Dreamscapes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have always been aware of magic. A strange, eclectic upbringing allowed me to grow without religious prejudice in a world where Bast and barguests were as possible as any other cat or dog and where Jehovah, Allah and the Buddha were held in equal respect.

I was taught to love the Earth in all her beauty and mystery, through folk tales and science in equal proportion. There was nothing of glamour attached to magic. It was simply there. Always and everywhere.

So what happened on Thursday...just happened...

I work in field sales and one of the privileges of that job is to organise one’s own workload. So, as Thursday dawned windy, but gloriously sunny, I decided to visit customers in the Cotswolds and treat my city–sated soul to the beauty of thatched cottages and rolling English hills. For some reason, I threw a pair of jeans and my painting easel in the car along with the files, which I’ve never done before.

I had a good day with customers and my final visit took me within a stone’s throw of the Rollright Stones, a stone circle set in a ring of trees on top of a hill. I went there once before with a friend and had shown him how to dowse with copper rods. This was the first time I’d been on my own and, being midweek, I had the site almost to myself.

I parked in the lane and stripped off my business suit, feeling that as I did so, I was stripping away the world’s perception of my persona. Donning jeans and T-shirt brought me back to simplicity devoid of pretension or pretence.

Leaving the mobile phone behind I stepped away from the humdrum need to make survival money and felt I crossed more than one threshold as I walked between the gateposts.

The circle, though weathered, is almost complete. The stones stand like broken teeth around a green lawn, not manicured, but scattered with daisies like little bright stars lifting their faces to the Light. The path enters the circle at the wrong place. A stone there has fallen, leaving a natural entrance, but it was never the original portal. Nevertheless, I enter the circle and as there is no-one around to notice, I bow to the Light and enter barefoot, treading deosil around the perimeter.

The sand is hot underfoot, the circle is sheltered from the wind by a horseshoe of trees, but here and there little dust devils dance. At the four quarters flowers have been left as offerings, sweet williams, with their heady scent and blood red petals, stark against the white and ochre of the lichen covered stones. Last night was the summer solstice and I have heard that this ring is still used by devotees of the Craft. I know that I will find the same flowers at the King Stone, a single monolith, as well as at the fallen burial chamber called the Whispering Knights, which form a triangle with the original entrance to the circle.

Circles and triangles take my mind to the Tree of Life with its great inrush of Cosmic Force and I wonder what the ancients were doing when they built this Temple of Light.

I walk to the centre of the lawn and sit, cross legged, in the circle. I am no longer alone; four men are also seated on the grass, talking quietly. We are isolated here and perhaps I should be careful. Yet I know there is no threat and a deep serenity enfolds me. One of the men stands to leave and I hear the words “Blessed be” repeated softly.

The sky above is a clear blue, scattered with clouds chasing each other in the wind. There is no road noise here; the only sounds are the birds and the rustling of leaves, overlaid by the muted conversation of the men. I close my eyes and begin the fourfold breathing as I have been taught. My body relaxes and I sink into the landscape.

In my mind I see the circle as a great chalice. It is empty save for its memories, yet I feel it was meant to be full of Light, a beacon for the soul. An empty vessel fulfils no purpose. The chalice is a vessel which gives form to that with which it is filled.

From the centre of the circle I renew my pledge of service. Around me I feel the wind spiralling into a great silver vortex, carrying me skywards on the wings of faith, yet the Earth is steady and solid beneath me and the grass tickles my feet in the slight breeze. Reality contradicts itself and I let it carry me with it, humbled and awed.

The vortex climbs through the azure haze, upwards, outwards, expanding and encompassing, the rhythm a great heartbeat, a counterpoint to my own, carrying reflected Light back to the heavens. The spiralling slows, stops climbing and rests, perfectly balanced on the point of the vortex in the circle where I sit. Then I am falling, in decreasing circles as it winds down and down, until the wind rushes through the Earth, in a subterranean vortex of white fire, funnelled from on high. The afternoon sun is warm on my upturned face as I swirl ever faster in the rushing fire. I can feel a pressure mounting. Suddenly, like a great star bursting, the fire spreads through the stones and out across the landscape. I can see it from my vantage point among the stars, a vast net of pure white force, veins of lambent silver spreading out across the land, carrying Light like blood.

One of the men laughs softly and that seems to fit. Joy is allowed. I open my eyes and smile, a smile shared by the men. Inside I feel different, a golden serenity which carries me home to my hearth.

Later, leafing through a book while I wait to kidnap the bathroom from my hoard of teenagers, I read the author’s words on how to honour the ancient places and smile. Perhaps those who work still at Rollright have kept it alive. It is I who was honoured today. Call it imagination or daydream if you will. I only know how it has made me feel and that today was a day of unforgettable beauty.

 

 

The Bible tells us to become as a little child. Whether or not we start from a Christian viewpoint, this is good advice. Children see the world as an uncomplicated place in many ways. Things have a simple clarity that we forget as the years fold in around us, clouding our eyes with common sense and pragmatism, sealing our sense of adventure within the hide-bound necessities of conformity and convention.

A child will see no reason why fairies cannot be encountered at the bottom of the garden. Of course broomsticks can fly as far as the imagination, and Santa Claus exists. To a child, these things are not only possible, they are real. And because they are believed in, the results of that belief are also real. Children have ‘imaginary’ playmates.. one only has to listen to ( or remember!) their games and conversations to realise that the interaction is just as complete as with another child. Being good is a prerequisite for a visit from Santa, and conscience buds and blooms in anticipation of Christmas morning.

The simple acceptance that anything is possible in the great, wide world makes it so. The wonder of eyes seeing life fresh and new is magical, and nothing is impossible. There is a natural magic in their observation of life, from the lazy contemplation of a caterpillar on a hot summer day, to the battles of the sky gods and their cloud dragons in a thunder storm.

Children carry a logic all their own. Battle lines were drawn in defence of my eldest son’s logic when, as a very young schoolboy, he decided to write about God as ‘She’. He had decided that as God made people, cared for them, looked after things, then logically, God was a ‘she’, as that is what women do. School was horrified and called me in. I did speak to my son about it. Not to correct, but to understand. School was even more dumbfounded by the progression of his logic as he decided that God must be a ‘He-She’.

Later, my younger son and his friends asked my opinion on a discussion that they were having, wondering if we were just a dream in the mind of God. Or were we just some insignificant activity on the surface of a single particle of some great being.

Children have no prejudice, until we, the guilty adults, teach them that there are differences to be abhorred or ridiculed. One living creature is much the same as another to a small child. A dog or cat is as close a friend as the child next door. One young lady of my acquaintance decided she was going to be a mother when she grew up and have lots of puppies of her own.

Another could not sing as she had a poorly finger because Mummy had made her eat cabbage. I never understood that particular train of thought, but she was perfectly serious as she told me.
Childhood is not always an easy time. Many children suffer horribly though poverty, neglect or abuse, yet there is still that capacity for wonder, for acceptance, for trust in the natural world and the stuff of dreams, even when they have lost faith in people.

Someone said that culture is what is left if one strips away all one has learned. Perhaps inner childhood is what we could find if we could strip away all we think we ought to have learned, and open our eyes fresh on the world and on ourselves.

 

 

 

The early death of my husband and friend since childhood had devastated our little family. We had fought cancer together for years, with laughter and water pistols and general silliness. I had lain wakeful beside him in the night just cherishing the sound of his breathing, and touched his skin every morning before opening my eyes, to make sure he was still there. Every day was precious. Our life was organised to minimise the impact of the disease on our children. He hid the pain, stubbornly clung to normality and did the hardest thing of all - he lived for us.

Our eldest son was at the rebellious, love-hate stage, symptomatic of his 15 years. Our youngest worshipped his father and we all found common ground in laughter and a love of vintage aircraft. When the end came, suddenly and when least expected, it cut the ground from under all our feet. My days had been regulated by need and I felt lost. My eldest boy was devastated and blamed himself for the less than perfect relationship he had shared with his father towards the end. My youngest was only 12 and felt his heart was broken. He sank further and further into depression until I found him one day, with a carving knife pointed at his chest, sobbing uncontrollably.

I took him to the doctors to try and get him some help.

After leaving the surgery, my son called at the local shop. I waited outside, and in the window was a small notice:
“Free to good home, excitable collie cross. 10 months old.”
The ad said it all. This was someone’s unwanted problem. We had long since decided that although we would love a dog, they were a major responsibility and an expense I could ill afford. So there was no way I was going to take the phone number.

Rummaging in my bag, I found a pen and a scrap of paper and scrawled down the number.
My son and I went home. He had school later and even if I made that call, it certainly wouldn’t be while he was still with me.
“Yes, I still have her,” said the voice two minutes later.
Quite obviously I would have to go alone, or there would be no way of saying ‘no’.

We knocked on the door and a streak of brindled fur launched itself at my son. The house was appallingly dirty and I saw in horror the muddy paw prints that reached four feet up the French windows where the dog had tried to get in. There was excrement trodden into the floor boards, filth and rubbish everywhere and the place was unpleasant.

The offending animal, the size and shape of a greyhound but with as much flesh as a starved whippet, was greeting my son by the simple expedient of sitting on his chest, wagging a disreputable tail and barking in a lunatic manner. My son had the glazed look one sees on Christmas morning, he was ecstatic.

Molly, for such was her name, came home with us. In the driver’s seat of my car, with her head out of the window, grinning broadly.

It took months to drag her through the separation anxieties. Two carpets, a pair of curtains, the contents of the laundry basket and several bottles of antiseptic went into her rehabilitation. I still have the scars on my forearms where she clung in her desperation not to be left alone. In the end, she graduated to my son’s bedroom and curled up at his feet. We never cured the lunacy, but it became more user-friendly and cost less in furnishings. We even got her house trained.

Good food, plenty of patience and loving and lots of walks from the boys soon had Molly strutting around like a queen. She had been beaten at some stage and was a very scared dog at first. A bath had disposed of the dirt and the fleas and her wonderful blue merle markings gleamed and rippled over her muscles as she grew strong and healthy. It was a joy to watch.

As she healed, so did my boys. Time is itself a great healer and wounds close whether we will or no. But this wound was still raw and aching. Yet, Molly made them smile. She made them laugh and run. She snuggled close and listened to them when they poured out their hearts. She read their moods, and mine, and when the tears came, would lean quietly against a knee till the storm subsided.

Molly never quite forgot her insecurities and we daily found bones, treats and toys carefully stored for later, as an insurance against starvation. Usually under a pillow or buried beneath the sofa cushions. She hated to be left alone and gradually I came to the conclusion that a puppy for her to mother might help. Not a sensible move, said my common sense. One is enough, and this one more than most!.

Molly, saving it for later..

Curiously, when what was left of the local paper came through the door (Molly objected to the intrusion), there was an advert for collie/ setter cross pups, which took my eye as it stated that both parents were pedigree dogs and the mating was ‘Mum’s choice, not ours.’ I had grown up in a household full of the madness of red setters, so I called the number. The pups were just four weeks old and Mum was struggling. However, the owner wanted £160 each for the pups. I couldn’t afford that, and regretfully said so. For some reason, the lady asked why I wanted one, so I explained.

“Come and see them anyway. I lost my daughter recently.”

I was ushered into a spotless room, where Mum was curled, exhausted, in front of the fire. A fat, black and white ball of fur waddled over and sniffed my feet. She looked up, eyeing me with wisdom beyond her short lifespan and I fell in love. She rolled on her back, all four legs flopping, and demanded to have her fat little belly rubbed. I was hooked.

The following week Mum gave in and couldn’t care for them. My youngest son came with me to collect the puppy, which I had been given as a gift with love and tears by the owner. His brother stayed home and looked after Molly. Or she looked after him!

Sitting beside me in the car, beaming in wonder at the small scrap of fur in his arms, my son said,
“She’s like an echo of love.”
Holding back the tears, much as I am as I write, I had to agree, and so we named her.

Being so young, I put her in a tall box in my room overnight, so she wouldn’t be alone. I woke in the early hours to find her snuggled behind my head with her face on my shoulder, next to mine. Every night I increased security on the box. Every night I woke to her snoring in my ear. She won that battle. Even though, when fully grown and, standing on her hind legs she was as tall as I, that was her place. If I lay on the sofa, she curled in behind my knees with her head on my thigh. If I sat in an armchair, Echo would sprawl across the back with her head on my shoulder.

I admit, she was not an obedient animal, and discipline was a matter of choice as far as she was concerned. She was stubborn, the laziest thing in nature and the most laid back. And I loved her.

She and Molly ruled the house between them. Molly never calmed down and Echo was her partner in crime. The pair worked as a team when they were up to something. One would distract your attention, while the other helped themselves to any unattended dinner plates in the kitchen. Or Molly would suck in her cheeks and look thin and soulful while Echo just watched and waited, knowing that treats always came in pairs. They would tear round the room at breakneck speed, weaving in and out of the furniture, never touching it. Echo’s tail was a barometer for her mood, a great, black, feathered flag that could sweep the entire contents of a coffee table to the floor with a single swipe. She laughed a lot, my Echo, my laughing girl. I got rid of the coffee table.

Bath time was always fun. Moll would obligingly stand and turn as required, as docile as a lamb, but as soon as the water stopped would shoot out of the bathroom like a cork from a champagne bottle, making strange noises and rolling on anything absorbent. Echo would put her front paws in the bath and then look at her rear end in disgust. It was far too much effort to lift those legs over the bath.. That was my job. Her curly hair and classic black and white collie markings disappeared under the weight of water and the lovely setter shape became apparent as she stared accusingly at the perpetrator of this torture.

Not that either of them disliked water! Take them to the local lake and they became water hounds. They swam like fishes and played games of their own devising. Whoever reached the bank first would run up and down, mock fighting the other to stop them getting out. Then the pair would chase, side by side, around the fields to dry out.

Some nights I would miss Echo, and would follow the snoring to my son’s room where she and Molly would be snuggled tightly to his sides, all three in the single bed, with my son having the least space. Next morning he would tell me of his nightmares. They had known, my girls. They always knew. Those two beautiful girls healed my sons and made them learn to laugh again. In turn, they helped Molly to heal and to learn to trust in love and in life.

I learned a lot about joy from Molly and Echo. I learned to love and respect them both as wonderful and loving creatures and I thank all the gods for sending them into my life. In caring for the damaged Molly, my son learned to put aside his grief and live again. Then, when he was ready, it was Molly that helped him grieve. My eldest son laid aside the burden of guilt he had imposed on himself and cried into Molly’s fur. My laughing girl, my Echo, taught me that my life was not over when I lost my husband and taught me how to love again.

Sadly, my girls are gone now. My personal circumstances changed dramatically and on one never to be forgiven day, when I no longer had a choice, and could no longer give them the loving, happy home and the care they deserved, I took them to the dog’s home at Windsor for re-homing. We stopped near the river for a last run together, a last swim, a last shared moment of joy and laughter. A last cuddle.

The staff at the centre could see how it hurt and were as wonderful as anyone could be in those circumstances. They promised to try and re-home them together. They even said I could come back and get my girls if I could change my circumstances before they were re-homed. I will never forget the half hour sitting on the floor of the office hugging my girls goodbye.

It broke my heart to leave my girls. I don't know how I made the drive home through the tears. I don’t even have a decent photo of them, as my hands were shaking too much that last morning. I miss their lunacy and their laughter every day. I never dared to write to Windsor for news of them, afraid of what I might hear. Now I no longer have the reference numbers to trace them. Even now, nearly two years on, as I write the tears make it difficult to see. But I remember and at last I can write this in tribute to the love they both gave and the joy they brought into our lives. Whoever gave my girls a home has my eternal gratitude.

When a dog is re-homed, people must wonder about the stories behind them. I have heard people ask why anyone would get a lovely dog and then abandon it for re-homing. Sometimes we have no choice. I owe my girls so much and I love them still. Losing them was as much a bereavement as losing my husband, and in many ways, harder to bear as it should not have had to happen. I made the only choice I could and will never forgive myself for it, though it was done with love and with their happiness and security in mind. They taught me so much, my two girls. Most importantly, they showed me that logic and common sense are not always enough. Sometimes we need to just listen to our hearts .