~moongazy gathering~drumming west kennet~

on the wednesday a group of us ended up a few moments down the road at avebury itself

my friend martin and holly-dog

after martin and i spent some time dowsing we all stopped for tea and food at the national trust cafe before heading a few minutes down the road to the west kennet long barrow, passing silbury hill on the way

i had my shamanic drum with me and so martin, kay and i spent some time in the barrow while i drummed. 

it was the most amazing experience. as we went in martin asked the spirits of the place if they would allow drumming and he had a positive response. we slowly walked down to the far end of the barrow and i slowly started a drumming pattern, one that slowly speeded up. after different periods of time i was drawn to stop~not a conscious decision to stop but almost as if a guiding hand was telling to stop for a short time. 

each time i was allowed to drum for longer periods and finally for the last few it felt as if i were being swept up into something more than just drumming, unconsciously my body would start to sway to the beat and it felt as if i were being drawn up into some ancient rhythm.

we also did a little experimenting, sending kay out to see where the drumming could be heard from~from either side of the entrance she could hear nothing and those sitting in the grass atop the barrow could hear it faintly, as if from a long distance.

finally, thanking the spirits of the place, who i hoped remembered me from last year, we left.

walking back down, we met tilli and chappie heading up, so we joined them and then diverted to the swollowhead spring on the way back down

then it was back to our vehicles and back to 'our' field, driving once again by silbury

next time...open mic acoustic night in calne!

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...

~drumming up the moon*earth mother & her green lord~

 

it seems right that this extended post should be in three parts


***

i have spent three days (thee again) on this post, getting no-where and becoming distracted until i finally ran out of possible words and thoughts and so gave up.

this morning i was up at that liminal time when the veil between worlds is thin and i stood in my garden surrounded by the scent of valerian and bird song, i heard the last conversation of an owl and when i heard the first morning calls of the crows i knew it was time to come in and write.

i admit this has been a very a difficult post to write, i think because it was part of something...
part of something larger over several days, weeks even, that caused a slight shift in my spiritual path and i keep having to stop and ponder, journal, ask my cards for more clarity.

i think at the end of the day it is all starts with labels
the labels we assign to ourselves, ones that are assigned to us by others

early on in our spiritual paths we label ourselves to fit into a specific category~a category that we actually wish for ourselves, that we think we should be, that maybe popular culture tells us we should be no matter what our heart tells us. we may fall into a path through our heart or through our reading. maybe we go through this process of labelling as a natural process that finally leads us to something that we find fits us and our spiritual practice perfectly

our spiritual path could take us through several 'incarnations' as we seek that perfect fit~that perfect place where we can stand alone or among a group of other pagans and know that we are on our 'right' path~the path that the universe intended us to be on. we no longer have the need, the urge, to seek any further.
more importantly we no longer feel we are wrong if we follow our own path because we realise that no matter how many books are written, no matter how many online articles and blogs are written instructing us in a particular path, no matter how many groups or orders are out there...at the end of the day we just do not know, there is no complete, written, ancient text that gives the whole, complete information for any particular path.
so any guilt/confusion we feel from not fitting any proscribed criteria, at being on a truly independent path, sloughs away like winters dead leaves and we feel all shiny and new. brimming with a new confidence that nothing can take away because we have travelled, maybe for many years, and we have undertaken our own form of initiation and come out the other side knowing that it is
right, that we have stood in the dark and been spoken to and told that 'yes this is right for you...'

 i sit here realising that i have gone through this process and found myself at this place, this time...this place that fits so well and feels comfortable, feels
right
and the final part of my 'initiation' took place over several days and  places...


air

 

i understand that the final part of my initiation started at the camp with a small private ritual during which the moon rose to the south while we were in our candle lit circle. it had not been planned that way, my beautiful friends who had written out the ritual had not consulted any almanac to find the exact time of moonrise and the place they chose came from the positive energy given out by a tree.
but as we stood in our sacred circle i noticed a small hint of light on the horizon and gently nudged my friend, nodding towards the light, one by one we all came to notice the rising of the moon and the ritual stopped while we all stood watching for a while, laughing and hugging and the rest of the ritual ended under the light of the full moon.
 the feelings that grew in me during this ceremony for friends were feelings of a circle slowly closing, that the ends were nearly meeting, that my unconscious searching was nearly at an end.


fire

the following evening as we sat around a large camp fire with music and laughter filling the air we again sat and watched the moon rise~this time was the drumming up of the moon, where those with shaman drums ran towards the moon, drumming and ululating wildly and it was a feral sound that made me feel almost complete...another part of that circle was closed


water

while in Glastonbury we went to the

 white spring

 

where i filled a bottle full of the water from the spring from which i take a little sip first thing in the morning and last thing at night and when i am close to running out its the perfect time to return.

 

once my bottle was full swampy and i went into the dark, chilly temple

 

 

 

 

as no technology is allowed these photos from the white spring website

within the temple lies three shrines~to Brigid, the guardian of the sacred springs where a  flame is always burning~to Our Lady of Avalon beside the healing pool and at the portal to the Otherworld lies the shrine of the King of the World of Faries.

if you haven't been to the White Spring it is so very difficult to describe~the spring gushing out from the rocks and filling the pools, the sacred water flowing over the top of the pools and flowing in rivulets along the floor.

the temple is lit only by candles and the sound of flowing water fills your ears but still there is a silence that fills you, a sacred silence that first fills your mind and then fills your body.
but it is not an empty silence, it is a silence filled with joy, with voices calling to you in welcome.
but these are ancient voices, new voices to me.
Brigid/Brighidh has been with me for a while now, slowly introducing herself with signs until i could no longer ignore them and she was here but there was another.
this other was older, far older~i am talking mother goddess, earth mother, Danu and Dôn.
and of course the essence of the lord of the wildwood, the green man, was there too, laughing among the flowing waters, making sure he was not forgotten.
i walked slowly around the temple, watching the spring flow into the pools from deep under the Tor, standing before each shrine, bathing my face in the ice cold water, my body was almost vibrating, humming from the feelings i was having, feelings that i was being given as a gift from a deity so much older than i imagined i would ever find.

i finally, and very reluctantly stepped out of this comforting, dark, watery temple~i wanted to stay there much, much longer and immerse myself in the pools, i stepped out into sunshine feeling transformed and that the circle more complete.


earth

the following day i stood at Avebury and felt a huge sense of peace fall over me and i lay for a while in the long meadow grass beside the great stones of the outer circle trying to absorb all the energy i could.

a little later found me walking the hill up to the West Kennet Long Barrow with that great symbol of the goddess, Silbury Hill to my back. this burial chamber is truly ancient...think back around 5000 years and then add a smidge of maybe another half a millennia...
ancient

i took a few other photos from this point but it doesn't feel right in posting them

within the burial chamber, as i walked though past the north and south chambers and into the rounded west chamber at the very end  i was getting the same feeling i had at the White Spring~there were no  threat in the darkness, if anything i  again felt comfort that the great earth mother had welcomed me into this ancient chamber and acknowledged me, allowing my time there to be uninterrupted. i held my hands out to the stones feeling an ancient vibration and greeted the ancestors.

this time, as i stepped out of this ancient and sacred place, the ends of the circle that had started to close days before finally joined together and the circle of my initiation was complete.


of course it doesn't end there, it never does.

i came home and still vibrating, humming from my experiences, looked though my journal.
i went back over weeks, to entries where i written down my card readings, the notes and musings i had made.
there was so much, so many words set into sentences and in the end i had to try to collate it into one easy to read page made up of single, repeated words
 the same things that kept coming up reading after reading and although i was aware of this as the days went by it wasn't until i returned home and looked again with new eyes that it all made sense...

interaction with spirit, ancestors, Brighid, Earth Goddess, Brighidh, Arianhrod, gifts of the Spirits
earth serpent, serpents, primal wisdom, deep soul knowledge
inner journey of spirit
rebirth, transformation, new paths,
springs, wells, river flow,
 weaving a web of life, synchronicity,
elements
otherworld
the embrace of spirits and their blessings

looking at it in this way i let out a huge sigh~i was not going crazy and reading my cards wrong, i wasn't 'inventing' something out of nothing. everything over the preceding weeks, months had cumulated into these events, at these sacred sites, some places i had not intended to visit on this journey, but timing and luck had me going to all of them.


reading back on this i feel nothing but joy that i have been taken by the hand and guided on this journey and although the circle has been completed i am still on a great journey.
i am looking at things from a new perspective, its almost as if the decades have rolled back and i am starting anew. which, of course, in a way i am, but with considerably more wisdom than i had before and with a maturity that makes me feel i can walk the path that the great earth mother and her wild green consort has laid before me and be open to anything that crosses my path.
i am looking at my sacred garden with new eyes, at my altar inside with new eyes and feeling grateful that i can turn a little aside from the norm that is given us on our pagan paths and forge a new path, with new ways of doing things, knowing that the simple rituals of my life are guided by the great earth mother.










i have seen people moaning that the taking of photos and film should be allowed in the White Spring Temple and why is there no proper lighting to see properly? well if they feel this then they do not get it and should maybe stay away from what is a highly sacred place to many, who do not want the flash and whir of cameras and mobile phones to disturb their mediations...or even better why do they they not discard this technology, kick of their shoes and wait and see what may happen to them in the darkness.

~its here, i can smell it...~

 

its here

 

its really at my doorstep

 

i can smell it, sense it, feel it as a buzzing going through me

 

those of you here in the northern hemisphere will know what i am talking about if you are tuned into our land and its cycles

 

 

stepping out into the garden in the early morning or evening you can feel the turn of the great wheel taking us into the darker days.

 

there is a slight chill in the air and a feeling of everything slowly giving up the best of itself and drawing back into darkness to regenerate its powers ready for spring.

 

i find myself having to rush into the garden to make the most of these feelings~i love the chill air and the smell. it is a very particular smell and the energy in the land is buzzing and i feel it reverberating within me.

 

it makes me feel supremely happy.

 

its the darker days that i enjoy having a fire in my garden, wrapped up against the chill and burning incense, staring up at the darkening sky...so perfect.

 

 

 

my rowan tree is full of fruit that i had thought of making jelly with but i thought it better to leave them for the birds~maybe if i plant another one we can share them?

 

 

 

 

i have not been here with my thoughts for weeks now and i have been constantly fretting over this~wondering what you have all been up to.

i have been so busy in my incarnation as the wylde apothecary getting ready for the new forest fairy festival i had little or no time for much else.

 it is now over (a post here on the festival to come!)

and so things are going back to pre-festival 'normality' here in this ancient forest i call home.

 

i am finding myself wondering what to do with myself over the coming months

of course the wylde apothecary will be gently rolling on

i recently started to learn the ukulele which s proving to be great fun-it is an eddy finn concert uke (a smidge larger than the teeny soprano ones) and i bought a hard case so i can safely take it away with us camping and not worry about damage.

i have a huge pile of books that need reading-although i am reading about 4 books at the moment i can never resist buying more to add to my pile

i need to spend time coming up with some new incense blends~'sister moon' proved to be very popular at the fairy festival and at one point i had to sit in pretty pagan to make up some new packets.

i have a hankering to learn clog dancing but have found no teachers down this end of the country.

i find my mind returning to the idea of delving deeper into druidry via the obod or bdo online courses~but i am torn, part of me wants to delve deeper while another part of me thinks i do not need it...i think its just that i miss my ou work i am looking to replace it.

i am still considering birthing my own shamanic drum

 

...so many things i want to do!

 

but or now i need to tidy my work room!

 

 

 

 

 

 



~goodies~

since my last post it has been like yule and my birthday all rolled into one!

 

i had a little box turn up two days ago, well it was for swampy so he opened the envelope but then gave me a little box saying it was from 'flynt, mismi and inca'...i recognised the box immediately as one from our lovely friend at where the wild roses grow...

 

the most gorgeous silver ivy leaf hair clip with a special little moonstone...

 



 

 

back in december i ordered myself a cloak with the money my family always give me as a gift.

i have wanted a cloak for a long time but usually the only ones available are made from velvet fabric and the woven wool ones are more difficult to find and often hugely expensive.

then i came across camelot creations on etsy and so took the plunge.

 

it is a three quarter circle and a little lighter than in the photo, a darkish olive green with a celtic knot clasp. it is also heavy as it is 100% wool so will keep me very toasty during nights around camp fires.

 

 

 

then a couple of days later my birthday gift arrived...a bodhran which was made just last week by paul mcauley at irish bodhrans of county antrim.

 because of my own irish heritage i had to have one from ireland-knowing my great granddad was a musician and singer i just had to.

if you look in the site you will find it listed as a glentaisie 18" fixed bodhran

it came with a beautiful turned wood beater and i am so in love with it.

 

 

 

 

i have never played a bodhran before so keen to start learning but the web is so full of different teachers and methods its a minefield.

however from word from my friend and neighbour calv i am hoping that a small beginners session will be held at the art house cafe in southampton in the future.

until then i shall try to teach myself the proper method.

 

but i also wanted it for shamanic/ritual drumming~the drum i really wanted for this was out of my budget (although i am thinking ahead to the pooling of yule and birthday gift!)

i have plans to customise it somewhat to make it more mine, more linked to ritual and will post about this journey.

my first task is to make a beater for ritual work...

 

i am hoping this coming equinox will be dry so i can sit in my garden with my fire, warm in my cloak and drum...