Goddess of the Week: Chalchiuhtlicue

Image via Wikipedia

The nice thing about blogging is that if you don't like what you're writing you can always hit the delete button and start over. Other creative endeavors are like that too. Bad day painting? Get a new canvas. Too much salt in your cake batter? Add more butter, sugar and flour. It'll be perfect.

The unspoken presumption of many creation stories is that we're not much more than some temperamental higher being's weekend craft project, which is why legends say that when we've gotten too unruly and ugly that higher being just tore out some of the crooked seams and even washed the whole hodge podge of a mess up and started over again. Of course, it must have been a drag. Throwing out a fallen souffle is a drag too, but what else can you do?

This, at least, seems to be the message of the Aztec goddess Chalchiuhtlicue. A creation and water goddess, she got so disgusted with humanity that she flooded the planet, washing it clean so that she could start over from scratch. A little mellower than some other higher being you may have heard of, she turned people into fish so that they would survive the deluge. She also created a rainbow so that truly exemplary souls could climb to heaven and escape all the drama that followed.

She must have been more satisfied with her remodeled creation because she decided to put it on exhibit, where it still receives raves for its inter-active features and fine sense of color and perspective. A fashion-loving goddess, she wore a blue-green jade skirt that resembled waves and looked over laboring women and new-born babies, born, as they were, out of their own small watery worlds.

Channel this goddess: When you are pregnant; looking after pregnant women is what Chalchiuhtlicue does best. Also, when you are birthing creative endeavors and they are just not turning out the way you planned. Darn it. Don't you hate it when that happens?

Elizabeth: This goddess is for you. She's greenish blue and Aztec, not Mayan. Hope that's close enough.

I feel like I'm falling behind giving people their goddesses, so I'm going to double up for a while, starting Wednesday. But if you need a goddess for any reason, let me know and I'll put you in the queue.