*connections & lost threads- a new community*

so i have been self isolating for a seven days now

i work as a community support worker with vulnerable adults-until a month ago i was permanent but as i am in the final year of my degree and wanted to gain more control over my days i became a relief worker and signed up to a second job under the same umbrella.

then covid 19 hit the UK and following government guidelines took to self isolation last monday.

which of course means no income

luckily, for now,  i have the money to keep a roof over my head and pay my bills and even luckier to have my North Star tell me daily not to worry, i know there are many out there who do not have these words to give them solace and so i know i am really, really lucky.

talking with my sister, i was made aware of areas in desperate need of staff, working from home and so as soon as she knows whats happening  i will hopefully have a trickle of income coming in-again i give thanks for what the universe may bring me.

this all means i have time, a lot of free time...

i don't spend all day on my university work, i think my brain would explode if i did. 

so i find myself trying to keep to some kind of routine to my day...

i study for 3-4 hours, maybe 5 now i have an assignment to do

i potter in my garden-growing my herbs, wild flowers and vegetables

yesterday i tung oiled one of my Adirondack rockers

i actually read again-while juggling work and study i actually stopped reading. now i find i have time again and find myself adding books to my kindle, or pull books of my shelves

i also just sit-i sit in the garden and watch the birds and think...i let my mind wander where it wishes as i drink cups of tea, a blanket over my knees if the wind gets chilly

and i grieve for my sweet Arthur-i think at the moment i have had maybe three days where i have not cried. but the tears come too easily and i miss him so very much. during the week when we had the cottage to ourselves he would always sleep on the bed at night, taking up much of the room and i feel badly that on his final night in the cottage he slept alone on the sofa as my NS was here...

of course being here alone makes me think of all the others who are alone and it made me think of the blogging community that existed years ago. by years ago i am talking of  13 years ago. 

my first blogger post was 27/06/2007 (which is freaking me out right about now because that was my NS 44th birthday) and blogging really was old school then and it really was a close community. we all sat typing away, opening our lives and hearts, we visited each other, supported each other and i think brought with us all a sense of belonging.

then it slowly changed, people stopped blogging, facebook happened and with the growth in mobile phones and the huge capacity they held things became instant.

now i feel change is in the air, or could be in the air and i feel the pull of grass roots, old school blogging

i think this virus will...no, i feel this virus is going to change things. i just feel that society will change and i hope for the better. we are being made to re-assess our lives, our world, the resources available. of course there are selfish, mean people who walk this world and there always will be but i hope that the lesson this virus will teach us will be one of increasing compassion, community and love. that we can start to take things a little more slowly, open our hearts and minds again and fill spaces of the internet with all the good things blogging can bring.

so are you reading this?

do you feel like un-earthing the past?

do you want to help re-build our old blogging community?

~all change...~

so...

here i am...

after a years break from blogging....

i was walking down from my kitchen and thought of my living 'my little life' and realized i needed to blog...

so here i am...sitting in my bed with a bucket of good strong yorkshire tea, still not using upper-case....i am sorry life is too short!

my life has changed a lot since my last post...

i am still with my NS i am glad to say and our relationship is stronger and more secure than ever. he has become more settled, open and after a couple of very, very rocky moments he finally...finally realized that i am not like the women who have become before-i am not out to lie, cheat and abuse him

also, please meet Arthur-i took him in as an illegal lodger who was living on the cobbles and fed by my neighbour and then myself, and i brought him with me when i moved to live out a splendid retirement in the country.

i am nearing the end of my classical studies degree-this time next year it will all be over. right now i am in revison mode with an exam in june and i am already in panic mode, feeling i know nothing...less than nothing! but already i am thinking of doing my masters with the utmost in support from NS. its a lot to think about which i will be doing over the next year while i finish my degree.

the biggest thing...well two things really...is that i moved from my home by the sea in february...at imolc actually which felt so perfect.

i only moved about 7 miles but it feels like a million miles. i am now back within the boundaries of the new forest national park, still only a few miles from my family home, living in, what i call 'splendid isolation'

i am not totally isolated, but close. 

i now live in a small village with a strong history to the witches of the new forest in a little cottage that was once a one up, one down to the groom who looked after the working horses of the farm here...the stables are still next door but now home to my neighbour and her cat.

best of all i have a garden, a little patio and a shed and...off road, private parking so i will no longer have my beloved car vandalised.

 the french doors lead to a small cosy living room and i wish you could see the patio now...

 the kitchen is up a short flight of steep, narrow stairs and the floor has the oldest and longest oak boards i have ever seen

 i was finally able to plant out my welsh rowan

 oh, did i mention the woodburner?!

the first weekend i put in a feeder and now get...robins, sparrows, blue tits, great tits, gold finches, jackdaws, dunnocks, starlings,  wood pigeons, magpies, the occasional nut hatch and rooks and also wood mice, shrews and bank voles

and oh my but i am happy.

my old flat became awful...the almost constant noise from the art gallery downstairs, noise late at night on the cobbles, noise and smell from the salon, it didn't feel like home and the final straw was just before Christmas i caught my landlady coming down from my flat after using my bathroom...within two weeks both NS and i were looking for my new home.

i didn't hold out much hope of finding anywhere and so was a little half hearted then one morning NS sent me a link to a small, independent letting agent and this cottage had literally been listed only an hour earlier. so i launched an email campaign, suddenly the cottage was listed as let so then phoned only to be offered the chance to view the next day.

i was one of four people who viewed it and after a very anxious week i was offered it because 'they knew i would stay and love it'

two weeks later i was in,,,the same day going down with flu

there then followed the very rocky time with my NS

but it passed

so here i sit, in my little bedroom, drinking tea, hearing nothing but bird song and the classical music from my radio, Arthur is fast asleep on the end of the bed...and i just realized with all this catch up i went off track from what i originally wanted to write...

sunshine & showers

its been a long time again

i have been finding it hard to gather my mojo for anything much

and my words have refused to flow here, although i have managed to fill quite a few pages in my moleskine~mostly connected to my card readings from either my shamans oracle or wild unknown tarot.

i have been having the black dog lurk within my peripheral vision~feels of 'i just cant be bothered', wanting to go to bed at an unnaturally early hour, not eating as i cant be bothered to cook, waking with a feeling of dread even if i am not doing anything that day and more recently random feelings of 'teary'

i know the signs, i have had cyclical depression since my teens (with anxiety and social phobia long before that...goddess i sound a mess!) but i refuse to go to my gp. i have an irrational fear of seeing any doctor, the fear of being told there is nothing wrong with me...the whole 'you dont look sick' thing. 

so i shall bumble along and see how things go. 

the good thing is the weather is slowly, oh so very slowly, getting better. today we have another blue sky day, although it is a little chilly still.

even better the workmen we have had here for weeks and weeks have finally finished which means we can restore our garden back to the beautiful space it was before they arrived and we had to move everything, dismantle the pergola, move the ferret cage...all this has meant that i have not been able to sit in the garden in any way shape or form. 

arghhh its just been awful!

now they have gone, swampy has put up the pergola, the ferret palace is back in place, my chairs, bench, pots are all back in their places as are my assorted green men and woven wreaths hanging with hag stones. 

even better i can now see all the new life springing back to life, pushing up from the damp earth towards the ever growing heat of our brother sun...goddess it feels so good, i cannot tell you how good. the black dog is still lurking though, i don't know when he will decide to trot off...even today with blue sky, sunshine and being able to sit in the garden he sits, very still, deep inside of me and i cannot shake off the little kernel of fear that is sitting with him. 

i wish i knew why...

*****

i bought myself something i have been wanting for a long time...

a red deer skin shaman drum from shamanic drums and rattles

i have been looking at their etsy shop for ages and finally managed to pool enough gifted money...

as soon as i held 'her' in my hands i felt the most amazing connection and looking closely at the markings on the skin had the feeling of the duality of light and dark with what could almost be an image taken from my shamans oracle cards standing between the two.

she sounds beautiful and i have already started to use her when doing a guided visualisation.

i have yet to properly dedicate her as my journeys are being done to find out more about those who have reached out to me over the years...

one day i went through some old photos and found a load of me at glastonbury and the festival c,1990-2, i look so young!

resting my feet with friends katie and jake

the top of the tor~short hair and cape over black leather

i have been exploring elen of the ways for a while now~it feels right living here in this ancient forest where seeing deer is not an impossibility. i have quite a few single antlers and a partial skull with antlers still attached. this i am sure is why i felt so connected to my shaman drum.

last week i went out on a sunny day for a walk with swampy and as we got out of the camper a large herd of deer bounded across the trackway and through the woods in front of us. a few stopped to stare at us before bounding away and they all crossed the nearby stream and vanished from sight.

then as we were walking back we ended up following the tracks of a few deer who had crossed the open land overnight leaving only their tracks, which vanished into the woods where the herd had been a short time earlier...

~another day~

 

it is my intention to blog every single day this year, no matter how small the post i will blog!

 

i have been sitting all cosy working on a crochet project~something for a friend, which i hope she will love.

i am finding it more difficult to not sit with some crochet in my hands these days~it is so addictive.

 

well my hands are really rather painful right now which is not allowing me to type without pain, so for today that is it for my blog post!

 

tomorrow i shall try to remember to tell you more about my shamans oracle cards.