Ok...picture this, a dozen older ladies(less then a handful under the age of 60), in formal gowns (i.e. prom dresses), prancing around to organ music...yes kids, my grandmother was installed once more last night as the Worthy Matron of her Eastern Star chapter. Now, I realize I should be polite, and probably not be writing about this, but it's soooo hard not to. At least I'm not posting pictures(I was there to take photos for my grandmother). To add to the weirdness of the situation, I'm Pagan. The Eastern Star(the female half of the Masons) is a Christian organization. While I can normally tolerate Christian events without much snickering, this was mind-blowing. It was the opposite of my world. They also use a pentacle as a symbol, but where ours points up, theirs point down. We do things in circles, they do things in squares(seriously, when they walk around the room, they stop and then pivot to make a right angle then keep going). They use the same colors and some of the same symbols, but their direction/symbol/color correlations are all different. And then there is the use of the word 'secret' stated multiple times during the ceremony, and promising to keep the secrets. Nothing makes me more curious than hearing that word. So that naturally leads to my desire to infiltrate the organization to find out what they do. But then I feel horrible for feeling so devious and figure there's no way I could spend that much time with these *cough cough* urm....women.