(Whoops! Thought I pressed Post last night!)
The world is alive! There are fluffy, four-day old chicks at the hardware store for the new urban farmers, and down at the creek the birds were making a racket: “I'm saying it’s Spring!" "No, I'm saying it's Spring!!" The lady duck and her fellow weren't in their usual spot, but I watched an Anna's hummingbird cruising the branches of a Douglas fir. Her beak was an inch away as she went down the length of each branch, measuring it's worthiness for nest.
Last night, I almost went to bed without doing my tea ceremony. It's something I learned at witch camp, of course. I sit before my altar and light the beeswax candle in the dragonfly holder for the green God – the God of earth. I light the three red candles for the faces of Venus that I work with: Kali, Brigid and Freya. I reach down and pull up winter’s darkness. I imagine it like a dark tree that starts below my roots and grows through me until it reaches the heavens and holds the white star of Venus over my head.
And then I empty my day, my worries, my gratitude, my monkey-mind-rattling-thoughts into a small white cup of water. I was taught to do this by blowing the thoughts into my cupped hands like I am making a little thought egg (speaking of spring!) and then I crack that egg on the edge of the teacup and empty all that was within me into the water. I was taught to hold the cup up at heart height and pull in earth and sky energy and sort of laser it at the cup and let it heal all that gunk. And then I drink the cup. It’s like magic homeopathy.
I find this to be as good a sleeping aid as two Benadryl and much better than three glasses of red wine.
(For some reason I find myself not wanting to do it. I guess it's like exercise: I never want to start. I'm always happy when I'm in it, and super happy when I'm done.)
But last night I had a wonderful new experience. I had pulled up the dark tree, and was filled with it. And I looked up at the face of Kali on my collage. It's the same face that was on the altar during the ritual last summer that changed me, that gave me the courage to face this darkness. And I swear to you last night as I was looking at her face, she winked at me.
And then the tree inside me changed. It was like a movie of a golden tree unfurling inside me. It started from the roots and grew up the trunk and extended all the way into these beautiful curly branches with red and gold leaves. And in the center of the trunk was an eye.
Sometimes I think my visions sound a little crazy. I am a visual person! So many of my thoughts come to me as movies, beautiful cinematography inside my head. Does that make them less sacred? More? I don't know. I know that worrying that they sound crazy is a bad reason to stop writing.
I did realize today that I'm not writing much about what's happening with my back and my body. Maybe because this is a place where I want to be away from that. It is the focus of my days, in a way that I have never allowed it to before. Always my body came last... my body came after my mission, my cause, my work, my partying. Not now.
I know that I am living in a time of privilege right now. I hope that I am spending it well. I hope that this recovery this allowing of the initiation of my stronger self is the best way to use this incredible blessing.