Coming Home
I’m home! Back from my adventure in Morocco. Home… what a lovely word that is: the ‘ho’ opens its arms to you and the ‘mm’ encloses you within them.
I wonder what makes a place feel like home. The red rocky soil of Morocco through which I have been travelling, is definitely not home; it did not grow me, but then neither did the lush, moist, green lands of Devon where I now live. I grew up in East Anglia and yet, once I could think such things, I never felt I belonged there.
After a few days on a long, challenging, exhilarating, circular walk in the High Atlas Mountains with a group of brilliant women, I headed off on my own to another part of the mountains and stayed put for 6 nights. My view was dominated by the snow capped majesty of Mount Toubkal at 4,167m. My room was the epitome of cosiness, the big bed soft and heavy, reminiscent of the feather bed I used to sleep in at my grandmother’s house. Each night I lit candles and Abdul made me a fire as I had no electricity for warmth or light. I snuggled on floor cushions, read, wrote, watched the fire crackle and went to bed warm and toasty. Even when storms were raging and the wind was rocking my room I was content and comfortable. But could I be at home there? No.
My friend River
For 57 years I lived elsewhere to where I live currently; why does this cottage and this village feel like home? When I moved here I knew almost nobody, just a couple of women in a nearby town. My first friend was the river. Once I’d adjusted to its ancient moorland nature, so different to the steep Scottish rivers I was used to, its bed scattered with granite boulders and pebbles, its banks shallow and accessible, I grew to love it. It became familiar, companionable, it had a song which changed with the seasons and the weather. In full spate it was awe inspiring, in the warm dry summer it invited paddling.
Little by little and in no small part due to walking the dog – people stop and chat to you when you have a waggy tailed companion – I found friends accumulating and the community here opening its arms to me. During my late husband’s illness, people in the village and beyond came to walk the dog, a few of my friends became carers, my lovely neighbour and friend would regularly leave vegetables from her allotment on my back door step, or flowers. When he died, we walked through the village with his coffin to the community centre; traffic stopped and villagers stood silent and respectfully. If they had a cap they doffed it.
“It’s about life”
In Marrakech I hired a guide for an afternoon. I asked him about their practices when someone dies and how they take care of those who grieve. The dead are washed, shrouded and placed in a foetal position facing Mecca on the same day on which they have died. And mourners?
“It’s about life. You carry on living.” In the mountains we had passed graveyards, graves marked with a simple stone dug up from the earth, two stones if the grave was that of a woman. The two stones stop the kind-hearted woman from going back to her relatives to comfort them, our Amazigh (Berber) guide told us.
“We have a big party”, she said, “to try to make the family happy.” But her own mother is dying and she is finding it unbearable.
The return
And then I return to my village and the horse chestnuts are in full leaf, white wood anemones and the first wild garlic flowers have joined the bright yellow celandines and paler primroses. There are even some bluebells in sunny spots. I stroke the moss which covers the old beech tree I love.
“Hello”, I say, “I’m glad to see you”. Me. Dog. River. Tree. A family. I am sensitive to this land. I can feel it, let it support my feet and nourish my soul. It can make me smile, not because it has 4,000m of grandeur but because…because I belong. How many decades have I lived before I could say that about somewhere? Perhaps this is one of the gifts of travelling – to return and, to quote TS Eliot,
“.. to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time”.
Belonging
So that now I am returned and with a sense of belonging, can I listen with new ears to the song of this land, to its ancient knowing, to its rhythm and rhyme?
As I write this it is Easter; or, to call it by the name of a much older tradition in these lands than Christianity, Ostara, from which we have the word ‘oestrus’ and the meaning ‘fertility’. I find it interesting that the date of Easter is still, like many of the seasonal festivals of old, determined by the moon: it is celebrated on the first Sunday following the first full moon after the Spring Equinox (fixed as 21st March rather than astronomically). In the past the spring festival of Ostara was a festival of fertility and the remnants remain: rabbits (originally hares) and eggs – the ancient traditions hidden in plain sight.
What roots, what threads, can I hear if I listen? What knowing do I carry within me? How did my ancestors bury their dead, honour their lives, trust the cycle of all things? And suddenly it feels as if I am a tiny and temporary, but necessary part of a vast continuum of life, of the cycling and recycling of material which makes up my body, with the opportunity to know life. “It’s about life”, he said. While I live my one small life in my one unique body, can I come to know what it truly means to be Home?
With my love
Nickie
PS thank you very much to everyone who sent good wishes for my recovery from ill health. Yes, I was well enough to travel and got better and better as I walked.
A POEM
Here is a new poem I wrote while I was away.
The Taste of Grief
Today, grief tastes of birdsong,
smells of snow from the towering mountains,
flows as a river of meltwater tears.
It surprises as flurrying petals,
white cherry blossom swirling in bouts of breeze.
Grief rests in the steadfast rhythm of breath,
an in-woven texture,
an underpinning chord,
season by season sighing through the valley.
NEWS
New Group
I am running a CREATIVE PRACTICE GROUP for people dealing with LOSS Maximum groups size will be 4 people. We will use writing, chalk, nature and other media, as the means to consider and share our feelings, challenges and understanding of the process of loss.
4 sessions of 1 1/2 hours, at fortnightly intervals, £15 – £25 per session payable in advance. Beginning mid-May. This may become an ongoing group, bookable in 4- session blocks.
Please contact me if you think the space remaining is your’s.
DYING MATTERS WEEK
Here is a summary of all the events I am involved in during Dying Matters Week between 5th and 11th May.
TUESDAY MAY 6TH – NEWTON ABBOT LIBRARY AND WOODS – 2-4PM FREE OF CHARGE
The Nature of Loss – finding solace for our loss through immersing ourselves in nature. With Emma Capper. Here is the link to the eventbrite ticket
WEDNESDAY MAY 7TH – IVYBRIDGE VICTORIA PARK AND LONG TIMBER WOODS – 11AM – 4PM £15 – £25 ACCORDING TO MEANS
Walking with Loss, Together – finding solace for our loss through engaging in creative invitations in nature and sharing with one another. With Emma Capper .
More information on the events page including the link to the booking form.
THURSDAY MAY 8TH – BUCKFASTLEIGH, M.I.C CENTRE – 2-3.30PM FREE OF CHARGE
Funerals: Creating our own Culture – with Sarah Bax of Heart & Soul Funerals
Together we will think about how we might choose to honour our lives and all that we have loved in life. You can turn up on the day or to book go to Eventbrite here
SATURDAY MAY 10TH – TOTNES, BIRDWOOD HOUSE – 12.30 – 5PM
A series of events hosted by Dying with Grace. I will be holding a gentle space where grief can be honoured. I will also be leading my choir to sing songs for solace, after the Death Cafe. Free of charge. Please just come, booking not required.
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