I’ve got buns in the oven

Nooo, not the metaphorical type; literal buns! In fact, bread, and shortly chocolate chip cookies, if I don’t eat all the dough.

It’s a grey, dank and cold day here at Three Chimneys. I went out running with the dog this morning at 8am alongside the river, which was roaring and churning, the ducks prudently staying in the few shallow bits. I saw a heron trying to spot fish but he looked like nothing so much as an angular and grey pensioner, hair awry, peering myopically both ways into heavy traffic, looking for a gap in which to shamble across the road. Eventually he gave up and creaked skywards, his body language unmissable in its defeat.  No breakfast for you, mate.

The dog took to every rut and muddy puddle down the lane on the way back, and one comedy moment thankfully didn’t go down in history, but only because there was no-one else there to see me; clinging to the hedge and teetering on the edge of disaster, as I inched my way past a puddle the size of the Red Sea, which I know to be lined with brick fragments and assorted building rubble, and which I did NOT want to fall into. Back home and a nifty attempt by the dog to go and dry off in our bed was foiled at the off; now he’s sulking in his special armchair in the sitting room, clearly underwhelmed and wanting to sleep the day away.

Myself, I’m deep into culinary pursuits; I have found a glorious recipe for mincemeat (tip to our overseas friends – mincemeat comprises currants, raisins, mixed peel, cherries, butter, brandy and spices. I eat it from the jar, which I believe is a shameful thing to admit, but you can put it in a pastry case and call it a tart. It won’t mind). I’m intending to fill medium Kilner jars with this unctuous mixture (heavy on the Cognac, GW) and offer them as gifts to friends.

There’s also a rather amazing sweet-sour tomato preserve which I have found in one of my Elizabeth David anthologies; it comes up garnet rich and cornelian red and sparkling through glass jars. A perfect selection for the upcoming Christmas fairs locally. There’s thirty pounds of regular marmalade to make before the big guns come out and I have orders for a further thirty pounds of proper, amber-coloured thick-cut Seville orange marmalade to placate my stepfather and my best beloved, who both dote on the stuff and feel totally deprived if there is none in the larder, or if, god help us, they have to go out and buy some sub-standard simulacrum in the shops.

Pausa there as I went to take a large Swansea loaf out of the oven. Golden brown and crusty, risen high in the centre and with a cross cut into its floury top, I’m hoping it measures up against the ones we buy, which have the distinction of being utterly delicious even when three or four days old, and manage (somehow) to combine all the chewy, tasty character of a sourdough with the crisp crust of proper English bread.

The cookies will be coming to work with me tomorrow, to be devoured by the wastrels in my co-employ; really, I don’t mind, it’s great to watch people eat things you’ve made. I’ve always been far more of a savoury person than a sweet, temperamentally speaking; this comes out in my cooking to a great degree. Now I’m feeling light, happy and settled for the first time in years, I seem to have fallen into a routine of cooking for pleasure on the weekends; baking pies and cakes, making bread and scones, planning storecupboard batches of chutneys, pickles and jam.

My BB is upstairs planing wood and making a lovely job of finishing the landing. I’m settled in the kitchen, off in another part of the house, listening to Radio 3 and pottering happily. Work again tomorrow; but this isn’t a bad thing. I’m just loving the creativity that seems to be flowing through me at the moment. This evening, beading, I think. Mmmmm.

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Postscriptum – The bread has cooled sufficiently for me to pick it up; the smell coming from the still-warm crust defies description. Is there anything more simultaneously comforting and quickening to the appetite than freshly-baked bread? I’m in bliss, just hugging the bread I made and breathing in its spicy, fresh yeastiness and savour. Delightful.

Divergence and Laziness

There’s a very great deal to be said about the power of the urge to do nothing. It’s closely allied to the conviction that there’s no time to do x, whatever x happens to be. In some people, this could be characterised as a conscious decision. In me, I’ve seen it as simply laziness and inattention.

I was looking round my rooms the other day, and saw all the books lining the walls for the first time in a long time. In many respects, books, moveable press, are a form of interior decoration to me. Not, as I saw once, a way to add colour to a room – when I asked the owner of the house if she’d read any of the books in question she gave me an extremely funny look and said no, of course not; she’d bought two tonnes of green-spined books from a wholesaler and was using them as decoration. No, my definition of decorative goes more toward Rennie Mackintosh – both beautiful and useful.

I’ve got books in every room and some of them are unread, the bindings uncracked. Most of the books in this category are regarding pagan studies. I realised concurrently with my musing over the number of books unread that I haven’t done a really meaty book review (read: hatchet job) on anyone’s work for a good long while. And as I am going to be absent from the Ludlow Symposium this year, and therefore unable to provide a digest of the day, I should get reading and noting.

One of the downsides that we all acknowlege about practising solitary witchcraft (if we do; you might not!) is that sometimes, and sometimes for extended periods of time, life supervenes or you lose your way or your thread or your enthusiasm, even, and everything stops. I’ve had six months or more of this, feeling like there’s no energy or will in the pot for anything other than dragging myself out of bed, getting Rowan ready for nursery, keeping the house straight and trying (and mainly failing) to keep up with my friendship commitments.

One of the things I always do in this situation is believe that the false dawn of returning energy is the end of the problem. I forget every single time that it’s just a burst, a sprint for the tape, a momentary second wind. I become part of the problem, by forcing myself back into the fray. This tendency has an unfortunate side-effect – it seems to make other people doubt me when I say I’m fine (or maybe it’s the edge of hysteria on my voice. ‘I’m fine. No, I’m fine. FINE!’

I don’t think I’m fooling anyone, though; least of all me. I’m getting too old to be constantly hauling myself up right and soldiering on if I’m down. And I am down; why do women like me never give themselves credit? I’ve left and divorced my husband in less than a year, moved house, become a single parent, dealt with crises at home and at work, held down a full-time job, done a good job as a parent and haven’t actually gone insane or become emotionally incontinent in the process. That’s quite good going.

So to get irritated at myself for not continuing my observances, work, writings, visits, pilgrimages and dedications seems specious to me. None of these things are dispensible in my life, but neither is my son, earning a living or having peace of mind and heart. So, not indispensible; but slightly more dispensible than the things I kept up with.

I’m here, Goddess, I still hear You. I worship You. I think the life you’ve given me should be lived well; and so I dedicate all my efforts to You. By doing my best I give my best to You.

Beltane – New Dreams

As I sit here, listening to the rain pattering on the roof of the unit where I work, I cast my mind back across the last twelve months. Rocky roads, rocky times; not time to think or to feel. Things left undone. But here in the burgeoning Spring of 2009, there’s suddenly light and room to move and to breathe.

I have thought I was fighting my way clear of the ties in previous months, but had the wit to realise it’s like climbing a mountain – numerous false horizons and that the key is never to give up hope. Conserve your energy. Keep plugging away. Take breathers. Don’t forget to breathe!

I’ve been out meeting new people, exploring new interests, and simply enjoying my home and my garden. Balancing solitude and the comfort of relaxation and downtime with going out and enjoying myself in company. I’ve been travelling more, seeing new places. Taking small risks, small excitements and relishing them. Working on my physical fitness, and my mental fitness. In essence, echoing the process of fettling and greening that I see going on around me every day.

So here we are at Beltane, beginning of our Summer; the Goddess and the God meet in the birthtime of the buds; so it couldn’t be a more auspicious time for me to reconnect with my path once more. Beltane this year  is also at the time of the First Quarter of the moon, which is perfect for the work I wish to do; building, strengthening, affirming work, consolidating the distance I’ve come so far.

I find the witchcraft path is like this – we allow ourselves to  become distracted by quotidian vicissitudes, separated from our source and the spring of our power; perhaps one day I’ll learn the trick of keeping my hand on the unicorn’s rein! Till then, I come home again, happy in the knowledge that I can rededicate, resubmit, revitalise my work, look at it once more with a new eye, keep the good and prune the no-so-good and shake the dust from the raiment.

I am taking Beltane Day off work, for an extended meditation, reorganisation and prayer session. I am taking time, precious time, to do what is necessary, what is right for me here and now. I like this. It feels like being able to spread my wings for the first time in an age; I will spread them wide.

Choosing to Choose what I Bloody Well Choose!

My divorce is now on the map – the paperwork was submitted to the court and approved, yesterday; I should have my decree nisi by mid-July and my absolute by August. I know categorically that I won’t feel any different when I have that piece of paper than I do now – a free woman, who is once again able to make decisions based on what I want out of my life; to choose the people I want to spend my intimate time with. I have the gift of choice. I can have any damn thing I want, within reason.

I’m older, though, and I have the benefit of a huge amount of extra experience, knocks and bumps; things that worked, things that failed catastrophically. Stuff I chose to do and reaped the whirlwind for; risks I took which had unexpected benefits.

The fact of the matter is; whoever I choose, however it ends up, whatever happens, it’s been my choice. We take the consequences for the things we choose to do; it’s the first step to knowing oneself; responsibility for action.

Witchcraft gives one a certain amount of prescience; but we’re not goddesses or gods, just plain old word made flesh; human, fallible, subject to all the usual humdrum lusts and desires that cloud our judgement and make us act irrationally. Everyone is like this. No-one’s experience is so like another’s that there’s an automatic read-across. So why the big urge to drop in the four penn’orth of  ‘useful advice’?

There are those whose guidance I seek and listen to, because I respect them and understand their motivation. There are others who give their opinion whether I want it or not, and whose view I discount if it doesn’t suit my purposes at the time.

I know I’m going to fuck it up at some point. Who doesn’t? But the crucial thing is; don’t tell me I’m going to fuck it up ahead of time. What do you think that says about how you feel about me? Think about that.

New Boundaries

I’m beginning to realise what a total blessing it is to have decided to move on from my old life, and to have redrawn the boundaries much more firmly.

There’s a new clarity to my thought process. Before, when someone I cared about said or promised something, I would extemporise; I’d hear what they said, and immediately bolster it or pad it out with all the things I’d wished they’d say. I made the half promise, the lukewarm thanks,  the semi-devoted utterance do, because I thought I would get no better.

Well, that’s one way to live, and many do it every day; stretching threadbare, perfunctory regard from their other to try to cover widening cracks in their own self-esteem and mental health. I’ve done it. I hated it – and resolved with the Goddess’s strength never to do it again.

Nobody is worth that sort of abasement. Nobody loves you, if they love you so little that you’re at the bottom of the pile when their time is being apportioned.

One of the most valuable things we can give our friends and our lovers is our time. Unstintingly, generously, without running the clock. I needed help last night. My friends were there for me. I texted my friend, and immediately got a call. Another friend left messages for me overnight to ask if I was all right. This is what I do for my friends; this is what my true friends do for me.

So if people tell me they love me now, I listen precisely to what they say, and to nothing else. I measure their worth by their actions and I do not indulge myself in wishful thinking. Everyone has the responsibility to be excellent to their friends, to make the message of love they carry for them easily read and unmistakably strong. There is no room in this scenario for ‘perhaps….’. It should be a yes. A YES!

Garbled Thinking

An interesting short conversation with a Christian in my family today highlighted to me the some of the facts regarding worship in Britain today. I quote:

Her: You’ll have to start going to church again if you want to get R into that school!

Me: I wouldn’t do that; it’s hypocritical and unneccessary. And anyway, I’m not sacrificing my beliefs to tick a box to gain an education for my child.

Her: Well, you don’t have to do you? You worship God, after all!

Me: Well, yes. In a way. But the Christian church worships Jesus. The clue’s in the question. I don’t believe in Jesus as a saviour or as the son of God.

Her: But all Gods are the same in the end!

Me: (thinks) Have you thought about that before you said it? It implies your One True Saviour… isn’t.

The idea that I would voluntarily retard my spiritual life and actively renege on everything I’ve worked for and earned in order to get my son into a particular school seems ludicrous to me, and will, I suspect, to many of my readers. But what is even more alarming to me is the thought that you can have any sort of moral excellence within such a system. One of the strictest proponents of Christianity I know, actively encouraging me to be mendacious and underhanded in order to achieve something worldly. Interesting.

It seems easy for Christians to be clear about what they believe and what they worship – they’ve got a book, a plan and a couple of thousand years of well-documented history. This all seems to go out of the window in situations like the above. Either you have a One True God or you don’t….

One of the things I get continually from those who ask me about my path is an accusation that I can’t be fully candid and straightforward about the doctrine I follow. The fact that I don’t have one with which to form a path seems to escape my interlocutor, nine times out of ten. We don’t get a book, a road, a threat of hell and a promise of heaven like the world’s heaviest-handed carrot-and-stick  approach. We don’t proselytise; we don’t advocate the worship of any particular goddess or god – we wouldn’t presume to intervene between the gods and the people they choose as their followers.

We get a braided channel, a map with no names on it, our wits and the clothes we stand up in. Who wouldn’t learn more this way?

To Be Silent

The ways that humans forge bonds and channels of communication fascinates me. It’s almost as if the communication is a carrier wave, which can be used to transmit either clear speech or code. Let me expand.

My job requires exceptionally clear and concise communication; to individuals, companies and those within my company. There isn’t any room whatsoever for error, and the information transmitted has a high factual content which needs to be got across in as condensed a form as possible. Most of the transmission is verbal. Even in this highly regimented environment, mistakes and misunderstandings occur. If such is possible under such tight control, what happens when the main disruptive ingredient – emotion – is added? Absolute freakin chaos.

Come away from the professional environment and into the world of the regular guy and you’ve got a minefield. If you can find someone – anyone – whom you can have a sensible, mutually understandable conversation with on a serious topic for longer than 10 minutes, you’ve struck gold. Because so many people are incapable. They either shy away from emotional discussion, or refuse to ask questions either of themselves or the person sitting opposite; or if they do ask, they don’t listen to the response.

Listening is the difference. Listening makes the person into a human. Trying to empathise and understand is the way to really hear someone. Leaving your prejudices at the door is the way to make sure the words you hear will at least get past the first layer of consciousness.

The carrier wave exists as a clear channel and it’s filled with either gibberish or sense. I’d say that it’s a 50-50 split beween a desire to communicate and a genuine desire to listen that ensures the code is cracked. If either of the sides is unwilling to do their part, the enigma will never be broken.

As witches, being silent, listening, is one of our hardest lessons to learn. Perhaps this is why so many of us go into the listening game and become counsellors. Perhaps listening to our own interior voices, and the voices of our Gods and Goddesses, gives us the capacity to listen to the humans around us. We’re used to it.

Thank Goddess for normality

I’ve faced my demons over the weekend, made my peace, made apologies where they were due, received apologies I know to be heartfelt, made promise of reparations where this is required, and let go my anger. And in the process I have come to understand the reasons for things, and to forgive, and to allow others to be different, act differently and feel differently to what I consider to be the norm.

I am grateful for the ability to be dispassionate. I am pleased to see I can be angry, but not let it drag me down to baser behaviour than is my wont. I am relieved that the anger can howl and storm, wear itself out and vanish. The working Seshat and I did opened my eyes, and released the pent-up well of emotion that was damaging me inside. I may be empty now, ashes where once I was fire, but I’m clean.

I shall be working for calm and for caring and contentment. I am reserving 2009 for myself, and my own concerns; personal development, counselling, enlightenment and learning. I’ve needed a year like this, of semi-enforced solitude, for more years than I can count and now I actually have the prospect of it I’m really excited. It just goes to show what it takes to get me to calm down, step off the merry-go-round and take some time for myself – it basically takes a bomb going off in my life to make me shut up and take stock. The wild internal yammer of other stuff, other people, other calls on my time  wears me out and has brought me literally to the brink of collapse. I’m back from the edge, now taking stock, and slowly and tentatively reconnecting with my inner Goddess, and those Goddesses, spiritual and embodied, around me. Painful. But necessary.

I add a postscript here to take into account the wise words by Marya at African Alchemy – isn’t it amazing how someone usually says what you’re thinking, but in such an elegant way it makes twice as much sense? Boundaries. Seshat and I have been discussing boundaries and I have work by her to catch up on at Star of Seshat regarding this very topic. If only I had set my priorities at formulating effective boundaries, I feel that the latest experience in my trial by fire could not have happened. Older, wiser, scorched round the edges and a rueful learner I am!

Like a Cat

I’m sitting here feeling the strangest sensation, the equivalent of a cat unsheathing its claws, that rubbery, delicious stretching and flexing of a rusty muscle working again after a long furlough.

My mind is waking up. Outside all the clamour and jabber and jangling the last three months have roused in me, I’ve had flashes of intuition, ghosts of ideas, brief flashes of inspiration, and just never got up the impetus to write effectively. Like Andy at Somerset Pagan I have felt as though I should write; but chose not to, partly from inertia and partly from cussed bloody-mindedness. And despite all this, visitors to my blog have not deserted me, despite seeing I didn’t have anything to say; we hit 19,000 this morning and I thank the Goddess, plus I’m totally amazed. Where did all these people come from?!

Yule looms and I am reminded that Seshat and I began our journey together at this time last year. We are working together this Yule too – and will be celebrating our difference, our strength, our togetherness once again. The year always begins and ends here for me.

Now the Sparkly Season is upon us and things have loosened off; there’s room to breathe and to look around. I’m organised; I know what I’ve got to do and by when. Work is in hand, family are in hand; my home is three quarters organised and a paragon of whimsical efficiency and comfort. I am looking forward to Yule and to receiving guests and friends for wassail and cheer. I am going to give myself a break and enjoy the next few weeks without let or hindrance. This is my reward for dangers faced and a breathing space to prepare for whatever is to come.

All Shall Be Made New

Here I am again, myself and yet not myself; grown different and stronger and freer all at once!

Some background seems sensible, or I’ll be talking gibberish; the upheaval and changes in my personal life, while traumatic, have been enormously fruitful and continue to be so. I feel reborn. It isn’t so much a shucking off of old associations and ties but a reassessment of what it is that I want out of my life, the only one I have.

When you bump along without demanding control of your life and you allow the winds and tides to drive you, you are relinquishing the better part of the thing that makes you human; the ability to determine your path and form it in the image you create. This is a form of alchemy, small ‘a’; you imagine the result and then, eyes closed, you mould the method and release it to do its work. We do this every day, all day; managing and planning and making things happen.

I’ve been silent, recently, because I’ve been listening; listening as though my life depended upon it, which I sincerely believe it might actually do. The life I want, at any rate. I’ve been learning the tune and committing the words to memory. I do not want to simply live; I want to live forever. Ambitious, no? I’m not talking about immortality, in the spiritual sense; I’m talking about the superlative life, the life filled with sparkle and dash and vivid memory, not one moment wasted henceforth. And the beauty of it is that the raw materials are free and all that is required from me is will and a sound plan.

Between me listening to me, I’ve been listening to others; particuarly my lovely Seshat and her new joint venture, The Adversarial Path. Seshat has found a new and compelling direction for her life, and again she and I echo each other in this; what I’m enjoying is the difference between our processes and the diversity of the results. She has made herself new, as have I. She has a new path, full of danger and wonders; I have reaffirmed my commitment to the old path, with a will to go back to first principles once again and work hard on my spiritual and religious life. In this we support each other, reveling in our difference, discussing, disputing but always respecting. I’ll be visiting her and Alexander there at the AP, to read and learn and understand, the better to discuss and question and grow. 

For me this is the essence of the Pagan way; joy in difference, in understanding, in growth despite pain. I often find that turmoil in my life causes me to think afresh and with renewed clarity about my spirituality and my beliefs. It makes you meet your gods again, as if for the first time. It reminds you of the first time you met them. 

Yule is upon us; the start of the celebrations of the year in my particular calendar. It is also the anniversary of Seshat and I beginning our year and a day… and look at where we’ve come to.