Pagan Tea Time Chat with Dogs!

Well it took us a while but Fritz Muntean and I finally scheduled our chat! Following Christine Hoff Kraemer’s excellent idea to reach out and chat with someone in the pagan community we’d never actually met in person, Fritz and I (who have “known” one another for years vis various forums and groups related to paganism and academia) got together via video chat on Google Hang Out. (Fritz also had a nice chat with Christine last week)

It was a lively and fascinating conversation (once I shut my barking pit bull in the bedroom; she gets freaked out by video chat for some reason). We discussed, among other things, the early days of the modern pagan community, Fritz’s founding of the pagan magazine The Pomegranate (which is now a peer-reviewed academic journal edited by Chas Clifton), the impact of the internet on us literature-minded “old timers,” and many of the pagans whose work or words we admire.

We also discussed shamans who used to call themselves witches (much head scratching over the political machinations behind this), how cool it was when pagan ‘zines ruled the world, and the future of the pagan community (from where we’re sitting, it’s a confusing and not altogether rosy picture).

We plan to do it again soon! In fact, given Fritz’s important contributions to the community and his familiarity with its history, I thought it would make sense to conduct some casual but earnest video interviews with him and do them on Google Hang Out so they could be uploaded to Youtube for posterity…

Watch this space for more information.