What happens when we die

 

The stark beauty of the new saltmarsh on the Otter estuary in East Devon. Ellie and I walked here at the beginning of the month

I read on Instagram this morning that scientists have now discovered that energy leaves the body (of both humans and animals) when we die. Tibetan monks comment, ‘You need science to tell you what silence already knows?’ 
 
I agree with the monks. It's our own experience that matters. Science is a clumsy tool. As my little book of Chinese wisdom says, 'Why light a candle to see the sun?'
 
When our first dog Brindle died (and Frog, Brindle and I were out in the garden with the vet), I saw Brindle's energy fly from her body like a puff of smoke and zoom northwards over our shed. It was a discrete entity and it was in a hurry. I presumed it was her soul. Brindle had nearly died a year before and I’d prayed for her to stay alive because I wasn’t in a position to deal with her death at the time. She’d waited for me, even though she’d wanted to go. I write about this, and more, in a previous post.
 
I feel annoyed when I read about things like the above because I don’t talk about most of what I experience because people mock. They need science to ‘prove’ things. Then the world catches up with me and I wish I’d had the courage to speak sooner. 
 
This blog is one of the few places where I do speak out, and my time here now without either parents or Frog is for me to learn to be my whole self without shame or doubt (not that Frog ever caused me to feel either of those, but my upbringing had). That’s something else I ‘know’, and I knew it as soon as Frog died.
 
I didn’t see Frog's soul go. It vanished in a second, as we stood together halfway up a hill admiring the view and he dropped to the ground with a cry of surprise.
 
Then the emergency services arrived - by helicopter, two ambulances and a car - and spent about an hour trying to revive him at the side of the road. Then they took him to hospital and tried some more with bigger machines.

When they stopped trying and pronounced him dead, I was almost relieved as the resuscitation attempts were gruesome. I was also unsurprised. And that’s something else I’ve never admitted before. He wanted to go. It was his time to go. He was removing himself for the moment so that I could learn without pressure. (My grief had yet to kick in.)

And none of that is what I intended to write in this post. I intended to tell you about another moving film from the Right to Roam campaigners. In September I directed you to a film about their mass trespass swim at Kinder Reservoir. This new film is about looking after a neglected river in East London and about what they call ‘wild service’. And I hope to tell you more about that when I know more myself.

Sunset last week as I walked home with Ellie

PS I realised after I uploaded this post that today is the winter solstice - the shortest day. How appropriate then to be talking about death - and resurrection perhaps. But that's another story.

Meditation and Mindfulness

In a couple of months I’m going on retreat to Sharpham House in South Devon where I’m hoping to learn meditation and mindfulness, geared towards those who feel burnt out. Well, I’m certainly that. It’s now nearly four years since Frog died and discovering how to function without him has been non-stop on every level. As my sister said, I need a reset (not to mention a rest).

As you might have picked up if you’ve been reading this blog, it’s the ‘spiritual’ side of life that’s got me through so far. I don’t like the word spiritual as it sounds pretentious, but I don’t know how else to describe that part of me in a simple way. I also have trouble describing the quiet times I take while out walking the dog since I don’t actually meditate in an official way during them as I’ve never been taught how to do it properly. Hopefully the retreat will help with that.

The entire dog-walking period is a sort of meditation however, as even if my brain is whirring throughout I always feel better afterwards, and often the whirring is interrupted and I’m stopped short by the beauty around me. Which is astonishing, given that I’ve lived in my current house for 45 years and been walking the surroundings for most of that time. Every day, it seems, there’s something new to see. 

And here are some recent photographs of some of those moments.

On a misty murky early morning at the beginning of the month, as I wondered what point there was in me still being alive, I almost missed these two jewels under my feet. I’m so grateful I didn’t step on them.

Feather

Toadstool

Here is a corner I found recently for one of my quiet times. I’d never sat here before and I couldn’t understand why not. I’m under my favourite sort of tree, an oak (as you can see from the fallen leaves), there are no houses staring at me, I'm hidden by trees and bushes, I can see to the horizon, and there’s some wildness around in overgrown hedges. All the criteria I unconsciously look for. 

The perfect spot for a quiet sit-down. Ellie obviously likes it too.

I encountered this lovely and perfectly framed view for the first time as I walked home along a lane I use almost every day. My house is the furthest white blob in the middle of the picture.

 

A new view of my house (the furthest white blob in the middle)

Here is another route I’ve walked countless times. On the day of the photograph, in spite of mud and puddles, the approach of winter, indifferent weather and stupid worries that were wearing me out, I looked ahead and my heart was lifted.

Mud, puddles and Ellie

The Cosmic Tarot

Because I’m embarrassed to be talking about myself so much in this blog, I thought that this time I’d share with you a tarot reading I did two weeks ago. Then you might at least find some interest in that esoteric art, even if not my internal ramblings.

I first learnt about tarot reading 27 years ago from a compelling woman who might or might not have been psychic. But you certainly believed everything she said, and she took me under her wing. She made the cards come alive for me in a way that all the learned books (by men) that I’d read hadn’t.

I do believe that magic sometimes happens in tarot-reading – when a certain card brings me out in goosepimples or strange coincidences appear in the fall of the cards – but on the whole I look at it as simply a case of noting the effect that the archetypal images have on me and weaving a story from them. We all know more about each other and ourselves than we realise. We just have to tap into that knowledge.

Sometimes I read for other people but I feel grossly under-qualified to do so and find it a huge responsibility. It is however a good way of opening up subjects for discussion. When reading for myself the results are variable. Sometimes the cards are meaningless, sometimes they’re only wish-fulfilment, and just occasionally they’re extraordinary.

This was one of those times.

The reading

My intention and the random card

I held the cards in my hand and pondered my intention for the reading. I wanted hope, I decided and clarity about something that had been plaguing me for several months. Then as I shuffled the pack this card fell out, and Cheryl, my teacher, always said that you should pay attention to these random cards.

 

It’s a lovely one, isn’t it. At XIX (19) it’s near the end of the cycle of the Major Arcana, the 22 cards that deal with our soul’s journey. I took it to be a good omen because it means happiness, being reborn, seeing the world with the freshness and joy of a child. It doesn’t mean that you’ve finally got the answers to life, the universe and everything. It just means that you’re on the right track at the moment.

Thank god for that, I thought.

The spread

Then I laid the cards out in my favourite ‘spread’ (arrangement) – five cards, with the first two representing the past, the third and centre card the here and now and the final two the future near or far (timing is not a forte of tarot reading, any more than it is of weather forecasting). You can use any spread you like so long as you’re clear in your mind as to what the positions mean.

 

Cards 1 and 2

These were the first two cards.

Oh dear, oh dear. I didn’t have any secrets, did I, from the powers that be (the powers that control the fall of the cards).

‘Anonymous’ commented on my previous post that it must be difficult for me to imagine a new life when I was happy with the old one. Well, sort of. Frog and I knew we wanted to be together but we both had ‘issues’ and they clashed, and for years we had terrible fights. By the time he died we’d reached stalemate and I knew his death was my chance to finally sort myself out – in my own time, in my own way, however messy the process.

So that’s what I’ve been doing for the last three and a half years – without much reward I was beginning to think. Why didn’t I look for a close male companion, or CMC as I put it in my journal? (Not husband. One was enough. You can only be married once.) Having a CMC might alleviate my grief for Frog and enable me to deal further with my issues. How nice it would be to fall in love again, I thought. I deserved it. Surely it was time.

But it wasn’t happening and I was getting more and more stressed about the whole thing.

And wasn’t this just what the cards were saying? Neither of the couples is actually together. Neither is kissing. There’s a gap between them. There’s indecision, lack of confidence. Well, that’s how they appeared to me anyway.

I was going down a blind alley, the cards said, and I knew they were right.

Card 3

I laid out card number three, the one concerned with the here and now.

How interesting that the card showed a female person. She had to be me, looking rather severe.

The 56 Minor Arcana, like ordinary playing cards, come in four suits with four court cards in each suit – princess, queen, prince, king. The suit of Swords, as here, represents the mind – the intellectual side of life, thoughts.

I was brought up to rely on the mind but it wasn’t working for me any more, if it ever had. It was my soul that had got me through the years since Frog’s death but my mind kept scoffing. It was horrible. It was my mind that had come up with this crazy idea about a CMC and worn me out with it.

My mind needed to know its place, said the card. We also had body, emotions and spirit (as in the other three tarot suits – and according to Jung). I needed to remember that I was only a princess and not yet a queen. I didn’t know everything. How comforting that was. 

Card 4

This was card number four, from the suit of Pentacles, representing the body and the physical world – money, houses and security – and this card showed lots of activity in that area.

How apt, I thought. That was also me over the last few years: clearing Frog’s mountains of stuff, having work done to the house in case I wanted to downsize, taking on the myriad practical jobs that Frog did, getting used to the scariness of managing alone, trying to stay healthy while staggering between sleepless nights.

That activity wasn’t finished yet, said the card. There was still more to do. That’s what I needed to focus on – not romantic dreams.

OK, I could cope with that. It was quite a relief, actually.

Card 5

This was the final card.

Put simply, this beautiful card means hope, which was extraordinary given that hope was exactly what I’d asked for before doing the reading. It means following your star. It means that you are a star. At number 17 in the Major Arcana it’s near the end of the spiritual cycle, like The Sun, and another celestial body.

The card told me to write, as that is where I feel most me, where I touch my star.

It gave me permission to believe in a higher (celestial) world.

It answered everything, as did the whole spread.

So there was a pattern. We are connected. All is well.

Note
Tarot probably dates back to medieval times but the best-known traditional pack is the Rider-Waite one of 1909. Modern tarot packs, and there are many of them, are easier to read because they rely less on symbols and more on pictures. I use the Cosmic Tarot (of 1988) because that was the one Cheryl used. Thanks to the artist Norbert Lősche and the publisher (of my edition) F X Schmid. There are other later publishers.

Reading, writing and being a zero-dimensional, non-existent point, floating in space

Since Frog died I’ve only been able to read light novels with happy endings, and I discovered in the library an author called Sarah Morgan who fitted exactly those criteria.

I’ve now read almost every single one of her books at least once, if not twice, if not three times, including the romances she wrote at the beginning of her career (what me, a one-time serious book editor, reading romances? Whatever next?) so, when I saw her latest book A Secret Escape on offer in Sainsbury’s recently, I snapped it up.

At the same time I saw Here One Moment by Australian writer, Liane Moriarty. I haven’t been able to read Liane for the last few years because she’s too worldly and cynical. You can never have too many books piled on the bedside table however, and it could be that I was stronger now, so I bought that one too.

 

I spent the first three years after Frog died clearing his Stuff from driveway, garage, shed and music room not to mention the rest of the house. He was a bit of a hoarder. Then I turned my attention to the structure of the place, doing essential repairs and improvements just in case I was going to move.

This month at last I’m free. I’m without clutter, builders, visits and visitors. It was deliberate. I wanted the rest. I wanted to get back to myself. But yesterday morning I wrote in my journal (my post-Frog record of thoughts and feelings, my best friend, my ladder of recovery), ‘It’s all a bit meaningless without Frog. He was my purpose and my sounding-board. He saw me, so I was me.’

 And I thought of a passage in Here One Moment, which I’m just about managing to read. It's not uplifting me, like Sarah’s books do, but I’m intrigued by the subject matter – psychic prediction – and I’ve no idea how it’s going to end.

In the passage, a mathematician is describing a letter she wrote to her fiancé when he was fighting in Vietnam (no, I didn’t know either that Australians were drafted for that war). She is remembering a lesson from school.

    “… a point is ‘zero-dimensional’, meaning it doesn’t actually exist. But once you have two points – two non-existent points – you can fill the space in between with lots and lots of points, and you get a line, which has length, so it’s now one dimension, which you could argue means it does now exist.

    … I told Jack that when I was with him, I felt like I was close to understanding what I had nearly understood that day.

   I told him I was a zero-dimensional, non-existent point, floating in space, until I met him."

When I first read that, I cried. As I copy it for you, I'm crying again.

 Thank you for reading this blog and being that other point at this moment.

 Maybe writing is an answer.

The Greenfinch

Greenfinches used to flock to our bird table, especially when we put out sunflower seeds. Then, about twenty years ago, they vanished. They had apparently fallen prey to the parasitic disease Trichomonosis which they were thought to have caught from pigeons, and their numbers had crashed by 60 per cent. I added them to my list of birds I no longer see, like swallows, barn owls, thrushes and pied wagtails.

At the end of March I was staying with my brother D at his farm in West Sussex, most of which he is now leaving to nature. The birds were in full spring throat and in among the dizzy-making tangle of sounds I caught something new - an insistent but gentle chirring noise. I didn’t know what it was and neither did D – who is an expert on birds – but Merlin, the trusty smartphone app which identifies birdsong, told us it belonged to a greenfinch.

I started to hear the noise everywhere, in the garden at home, on my long rambles every day with Ellie (who is now 15 and not showing much sign of slowing up). The greenfinch became my bird of this glorious spring, my bird of the year.

If you’ve read previous posts, you might remember how important affirmations are to me, particularly since my husband Frog died, three and a half years ago. I recite them to myself every day and hope that one day they will stick. Some I make up myself, some come from that inspiring book You Can Heal Your Life by Louise Hay, 

and one – the queen of them all – comes from a medieval woman mystic whose name I’ve forgotten.

A few days ago I was dozing in the garden and the greenfinch was chirring as usual, and the sound was so beautiful and loving and warm that my half-asleep brain connected it with that queen affirmation. The greenfinch was chirring ‘All is well’. He was telling me that he and his species had come back from the brink, and so could I.

Crab-apple blossom (I think) in a hedgerow a few weeks ago

A winter's walk by the sea

I’ve been getting in a terrible tizz about my future – to move or not to move, whether it’s OK to sell some of Frog’s stuff (do I want to keep it as a memento or is it better to move on?), how long will it be before I’m too old to manage on my own and what will I do then, ?

So yesterday, the dog and I took off for a walk by the sea.

During the walk I met a lovely woman and we had a long talk that started with our dogs - what else? -  and went on to range from reincarnation to quantum mechanics, stopping off on the way at Tolkien and Philip Pullman. As Bilbo Baggins used to say, you never know what's going to happen when you step outside your front door.

The weather was perfect – bright but not too sunny, a light wind, moderate temperatures – and there weren’t many other people about. All my worries blew away and I wanted to keep going all day but I realised that I’d come out without any money and no map and had left my water bottle in the car. 

So after a couple of hours I took the sensible option and walked back to the car along a filthy farm track, my feet squelching in a mixture of animal excrement and mud. I was glad of my hefty boots and knee-high waterproof socks.

Next time, I'll go better prepared.

Probably.

It's hard when the way ahead is so unclear.

All will be well

I’ve mentioned before my guru Louise Hay and her book You Can Heal Your Life.

 

I’ve also mentioned my disinclination at the moment to get out of bed in the morning and face the world, and the bad back and leg that have crippled me since November.

Last night when I couldn’t sleep yet again because of the pain in my right calf, which paracetamol hadn’t touched, I decided to explore with the help of my beloved Notebook what was going on.

According to Louise, pain in the lower leg is caused by fear of the future and not wanting to move on. The affirmation (to counteract that) is:

I move forward with confidence and joy, knowing that all will be well in my future.

I said this to myself over and over and found myself sobbing so I knew she was right.

I’ve been through this process again and again recently and I keep forgetting, and falling into old ways, and believing what everyone else says instead of what I say deep inside me. For instance, out of fear I’ve been to see a physiotherapist, which is what my doctor recommended for my back and leg, even though I don't normally do conventional medicine, and all it’s done is make me feel worse. 

One day, I might manage to hold on to me.

And, of course, as I might also have said before, that is what this time since Frog’s death is all about. I have the idea that moving on will take me away from him, but actually it will take me towards him. 

Even though Frog and I had the deepest of connections, I couldn’t be myself when he was here because I was too preoccupied with being a good wife, with being what I thought he wanted. He removed himself in order to help me and now, in order to rejoin him, I have to face the world without him and learn to be me. It’s bloody terrifying.

Wish me luck.

And in case none of that makes sense, which is more than likely, here are some pictures from the last week or two. Isn’t the world beautiful? Why on earth should I fear it?

Floods

Shining Cranesbill, a tiny flower named for its shiny leaves (the small roundish ones)

The nearby Weeping Willow, waving its hair-like tresses

My Secret Wood, a fluff of greeny-brown about to burst into life

The buds of Holly flowers, another secret

Dandelions like suns and Dandelions with Speedwell, the colour of the sky. (Spot the dog.)

Wild daffodils

Since Frog died a year and a bit ago, I’ve not watched or listened to The News. (I only followed it when he was alive because he did.) It’s too depressing and I think it’s designed to keep us scared and grateful. Those in charge (at the moment) don’t want us to be happy because then we might start thinking for ourselves and discover that we don’t need them after all.

Recently I’ve found myself less and less inclined to venture out and meet The World. I want to stay in my nice safe house and garden or, even better, cocooned in my duvet. A couple of days ago I realised that this is because I’m frightened. I have this idea of the world and I don’t like it. I’ve lost Frog, my buffer between me and the world. I’m ‘alone and naked in the dark’ as Frodo said on his way to Mordor.

So then I thought, well, this idea I have of  the world is only an idea. Somehow that horrible mainstream view has seeped into to me in spite of my best efforts. So why don’t I change it? Why don’t I start imagining the world as I want it to be? As I really see it?

And I began to put together a different picture of the world. My picture. And it went something like this.
 
 
My world
 -A place of kindness
-A place of meaning
-Somewhere I have a future (even female and at the age of nearly 70)
-Nature (not humans)
-Eternity
-Somewhere I belong and matter and have a place.
 
I might elaborate on those points in the future, but I hope each of them makes enough sense for the moment.
 
None of them accords with the mainstream view or that put across by the media, and you might think I’m deluded or flaky or worse. But what the hell? If I can’t stick my neck out at nearly 70, when can I? If it helps, why not believe?
 

A couple of days ago I was driving to fetch my sister off the train from London. She was coming to stay with me for a few days. I thought I’d left plenty of time but after a long diversion around a new housing estate in the process of being built and the discovery that my shortcut across country was closed (no reason given), I began to feel slightly panicky.
 
I had no proper map, I didn’t want to go miles round to get to the station and I haven’t yet got the hang of the sat nav (which was Frog’s baby). That panic is becoming rather too familiar. It happens every time I have to do something that Frog used to do.
 
Anyway, I headed across country by a different route, with no clear idea of where I was going except a couple of village names, my not unreasonable sense of direction and a compass.
 
According to my new world view, I thought, there would be no need for panic. I would be going this way for a reason. And if I kept my eyes and ears open, I would discover what it was.
 
And then I saw it. A bank of wild daffodils stretching as far as I could see alongside the road.
 
I haven’t seen wild daffodils in Devon since the 1970s, when there used to be meadows of them. They’re different from the cultivated ones you see growing wild - smaller and paler and much more subtle. They’re what Wordsworth saw. And when you see them, you just know they’re special.
 
I stopped in the middle of the lane, hoping some monstrous farm vehicle wouldn’t charge round the corner (as they do) and slam into the back of me, put my hazard flashers on, and took some pictures out of the car window.
 
And here they are. My proof.
 

 
And, yes, I did make it to the station in time. The shortcut proved every bit as good as my usual one. I might take it again.

Talking of Time

Unsurprisingly,* I’ve been thinking a lot recently about Life and Death.

Yesterday, as I sat on the hill, trying to work out what Life and Death were and how to explain the connection between them, I suddenly had the idea that this life – the one made up of physical matter and Time – is like travel, whereas Eternity is our home.

As I’ve said before, I do believe from both direct experience and because it makes so much sense, that we live more than one life. Through our lives we learn and develop our spirit. In between lives we return to where we came from – Eternity. Life therefore is a sort of gap year and Death is simply the journey home.

I liked that.

And talking of Time, on Sunday I went for a walk with my friend C, her dog Darcy (aka Bert) and my dog Ellie. We climbed a path new to me, called Armour Lane because of its connections with the Civil War.

Armour Lane, with C, Darcy/Bert (the small black dog in the distance) and Ellie (the fluffy black-and-white dog

(The distortion on the left of the picture is I think caused by me putting my finger over part of the lens by mistake. Oh dear.)

On the way up we passed Armour Wood, also named after its connection with the Civil War.

Armour Wood

Unfortunately the wood is privately owned and not open to the public so this is all we saw of it

Near the top we paused to look at Parliament Cottage, so named because the Parliamentarians used it as a base - but for how long or how many times, C didn't know.

Parliament Cottage

At the top, there were views all the way to the coast.

The views from the top of Armour Lane

C showed me this sign designating the track a County Road (And, yes, my picture is the right way up. The sign is pointing back down the path.)

County Road sign

What a County Road is, I have yet to find out (Google not being any help) but C says Armour Lane was once a major route, and W G Hoskins (in his classic book The Making of the English Landscape) says that many long-distance paths date back to prehistoric times.

Nor did Google help me with any of my other questions about the area and its past.

It always amazes – and pleases me – that there is still so much to discover about our history and countryside.

*given that Frog, my husband of 44 years, died suddenly of a heart attack last year, aged only 69

August (so far) in pictures

 Scots pine and friend

A view of my Scots pine friend (the tree slightly left of centre at the bottom of the picture, with its thumb and forefinger together) and the hill (right) whose crown is the home of the Scots pine it connects to. (See previous post for more about this connection.)

The hills on the far horizon are probably Dartmoor. Usually I can tell what’s Dartmoor because it’s yellowy-brown, whereas the rest of Devon is green. Now everything is yellowy-brown except the trees, and they’re starting to lose their leaves - through drought I think, not through cold and the waning of the light.

Gleaming gold

I was out early on the morning of this picture and the cut corn (?) was gleaming gold in the low sun.

Ellie and Aeryn

Last week a lovely niece of Frog’s came to stay with her 8-month-old Akita, Aeryn. Aeryn is a delightful dog, affectionate, good-natured and well behaved. Unfortunately Ellie, an old lady of twelve years, took exception to her and snarled whenever she came near. Aeryn couldn’t understand why Ellie didn’t love her as everybody else did and followed Ellie around. Only on walks did Ellie tolerate her, and here they are exploring the gravel banks on a local river. Aeryn (left in the first two pictures and right in the third) is still following Ellie around however.

Moon

The moon a few hours short of being full. To my eye it looked orange-ier than this, but this is what my camera saw.

Roots

I took this picture last Friday, on the hottest day of the year so far. I had taken refuge in the shade of this beech tree, having climbed a steep hill to get there. As I got up to leave, after a good half an hour cooling off, admiring the view, doing my affirmations, crying and talking to Frog and God, I became transfixed by the tree’s roots.

There are three beech trees in a row on this hill and you can just see one of the others in the hot white background. Judging by the roots, the ground was once higher and I often wonder whether the three trees were part of a hedgerow.

As usual in my pictures, something is wonky, but as the trees appear to be leaning at different angles I can’t tell what the vertical line is and I’ve left things as they are. 

Shooting star

 I first published this post earlier in the week but then I took it down because I thought it was so awful. I’ve now decided to publish it anyway, good or bad. It was what I wrote at the time.

I would also like to thank my very old friend B (old in the sense that I’ve known her a long long time), with whom I spoke on the telephone last night for the first time in decades, for expressing an interest in my mad metaphysical ideas and saying that she read and liked the blog. Perhaps I’ll inflict my novel on her next . . .

 

As you might have gathered by now, if you’ve read this blog before*, it’s my metaphysical beliefs and experiences that are getting me through the months since Frog’s death in January and giving me hope for the future. Among these are:

-We live more than one life.

-We meet again those souls that are important to us.

-There is relevance to everything that happens and we can learn from it.

-On a higher plane that we’re not necessarily aware of, we choose everything that happens to us. We’re not victims.

-We create our own future through our imaginations. If we visualise what we want and ask providence for it with total conviction – whatever its downsides – we will get it. As they say, beware of what you ask for!

-The world is made up of matter, energy and meaning. Meaning – sometimes called spirituality - is therefore part of what we are too. We deny it at our peril.

Having said all that, I’m not perfect (sadly) and sometimes the whole edifice crumbles and I’m back in the workaday world, tired, cross and miserable. I’m disconnected. I’m overwhelmed by my hard sceptical self.

Over the weekend I was in that sort of state. None of my prayers was answered. I was lost and alone. In the middle of Sunday night when I couldn’t sleep, I went and sat outside and had a bit of a rant, asking God why s/he had been so quiet lately.

    ‘And I’ve not seen a shooting star for months,’ I complained, shooting stars being something I’ve always seen as messages from God. ‘If only you could send me some sort of proof.’

    I know of course that you can’t ask for proof or chase meaning. They come when they want to, usually when you’re concentrating on something else. So I knew what I was doing was useless. So then I started to cry. I’ve been doing a lot of that over the last few months. In fact, crying is what I do most when I’m alone. I like crying. I know where I am when I cry.

    Cheryl, my tarot teacher, had always said that emotions were the gateway to the soul. They certainly are for me, and unblocking my emotions is part of what I’m learning at the moment.

    Suddenly, to my left, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the streak of a shooting star and in an instant, without me doing anything, and before I’d even thought about what had just happened, I was back. I was me. I was whole. The world was once again alive and beautiful.

As I made my way to bed, full of thanks and relief, I realised not only that God had a sense of humour but that the hard sceptical me was only part of me. She might take over sometimes but that didn’t mean she was right. Surely, I could find a way to deal with her.

To be continued . . .

  

*Hello to my two new followers, soleil and Gail. You are very welcome.

 Notes on the pictures

The cards pictured above come from Cosmic Tarot by Norbert Lösche. This was the pack with which Cheryl taught me how to read tarot cards over twenty years ago. I still use it. Neither of the people on the cards looks like me and there wasn’t a full moon on Sunday night.

I’ve taken the shooting star picture from Google. Thanks to the unnamed copyright owner.