Wow. What a weekend. I have almost recovered from it.
I got to the site Friday afternoon, after a beautiful drive with my best friend Aianna. Set up my tent. Had a good visit with a new friend Brown Bear. Then the rains came, hurricane force winds, a tornado touched down about 10 miles from the site, my tent capsized with me inside it and I and a lot of my stuff got drenched, I salvaged a lot of my stuff.
Several hours later, the rains left, my Family and friends reconstructed my tent and salvaged what was left, and bagged what needed to be dried. They couldn’t find a laundromat open in the nearest city 17 miles away, so I slept in the car. Stupidly, stubbornly, still in my wet clothes.
Sometime Saturday I finally changed shirts at least. It rained a little more. I went to a wonderful workshop with Lady Rhiannon on dealing with death and dying, something I’ve had to do. Saturday afternoon it brightened up, and I calmed Sapphire Skye down and got ready to do her Initiation ritual.
But someone who knew better had gotten into Joy’s face and ruined her state of mind, so we had to get Cain to substitute and mix positions up, who was holding down what Quarter in the ritual. It all was worked out and went fine… except that my left lens fell out of my glasses in mid-ritual, LOL. Everything went fine, and we now have a new Witch in the world.
Saturday after the ritual I finally took off my wet socks and put on clean dry ones and my sandals, tuned up my guitar, and picked out some songs for my concert, only a short one. It went well, only 6 songs (I’d picked out 7, but for some reason forgot my chords for one of them — I remembered them sometime Sunday night after I got home, LOL). I had good response, and played The Coven Grows for Shain Stewart, who loved it — it’s a “filk” of his song, to the tune of Garth Brooks’ “The Thunder Rolls”. I also played “The Rawdon Hills” for the first time in public ever, also the same for “Crimson and Crystal” by Cynthia McQuillen.
I was in constant pain, in some places I’d never hurt before, but had Family and friends doing Reiki and other energy work on me throughout the weekend. Sunday morning I woke up (after sleeping in my car instead of in some friends’ tent like I could have, stubborn me), with my left ear and part of my left cheek numb. Again, people worked on me. I probably pinched a nerve sleeping in my car with my neck in the wrong position.
One of our Sisters had three strokes Saturday night and was being worked on very hard Sunday morning. Turns out the doctors didn’t expect her to live as long as Beltane, but she refused to go before Beltane and wanted to be at the Gathering. The Elders were ready to whisk her off to the hospital if need be, but she refused. By the end of the Gathering, she was still with us, and peacefully ready to pass on when called.
I was gifted with a bottle of Summerland Mead by Dreamfox. This was made from ingredients left over by my dear friend Kerrwynn Pendragon when he passed on a few months ago, and is blessed with his picture and dates of his birth and death on the label. It should be ready for drinking in about 4 months, and if it weren’t for the fact that I know for damn sure Kerrwynn would WANT me to drink it, I’d keep it in the bottle unused as a tribute.
Aianna also was in abject pain from the weekend, and I got help from DragonAss and Greyfix in breaking her camp after Brown Bear helped me pack up mine. We moaned and groaned our way back to civilization, with stops in Russellville for gasoline and Burger King.
The food was wonderful, the weather was mixed, many wonderful and awful things happened, and I’m glad I’m home. After a night in my own bed and lots of painkilling drugs, I’m in much better shape, and most of the feeling is back in my ear and cheek.
And I have spent hours in the tub and on the phone with my sweet Willow, who had to live without me all weeked, and I without her. She still is in love with me, and for that I am immensely grateful.
I LOVE YOU WILLOW!
Many thanks to the Goddess and all my Family, without which I would not have survived the weekend.
Be blessed and huge hippo hugs,
Me
