So here I am on my lovely decking in our spiritual garden, surrounded by tub after tub of amazing flowers and trees, pots of ferns and pinks and clematis and roses. All manner of ornaments, jewellery and chimes hanging and twinkling from various places and a wooden bowl steadily filling up with the treasures that I gather on my daily walks that get hand painted or decorated when the whim takes me. The suns gone down, the dusk is setting and to top it all off Ive found a Scottish folk festival on the radio to listen to! Wonderful. The speaking is in Gaelic so i have no idea what they are saying but who cares its really soothing.
I had many choices today to entertain myself, an offer of company and tea at new friends house, a place booked at Moon Henge in Cambridge for a pagan blessing ceremony and the idea of going to the local pictures to see ‘Spy’. And yet when it came to it… I stayed here, with Archie. It felt like I needed to be near home, near to Alistair and my feelings maybe. I ached, really really ached for him this afternoon. To be able to climb into my own special space right next to him and sniff him in and feel his love encompass me, yes, ache is the right word.
I think thats where I am now on this journey of widowhood, missing physical touch with him. Skin Hungry is a phrase that I have come across, the need for touch. So this is a new transition for me, a different face of the loss of my man, my best friend, my lover. So I fired up my friend Google and read on forums and other sites about what other people who are alone might have done to help with this. Those that know me know me to be open minded and not shy at trying things that are a bit “out there” so when tantric massage came up as option I thought, well, OK, let me find out a bit more about it!!!
I’ll tell you why I found.., NAKED man with his wobbly ugly bits bobbling about whilst he oiled and massaged his female subject!!! That, I was not expecting. I got a bit more alarmed the more I ventured onto the Tantric Massage sites. Please enlighten me if I have got this wrong but it seemed to me as if I had stumbled onto message sites that used Tantric Massage as a euphemism for “call me and I will come round to you and give you a sorting out”!!! So, I closed my mind to that particular avenue of touch. Made me smile though and I think it probably made Alistair chuckle too (dirty slut he’s probably thinking).
So, after that I kept it clean, had a pot of tea, cried a bit cos I felt sorry for myself and then got back on with channeling that energy into creating some lovely shabby chic effect on an old table ready for my upcoming house move. I SOLD really quickly and bought an old Victorian cottage, just big enough to swing a cat in (too bad Ive got a dog, a huge great big 7 stone one at that and far too heavy to be swung). Its a really beautiful little house for me and Archie and the best thing about it is that Alistair and I looked at it together online before we bought this one so its like he knows where I will be. I love that thought.
Im hoping to be in by early September and I know that that cottage will herald the dawning of the next part of my souls journey. The widow and the wolf finding their way, unleashing the “Wild Woman’ within and uncovering an ancient aspect of myself that has been asleep for a very very long time (Candace and I are currently reading Women Who Run With the Wolves, I would go so far as to say it should be compulsory reading for all women.. prescriptive I know but its a revelation).
It seems really important to me when I write to be truthful about how I feel, but because I have had some painful feelings today that doesn’t mean that Im not OK. Im content, deeply content, I have inner peace, I am richly blessed every day, I am loved and, having to live without Alistair has forced me to open up fully to my spiritual life. I like it, a lot 🙂
NAMASTE x
Living With Gladys Full Time 