts. For many years I have been practicing how to transmit the wonder of astrology and how practical it is for anyone but especially so for those of us who seek to understand our relevant others and ourselves on a deeper level. 
Whenever I am at Conferences, I do some private astrology readings on
the side. This event, a 22 year-old approached me at breakfast and
booked a reading early the last day of the Gathering. She had the most
amazing map. She had no squares and grand trine in air and fire. Also,
she had Venus and Mercury in the 12th house, just like my own horoscope.
When I suggested that keeping a journal of her dreams would be well
advised (the 12th house rules dreams and Mercury is the Scribe), she
said she already did. I invited her to also keep track of her fertility
cycle and correlate them, and she replied that she did that too. Then I
pulled out all of the stops. "OK, then do you also kept track of the
lunar phases and other astrological data?" and she said once more that
she did!!I did surprise myself at first but when I thought about it later, I realized that her work to understand women's mysteries in exactly the same mode as I was exploring, was truly indicated in her map. Here I thought that I had made up this marvelous way to see the relation between events through ones own dreams, fertility and astrology. Yet perhaps there are many more of us who have this constellation in our horoscopes - Grand Trines in Air and Fire and Mercury and Venus in the 12th house. It’s literally "in the air". This autumn I settle home at desk and have astrology readings to look forward to and in the words of one recent client, whose daughter got the taped reading and horoscope for her birthday from her midwife/mother, "Sarah absolutely loves her tape and thanked me over and over. I'm sending $90 for Isaac's on Monday. You're great on tape; it feels like you're here!" Below is what I wrote to her before I mailed the chart and one half hour reading; "Sarah has an incredibly deep sensitivity. Chiron in the 12th house is the "wounded healer" and until the first Chiron Return (app. age 50), Sarah is gathering notes to be a psychic healer. Her next 50 years, watch out world for Sarah has been watching you!" After almost 30 years of reading horoscopes for people around the world and in all walks of life, I have a core appreciation of the uniqueness of each soul and how precious each of us are for the sake of the Earth. My delight is reading charts for infants in order to assist parents and extended family to draw out the full potential of this new soul. I also love to read charts of couples - over the years I have found that when the partners know what they are working with, they can put into practice the 2nd step in the ego addiction recovery program, which is, "Don’t take it personally". Astrology helps each of the souls involved in the grand hall of mirrors of committed partnership to understand how and why they psychologically relate. The comparison and composite maps are guides to fulfill ones destiny. Both Rico and I read astrology charts and look forward to serving you and your friends this autumn and long winter from Joseph and Moab, Utah. I am so impressed with the young herbalists who spent one weekend dedicated to studying our plant allies. Actually, not only young people but also every age was represented at this Gathering. I learned so much from my elders who have traveled great distances to bring their herbal lore to us. The faculty at Green Nations is consistently the cream of the crop. My great joy was riding with Amanda McQuade Crawford and her infant daughter Nora. We spent 5 hours together in the car on the way to Green Nations from Albany Airport and back. I feel in love with Nora, so full of her peaceful self. 
Getting to Green Nations was eventful, with missing my car ride from the
airport after three flights and lost luggage. Yet flying back was even
more of an adventure. We had a long layover in Houston after two flights
to even get that far toward home. However with my laptop, I was able to
collect my thoughts about this last Tour of the early autumn season and
hang with Halley, who is the best traveling companion in the world. We
watch people together and she puts up with my fanciful stories I make up
about them. Whenever there is a baby on board, we feel doubly blessed.
The last flight to Utah I was given an aisle seat right next to a baby
(with his mother, of course). The time literally flew by and we touched
down to a beautiful night in the big city.The next morning, Halley and I drove to Orem as I had been invited to give testimony to our Utah State Senator Hellewell about the midwifery legislation he is sponsoring. I oppose it and so did a room full of others. It was a hot meeting - generating much light as well as heat!! This is what I love so much about my home state - how passionate the people are about our freedom to choose where and with whom we give birth. As a matter of free agency, of principle, this proposed regulation / certification had drawn out a standing room only crowd into "For Every Mother", a childbirth center in the heart of Utah Valley. Midwives, nurses, parents and yes, I sat right near the baby in the room, gave persuasive testimony to the good Senator who declared that with this much opposition, he couldn’t see the law passing now. However, we will be vigilant. It’s like what I had written to my midwife friend about her daughter’s horoscope. In order to keep the State out of our bedrooms, and delay any further usurpation of birth by the medical monopoly, we continue to watch legislature to keep our freedom. I was there to inform the midwives who supported the legislation, that licensure was no immunity from prosecution and cited my recently incarcerated midwife friends. After some of my midwife friends were licensed, they eventually practiced outside the scope of the regulated "standards" when that unique situation came along at birth, as it tends to do. Then they lost their licenses but continued to practice, at which point they were practicing medicine without a license. My idea was for those "midwives" who want this legislation, to rename it "Medwifery Certification Act" as their need seems to be to carry medical equipment and drugs and therefore need licensure (plus the 3rd party reimbursement and malpractice insurance is a nice perk). Let’s keep midwives free of imposed standards of practice, particularly as we are not practicing medicine with or without a license anyway. Which brings me to the great news - Gloria Lemay has been released from the Vancouver prison. Our Canadian midwife friend is FREE!! (See our Late Summer Newsletter posted on the Archives of our freestone.org website for the fuller story.) With this accomplished, we arrived home to Quinn, who had been managing Freestone Innerprizes in our absence. All is well in Zion. As we settle into the irrepressible autumn season, we send our best wishes for you and yours.  With Love, The Alchemical Bakery Jeannine Parvati, Rico, Gannon, Quinn, Halley AUTUMN News 2002 Birth the Morning with a Smile © Jeannine Parvati Baker Shifts happen. I lose my drivers license this week as Saturn crosses my Ascendant. Find it again when Saturn goes into my 1st house of identity. Life can be so literal at times! This had happened to my partner, Rico, around the time when we first met. (Recall, we met on a deeper level in 1977, when we exchanged astrology readings and both noted that we had Mars conjoined Venus in Gemini, to the exact degree, between our charts.) Saturn was then crossing his Ascendant and he lost his wallet with all of his identification. Then Saturn came into his 1st house and it was found. "I was lost, but now I am found." 
Amazingly graceful these early autumn days are. We think we know who we are, and then Saturn, a.k.a. "the Crone", harvests a whole new identity.Perhaps just like for you, a lot of good things have happened since we last met? If we were together, I would sit down with you over a cuppa, sharing stories of summer falling into this autumn moment. I'd tell you about my recurring dreams this season of being pregnant and/or having new babies and the one just this week where I was present at the beginning of time. In this dream, there was only an immense vortex of energy, a sensation of a moist, swirling wind, and the words, "This is the the beginning". Suddenly, "I" disappear into the intensest of white light and I awake with the silliest grin on my face. Not too shabby a way to start a day! Birth the morning with a smile!! Yet I'd also share that my sister Kit broke her leg, my daughter-in-love was in a car accident in Moab, as was a new best woman friend of mine, the midwife Mary from the desert of southern California. And now, here is the top story; Another midwife, Nan Koehler of Sonoma County, California faces criminal charges and this November, Jeannine will speak at a Benefit for Nan. There will be other Benefits beginning this September 17th. Details through the website - www.friendsofnan.org. Late August, I brought perinatal psychology to the Rocky Mountain Herbal Gathering in Estes Park, Colorado. This was the first of these events, for which we are grateful as it's only a drive into the Rockies from Utah to attend these glorious gatherings. As I hugged Rosita Arvigo, these words were whispered into my ear by the Mayan Massage Teacher, "This is our special perk being teachers - we get to meet each other again and again all over the country." Indeed, I met my best friends - Mindy Green, who I midwifed thirty years ago, Brigitte Mars, 
another herbal author extraordinaire and Susun Weed, who called me many years ago asking me to write the forward to her first herbal. How I love these wild women! My new friends are Feather, Niki and Rabia of the Rocky Mountain Center for Botanical Studies, which created the Gathering in the Rockies. It was extremely high is altitude and in attitude both! An outstanding faculty spoke eloquently for the Earth - the live dance Sunday night was pretty hot, too.Rico, Halley and I had a booth in the vendor hall and here we met many who had brought their HYGIEIA or other Freestone books all the way from home for us to sign. I hears many stories of how our Freestone books have helped for years. Over and again came the story that HYGIEIA was a gift when merely 14 years old or so. Seems for many, the world of natural health was opened by Hygieia's herbal. Three Workshops were presented and tapes are available through our Catalog page on the Freestone Innerprizes website. Order by title and # below through any PayPal button that works and specify which CS tape. Each tape costs postpaid $15 and is 90 minutes long.
ASTROLOGY FOR PLANT LOVERS 9.1.02 EARTH BASED MIDWIFERY 9.2.02 
For over a generation, I have been an advocate for the soul of the baby and a pushy visionary for the "possible family". Bringing word medicine to healers of many kinds - therapists, naturopaths, chiropractors, doctors, nurses, midwives, doulas, herbalists and parents - cross-pollinating, if you will - has been the main work of this speaker. Yet just this year a major shift is noted in how the perinatal message is received.Previously, such sensitive topics as homebirth, circumcision, and the baby's psychology were too controversial for many natural healers, much less the medical professionals. Now these subjects are embraced by audiences all over the North American continent.  While in Colorado, JP and Rico conducted a Blessing Way, a ceremony inspired by the traditional Navaho ritual before childbirth. It was in true American style - an amalgam, mainly consisting of Mormons - a perfect blend of the birth wisdom of the First People with the prevailing form of worship for this family and community.APPPAH Member Jeane Rhodes attended the Blessing Way and invited me to be on the Peer Review Editorial Board for the JOPPPAH, a position I have heartily accepted. The first article I reviewed was submitted by an Italian researcher on the healing power of the mother's narrative - how telling (or writing) her prenatal and envisioned birth story helps to ease any trauma from the actual birth she may have postpartum. If my peers agree, this paper will be published in the Journal of Pre and Perinatal Psychology and Health this coming year. I also met at the Blessing Way, my friend and colleague Laura Shanley, author of Unassisted Childbirth, who told me about a birth in Boulder. THe midwife pushed hard enough on the mother's womb after birth for the pain to render her unconscious. The mother awoke to a hemorrhage and EMT's to transport her to hospital. The midwife spread the word in the community that it was a good thing that she was there or otherwise, the mother would have bled to death. Here is a clear case of iatragenic medicine. 
Here is the report wherein this mid-September, I taught at the Green Nations Gathering in upstate New York. Hundreds of herbalists gather to share the gnosis of plants. Once again, bringing perinatal psychology to this International Gathering of health practitioners brings out my jubilant heart.For the upcoming TOUR Schedule for 2003-4, see our website http://www.freestone.org/events/ BACK to Newsletter Archives |
