Economic Pressure

There's always been a huge discussion in the Heathen community (and among scholars of the North as well) as to why heathenry lost out to Christianity a thousand years ago. One of the stock answers trotted out whenever this debate arises is that of "economic pressure".

The Icelanders faced a historic dilemma is 1000 CE - convert and continue trade with Norway, or remain True and be isolated from Christian Europe. Thorgeir the Lawspeaker, for good or ill, chose the former route, ultimately leading to the end of the Icelandic Commonwealth, but maintaining contact with the ancestral homelands. I'm sure he felt it to be a "lose-lose" proposition, and simply did the best he could under the circumstances.

And those pressures have not gone away. Better than half my delivery customers are very pious Christians, and, while I don't make a big production number out of my heathenry, I'm pretty much all over the web with it, and anybody with a browser and Google search can (and does) run across it. And it's cost me some business, I'm sure.

I've been invited to supply various Christian buying clubs and co-ops - if I'll certify that I'm a "Christian business". None of my customers have ever explicitly proselytized me, but there have been many subtle hints. Some folks just assume that I'm a Christian, usually by observing the farms motto of 'Honoring Our Ancestors, Honoring Our Land' and believing that I'm into their brand of "Old Time Religion" as well. And in a sense, I am - it's just really old time religion. I've been told by a customer that she's knows I'm a Christian, because she can hear the Lord in my voice. I've not had the heart to tell her that Freyr is Lord, and Freyja is Lady, mostly for fear of losing an order for a pint of ice cream and a quart of milk a week. Maybe she wouldn't do that, but I don't know.

And that's the point of economic pressure, really. You don't know, anymore than Thorgeir knew, how it's all going to work out in the end. The carrots are dangled, but you know the sticks are laying in wait. You just don't know if you can really reach the hanging veggies, or if the bats are gonna whack your ass, until you try moving forward or back - and by then, it's too late to change direction, and you're had.

The more things change, the more they remain the same.

00:00 /Asatru | 0 comments | permanent link


'Last Call Poker' celebrates cemeteries

I see nothing whatsoever disrespectful about this - in fact, were I a poker player, I would've been honored to participate! Only by remembering the dead can we honor them, and honoring our ancestors is honoring ourselves.

All in all events like this one are a good first step towards recovering our connections to the past, and the people who have walked this world before us.

When around 60 people convened on the Hollywood Forever cemetery here Saturday for the finale of the alternate reality game "Last Call Poker," it may not have seemed to some observers as the most respectful thing to do.

(link) [CNET News.com]

00:00 /Asatru | 0 comments | permanent link


Meanwhile, Back on the Home Front ...

Those of you who know me have probably detected an undercurrent of something bordering on despair in this blog of late: and I must confess that your apprehensions would've been dead on. It's wearing me down, slow but sure.

The delivery business has stopped growing - we're not shrinking, but any new customers we're adding are simply replacing those who are leaving. And I can pretty much put my finger on right when the growth trend reversed itself, and hazard a guess as to why: Labor Day weekend, and the high gas prices engendered by hurricane Katrina.

Hmm, let's see: do I want a quart of good milk this week or an extra gallon of gas?

And even now, as gas prices have returned to something resembling reasonable levels, the price resistance is seemingly growing stronger rather then diminishing. I don't think folks believe that prices will stay down, and I think I'm seeing a microcosm of the fabled "consumer confidence" indices. If I am, it doesn't bode well for the economy as a whole.

Topping all this off, we had several more truck problems last week, culminating in the S-10 being put into the shop for a possible blown transmission. By the time you factor in repair costs whatever profit I've been making on the delivery business fades fast.

One expects this sort of thing whenever one starts up a new venture, and I'd be willing to hold the course if I could see some light at the end of the tunnel, but I am becoming increasingly fearful that the old adage "it takes money to make money" is rapidly coming into play: without money for advertising, the business won't expand, and without expansion the money won't come in to pay for it.

For right now, I'll hold my own and see. But if this goes on ...

00:00 /Home | 0 comments | permanent link