Now, Swindon, where my brother lives isn't terribly exciting. It's an industrial/railroad town. Reminds me a lot of Scranton. Once you get out of town, it's rolling hills and green fields and sheep (so many sheep! seriously, as near as I can tell there are more sheep than people in England-less-London) For someone who grew up in the most beautiful place in the world, it's pretty, but nothing special.
Getting used to driving on the wrong side of the road is actually pretty easy. What's a little harder is getting used to the fact that the British just park wherever the hell they want, including in lanes of traffic. Before this trip, I thought of Brits as an orderly and rule-abiding people. Not when they're parking! Except for large highways, basically every road I've been on here is one lane (even when it's two way) because everyone double parks like assholes. (I understand it is not fair for me to project my cultural assumptions about appropriate pro-social behavior onto another people's cultures. But, seriously, tho....as near as I can tell, no one in this whole country knows how to parallel park.)
Along the way there, my spidey-sense started tingling, and I kept seeing these signs for Cheddar Gorge and Caves. "That sounds cool," I thought. "I love me some caves! I wonder if there will be anything cool I can see without having to hike?" So, I turned off, and followed the signs. My GPS was not best pleased, but I quieted her and followed my gut, and the entirely insufficient road signs. I drove thru several little towns, including one that looked positively medieval, just like it was out of a King Arthur movie! Eventually I got to Cheddar, and followed signs to the Gorge.
OMG, guys! This is the most beautiful drive ever! I duct taped my phone to the visor and shot you a video of it. Watch below. (now that I have invented this method, I'll try to get a chance to shoot you a video of the drive up Uffington White Horse Hill, also)
Sadly, it seems like the second video I tried to take failed when my phone ran out of memory. :( Sorry! To make up for it, here is a video someone else shot with a drone. Warning: the music is super annoying.
So, after Cheddar Gorge, I got back on the highway, headed south to Cornwall. I drove for a while, and then I started seeing signs for Glastonbury. Now, I had planned to go to Glastonbury earlier in the week, but I got sick, and had to cancel that day trip. I'm planning to go later in the week, but after my extremely successful outing at Cheddar Gorge, I figured I'd at least drive thru town, and shoot some photos of the Tor from afar.
Having spoken with a friend who lives nearby, I was told that under no circumstances would my knees permit me to climb it in the winter. England, I have discovered, is about 20% sheep and and 70% very slippery mud. I don't know what their dirt is made of, but I suspect teflon. In any case, for whatever reason, as I approached Glastonbury, I actually started to be really scared. I almost turned around. Then I saw a sign for an Aldi, which seemed VERY familiar and quotidian, so I stopped, got some snacks for the rest of the trip, including a dozen bottles of water, and collected myself. "Don't be silly, Sara. Just drive thru. You don't even have to get out of the car if you don't want to." Honestly, I was genuinely scared. This is a thing that often happens to me before big initiatory experiences. I think my ego thinks "No! We're going to be big and scary after this!! We like being small and weak and just like this!"
In any case, I followed signs for the Tor, and found myself at the Chalice Well Park, which is where the Red Spring of Glastonbury is. That sounded great, but there was no parking (see aforementioned rant), so I turned up a tiny side street looking for a spot. My magic sense went crazy! Then I saw a bunch of sparkly magic hippies by the side of the road. I know my people when I see them!! I pulled over, and just blocked half the road, English style! I was headed to a sacred well, so I dumped three of the water bottles, so I could fill them with spring water. (good job, Aldi panic stop!) The hippies went into an old pump house - a place I later learned is called the White Spring Sanctuary.
It was so beautiful. It had a sort of neo-pagan hippy magic vibe, very much like the Chapel of Sacred Mirrors. But, it also had an older, deeper power. As you know, I adore She of the Waters Below, whom I call by her Greek name, Tethys. I had a profound experience the other day at Bath, and this was, in many ways, the twin of that. Now...look... I'm not saying the National Trust (which is the non-profit that administers most of the British Sacred Sites I've been to) ... I'm not saying they actively attempt to profane everything they touch and turn the Holy Places into tourist attractions, but, well... honestly, I didn't really feel anything at Avebury or many of the other "well tended" sites I've been to. I've seen a lot of "our ancestors were so foolish that they believed this nonsense" explanatory plaques.
But this spring was the way I like my sacred sites. Dirty. Dangerous. Powerful. No cameras are allowed inside, but below I've put a video I found on youtube, which ends abruptly, when he's told it's not allowed. Since it's already on youtube, I think it's ok.
"Wait! Is this allowed?!? Can I get in?!?!" I looked around. It seems that it was ok, because nobody made any fuss at all. Honestly, it seemed like nobody but me really even noticed. Hard to say. Brits aren't the most emotionally expressive of peoples (or, more likely, I don't know how to read their emotional expressions yet?). Maybe Brits are just casual about public nudity, like other Europeans? I don't know. But here's the thing: it's fucking December. It's warm here compared to home, (it was about 40'F today), but this spring house isn't heated. It was cold as fuck just having my feet in an inch of water on the stones. And I'm an ice princess who is rarely cold.
I think he caught me staring, wide eyed. He motioned to me I should get in. I stripped, put my clothes on a bench, and clamored over the rim into the fountains. I closed my eyes for a moment, and made a bit of a thanksgiving prayer. I must assume he got dressed and left while my eyes were closed because I didn't see him again. But, in truth, it seems impossible he could have gotten out of the fountain, gotten dressed, and left the building in the few minutes my eyes were closed. In truth, I believe he was never there, or...never an embodied human. I think he really was the Holy Horned One.
It was extremely cold. Seriously. Fucking. Cold. Searingly cold, and then numb. My friend M and I, when we were young, would sometimes enter the Atlantic in Delaware for our birthday in late February. That is the only time I have ever felt cold like this.
And yet, only my outside got cold. My blubber protects me; it takes a long time for cold to penetrate me. This is not an adventure I think would be safe for skinny folk!!
I was in the main circular pool for a little while. I got a lot of nasty stares and evil eyes. Why, when the man in green got none? Perhaps because I am fat. There is a cost to being fat, happy, and naked in public. People who spend a lot of time obsession over being not-fat get VERY angry about me being fat and not "appropriately" ashamed about it. After many unhappy years, I finally understood that is because my happiness obviates their own. Perhaps all that suffering they put themselves through isn't worth it? So, it's possible that's why. Or, of course, it's possible they couldn't see the Green Man, and I was NOT supposed to be naked in the fountain. It's possible they were just worried I'd get pneumonia; it was cold AF. No way to know.
There, the water was up to about my knees. Next, I moved to the back left, where there is a small altar of the Black Madonna, Our Lady Below. I climbed up. In the large pool at the back, behind the Black Madonna altar, there were stairs leading in (which I took as a sign that I was permitted to go there). There, the water reached up to my breasts. COOOOOLD!!!!!! I ducked under the waterfall, and drank some of it. I was weeping, I think. An old lady was singing in what sounded to me like a non-Russian Slavic language. Possibly Ukrainian?
I had a visitation experience which I will not share, save to say that it ended with an angel interrupting and commanding me to get out of the cold water NOW! I looked down at my hands, and my nails were starting to turn blue. Even blubber can't protect you forever.
I had a visitation experience which I will not share, save to say that it ended with an angel interrupting and commanding me to get out of the cold water NOW! I looked down at my hands, and my nails were starting to turn blue. Even blubber can't protect you forever.
The old lady gave me a hand getting out. I do not think she spoke English. I dried off as best I was able, and put my clothes back on. It was very, very, very cold being in the wind. I quickly walked back to the car, cold and wet, and jacked the heat up as high as it would go. I sat for a while, collecting myself. It was a very powerful experience. Second to Eleusis, this is perhaps the most powerful magical place I have ever felt. I wish it had been warmer, so I could have stayed longer.
I'm tired of writing, so I will tell you more later tonight or maybe tomorrow. Museum of Witchcraft and Magic is slated for tomorrow, and Merlin-themed site-seeing. :) . Excited. Good night!
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