May 1st 2003 – a day of great milestones. Well, three. Okay, they’re quite small ones really.

Firstly, today I have blogged for one whole calendar month. Considering I started on April Fool’s Day, which wasn’t exactly an auspicious beginning, I think I’ve done pretty well so far. There were those who didn’t think I would stick with this (well, me for one) but here I am. One month later. Ta da! Go me!

Now they say that it takes 8 weeks to make or break a habit, so if I keep posting daily for the next month then writing complete utter rubbish regularly should become effortless and a habit of a lifetime. Lucky you.

Secondly, it’s Beltane today (or Samhain for those of you living in the other hemisphere – [waves to the upside down people]). Happy Beltane! Or should it be Merry Beltane! Um… Have a Bountiful Beltane? No, that just sounds silly. [Checks Oh My Gods!] Ah, Blessed Beltane! Whatever. Have a good one.

Thirdly, this day three years ago I made the decision to explore paganism. In honour of this, and because it sounded a cool sort of thing to do, I planned another outdoor expedition today: to visit Croham Hurst Barrow. That’s the barrow of the ancient burial variety, not the garden implement with a wheel variety. Just so we’re clear. It’s within walking distance from Akra Jr’s nursery, so it seemed like an ideal place to go to.

Woke up this morning and the rain is HAMMERING down. Really pouring – even Akra Jr started to sing the “It’s raining, it’s pouring” song. We had thunder, lightning, the works. Not very appealing. I did try though – I’d promised myself I’d go today and I don’t like breaking promises to anyone, let alone myself, but when it got to the point where I couldn’t see anymore from the rain dropping behind my glasses I decided it best if I left it for another day. I wasn’t going to be getting much out of the experience if I was uncomfortable and my double-glazed cocoon was calling to me. Will try again next week. Promise. Ahem.

So, instead I went into town and had a lovely breakfast courtesy of Starburger Express. Well, okay, I did pay them for it, but it was gooooooood. I then bought Akra Jr some birthday presents, and I think they’re really COOL even if I would say that because I chose them. I would tell you what they are, but then you might be really mean and spoil the surprise…

What do you mean you wouldn’t tell him? You can’t trust anyone you meet on the internet you know…

It was the kind of “spur of the moment” outing that required planning of military precision. I had decided to spend some time recharging my “spiritual batteries” and where better than being outdoors in beautiful surroundings especially with the gorgeous weather we’ve been having. However, being alone with your thoughts and having a toddler along are rather mutually exclusive, so plans were made for today, being Akra Jr’s day at nursery.

So, last night I rescued a small rucksack from the back of the dark recesses of the wardrobe and prepared a small packed lunch (including the essential item of a cheese & pickle sandwich – I blame my mother for my association with these and trips out). In a sudden panic that I’d be bored after half an hour, a few books, a pad of paper and a pen were thrown into the bag for good measure.

Kelsey Park in Beckenham was chosen for operation “Pilgrimage to the Park” as although it’s a bit of a trek for me to reach it, it pretty much meets all my criteria for a damn good park: lake with ducks, “woodland” area, stream with little water falls, cafe & loos (oh, and a superb playground, but I couldn’t really justify visiting that without Akra Jr). It was about as close to nature as I was going to get around here without putting myself at unnecessary risk of wandering around on my own in a secluded area. Map was thrown into the bag too.

So the day finally dawns and, as usual for a Thursday, the morning routine is horribly rushed and chaotic. Akra Jr is doing his utmost to be uncooperative. Dash out of the door grabbing the rucksack along with all his nursery stuff on the way. It’s not until I’ve left Akra Jr at nursery and am walking down the road towards the tram stop that I start to wonder what the hell I’m doing. It’s not a warm sunny day like earlier in the week, it’s actually quite chilly, and I haven’t packed a jumper or a raincoat. I have 101 things I need to do at home, and here I am proposing to wander around a park all day. Not to mention that I know I can’t survive that long without a computer and that central heating and double glazing are listed among my favourite of inventions. Have I gone completely insane?! (no, don’t answer that).

I’m still trying to talk myself out of it while buying the tram ticket and waiting for the tram, but on the tram I’m feeling a bit more upbeat. It’s warm behind glass, the journey is picturesque in places, and I’m starting to appreciate the freedom of an empty day in front of me. The rushing around getting ready is in the past now and I manage to relax and watch the world go by. By the time I arrive at Beckenham Junction I’m just feeling faintly silly.

It being only 8.45am I decide to go and have some coffee and breakfast in the Wimpy – delaying the inevitable quick walk around the park and thinking “sod this for a game of soldiers” and buggering off home. Note to Akra: Starburger does better breakfasts. But it filled a gap, was warm, and the waitress left me alone to eat in peace without early morning overtures of friendliness so that was good. After all, spiritual epiphany isn’t going to appear on an empty stomach now is it?! (well, okay, ignoring all the “fasting is good for the soul” rubbish – always thought that was stupid anyhow)

Got to the park. Started walking around trying really hard to “listen”. It was really beautiful there, but I found it really hard to quieten my mind as I kept having an inner dialogue as if I was writing down all that I saw in my head – trying to present it to others. “Woo hoo” I thought, “I’m finally becoming a writer” then I remembered that wasn’t quite the point of being there. You know what? It’s not actually that hard to listen to nature, cos nature is bloody noisy. It was early morning and the birds were singing their little guts out. Somewhere in the trees there was a woodpecker. Canada geese on the lake fighting. Water flowing over rocks and over little water falls. Moorhens making little “peep peep” sounds. The quintessential duck quacks. Okay, you could still hear cars and planes in the background, this was only a little oasis in the jungle of humanity, but you had to try to hear them.

I was really quite proud of myself, actually. Here I was … the city dweller… actually remembering my country roots. I could look and name the trees: oak, sycamore, horse chestnut, silver birch… I even recognised some of the different bird calls. After half an hour of inward dialoguing I managed to stop and start really looking and listening. No, it wasn’t warm, but I found after a while that I wasn’t really that cold either. I saw a heron that I was convinced was a fake one it was standing so still, until I rounded the corner and saw scores of herons roosting on that little island. I saw little tiny spring ducklings. I smelled early morning dewy ground. A squirrel went foraging for food inches from my feet while I kept really still (okay, that’s not much of an achievement, it’s a city squirrel after all, but still). I lovingly stroked the bark of trees (yes, I confess, I am a tree hugger. I can’t help it – the patterns in the bark, the shape of trees, their presence and age…). I would have climbed one of them – it was a perfect shape, but I was worried that I’d get told off by a park keeper or a passerby would have thought I was a crazy person. Oh to be a kid and not to care what people think!

I spent 3 HOURS in that park, and didn’t even notice the time going by. Books, paper and pen remained untouched. I did go home after that though as it started to look like it was going to pour with rain any minute and this stupid city dweller had forgotten to bring a raincoat or umbrella. Am going to try and make a habit of taking time out for myself in future though. I feel really refreshed.

Oh, and yes, I know. I should have taken my camera. I forgot. Sorry.

I hesitate to write about this topic, as it’s about religion/spirituality and like politics it’s one of those topics that’s almost guaranteed to piss someone off somewhere. I’ve spent about half an hour arguing with myself that it’s not an appropriate blog topic, that by writing down something I’m still exploring I won’t make much sense, that I’ll somehow invite ridicule/advice/debate that is unwanted at this stage, that I really should write about something fun and avoid heavy topics. I then realised I was protesting too much and should just sit down and get on with it.

A bit of background about my brand of spirituality is probably in order about now, to put things into context. I consider myself a pagan. I made a conscious decision to follow a pagan path about 3 years ago – but the road has been a bit meandery since then. I’m still finding my feet if you like. Before that I had been a pretty fundamentalist christian who became disillusioned with organised religion when I became aware that intellectual questions about the faith weren’t particularly welcomed – I was expected to switch off my God given brain and accept what God had supposedly ordained on blind faith. The issues were slightly more complex than that, but that was the final breaking point really. Before that as a young child, I was just interested in ancient history, myth, spirituality, occult, the bible… I think I’m probably one of those people who are just wired to be a constant seeker.

Appropriate to the time of year, I have just finished reading The Jesus Mysteries. It was a spur of the moment purchase while I was actually searching for something else. I read all the customer reviews and thought, that’s a book I want to read for myself and form my own opinion on. I won’t get into a complex review myself – I’m sure to make a hash of the authors’ main points, but I will say that it was a good choice, I’ve hardly been able to put it down, and now I’ve finished it I feel… well I’ll get into that a bit more later.

I learnt a lot more about gnostic christianity, and probably have a better understanding of how initiatory stages in mystery religions work now, which is interesting to me on a philosophical/intellectual standpoint not just a spiritual one. So much information and learning was casually dismissed by a throwaway label of “heresy” without true understanding of what it was all about.

I also understand more about the early history of the christian church – I still feel great anger, loss and sadness whenever I read about the burning of books and the devastation at Alexandria so that wasn’t news, but there were a lot of gaps filled in for me about how christianity relates to judaism, why most jews never accepted Jesus as Messiah, and how christianity came to dominate the world so much.

I knew that there were a lot of parallels between christianity and paganism particularly in their choice of festivals (the church’s way of “selling” their religion) but I didn’t realise quite how incestuous it all was. Really, this should lessen my respect for christianity but it hasn’t (at least not for the christianity of the bible rather than the organised church). Seeing how it all interconnects has given me a sense of awe of the philosophy and deeper truths behind the teachings rather than the sense of frustration at inconsistent “historical” documents being used for the agenda of the day. It’s helped me reconcile my personal spiritual history too – I don’t feel that any of it was “wasted” or a “wrong” path anymore – I needed the journey to get here, and hopefully move on to something deeper. I feel relief and a sense of freedom to move on too – something that I find hard to put into words, but makes sense to me.

I realise that this blog entry isn’t particularly coherent, but it’s just something that’s had a profound impact on me and I wanted to share.

Took the car in for a service this morning which meant that I had to return via bus. I like bus journeys (well, at least the ones where you know where you’re going) as it gives me the opportunity to let my mind drift and to look at all the scenery as I pootle along.

On the way, I passed my old office. In a previous incarnation (known as pre-motherhood), I used to work for a large multinational in Customer Service. I like to think I was quite good at it too. However, looking at the workers going about their daily routine of buying coffee downstairs (there’s big glass windows at the front of this building – my psychic powers aren’t that good), swiping their security passes through the barrier and waiting for the lift, it made me wonder if I missed all that. It certainly seems a whole lifetime away now and not just two and a half years ago.

No.

Not at all.

How did I ever find the time to be in paid employment?!

I also noticed a couple of shops next to each other which made me smile. The first one, a Wesley Owen Christian bookshop has been there forever, well okay, as long as I’ve lived here which is … seven years now? The shop next to it must have recently opened (well, recently being in the last year – I don’t go down that street often) and is a new agey/esoteric/curio type shop (at least, that’s what it looks like from the outside) with an “egyptian cafe” inside. It actually looks rather cool and had loads of really beautiful things in the window display, so I must go and investigate if I get a chance (and I don’t have an Akra Jr with me to leave a trail of devastation in my wake). I bet the christian bookshop had kittens when that place opened up next door. I had this image flash through my mind of groups of serious looking christians holding prayer meetings in the back of the shop, petitioning God for protection from evil forces emanating through the wall, and next door the owners cheekily making their displays more and more outrageous just to annoy the christians. Well, made me smile anyway.

Funnily enough, having experience of belonging in both camps, I have deep sympathy for both sides and now would probably be quite happy having a gentle browse in either shop. Does that mean I’m becoming a more emotionally and spiritually mature adult? God, I hope not…