- All My Dreams are Ripped Away from Me. Pt 1. Hallowing Moon.
I have not drawn in my traditional fashion in years, but I begin to work a picture in my final days in California. The whisper of the moon fades from my mind and I fall truly energetically asleep. In this sleep and in this dream, I begin to believe that I know what Wicca is all about, and know what it is to be a Shaman: even with little experience and knowledge and not much practice in recent times. But now is the day I move away from California I leave my bridges smoldering and charred, and as I leave on that final day: I rip up my deep roots so that I can move, deepen my depression due to severe root shock, and file the personality of myself away deep in the corners of my mind to make room for what may come; and again lose the key.
The root shock completely shakes who I know myself to be, and sets off a bad case of Borderline Personality Disorder. I don’t know who I am, but now in a new location, I am silent about my feelings, nor do I truly know what I am feeling. Because I have so much of myself locked away and buried, I don’t know how even to be myself. I am frightened, I am lost, I want to cry, but with my wife being the only reason I am there; I do my best to resolve myself to build a new life as the man she needs. But who I am is screaming at me in my mind as I move farther and farther from my own truths. I live under the roof of my mother in-law’s house and it is clear that she is the matriarch of the home. And she is verbally abusive to match her manipulative. There isn’t a day that goes by where I am verbally assaulted or called out for some reason other than being there.
I jump for joy when I get a new job the first month that I am in Eugene, but it isn’t long before the law of the home is set. Now that I have a decent paying job, I am seen as the breadwinner for my wife; which doesn’t bother me, it’s the excessive “training” that my mother-in-law puts me through because according to her, the only way I can have a decent understanding of financial responsibility is by relinquishing ALL control to her. So she demands I hand over my debit card, which to keep harmony and stop this woman from yelling at me consistently, I do. In the mean-time since my wife and I are living with this woman, it is made extra clear that she despises people who are overweight, completely ignoring that her own daughter is morbidly obese. Of all the arguing that this woman and I get into, I look at myself, a three hundred pound man and think to myself that what she is dictating works in my favor, so I begin to exercise daily.
My job is working at a small Goodwill Boutique shop as pretty much every position there. I run the treadmill twice a day, hold an exercise routine in the computer room twice a day, since my job requires a lot of stairs and running around, and due to a very strict diet, in six months I lost over one hundred and thirty pounds. The icing on the cake in this situation is that because of the excessive arguing that goes on in this house, I view all my exercising and even once a day four mile walks as a way to get the fuck out of that house.
However, it doesn’t take long for the mother-in-law to begin to realize that something is wrong, and begins whispering to my wife that I am cheating on her every time I go out for a ‘walk.’ eventually, as we continue to look for a larger household to accommodate for the large family we are, my mother-in-law is driving me around town and begins probing into my personal life by asking what I think of her daughter, how often am I having sex with her daughter, when can she be expecting grandchildren. To be absolutely honest, because of the home life and suspecting that everything I tell my wife in confidence is being used against me, and the hostile nature of that household, I barely think of sex, I am less than attracted to my wife, and even if we had sex, I cannot shake this extreme feeling of guilt and being dirty each time.
Yet for all that is going on around me in my life, and six months later, I manage to finally finish that picture I started.
***
Only six months into this Oregon Adventure, we break the lease of the home we are in to move to the countryside. As we are packing and cleaning, the woman has an announcement to make to my wife, and all of a sudden I am outed as a gay man married to my wife just days before Halloween. Even though I am outed as a gay man, and now the woman expects me to leave to find the next dick I run into, I look at her and remind her that I have made a vow. I will do everything in my power to uphold that vow. She looks dubiously at me. But I am firm in my convictions; even though I am beginning to ask myself what the fuck I am doing in my head.
Meanwhile, as all of this is happening, my wife and I are active members of the local spiritual circle. We attend voodoo Friday events, we frequent the shops to visit with friends and gather recent gossip. After the wife and I along with the mother-in-law find the house in the countryside, we join in on the latest spiritual community event. A Darkmoon Ritual.
***
As the It is a Dark Moon night and the spiritual circle is hosting a ritual with the intent to reclaim an aspect of our personal power. This ritual excites me as I am curious to see what I would find, and what I will see along the way. Besides, having been through some Shamanic journeys before; this adventure will be a piece of cake. On the night of; I come equipped with a Selenite Healing Wand, and I essentially drag the spirit Totem of my youth with me. The ritual begins: we are to go to the lower worlds, pass three gates where we pay our way, and in the final chamber we find what we have been looking for.
I delve into the journey; call my Totem guide from my childhood, and the wand has turned into a lantern to light my way. Also, a black figure appears behind me to also guide my way. He leads me to a cliff face. There are a large granite gate and archway with the words Know Thyself inscribed at the top, and to the side of the arch is a gnarly gargoyle guarding the door. The creature holds out a stone bowl asking for the first offering. I look around, the spirit animal shakes his head, and the black figure is motionless and silent. “I offer my eyes. As with them, I have missed too many things, and I continue not to see.” and place representations of my own eyes into the bowl. The doors swing wide open and my offering is accepted: my party and I enter the cliff.
The next chamber is a desolate frozen wasteland, and the floor is a frozen glacial lake that houses scores upon scores of warriors: frozen both at peace and at war beneath the frozen water. The wind howls past my ears, yet I am not cold nor am I tossed about in the wind. The totem guide seems nervous and his pace is creeping along. The black figure glides ahead of us, and the lantern has lit up to guide me in its light. Time is meaningless here, and after what seems to be an eternity we reach the other gate and archway. It is the exact same sight as before when we entered the cliff side. The gargoyle asks for my offering. Again I look at the animal guide who no longer faces me but faces the ground and shakes his head, the black figure only points at the offering bowl and is otherwise still. I ponder what I can offer. “I offer my heart. My love is one I do not love anymore the way I thought, and my love of life is as frozen as this lake. I don’t want this cold feeling anymore. I’d rather not feel. The Gargoyle accepts the offering and the doors swing open. We enter into the next chamber.
This next chamber is pitch dark. There is absolutely no light to this chamber that the senses can’t distinguish up from down. Even the light from the lantern; which illuminates where my footsteps are, can’t help relieve my equilibrium as the ground is just as black and void. The only things that are illuminated are my companions and me: and nothing more. How I can still see the black figure who guides me is still a mystery. Time is absolutely meaningless, the direction is pointless. All there is empty space all around. Countless moments later we reach the next gate; which my lantern lights up. Even though heavily cast in shadows; the details of this gate are the exact same. The gargoyle to the side holding a bowl asking for my final offering, and I ponder for a moment. Again I look around to my companions. The animal guide won’t look at me or shake his head, the black figure is pointing at the bowl, and my lantern flickers. I wonder what I can give for a while. My eyes and my heart are the two most important things to me in my life, and I’ve already offered them up: what else do I have that’s left? “I offer up all that is me. Take the entirety of my being. Take it; for I am tired of it, and only causes pain to those who are the closest to me. I don’t want to cause more pain, not take anymore. Take it please.” There is an uneasy pause as I wait to see if the gargoyle accepts my offering, and eventually, the doors swing open. The gargoyle and the black figure vanish, leaving the animal guide and me to venture into the next chamber alone.
The final chamber is of pure beauty. The walls have crystals in them, and there are pure Sapphire crystals pillars standing tall and holding up this chamber in front of a single step up to a ritual pool illuminated by an unknown light source. Within the light though is a swirling mist of light that dances above the water of the pool. This is it. That swirling mist of light is my strength and my power! I take a step forward towards the light; and many things happen all at once: My lantern shatters and extinguishes, the totem animal guide is kicked out of the chamber, and the doors slam shut thereafter. The ground rises to encase me up to my neck, and I can’t move – I am trapped staring at the item of my desire and left reflecting on my now loneliness.
Laughter comes from the shadows: a mature woman’s voice. She cackles and laughs as she steps out of the shadows and comes into view. “You think that the Source is your strength, you have no idea what you reach for child? You have completely missed the point of this chamber, to grasp for what you are not ready to hold. You are an arrogant, haughty, and fool of a child! Yet here you are in my grasp. You have already given yourself away because you hurt others instead of standing up and taking responsibility! At the beginning of all of this, you hurt the one person who means the most to you; and you have ignored her repeatedly! Why now should I let you go? You’ve given up.”
She takes a step closer and I get a better view of her. She looks familiar to me, yet I can’t place where I have seen her.
“Take a good long look…” she says. “because I believe that at the start of this little adventure, you gave up your eyes. Well; you won’t be needing them now anyway.” The last thing my eyes see is a blast of white orange flame come from her palms, and I see nothing more: instead, I feel my eyes liquify and evaporate in that momentary burst of flame. My eyes are gone. It occurs to me as my face is seared and scorched; that I may potentially die in this journey – what does this mean for the body in the physical realm? The notion fills me with such sorrow, and shame. I did this to myself. “Well now, such sadness that surges through you. Whether you know it or not, and I’m guessing that you are painfully aware of it now; you did this to yourself. What did you think was going to happen? It hurts, I know, let me take away your pain.” She shoots her hand into the mound of earth that traps me, and I feel her hand quickly dive into my chest, and rip out my heart. “But you offered your heart away anyway. You don’t want to feel for all the pain you caused. It’s alright, now you don’t have to feel a thing.”
I can’t see yet through perception senses I see her eat my heart small bites at a time. There is a squishing noise followed by some chewing, and eventually a swallow of satisfaction with a small gasp for air: she finished eating it. Slowly all feelings flee from me. My situation swings from one that I can emotionally feel; which is of terror, and shifts to intellectual understanding. And I know that I am doing to die. She is taking my offerings, the last thing I offered up was the whole of my being. She will take this next: and then I am done. “I see you understand what is next; cold emotionless yet full and feeling but empty, relying on the intelligence of the mind, sightless yet able to see clearly here and now. You offered yourself up. All that it is to be you, offered up and away. You know not what you have done, and what you forfeit. You can not see the road ahead of you even though it was spelled out for you. You truly are lost, which is more the pity – and such a waste.” I tip my head back in acceptance of what comes, I hear her take a step back in front of me, and suddenly the same heat blast that melted my eyes hits me again: and burns my face and head. I am finished, and I accept that I did this to myself.
I close the lids to what was my eyes and become at peace as my life hallows out.
* * *
A Mental Kiss for a Thirsty Mind's Life Journey 