reflections

Hello you!

I hope the end of the summer is treating you well. There is a serious nip in the air in Ireland and the blackberries are plentiful. Time to get my jelly making equipment out!

But before I do that, I wanted to carry on talking about names. It has been a long saga and this may or may not be the last of my blogs on the topic, who know what will be revealed next? At the grand old age of 66, I still marvel at the way things unravel, how magic happens in my life and how, again and aga…

Hello you,

What did you think of the last blog post? Did you make sense of what I was talking about?

I want to tell you the next chapter of this story.

The story of my name.

Because, I think it matters. Because I feel that there is a need right now to go back to the fundamentals of things. To the root of what matters. With the winds of anxiety and threats that are blowing all around us. We are going to need anchoring and words matter.

Names matter. What do you call yourself matters. B…

Hello you,

I have to come clean. I am not really who I say I am...

Hold on a minute. I have got you (and myself) confused already. Lets start at the beginning...

Once upon a time,

well, a few weeks ago anyways,

I was in Italy, chatting to a friend in French and they said, kind of out of the blue, "I know your first name is Baya but what is your surname?" and, without thinking, I said "Rouzoul!"

Rouzoul, I hear you cry, but we thought your surname was ....

do you actually know my surna…

Hello you,

How is it going? How has July treated you? Is your summer all that you want it to be? If it is, take time today to mull over what has been happening and if it is not, then all is not lost, we have another four weeks of summer to come.

Lamas is the celtic festival of the first harvest, the grain harvest. I know that we also celebrate the harvest on 21st September but that is a different harvest altogether. The Autumn Equinox is the hedgerow harvest, the harvest we preserve to feed…

Hello you!

How have you been? I am just back from Italy and I am full of sunshine and the sea. Back to the grey weather of Ireland with a heart full of joy and hope.

So I thought we would spend a bit of time talking about The Dark of the Moon.

We are often aware of the New Moon and the Full Moon but rarely pause a minute between the two as we launch ourselves into the next planting of seeds or the next harvesting of the seeds we planted last time.

The Dark of the Moon, when the moon is hidde…

Hello you,

How is it going as they say. Remember, last time we talked I was saying about going even though we did not really know where we are going and today... we cannot even see where we are going!

Because, today is the day before the New Moon

The Dark of the Moon.

And in the current circumstances as the world lurches from one more unbelievable disaster to another, it feels entirely appropriate to write about the dark, hence the photo at the top of this blog.

The dark is so tough because…

Hello you,

Why a dog with a pacifier in its mouth I hear you wonder? Well, this blog is about self soothing and pacifier came to mind but I did not want the photo of a baby because that is not my point and I thought the dog one was cute.

OK?

So, I was thinking the other day of how I always have a mint tea and a square of chocolate at the end of the day when i sit down to watch some television. It all goes together. I am not hungry, I have just has supper. I want the mint tea because it …

Hello again,

Here I am, still with my pullover and winter socks on as the weather is not improving over here in Ireland. And it is now June 14th and the Summer Solstice is on its way with yet again more fires to jump and more dancing outside. I don't see this happening any time soon here.

So, I got to thinking about ceremonies and rituals, traditional ones, ones that it is said our ancestors performed.

Well, between Beltane (First May) and the Summer Solstice (21st June) there were outside ce…

What are we today? I stare out of the window of my office at the grey sky and the eternal drizzle, I tell you what, we are not at the start of summer, nowhere near.

Here in Ireland the cold winds still blow and our kitchen garden lags behind previous years. I feel so sorry for my tiny baby courgettes!

And I know in other parts of the world the temperatures are already higher than last year and the droughts are getting worse.

It is all changing and I HATE CHANGE!

Which is kind of why I am wri…