Imbolc

Winter is long, energy is short.  And so are my blogs.  Inspired by a deep dive into story and source facilitated by Tanya Taylor Rubenstein’s Story Archaeology, let’s see what happens between now and the equinox...    

My place right now is the hearth in my house.  I’m not sure the land around my house supports me--winters here are deadly like nothing I’ve known before.  But the hearth stands in for all the volcanoes and minerals I keep dreaming about.  Especially now--winter, Imbolc, pandemic, retrograde.  This hearth is massive, timeless.  I always say goodnight to my glowing red fire demon before bed.  Last night was even better with the Imbolc candles and wishes dripping wax onto the stones.  Brigid and Calcifer, keeping me company through this ridiculously dark winter, dark passage we entered with trepidation back in October, fearing the light would lose in November, watching for it’s return in December.  It did come back, in increments too small to see.  But oh, my fires, we’re halfway there now.  Keep digging, burning, smoldering.  Magic comes off this hearth in waves.  Spells go right in this house.  The stones are connected to a deeper earth, a deeper spirit.  It’s not just the people and the routes I walk every day.  These are old, old mountains.  Somebody cut out pieces of their heart to build this place for fire.  Food and fuel come from these rocks that are the veins of the earth.  Blood of stone, mineral flows through time.  Galaxies float on the ceiling every night.  I’m suspended in time even as my body panics over impending old age and obsoletion.  “I’m not doing enough!” But the hearth says, “You are enough just by existing and not existing.  Dying is nothing to be ashamed of.”  I tether myself to the heat source, this light source, this dream source.  And in the spring I will find ways to let go and move away, a creature of sunlight and air once more.