I came to Folleterre Radical Faerie Sanctuary for the Solstice

the year before I was intensive care

watching the suns rays creep across the floor to the bed I couldn’t leave

hooked up to a tube helping me breathe

for 24 hours

In folleterre I was welcomed home, home to the earth, to nature

I marked the solstice by watching the sun rise

As the sun entered my sign of cancer

I sang songs I made a year before in the sandpit, with my crystals and cried

I had an epiphany

I could heal from everything that ever happened to me

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I vowed to myself, faeries, the lake and Pan that I would return

for as long as I could

I bravely asked for help

negotiated for time

couldn’t return for atleast 5 weeks

didn’t even want to leave…

lost in limbo

but before I knew it, it was time to return

.

I missed my initial flight

I got 3 days in a much smaller and more familiar sanctuary

a half way house

I arrived 3 days late

and immediately sang at a spontaneous cabaret, about how lost I was, and how it feels so good

to have found my tribe

dressed as Jesus Spice

It was nerve wracking

but really helped me arrive

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I had made a beloved friend a Wand from the Ancestors tree while I was away

he had stayed

I got to put the Wand back in the very spot we found it in, as fallen wood, 5 weeks before

I love the magic we all create

We are so lucky to have Sanctuary, Off grid, Safe, Faerie Space

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At the First Gathering, there were about 80 more people than the Solstice

I knew this would be intense

But being out in nature together

was very different, to my experience of being in the many roomed, crucible like Featherstone Castle

Morning Circles were long, but the experience was much more cohesive

the number of people  made every task seem rather threatening…

My focus was on entertaining myself by getting dressed up, enjoying the attention, compliments

showing off the parts of my body I actually like

 and heart circling

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Blonde Ambition Spice

 Sex Book Madonna

 Joan Collins Spice

 Kylie Minogue, singing whilst doing yoga

 BDSM Barbie

Shamanic Spice

 Princess Leia Brigitte Bardot Spice

 Cruella DeVil Spice

 Spiritiual Barbie Spice

 Mama and Baby Winehouse

Show Girl Spice

some of the looks and names I created… I know there were many more…

always a little bit self conscious

unsure of my motivations

I talked to myself in the mirror about it one day and cried

It’s not easy being incarnate in a body sometimes

I don’t have to be an attention seeker, it is safe to approach people

sometimes an outfit felt like armour, or at least it put a distance between myself and others

I think I may have simply been too much in my head

Most of the times it brought on pure joy

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Its amazing even in a very safe space

How much fear I often still felt

I had this constant desire to be held

it happened twice in almost 4 weeks

I avoided many opportunities for intimacy through fear

intimacy to me being authentic, revealing your most private and true at this moment self – thoughts, feelings, bodily self..

And I actually also did this a lot..

But it requires trust

The Sanctuary was a very different place for me in the final week once long term friends I have built that with had left

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I got sick twice

both times when I was getting close to people I really liked

what was that about?

I felt like a contagious leper…

avoiding people when I needed hugs more than ever

not completely, the first time I felt so much better when I realised it wasn’t just me…

I heard afterwards,  50% of the gathering had it to!

The Shame I felt was totally disproportionate to the present situation

But I read in a book while I was there, and it was true for me, and these things take work to clear..

My first sexual encounters were totally entrenched in shame and fear

.

I was able to focus and feel grateful for what actually happened, instead of what I felt like I missed out on…

Lovely cuddles, kisses, wonderful hugs and beautiful conversations… people being there just at the right moment

Helping me be shoeless shamanic spice, when I was freaking out about performing without heels, so genuinely, lovingly supportive, and grateful for things I had done too…

I was able to share my shame at being so lazy, and why, and gently encouraged to do more…

I definitely felt better once I finally did some washing up!

I started cooking more too

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 I thought about how we are Radical, its Radically different for me anyway to be in such a space, from 17-21 I only knew websites as the way to secretly connect with other queers

I was in an abusive relationship after that for five years where I didn’t connect in that way or any other

I spent one year of my life out and single, but my priority was healing, in a rather heteronormative spiritual community,

then I found the faeries, and a new lover, two years, feeling I was sortof  part of this tribe

Ended that relationship in January, and 8 months on there are people who feel like my chosen family

Allowed to “just be”

I love myself more, I love them, and I know they love me…

Real affection outside of a “relationship” is almost a totally new thing

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Being in Sanctuary did bring me more physical healing that I desired to, not in the way I expected

as lazy as I was at times, I was still up on my feet so much more, rarely ever inside

Just walking up hill to meditation rock was a workout

swimming was wonderful

I eventually got so fed up with feeling crap I started stretching in the morning

I feel so much better I’m maintaining more activity

before I would just sit around at home thinking I can’t be bothered

Last night I had a totally enchanted experience, a regular occurence in Folleterre

Missing the lake, I walked to the nearby river, and swam down it, surrounded by tree’s on each side

It gives me tingles just thinking about it

Remembering the Lake, I had a mystical experience there too, to the sound of a flute

I was missing some of my friends, but then in my heart and  my minds eye, they were all there, dancing in the lake, or on the bank with me too!

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Once I left, I could really appreciate where I had been..

People who aren’t faeries think I’ve just been on holiday… A holiday from the outside world I guess

Walking in the French town of Lure

I was checking out his muscled arm

I noticed his angry face…

I felt the fear, (so small, compared to the all consuming kind I’ve felt in the past)

I breathed through it (what an improvement)

But thought, shit, this isn’t safe (so much more aware of what’s happening)

I’m no longer in Faerie Space

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Really i’m always in Faerie Space

I came back to london

I performed at a Queer Cabaret

I brought my ability to share deeply from the heart to the Glory’s stage

about how much I’ve grown, probably demonstrated more than anything by my Angelic outfit

One that’s been nurtured and appreciated even more in the last month, but finally recognised during the last 4 years

People were so grateful and touched

Take your broken Heart, and make it into Art, as Carrie Fisher once said

My hearts no longer broken though, just wide open