Category: Life of a Parran

  • Smile it’s Monday!

    Back to work!  Hope you all had a good weekend.  Needless to say we get a ton of email here at Spellmaker.Sometimes it is hard to keep up with it all. Both Mambo and I have a tendency to hit the computer first thing in the morning to start seeing who needs what!

    Since it is Monday I thought you might need a laugh. This is a list Ifound by Michael Boyd:

    How to tell if you're an e-mail junkie

    How to tell if you're an e-mail junkie

    Date: Fri, 16 May 1997 09:57:28 +0600

    You know you are an Email/Internet Junkie If :

    1. You wake up at 3 a.m. to go to the bathroom and stop to check your e-mail on the way back to bed.

    2. You get a tattoo that reads "This body best viewed with Netscape Navigator 3.0 or higher."

    3. You name your children Eudora, Mozillia and Dotcom.

    4. You turn off your modem and get this awful empty feeling, like you just pulled the plug on a loved one.

    5. You spend half of the plane trip with your laptop on your lap…and your child in the overhead compartment.

    6. You decide to stay in college for an additional year or two just for the free Internet access.

    7. You laugh at people with 9600-baud modems.

    8. You start using smileys in your snail mail.

    9. Your hard drive crashes. You haven't logged in for two hours. You start to twitch. You pick up the phone and manually dial your ISP's access number. You try to hum to communicate with the modem…And you succeed.

    10. You find yourself typing "com" after every period when using a word processor.com

    11. You refer to going to the bathroom as downloading.

    12. You start introducing yourself as "John Doe at AOL dot com."

    13. All of your friends have an @ in their names.

    14. Your PET has its own home page.

    15. You can't call your mother…she doesn't have a modem.

    16. You check your mail. It says "no new messages." So you checkit again.

    17. Your phone bill comes to your doorstep in a box.

    18. You don't know what sex three of your closest friends are, because they have neutral nicknames and you never bothered to ask.

    19. You move into a new house and decide to Netscape before you landscape.

    20. You tell the cab driver you live at "http://1000.edison.garden/house/brick.html"

    21. You start tilting your head sideways to smile

    Love, Parran Matt

    www.spellmaker.com

  • Voodoo Debt Eliminator!

    Since I am a former letter carrier I could not help but sharing this one.  (So that is why I have back trouble!)

    Howtodealwithbills

  • Faith.

    In my duties as Parran of our House, I get asked a lot about the question of "faith."  How to keep the faith? What to do prove what you have faith in, etc.  I am no expert on faith, but I do know that life is pretty bleak if you have faith in nothing.  My wife, Mambo Sam, once said to me that it was really easy to have faith when things were going great, it is when things are going terrible and we need faith that we seem to have it the least. I couldn't agree with her more.  Good days bring great faith, but who needs faith on good days?  It's those bad days where we need our faith.

    Mightier writers than me have written a lot about faith and I thought I would share with you some of the quotes I have found.  I hope you enjoy them and keep them for those days when your faith is in short supply.

    Faith is like radar that sees through the fog.  ~Corrie Ten Boom, Tramp for the Lord

    Reason is our soul's left hand, Faith her right.  ~John Donne

    Faith is reason grown courageous.  ~Sherwood Eddy

    Doubt is a pain too lonely to know that faith is his twin brother.  ~Kahlil Gibran

    Fear knocked at the door.  Faith answered.  And lo, no one was there.  ~Author Unknown

    If there was no faith there would be no living in this world.  We couldn't even eat hash with safety.  ~Josh Billings, His Complete Works, 1888

    Faith, to my mind, is a stiffening process, a sort of mental starch.  ~E.M. Forster

    Faith is spiritualized imagination.  ~Henry Ward Beecher

    Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens.  ~J.R.R. Tolkien

    Faith is courage; it is creative while despair is always destructive.  ~David S. Muzzey

    Faith is a passionate intuition.  ~William Wordsworth

    To me faith means not worrying.  ~John Dewey

    Faith is putting all your eggs in God's basket, then counting your blessings before they hatch.  ~Ramona C. Carroll

    Every tomorrow has two handles.  We can take hold of it by the handle of anxiety, or by the handle of faith.  ~Author Unknown

    Faith is the bird that sings when the dawn is still dark.  ~Rabindranath Tagore

    He who has faith has… an inward reservoir of courage, hope, confidence, calmness, and assuring trust that all will come out well – even though to the world it may appear to come out most badly.  ~B.C. Forbes

    A faith of convenience is a hollow faith.  ~Father Mulcahy, M*A*S*H, "A Holy Mess," 1982

    Be like the bird that, passing on her flight awhile on boughs too slight, feels them give way beneath her, and yet sings, knowing that she hath wings.  ~Victor Hugo

    Faith makes things possible, not easy.  ~Author Unknown

    Faith is raising the sail of our little boat until it is caught up in the soft winds above and picks up speed, not from anything within itself, but from the vast resources of the universe around us.  ~W. Ralph Ward

    Faith… must be enforced by reason…. When faith becomes blind it dies.  ~Mahatma Gandhi

    Faith and doubt both are needed – not as antagonists, but working side by side to take us around the unknown curve.  ~Lillian Smith

    As your faith is strengthened you will find that there is no longer the need to have a sense of control, that things will flow as they will, and that you will flow with them, to your great delight and benefit.  ~Emmanuel

    In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't.  ~Blaise Pascal

    Faith enables persons to be persons because it lets God be God.  ~Carter Lindberg

    Weave in faith and God will find the thread.  ~Author Unknown

    A little faith will bring your soul to heaven, but a lot of faith will bring heaven to your soul.  ~Author Unknown

    Faith can move mountains, but don't be surprised if God hands you a shovel.  ~Author Unknown

    A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything.  ~Friedrich Nietzsche

    Faith, indeed, has up to the present not been able to move real mountains…. But it can put mountains where there are none.  ~Friedrich Nietzche, Human, All Too Human, 1879

    Faith is believing in things when common sense tells you not to.  ~George Seaton

    Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase.  ~Martin Luther King Jr.

    Faith makes the discords of the present the harmonies of the future.  ~Robert Collyer

    Feed your faith and your fears will starve to death.  ~Author Unknown

    Life without faith in something is too narrow a space to live.  ~George Lancaster Spalding

  • The LaPlace’s of Our House

    It has taken me a little bit of time to get my thoughts together for blogging. One thing that I thought my be interesting is to write a little bit about the role of the “LaPlace” in our New Orleans Voodoo House.


    At our convention last year we had the great experience of appointing the two gentlemen who are now the LaPlace’s of our House. They did a great job and we look forward to the many years we are sure to have together.


    We didn’t have a lot of time to explain to everyone the exact role of the LaPlace. The LaPlace’s are still learning and will continue to do so as their service continues. But basically, the LaPlace’s, along with the father of the house (that’s me), are the guardians and protectors of the house.


    So first and foremost, the role of the LaPlace is to protect The House in every way possible. Historically this role was much more arduous than it is today. Literally, the LaPlaces physically guarded The House. The LaPlace was armed and ready to kill to protect The House. Rival “flag boys” as they were called (as they protected the flag of the house) were known to battle in elaborate rituals and fights. Each of our LaPlace’s was given a bell at the Convention. The bell of the LaPlace at one time was used to alert the members of the house of danger or threat so that they could get away.


    The bell was/is also the link between the different LaPlace’s of the House and the Father of the House. The Father of the House is the guardian over the LaPlace’s and, in turn, the LaPlace’s are the guardian of the father. The bell of the LaPlace is used to call for the father of the house if needed and is a spiritual link as well. The ringing of the bell when danger is not present signifies that the LaPlace needs the protection or guidance of the father of the house.


    The LaPlace also uses his bell to communicate in secret with the other LaPlaces of his house (and with the father of the house). Houses have elaborate “bell codes” that the LaPlaces can use during ceremonies or every day life to communicate with each other and the father of the house. This is often done in ritual so as to not interrupt the ritual with talking but rather soft bell ringing which has meaning and is a way of communicating without talking. This is also done to alert each other of some kind of danger or inappropriate behavior that might just be starting and the LaPlace’s want to alert each other and the father, but not necessarily alarm the congregation. (The LaPlaces and the father of the house determine these codes.)


    Today LaPlaces tend to have the duties of keeping rituals flowing properly, attending to the congregation, all while keeping the peace and watching out for any kinds of inappropriate behavior. LaPlaces also bring to the attention of the father of the house anyone or anything that could be considered a threat to the peace, reputation, or progress of the house.


    We are very lucky to have our two wonderful LaPlaces, both of whom will learn much, much more about their roles as time passes.


    TAke care all, Parran Matt

  • The Godfather

    Hey everyone.  As many of you know from the 2007 Albuquerque Voodoo Convention, I have finished a large portion of my New Orleans Voodoo training.  This is of course not to say that I don’t still have a lot to learn because obviously I do.  But taking my position beside my wife, Marran Sam, as head of our Voodoo family is something that I take very seriously.

    So you might wonder, what IS a Parran?  Technically the term means "godfather" – this term is adapted for use in the New Orleans Voodoo heirarchy to mean the spiritual Father of a particular Voodoo family.  Parran is the title that is used by the public and followers of the family who are not initiated into the family.  (Actual initiates of the family use the term "MaPere" – my father – when referring to me.  Interestingly in most Cajun families, MaPere refers to the actual grandfather of the family.  This is supposed to be taken from parents referring to their own fathers to their children as "my father" to explain to a child who the grandfather of the family is. However, the term MaPere is used by the children of a Voodoo family to describe their spiritual father. It’s a little confusing, but makes sense when you think about it.)

    Another question probably is, what does a Parran do?  First off, I am very active in our business, www.spellmaker.com.  Besides my spiritual duties for the family, I assist in consecrating of items, shipping, working on the website, ordering, product development, packaging, and general day-to-day operations.  A lot of my participation in the business is much more behind the scenes than Mambo Sam (Marran Sam).  You may not see me but I am always there!

    Marran and I work together almost every day.  We are blessed in that we work well together and complement each other very well in our work ethics.

    Right now we are working on developing new packaging systems for products so that they arrive in the best possible condition to you.  Additionally, we are planning the 2008 Albuquerque Voodoo Convention.  I hope to meet many more of you this year.  I am looking forward to seeing old friends and making new ones. 

    Until next time, take care everyone and many blessings to you all, Parran Matt.