Approaching the Spring Equinox and Lent

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New moon at Sunset from the Vicarage

We met in that dark time, just before the new moon for the Circle on Thursday. As we fed ingredients into our shared ‘wisdom pot’, the equinoctial theme of balance kept recurring. During our meditative walking time in nature, the cold frosts of winter and the bright beginnings of Spring were equally evident. Here at home, how I wished I had photographed our beautiful Vicarage rhododendron before the delicate pink flowers were frosted to a sad brown!

The early Spring of Imbolc really is drawing to a close, as the snowdrops fade and the slow, veiled start of the season begins to move to a faster pulse. Everyday new shoots are emerging…wild garlic and dogs mercury especially are the great green pulse in our local hedgerows. I walked to the old ash by Bidwell Brook, past a bank starred with celandines shining in the sun and got down on my knees in the frosty grass to smell my first violet flowers. (Which turned out to be scentless ‘dog’…rather than ‘sweet’ violets). Apparently we have Zeus to thanks for violets, who created them as a fitting food for the nymph Io, after turning her into a white heifer to hide his lover from his jealous wife… hmmm

Dartington crocus… on the ‘lenten purple’ colour theme!

I remember how the approach to the Spring Equinox in our shoreside crofting environment in the Highlands, often included storms and extreme tides. It seemed as if the full birth of Spring and the move towards a moment of balance between light and dark was something of a labour. There’s a similar sense in the life of the world at present, with the ‘Arab Spring’, as the young forces of democracy struggle against the  frosty grip of tyranny. I keep thinking of these people who are giving their lives to this new birth and how buffered we are here from that level of struggle and sacrifice. I think the only time I’ve had any personal sense of that was in home birthing…an experience in which power, pain and the real presence of death are the inescapable path to the wonder of new birth.

The theme of suffering and sacrifice as a path to renewal is of course central to the story of Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection and very close to my heart as we approach the start of Lent… by eating up our rich foods on Pancake Day next Tuesday and preparing to enter a period of austerity, reflection and preparation from Ash Wednesday. This motif is very much in my mind as Sue and I prepare for our next Wood Sisters Day…but more of this in my next post!