Last quarter of Owl Moon, Casa del Sybilla

The mystery of my bottle has not been easy to solve. First, opening the bottle was difficult. Lucia and I brought it to a glassblower in the village, after we had deposited our waste for recycling. In Duwamish cleaning the beaches is very important. We were well rewarded with huge mugs of steaming Chai, apricots, and as many honey drenched pastries as we would carry. Even our little jennies were given apples and good oats for bearing the bags of garbage away.

The glassblower held my bottle carefully over a fire, not the one he uses to melt glass, but something like a large candle. The black coating would become soft, and he would quickly scrape it away with his knife. Much like I had tried the evening before, but his tongs made the process much easier. Once most of the black was scraped away, he gouged away at the cork with a smaller knife. The pieces crumbled away quickly under his deft hands. I held out my hands to him and he poured the contents into them – a tightly bound little scroll and a small gold ring.

The little ring fit my right ring finger. Looking closely I saw it was etched with little markings that I could not decipher. Carefully I unrolled the scroll. It was two pages of translucent paper, vellum I learned later, covered front and back with tiny letters written in a delicate, clear hand. Written in a language I did not understand.

Lucia and I walked the long walk back to the Casa, arriving as the evening banquet was dissolving into the evening dance. Emil graciously curried and cared for our donkeys, tent and baskets. He shooed us into the Casa with a smile. I felt as if the color had faded from the sunset. I was very curious to know what the writing in my bottle said, but afraid too. Whatever one writes, encapsulates in a bottle, seals and throws into the sea, never to know if it be found, is significant.

Once I threw a bottle into a river for a lark. As I take even a lark seriously, I pondered over what message to write. What message is important enough to throw into the future? I imagined who might find it – a little boy fishing? A lonely, moody adolescent? A homeless one looking for bottles and cans to redeem for pennies? I will never know. I imagined the feeling of intrigue and excitement that unknown someone might feel picking up a bottle with a rolled up piece of paper inside. An obvious message.

I thought about what message I would want the universe to send me.

“This too shall pass.” “The sun also rises.” “Somewhere the sun is shining, somewhere the sky is blue.” “Never, never, never give up.” “It’s never too late.”

These messages distill into one word: Hope.

After one of our first dates, my husband sent me a dozen sweetheart rosebuds. The card read, “On the advise of Edmond Dante. Jade.”

He teased me and I had to read all of the Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas to find the answer to his mysterious card. At the very end of the story were Dante’s words of advise, “Hope and Wait.”

Now, when I feel all is lost, all my love and effort to create a happy home and marriage a waste, those words whisper back into memory. Hope and Wait.

Hope and Wait.

Hope and Wait.

My mantra to repeat through the tears. The message of the Universe to my grieving heart.

Hope and Wait.

The words soothe my spirit as the warm water of the bath soothes my tired body.

Lucia and I bathed in the glorious pool near our rooms. Wrapped in soft robes we returned to our rooms. Warm bread and hot lentil soup awaited me in mine. I curled in the ample chair before the fire, eating the nourishing food slowly. A fire wasn’t really necessary for warmth of body, but it is soothing to the soul. Watching the flickering light brings a meditative peace. As does the purring of a creamy kitten nestled under my chin, and a black Tuxedo cat curled next to me, also purring.

Hope and Wait.

One day past full of Owl Moon, the Duwamish Shore

Sybilla has encouraged me to take day trips from the Casa to various destinations with intriguing names: Owl Island, Duwamish Bay, Gypsy Camp, The House of Serpents at Blind Springs, Isle of Ancestors….

I am here for adventure, to explore who I am. Each destination has charm for me, who knows but I will find what I am looking for in one of these places. Today Lucia and I rode our donkeys along the Duwamish River, which is the River I followed from the Cave to the Casa, to the Duwamish Bay. It took most of the day to get here. We circumvented the village of Duwamish, heading south along the coast. We spent the day beachcombing and tidepooling.

Beachcombing had it’s practical purposes, we collected garbage to dispose of in the village tomorrow and we gathered drift wood for our fire tonight. We are camping on the shore this night. My little Jenny bears a basket of food, Lucia’s donkey bears a tent and bedding.

Our wanderings along the sea had their magical purpose as well. Each little tidepool is a miniature world inhabited by amazing creatures. There are flowery anemones, wee little octopi disappearing in a clouds of ink black, limpets, small fish, mollusks clinging to rocks. At tide line are long nests of sea weeds cradling driftwood, dead sea creatures, broken shells. Lucia and I poked through these, sharing treasures as they came. We returned the treasures to the sand, understanding we cannot touch a flower without troubling a star, a poem by Madeleine L’Engle from her book by that name.

All things by immortal power
Near or far,
Hiddenly
To each other linked are,
That thou canst not stir a flower
Without troubling a star.

Thou canst not stir a flower
Without troubling a star.

One treasure I did keep, one which will not disturb the stars adversely, I trust. I found a bottle, tightly capped, its lid sealed with something thick and black, something the salt sea has not corroded. When I shake it there is a dry rustle and a clinking rattle. Something is in the bottle, and I am eager to open it.

Easier said than done. Sweet Lucia would have gladly set up the tent and cooked our simple dinner, but I am not so selfish as that. The suspense will not kill me. It took only minutes to pitch our gaily colored tent, unroll our bedrolls, fluff up our pillows. We grilled our bread, cheese, tomatoes and onions over a small drift wood fire. The kitchen packed us wonderful lunches to keep us going, complete with a well seasoned pan, and bottles of something called raspberry cordial.

After eating I warmed the lid of the bottle carefully over the coals. The sticky something melted some, dropping into the fire with a smell like tar. I tried scraping the tar away with sticks, but became sticky myself with the loathsome stuff. I needed to rub my fingers raw in the sand to remove it. Angel Lucia pulled a lotion from her pack and my wounds were soothed.

We sit listening to the surf, watching stars, toasting our toes before the embers of our little fire. And I write.

Words from Psalms seemed to say themselves, not as I memorized as a child from the King James Bible, but the echo of my own cry -
“‘When I consider the heavens, the work of Your hand, the moon and the stars, which you created; I wonder, ‘What is humanity, that thou art mindful of us? and Who am I, that thou should care for me?’”

Stars are remote, their unfathomable distances hide their violent burning hearts. A thousand years or more for their light to reach my eyes! From here they are pinpoints of light, when in reality they are as enormous as galaxies. I am as lost in the roiling of their heat as I am among their spangled numbers.

Yet I have title to a star; a very little one, invisible except with a telescope, though probably a million times larger than our solar system, just so far away. It was a gift given by my husband’s oldest niece in loving memory of our son.

He would be seven years old now, had he been allowed life. We were told he was stillborn, we believed what we were told. Holding him in my arms eased their ache, I had longed to hold him for so long! Holding him just a little while was both enough and never enough. How I long for just one moment more of holding him to my breast! But just another moment would not be enough, only a lifetime is enough.

My son is as far from me as his star, as close as the comforting picture of him playing on it. He is on the other side of eternity’s curtain, a curtain fragile as an amniotic sac, strong as time, beyond a universe of stars. He is an ache in my heart. He is a dream child looking at me with ancient eyes, promising me that everything I believe is true. I will hold him again someday and it will not hurt to let him go. He will meet me at that star.

Healing has been a raw journey. I cried for more than a year. Until a good doctor gave me pills. Pills didn’t deaden the pain, but somehow I was better able to hold the pain. I could breathe, cradle my grief rather than being borne along by it. Pain had been carrying me along, a wisp in a raging torrent. A leaf on the wings of storm. Now I carried my pain, gently, tenderly, as I walked deliberately through life again.

I can look at the gifts my child’s life left in mine, and treasure each. I understand I will say good-bye to everyone I love. I have learned Eternity is forever; that I live on the Death side of Eternity, my child lives on the Living side.

Tears flow down my face. Why am I crying so now? What loss am I mourning? Lucia sits by me, her arm around my shoulders, gently rocking. How gracious God is to give me her tender embrace. I cry and cry.

I am mourning my marriage.

Full of Sucker Moon, advent of my 45th Year, Casa Del Sybilla

I loathe being born in Sucker Moon. At best a sucker is a leech, a thing that attaches to your skin and sucks through it to feast on your blood. At worst it is profanity. In between it means a gullible fool. None are symbols I want to be associated with.

I prefer Owl Moon. This is the month owls swoop on silent wings through the forest in search of mates. I love their fierce wide eyes, their distinctive call, the strength of their talons. They are sacred to Athena, goddess of night, moon, wisdom and weaving. I do not mind being associated with these.

My daughter loves the moon. She looks for her and talks to her. She bids her to be careful, not to fall. She sings to her and tells her good night when we enter the house. She names the fullish moon Lady Moon, the wisp of a moon is Baby Moon. Once I showed her the moon in the morning sky, to her three-year-old delight. She goes to every window from where she has seen the moon, looking for her.

My Solveig is a daughter of China, a child of the land that celebrates the Moon’s birthday. I want to collect for her all the folk tales about the moon, and tell them to her as we lay in our hammock watching the moon during summer nights. I want to be her own Sheherazade, weaving stories for a thousand and one nights.

The hardest part of my sojourn here at the Casa del Sybilla is being parted from my daughter. I miss her spindly little arms around my neck, her nose to nose stare down, her dancing and singing, her sass. I hope she will forgive me this hiatus away from her.

I have sent post cards, and received back a letter from my family. They are well. Life is going on as usual. I am missed, not just for the tasks I do for the family, though my sons grumble about having more chores to do, but for myself. I am not missing housework. It is pleasant to be waited on by the invisible servants of the Casa. I do not see anyone making my bed or cleaning my room, but it is always clean, though I keep it picked up. I enjoy the tidiness of my surroundings. The orderliness is soothing.

The notes within the letter, the grumbles about chores. bits of news, little drawings and rows of x’s and o’s, make me homesick. Though I miss my little girl most, I miss my sons too. And my husband, of course. But I have missed him for a long time.

I am lonesome in my marriage. I have heard of couples drifting apart so often I believe it is an normal stage of marriage. Not inevitable, but not catastrophic either. I understand better now why long married couples may be tempted into an affair. I can understand why it would be natural to seek the affirmation I crave from my husband, and am not getting, from another instead.

I cannot pinpoint what is wrong exactly. Part of it is the wear and tear of the work of survival. Fate has not been good to us and Fortune has entirely passed us by. We live simply, but even so making ends meet is difficult. Our bitterest arguments are about money, with the division of labor being a close second.

When we were first married his great aunt Louise told us, “Pull together, children, and you’ll never pull apart.” She described the happy marriage with her late husband, husband number three. How he shared every good thing with her. “It’s your turn,” he would say. We are not pulling together, we are not sharing. Our life together feels like a competition, it is definitely a power struggle. It hurts.

The other day our kitchen scissors broke. The pivot pin is loose, so the blades are too far apart to work. It brought to mind an analogy I heard once comparing a marriage to a scissors. Without the connecting piece, commitment, a scissors is two blades that can only stab. With commitment, those blades are united to work together creatively.

Our commitment is there, just too loose to keep us functioning as we should. Closeness is lacking. We are together, just not connected right. But we are fixable, yes, definitely fixable.

But will our scissors be fixed?

I pray that it will. Perhaps I will find a cure here in Casa del Sybilla. The very walls exude wisdom here. Sybilla is an oracle, not because she can see the future, but because she understands the questions. I have not asked her any real questions, just queries to make sense of the Casa. But I have heard her answer others who asked, “what is the meaning of my life?” Her cryptic answers do not obscure truth, but force one to look squarely at truth, especially at truth you do not want to see. But if you choose not to see, you will never heal.

My days are peaceful here. I spend much time in study, in thought. I read, write, draw, paint, walk, enjoy the opulent surroundings. Every afternoon after a nap, Lucia and I meet in the courtyard to do needle work. I embroider my dress; she cards, spins and knits.

Through her knitting, I have discovered how I am linked to Lucia. A few days ago she was knitting brightly colored yarn in a pattern that is very familiar to me, the Oxfam Sweater. Many years ago I found the pattern in an old magazine and started making them. An American craft magazine carried the article and gave an address to send the finished sweater. From there they would be distributed around the world to children. I started making them. My favorite was one of bright rainbow stripes with tassels along the side where the colors changed. It looked so happy when I finished it. As I knit I pray for the recipient, even if it is someone I do not know. God knows. And God answers prayer for our benefit.

Lucia was the child who received that rainbow sweater. She showed me a photograph of her as a little girl, hiding her face behind her hand, but obviously proud of her sweater. Her brown eyes sparkled in the picture, she looked so beautiful. She wore the same expression showing me this treasured picture, and looks as beautiful still. The sweater I made of leftover yarns blessed her. Now she is blessing other children with pretty sweaters. And she blesses me with her companionship and assistance.

Sybilla told me Lucia’s story. She was abandoned in Katmandu, Nepal just around the corner from an orphanage. It is likely her parents were poor and broken hearted that this little daughter was born with a cleft palate. The orphanage took her in, of course, and she grew up there. She was four years old before a volunteer surgeon from Canada repaired the cleft. With every year that passed her chances of adoption grew less and less. She was taught to card, spin, weave, and embroider, showing amazing aptitude and creativity. In time she found her way to Casa del Sybilla.

“How did you know I made Lucia’s sweater?”

Sybilla smiled, “I am del Sybilla.”

The following day we went to the bazaar. I felt shivery, excitement tingling my spine and nervousness prickling my skin. We departed in the morning, before the day was too hot and while the produce was freshest. The air was crystal, dew pearled on every leaf. The walk pleasantly wound along the river, shafts of rising sunlight illuminating our path.

We entered a city gate into a world aflame with color, scent, and noise. The bazaar is a maze of tent covered booths overspilling every plaza down almost every cobbled street of the city. Brightly colored carpets are heaped with wares, shaded by equally bright awnings, shading vendor and customer. Merchandise is wonderfully jumbled together, bolts of colorful cotton and shimmery silks next to shelves of polished bronzes, next to rows and rows of glittering beads. Glassblowers rub elbows, literally! with herbalists’ trays of medicinals. Mounds of mangoes, apples, lemons, spill into the embroidered slippers next door to them. Chandlers create next to tinkers repairing pots. Next to them an artist paints a child’s portrait watched an awed audience. There a woman sells love charms. Here a young boy squeezes oranges into tall glasses. Tall vases of fresh flowers create a garden before the door to an Internet Cafe. Tables of books front a pastry shop. Amid the hullabaloo three little boys are giving away chubby puppies from a basket. Across the aisle their sisters are giving away kittens.

Everywhere there are people; hawking, laughing, talking, haggling, gossiping, in languages I do not understand. Musicians wander up and down, or sit in the middle of plazas, cups next to them to receive offerings. Already cups are nearly full of gold and silver coins, flowers and fruits are also laid near the musicians as tribute. The music is barely heard over the din of voices.

A blind girl, draped in a glittering red sari, sings so sweetly the noise around her is stilled. She seems to rise out of an island of flowers. Like everyone else, Lucia and I stand entranced by her song. When she finishes we discover we had stopped breathing to listen. Lucia quickly purchases several golden roses to lay at her feet.

I am dazzled by the smells. Fruit, flowers, the musk of people’s bodies, bread, sizzling meats, coffee beans being ground mix with the amonnial smell of animal dung. When we passsed a spice merchant, my eyes began to water and my nose went numb from the intesity of the smell – pepper, chilis, ginger, cumin, aise, cinnamon, cloves heaped in pungent mounds. Livestock, butchers and tanners are kept separate, the smell of their trades repel customers even as they attract flies. Here bleating, braying, clucking and quacking increase the volume of the bazaar’s cacophony. Lucia and I scurried away, unable to bear the sight of creatures in tanks and cages waiting to be butchered for dinner.

Lucia is my good angel, without her I would have wandered helplessly for days among the stalls. She held my hand, leading me faithfully to the very center of the bazaar where the Golden Bone Chair awaited.

It stood on a dais under a scarlet canopy upheld by polished black spears. We listened to a woman weave an enthralling tale of a Scottish doctor’s encounter with the fey – an exquisitely chilling story.

Then it was my turn.

A very queer feeling tickled behind my breast bone as I took my seat. I laid my sweaty palms on the lap of my gown to still their trembling. I sat straight, praying I looked calm, at a loss as to what I would say. I had rehearsed a dozen stories a hundred times, but still nothing seemed right. I met Lucia’s beaming eyes. Sybilla stood next to her, nodding encouragement. She took it for granted that I would do well. She knew I would which is how she knew I could! The realization galvanized me. Del Sybilla knows! Her confidence in me is based on knowing what I would do, not just because she had faith in my potential.

I breathed deeply and began. The stories and study of the past few weeks spun together. The words flowed from me. They knit themselves together smoothly, creating a garment beautiful and whole. And exactly 1001 words.

http://lemurianartefacts.blogspot.com/

My knees wobbled as I stepped down from the dais. Lucia put her arms around me, steadying me. Sybilla took my face in her hands to kiss my forehead. Those who had listened smiled and bowed when they met my eye. Some gave me flowers, some slipped coins into my pocket.

I had a sudden thought. “Sybilla! How do they understand me when I don’t speak their languages?”

“It is the magic of the Golden Bone Chair. Those who speak from it are heard by those who listen in their own language.”

As we passed through the bazaar returning home, the merchants pressed me to take from their wares. “Sybilla, what do I do? I cannot take these things, I don’t need them.”

“It is good to be prudent in what you choose, but please accept some of what is offered you. It gives the merchant status when a Golden Bone Storyteller chooses their merchandise. Your choice endorses their quality.”

“How can they know I told a story? Most did not hear me.”

“When you tell a story of exactly 1001 words on the chair, a golden mark appears on your forehead. When you choose from a merchant, a golden bone will hang at his stall. The more golden bones, the more prestige the merchant has.”

“The storytellers in the bazaar will repeat your story exactly as you told it until everyone has heard. You are famous here now.”

Lucia guided me through the bazaar maze, shaking her head for me, helping me accept only a little. We ate fresh pastries and drank lassi flavored with rose. I accepted a kitten from the little girls, a tiny cream and brown smidgeon with blue eyes. Because a Golden Bone Storyteller chose their kitten, all the kittens were assured a home. Henceforth, all the kittens the mother of my kitten ever birthed would share the distinction of Golden Bone Pedigree.

Lucia helped me choose floss to continue my embroidery. Today’s adventure must be stitched on my gown.

for more information about the Oxfam Sweater and Guideposts Sweater Project go to
www.guidepostsmag.com/sweater

Bear Rose

Bear Rose

Bear Rose, eyes closed, lifted her face to the warm sun, breathing deeply of the sweet scents of the forest. The sun burned bright red through her eyelids, red teh color of fire, of life, of her monthly flowings, just begun for the first time.

She sat in the door way of a small wigiwam, a house just for her, a house for this special time. It faced east, away from the village, that she could bask in the mornig sun during the dawn of her womanhood. She was a woman now. This was her time of testing. Alone, away from the village, she would fast for four days, adn then return home, transformed from child to woman.

It was good being here, alone, although a bit strange. Last night was the first time she had ever slept away from her family. always she had lain close to her sister, Little White Flower, arms around each other, whispering until they fell asleep. Last night she had been alone, listening to the sounds of night, teh wind rustling the leaves, the traffic of small creatures, the singing of owls. She had no dreams, but awoke as teh sky was pearling to white of a mussle shell. Wrapping herself in her blanket she sat her in teh dew spangled morning, reveling in the beginning of this first day of womanhood.

She let her breath exhale slowly and breathed in agian, opening her eyes. what she saw frightened her breath away. Not ten paces away was the most magnificent bear she had ever seen. Had been standing on his hind legs he would easily be twice the height of her father. He stood facing her, quietly looking at her. His gaze held hers, she forgot the admonition to not stare at a creature, such was a threat to them. The gaze of this bear was different, something about his eyes was different. His stare did not threaten her. teh bear took a step forward. Bear Rose remembered her manners and dropped her eyes. She was trembling now. She could not hear or see the bear, but felt him coming closer. she did not feel danger, for his posture was calm.

The bear was so close she coudl feel his breath on her cheek, his smell enveloped her. From teh corner of her eye she could see the claws on his foot, as long as her longest finger. She trembled, afraid and excited too.

“Look at me.”

Her head flew up in surprise. Surely teh bear did not speak like teh People! She was looking him eye to eye. His eyes were beautiful brown, they seemed sad and gentle.

“Touch me.”

The voice was deep, and rich, the voice of a bear, but it did not come form his mouth, it reverberated within her head.

Still, trembling adn very slowly, she reached out her hand for his face, gingerly running her fingers in teh warm, coarse hair of his jaw.

The bear turned hhis head adn nuzzled his nose in her palm. He gave her hand two gentle swipes with his tongue, like a mother cleaning her cub’s ear. Then he backed slowly away into the brush. his eyes held her eyes until he turned adn was gone.

Bear Rose felt dizzy, she had ceased to breathe while the bear was so near. Her hand felt moist where his muzzle had been.

Was this real? or was it a vision of her fast?

Third Day of Waning Moon, Spirit Moon of my 44th year, Grotto del Sybilla

Today I woke wonderfully refreshed. The sun was well up. I washed up and dressed in one of the gowns I made for this trip. Then I wandered in the garden outside my room. The garden was surrounded on all sides with other verandahs, barely discernible through the trees, fountains and flower beds. The path wove through the garden revealing its treasures a bit at a time, roses and lavender, flowers of every color and scent, fruit trees in blossom and frutation at the same time, delightful fountains, comfortable benches inviting repose.

Lucia found me in the garden. Taking my hand she led me back through my room out the door into the grand hallway, down the stairs to the same room where we ate the evening before. Sybilla was already breaking her fast and greeted us warmly.

“My dear daughters, good morning. How well you look!”

We sat down as Sybilla filled our bowls with muesli and fresh milk. There were goblets of golden apricot nectar, and hot, fresh, saffron buns studded with almonds, crusted with sugar.

“How do you like your room?” Sybilla asked.

“It is perfect. Everything is so rich, so luxurious.”

“I am glad you are comfortable. The room will evolve during your stay. Right now everything is white, everything is plain. It is a blank canvas, a mirror that will reflect you as you grow into yourself during your stay. In a few days we will go to town for market day. Until then, please roam around the estate, make yourself at home.

“We do not serve meat here, in my Casa. I prefer not to take life to live. But neither are we strict vegetarians. We do eat unfertilized eggs and drink milk. There are vendors in the market who sell meat. You will offend no one if you choose to try the wonderful foods they sell.”

“I also prefer meatless meals. I will need to have money exchanged, or I will not be able to sample the delicacies of the market. Is there a bank or exchange office near by?”

Sybilla shook her head. “You will have no need of money here. We barter for all our needs.”

I felt panicked. “I do not have anything to barter!”

Sybilla smiled gently, and patted my cheek. “Oh, indeed you do have something to barter, you have skill. In the center of the market is a chair of gold bones. If you sit in the chair and tell a tale of 1001 words, no more no less, every one who stopped to listen will be in your debt. Everyone always listens, here stories are more valued than gold.”

Sybilla’s words did not reassure me. “What will i say? how will I know when I have spoken 1001 words exactly? I don’t think I can do this.”

“You will do splendidly. Ramble around the estate, listen to the murmurs of wind and water, when you take the chair, the tale will tell itself.”

Sybilla rose gracefully, kissed both Lucia and I on our foreheads. “I will see you at dinner. Enjoy your day, my daughters.” She left Lucia and I to finish our meal.

After we had eaten, I asked to see Jenny. I felt guilty to not be caring for her myself. Lucia’s warm smile communicated understanding. She led me through gardens mazing through elegant white buildings until we came to an arched way in the sheltering wall adjacent to the stables. Outside the wall was a pasture, no fence that I could see, but many horses and donkeys placidly grazed. My Jenny detached herself from the herd and trotted to me. She nuzzled my hands and face, happy to see me.

The gentleman who had taken her from me the evening before joined us. “She is sweet, this little jenny,” he said to me, stroking her back with a gnarled hand.

“I met her only yesterday, but I feel like I have always known her.”

“She feels the same, Signora.”

“May I help in her care?”

“Of course, Signora.”

The gentleman introduced himself as Emil. He showed me where the fresh hay was kept, and the pitchfork. I knotted up my skirt and shoveled the dirty straw into a wheelbarrow, wheeling it to the compost heap near a large garden. I filled the stall and manger with sweet, fresh hay, and her stone trough with fresh water I drew from a well – drew by lowering a jug down into the deep with a rope and pulling it up again. It was seven jugs to fill the trough. There were curry combs and brushes an a shelf in her stall. I took them and brushed Jenny until she was soft as velvet. She bit my shoulders delicately, it felt like a caress, before she trotted back to graze.

Lucia took my hand and we walked across the pasture, picking up a trail on the far side. The path wound through the trees downhill to the river. We followed the water downstream to a waterfall and pool. We spent the morning climbing over the stones and wading. We watched trout in the deep pool, they were hiding behind rocks and under trailing branches, gleaming in their jewel like colors. We sat on the sun warm rocks in companionable silence, our bare feet dangling in the chill water. When we began to feel hungry we walked back to the pasture and into the Casa. Although Lucia did not speak, she communicated very well with a look, a nod, a gesturing hand. I felt as if we were having a conversation, even when we sat without looking at each other at all.

Lucia led me to the kitchens, where we were given fresh bread, cheese, fresh fruit and a jug of milk. We took our bounty into the garden near my room, where Lucia had found me in the morning, sat on the benches by a fountain, and ate. Colorful little birds chirruped about us, and we responded by sharing our bread and fruit. Boldly they perched on our fingers to eat crumbs from our palms. Their little feet and beaks tickled, making us giggle, setting the little birds to flight.

After we finished eating, Lucia walked me to the verandah. She stopped at doors kitty corner to my own, and bowed slightly to invite me in. These were her rooms, very similar to mine. Her rooms were abloom with color. In addition to a sitting room, overflowing with books, she had another room with a spinning wheel, loom, raw wool to be carded and dyed wool to be made into cloth. Her eyes beamed with pride as I fingered the fine wool, and exclaimed over the beautiful pattern of the woven cloth. She laughed delightedly as she displayed to me lengths of colorful cloth, each more brilliantly lovely than the last.

She led me to her stacks of books, nudging me to look through them. She placed several in my arms, and led me back to my own doors. She bowed slightly, inclining her head on her hands as a gesture to rest. I watched her return to her rooms, moving across the garden with the grace of a dancer.

Entering my room I saw its metamorphosis had begun. The white drapes about my bed had been replaced with shimmering midnight blue ones. The alcove containing my bed was painted the colors of twilight, rosy afterglow blending into the violet blues deepening night, the silver moon and glittering constellations properly placed. The white bedding and pillows had been replaced with new ones in the twilight colors of the wall.

Across from it the sheer white drapes enclosing the window seat were replaced by filmy rose ones, the white pillows replaced by those with colors of sunrise. Between bed and window lay a Persian carpet, blending the cycle of day and night in rich splendor. Kicking off my sandals I buried my feet in its luxurious softness.

I wanted to dance and curl up to sleep at the same time. I danced across the room into my sitting room, which was still the same soothing white. I curled up on the sofa, delighted to find a tray with a pot of hot tea and chocolate confections within comfortable reach. Cocooning myself in a throw soft as cloud, I began to page through the books Lucia had given me – my idea of bliss.

One book was a book of poetry, more like a casket of finely polished gems. Each poem seemed like a smooth stone in my palm. The second was an encyclopedia of goddess mythology, the third an anthology of multicultural short stories and poems. I read bits from each, sipping tea, nibbling chocolate, hunkering deeper into the softness of my sofa corner, gradually drifting into sleep.

Which may explain my odd disjointed dream. It was like a slide show of memories, I recognized everything – the unfinished room where the lathes showing through the plaster; the dormer window, painted shut a fly buzzing madly against the grungy glass; doors locked to keep me in, keep me safe, but what was on the other side could unlock the door; the leaning tree which was so easy to climb; the burned forest behind the house oozing smoke like pus from a wound; the dim, pungent interior of the privy house; six ducklings shivering in a corner of the horse trough, peeping desperately; cattails rising as walls along each side of a gravel road; a black snake, thicker than my arm, twice my height, undulating at my feet; the dizzy height of the corn crib; wood ticks; planting a penny packet of seeds that I would never see grow…

I jerked awake, panting, my heart pounding furiously in my chest, a film of sweat across my forehead. The memory was from kindergarten days. More images flashed across memory’s screen – the cool halls of the church where I went to school; the rug I used for nap time; the little bathroom; crackers and milk at snack; marking a strip of paper with X’s to be an Indian headband, coloring a pillow case cut to be an Indian dress; coffee can drums; rebelliously hitting my drum one time after being warned not to; having to put away my Indian clothes in my coffee can as consequence; of other children pushing me around the room on a papier mache horse; of going home with a little girl to her yellow house, so beautiful with wrought iron, sunken living room, tuna sandwiches and the bright whiteness of her room; a kennel of black dogs barking and jumping as I came to them through a mist; a trailer, being introduced to my new daddy; watching him take apart jewelry and glue it on his guitar, giving me a brooch of pansies frozen in lucite, ball chains and plastic charms from his bag of treasure; building play houses with broken concrete blocks; gleaning cans and such from the garbage for dishes; scaling snow mountains pushed up by plows; my new daddy crashing his milk truck, crushing his face, nearly dying; the house behind the green dinosaur filling station where Mary Alice took care of me; her twin daughters, three sons, Kevin just my size, we both liked tomato soup; the wall hanging of the Virgin Mary her dress a basin for holy water, climbing a pine tree; trapped between mother and the wall while she napped; standing on a chair to wash dishes; locked in my room with socks over my hands feverish with chicken pox….

I shook my head to stop the parade of details. I reached for the tea, hot and fresh, replenished as I slept. Breathing slowly I sipped it, savoring the jasmine scent. Thankful for the call of nature, I left my memories on the sofa as I retreated to the W.C.. I did not want to think of childhood. Splashing water on my face washed away the gound from my eyes. I walked barefoot into the sunshine of the garden.

Lucia was carding wool where we had enjoyed our lunch. She gave me a pair and we spent the remaining afternoon teaching me to card. My arms became sore from the unfamiliar labor. My mind was bleary from memories. I was grateful to go to dinner.

Dinner was served in a large dining room. Sybilla sat at the head table, gracefully reclined on her divan. Lucia and I took a divan halfway down the left side. The tables formed a U, leaving a wide aisle in the center. Musicians sat on floor pillows playing guitar and flute. Servants were placing platters of food on the tables from the center as well. I thought they were servants, until I saw them exchange places at the table with others who had finished eating.

I recognized Emil from the stable, he raised his goblet in salute to me, as well as others Lucia and I had met as we traversed the Casa. Everyone was engaged in conversation, laughing, arguing. The sound burbled over me as water over stone. I did not feel like talking, and did not feel conspicuous for not. Lucia and I shared our meal in the same companionable silence we shared all day. She dished foods onto my plate, they were all delicious. Pastas in creamy sauces, broiled eggplant, salads piquant with citrus dressings, and always the fresh bread, the sweet wine.

After dinner we wandered into the dining room courtyard. torches blazed, illuminating the snowy stone as gold. More musicians played lively dance tunes – Musicians and dancers joining and leaving the gathering easily. Lucia and I watched the dancers. All my life my body has longed to dance, restrained by religion and lack of opportunity. In high school I learned a little disco, a few line dances, and the slow swaying dance of prom. I have not danced since then. I did not know the steps which were thoughtlessly familiar to the joyous people before me. After awhile Lucia and I wandered back to our garden, the music floating after us.

In our garden, Lucia showed me the steps to the dance. We walked through them slowly, picking up speed, until I was whirling about the garden paths as confidently as any, laughing in the freedom of flying, until we danced and laughed ourselves into a tired heap among roses.

Impulsively I embraced Lucia. She hugged me back, flooding me with the peace which comes from the true affection of kindred spirits. We bowed goodnight to each other.

The only change in my room was the presence of a dainty black and white cat. If I was not absolutely certain my own black and white cat was at home many thousand miles away, I would have sworn she was my Tuxedo. The kitty rubbed herself sinuously about my ankles, before hopping into my bed kneading herself a spot in my comforter.

I have caught up in this journal, and jotted off a postcard to home, before I go to sleep. Except for the dreams, it has been a perfect day.

Second Day of Waning Moon, Spirit Moon of my 44th year, Grotto del Sybilla

Second Day of Waning Moon, Spirit Moon of my 44th year, Grotto del Sybilla

I arrived here late yesterday. It was a day long trek by mule through the forests of the Sibillini Mountains. David picked me up at the convent at 7:00 AM as he said. I had eaten breakfast with the nuns in their dining room. Hot bread spread with ricotta cheese and apricot preserves. They were gracious and caring. All I could say was ‘Si’ and ‘Grazie’, but many spoke a little English, and we could make our selves understood to each other. They wished me good journey to the Sybilla. When David teased and laughed familiarly with them, I felt all my apprehensions dissolve. This adventure was unorthodox, true, but there was no latent evil lurking to exploit me.

I mailed a post card to my family, as we walked to the Piazza San Benedetto. There the car from yesterday was waiting. We drove into the National forest where a young man was waiting with donkeys. David took charge of a dark grey male and introduced me to an almost white little jenny. Across her back was a darker grey marking of a cross.

“It is a marking all donkeys have since they bore the Christ into Jerusalem on the day of Palms,” David informed me.

“Does everything in Italy have a legend?” I asked, half teasing and half serious.

“Everything,” answered David, smiling.

I stroked the cheek of the little donkey. Her black eyes were those of a friend. She nuzzled into my hand as I laid my face against hers.

“What will you call your donkey?” David asked.

“I get to name her?”

“She will be yours throughout your stay. Naming her will make her more so.”

I thought for a moment. “I can not think of anything better than ‘Jenny’.”

“Jenny it is,” affirmed David.

We rode and walked through the forest. We started on the marked trails. At a small stream, we left the trail and followed the flow of water up stream. David showed me our route on a topographical map. Besides being written in Italian, it might have been ancient Chinese for all I understood. David patiently explained where we were and where we had come from. He tied a leather sack to my saddle.

“I have lived here all my life. Summers between college I worked as a guide here. I know every rock and tree, but you do not. Should we become separated, go down hill until you find water, the Jenny she find water, let her lead. Then sit, make a fire. In your pack is a fire kit and a flare. Send up the flare. Either myself or the park salvare, the rescue, will come.”

We continued to follow the stream until we reached where it came out of the rock through wintergreen. David plucked a leaf of wintergreen, chewed it , cupped his hands and drank, inviting me to do the same. The taste was amazing, cold and fresh. I felt renewed.

“This must be the fountain of youth!” I exclaimed.

“Perhaps it is,” answered David with a grin.

From the source of the steam we followed a trail only David could discern. It wove around and up the mountain, almost to snow line, then down again. In the valley was a larger stream.

Here we made a fire and had a lunch. Rather, I made a fire using the materials David had given me in the sack. I had never made a fire using flint and steel before, after a few awkward swipes I was able to direct the spark into the tinder. David had directed me in collecting bit of dry twigs and sticks. He was satisfied I could do this independently if need arose.

David made a satisfying lunch of good panini from the convent, chevre montrachat, prosciutto, fresh pears, wine. The fire was for comfort. It felt good to stretch my hands over the tongues of flame.

I had continued mulling over the saints. There were so many similarities between them, they overlapped areas of patronage. I did not think it was coincidental. I shared this thought with David.

“I think that is astute.”

“David, what deities were here before the Christians?” Christianity is plagued with the ghosts of paganism. I know the early church blended the customs of the paganini, the peasants, with Christianity. Gods and goddesses were given new histories and became saints. Festivals were kept in form, but changed in substance. Winter Solstice became Christmas. Hallow Even became All Saint’s Day, though it has stubbornly retained its druidic roots despite the attempt to convert it to Christianity. Halloween is divisive among Christians, some who abhor it as Satanic, others see it as a benign childhood holiday.

“Before the Estrucans, I cannot say. All early peoples believed in a spirit world. Estrucans came from somewhere over the sea. Where? No one knows. Perhaps Atlantis? But they came, and settled the west of Italy into these mountains. This land is called Etruria when the scholarii talk about that time. “

“How long ago?”

“About nine hundred to a thousand years before the Christ. They bring their civilization with them, their way of life, which is better than the people here. They bring gods that are like people, not simply the spirit of this, the spirit of that. Nortia is one goddess they bring. She is a dark goddess, of fate, healing and time passing. Nortia drives the nails of fate, she is also called Nortia of the hammer. Nail, hammer, they are death symbols. In her temple at Vulsinii, every year the priest drove a nail into the door. The tarfuti, truffles, are called ‘nails’ by the plain people. They look like nails. Like St. Anthony she is patron of truffles, but because of nails, not the pig. There is a song to her when the truffle hunt is not good –

“ di Norcia va ti à raccomodare
Che i tartufi ti faccia ritrovare,
E cosi io lo potro tanto ringraziare,
Che la fortuna mi voglia ridare!”

‘To Norcia go and pray;
For if her favour we implore,
She’ll grant us truffles in such store,
Fortune will smile for ever more.’”*

“Perhaps, Saint Benedict, Saint Anthony, Saint Scholastica are Christian faces for Nortia?”

“Perhaps. The Greek and Romans break her up into many goddesses, Tyche, Nemesis, Fortuna, who knows how many others?”

I thought on these things as we traveled downstream this time, crossing the stream to follow its eastern bank as it flowed southeast. We forded five small streams flowing into the one we were following. The stream, birds and wind created music for our pleasure. The woods were deep, every log and stone coated with velvety moss. At the fifth stream we turned north east to follow the water upstream. The climb was steep, but little Jenny was sure-footed as she followed David’s donkey. The way was blessed with many waterfalls, leaping joyfully on their journey to the sea.

After about an hour, David turned west to follow a trickle. About a kilometer from the stream the trickle led to a wall of rock, its face covered with heavy brush. David began to pull back the brush from the wall, holding away with bungee cords to trunks and branches of nearby trees, exposing the entrance to a cave.

The entrance was just a hair taller than I am, but wide enough for Jenny and I to walk abreast. David opened a pack on his donkey and handed me a candle lantern. He tied another leather sack to my saddle pommel. Taking a lighter from his pocket he lit the lantern, handing me the lighter as well.

“From here Signora, you will find your own way.”

“Through a cave! Alone!”

“Jenny will be with you. The way, it is easy to follow, When you are in doubt, go right! The path is well worn under your feet and marked also with soot along the wall. In the bag are more candles, the lighter is better than flint and steel in the cave.” He smiled at my shocked face. “Let us take a little refreshment before you go, give you a chance to get acquainted with the idea, si?”

David built the little fire this time. I stood stupidly holding the lantern. A cave. I thought of Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher and Injun Jim lost in the cave. I remembered caves I had visited, one in Wisconsin with my father, Mystery Cave with my husband and sons, a cave in Tennessee with my husband. It amazed me, the stark beauty hidden in darkness. The ancientness, the millennia each inch of rock formation needed for creation, and how fragile, how easy to shatter. Caves were the earliest shelters of human beings. Caves are mysterious, their darkness hides secret rooms of exquisite beauty. They have provided safety from marauders, but they are dangerous too – to be lost in the labyrinthine bowels of earth, lost in darkness until you die, are terrifying thoughts.

When I read Tom Sawyer, I envied his and Becky’s adventure in the cave. I wished I was Becky Thatcher. Thirty odd years later my wish was coming true.

David was reassuring as we ate more bread, toasted over the fire with sticks, cheese, prosciutto, pears. The wine was warm going down.

“You will not get lost. Pilgrims have used this cave even before Etruscans. It will take you through the mountain. You will come out on a clear path to Sybilla’s casa. “

How long will it take to get through the cave?” I asked, trying hard not to let my fear show.

“Four, maybe six hours, depending on how fast you go. Do not hurry, Signora. She is beautiful, this Grotto del Sybilla.”

David added the sack of leftover food to the other sacks on my saddle. “You can go back with me, if you like. If you become afraid to go on in the grotto, come back. I will wait here for six hours. If you change your mind at any time, the trail is clear through the cave. Follow the path of water, use your flare, someone will find you, bring you out.”

“Thank you.” I was afraid, but I would try.

“You will be fine. You can do this.” David kissed me on the cheek, and embraced me in a tender hug.

I blushed furiously, and stepped boldly into the cave- more to hide my discomfort than to begin the trek through the dark. I held Jenny’s bridle in one hand and the lantern in the other. Before me the cave opened a little. The little trickle of water flowed down the far right wall, over stones that looked like puddled satin. Toward the left the floor rose gradually, making shallow, broad steps. The wall curled toward the back of the falling water, making another door way just big enough for Jenny to follow me through.

David had stepped back from the entrance, allowing as much light as possible to illuminate my way. I looked back, he was not there. Taking a deep breathe I turned the corner. The way was narrow, but wide enough. The walls flared open toward a open roof, bats hung drowsing between stalactites. My lantern threw golden light illuminating the way. David was right, the floor bore the imprint of hooves and the wall wore a smudged line of soot. I was no longer afraid, just curious. I trust him. That thought brought relief to my spirit. I live in an anxious world, a world where trust is infrequent. Believing, trusting David was leading me truly, set me free to enjoy my first solo walk through a cave.

I don’t know how long it took Jenny and I to traverse through the mountain. There is no time under the earth. Time belongs to the sun and moon. These chambers had never seen their light. One chamber opened into another. Sometimes the path twisted among columns of shimmering white stone, so tall they disappeared into black emptiness of the ceiling. One corridor was narrow, its walls lined with crystals shaped like roses, swans, stars, castles. They sparkled in my lantern light. One wall looked like the pipes of an organ, another rock formation shed a shadow like a maiden dancing. We crossed a small burbling stream, and skirted the shore of a lake. Its waters mirror smooth in the dark, a shelf of rock rolling over it, thousands of stalactites dipping down into the still water. Sometimes my lantern would illuminate a room except for the black openings of other pathways. Those made me shiver. I could almost hear siren voices whispering promises to lure me from the path and be lost forever. Fear bound me me safe, safer than Odysseus lashed to the mast to save him from his siren’s song.

I longed to touch the lustrous formations. I was held back by the warning echoes of the cave guides from the past. The oil on my hands, even a single fingerprint, will alter the flow of water, changing the formation to be. Even these rocks, deep in the belly of the earth, are ever-changing. What I do, or do not do, makes an impact in the eternal scheme of things.

Knowledge can be such a burden! I wish I could be as unthinking as the innocent Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher, able to reach out and touch the smooth stone.

What difference will my touch make? The warnings of the cave guides imply my touch will cause irreparable harm. If I carved my name in the stone, that is destructive. It I broke off one of the stalactites, or crystal rosettes, that is destructive. But is it destructive to stroke the wall , like I stroke the soft hair of my child’s head as she lies in my lap? My caress has molded my children as the smooth flow of water has shaped these caverns. The oil of my hand will create a change, just as my life has created a world that is different from what it would have been without me.

I believe I am responsible to leave this world a better place because I exited. My grandfather taught me his life verse, which became my own, without my really thinking about it. It is just me, like my face and oily fingerprints.

‘He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8.’

Touching the wall will make a change in the formation. Whether that change is good or bad, who can say? I believe that when I meet God I will be shown what difference my life made for good or ill, what would have been different if I made different choices. I believe I will feel shame. I believe my shame will be removed when God opens his arms to me, in His embrace I am whole. Though my choices are in ignorance of their impact on eternity, my choices are not ignorant of my heart’s intent. Perhaps that is why the Psalmist prayed, “Create in me a clean heart!”

Why do I want to touch this wall? Because it is ancient, and beautiful and I want to connect with it. Is this a good reason, a pure reason? Who can say? Only the creator of this holy place. I believe touching this wall is touching its creator.

So I touched, I stroked the cold, smooth surface of the stone. I laid my cheek against it, as if to a mother’s breast. The silence of the cave was absolute, as absolute as the darkness but for my candle lamp. The sounds I heard were my own heart beat, the surging of my blood through my veins, the soft sound of my own breath, of my jenny’s breath. I stayed pressed against the stone for a long time. When I pulled away I felt a bit dizzy, disoriented in my head, but deeply peaceful in my heart. I have left a mark in the Grotto del Sybilla. I have made a change.

The sun was slipping on the western side of the mountain when Jenny and I emerged into its shadow on the eastern side. The air was evening cool, but warm compared to the what I am used to. The path from the cave meandered down to the banks of a river, placid as the eventide. I rode Jenny up the path as it curved west from the river to go up a gradual hill. The sun was enough over the horizon to glare into our eyes, keeping us from seeing the the plastered stone wall at it’s crest until we were almost up to it.

The gate was an intrically carved moon gate, without doors to shut any out. It opened into a lush garden, filled with trees in bud, bloom and fruitation. Smooth stones paved a way between the trees, thyme growing rampant between them, giving off a healing fragrance as we stepped on it. Flowers dotted the grasses under the trees, birds and bees still made music in the waning day. Before long we found ourselves entering the arched entry to a courtyard of the same smooth stone. Urns overspilling with abundant flowers lined the covered walk ways. A fountain sprayed water into the air, the drops tinkling over bright colored stones in its basin. Attracted by the colors, I looked closer, the stones were polished gemstones, lapis lazuli, turquoise, opals, bloodstones, moonstones, agate…

When I looked up a young woman was coming toward me. She wore a gown of yellow, embroidered with gold. The gown was sleeveless, showing the golden armbands on her brown arms and bangles on her slim wrists. She wore red slippers on her feet, and ankle bracelets of tinkling bells. Her face was veiled with a scarlet veil. she bowed as she approached me and gestured me to follow. She did not say a word as she led me through another archway to another courtyard, where there were stables. An old man in white, embroidered in blue and silver bowed to both of us and took Jenny’s bridle from me. His smile was gentle in his wizened face, his eyes twinkled kindness. I had no qualms leaving my companion in his care. Had it only been this morning that Jenny had been entrusted to me? It seemed like she had always been a dear friend.

The young woman took my hand, I could see a quietly smiling face behind the veil. Her eyes were also kind, though a little sad too. She led me through yet another arched gate into yet another courtyard, this one huge, with one garden after another, rather than urns. There were several fountains, each in a flower garden devoted to a single color – white, yellow, orange, red, purple and blue, pink. At the end was a sparkling white marble verandah, tall pillars supporting an overhanging roof, centered over a tall arch shaped door. The marble was carved with everything, In the time it took to cross the verandah and the threshold, I saw monkeys in trees, kittens chasing butterflies, mermaids cavorting with dolphins, coral castles under the sea, dragon castles in the clouds, sheep and ivy, grapes and fauns, all in merry occupation. The door was carved as well, the floor and walls inlaid with mosaic stones in sumptuous colors – the same gemstones a in the fountain. The mosaic was geometric in design, intricate. my eyes wanted to follow the design, study it, until it was arrested by the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.

She was not tall, just my height, but seemed taller because of the intricately arranged silver hair on her head. She was a little plump, dimples in her elbows. A veil the color of the sea fell from her hair down her back, the corners bound to pearl bracelets at each wrist. Her gown was the same color, belted with a silver girdle at her waist. Pearl drops hung from her ears, encircled her throat. She was at once regal, but you felt as if you were welcome lay your head on her bosom to be comforted. Her face was old and young at once, the face of one who has tasted deep grief, but risen through its fire refined. There were wrinkles, but they were smile lines. Her cheeks bloomed rosy and her grey eyes were bright. Her smile was genuine and gentle.

I fell to my knee and bowed. “Sybilla.”

She came to me, gently lifted my chin, smiled into my eyes with her own, helped me to help me rise. “Do not bow to me, child. We are all equal here. And welcome. I am glad you are here. “

She turned and I followed her into a dining room. The table was low to the floor, set with fresh bread, fruit and wine. Divans heaped with cushions of every color upon them circled the table. She reclined at her place at the head, patting the cushions next to her for me to do the same.

“I know it has been awhile since you have eaten. And you have traveled long. You will be tired, and stiff. We will eat, and then Lucia,” she gestured to the young woman who was gracefully taking her place at table, “will take you to the baths and to your room. I want you to be comfortable during your stay here. If there is anything you want, no matter how improbable, please ask.”

“Thank you. You are most kind.”

Sybilla smiled, “It is nothing, really. I have more wealth than can be spent in a thousand life times.” She leaned toward me, talking in an impish whisper. “Good wealth is like good manure, when you spread it around it makes things grow.”

“It is hard to accept…”

Sybilla nodded. “Yes, it is hard to be indebted. Who know what price might be exacted? Like Persephone, losing six months of the year to Hades, the price of six pomegranate seeds! Be at peace, Daughter, I will not ask anything you do not want to give wholeheartedly. That you are here is more important to me than anything. You come from a self serving world, so this is hard to accept. In time, you will understand. Now, eat, drink and be merry!”

I nodded, glancing at the young woman, who had pulled aside her veil to eat. Her face bore the scars of a badly repaired cleft lip and palate. Still, her face was beautiful. Sybilla noticed my glance.

“You have met Lucia, but have not been introduced. Lucia know who you are, she has read our correspondence. She has difficulty speaking, so chooses to be silent, unless she has something that must be said. She will be your guide while you are here, to help you. The Casa is quite confusing. She will always be nearby you, like you she likes a companion who doesn’t expect long conversations! Serving you will not impose on her, it is her wish.”

Lucia smiled at me as Sybilla was talking. Sybilla caressed her cheek. There was love between the two women. I felt a stab of longing, wanting to belong in their circle of affection.

The meal over, Sybilla rose. She embraced Lucia and I both, kissing me on the cheek, Lucia delicately on the mouth.

Lucia took my hand and led me up snowy marble steps, white marble halls that could be made of snow for their bright whiteness. She opened a marble door, simply by giving it a gentle nudge with her finger. It opened into a bath. The mosaic in the floor depicted the swirling blue waters and citizenry of the sea. Steps led down to a steaming pool, a sulfuric smell rising with the steam. Through the supporting columns, carved in the shape of trees so realistic they looked like frosted birch in a forest, I could see the room opened up into a garden. Lucia smiled as she took a handful of something from a basket and scattered it on the marble floor. Birdseed! Immediately a flurry of colorful little birds descended in a chirping scrabble. After eating, many birds perched in the stone branches of the columns and sang.

Lucia helped me out of my clothes and into the water. It was hot! I felt myself melting into relaxation. Lucia sat on the steps, her yellow gown billowing in the water. She lay my head in her lap, and taking something from an alabaster jar, lathered my hair. The smell was beautiful, flowery and musky. As she washed she hummed, her music was beautiful, soothing. She rinsed the foam away with cold, fresh water. The contrast between hot and cold made me tingle. Then she combed my hair until it was smooth. Helping me rise from the water, she wrapped me in a thick robe, and gave me soft slippers. She led me to a low table, and massaged my weary limbs.

Leading me through the columns, along a verandah, through tall French doors Lucia brought me into my room. The room was both plain and luxurious. Walls, floor and ceiling were fashioned of snowy marble, intrically carved as those at the entrance. A deep window seat was enclosed by windows as tall as the door, curtained by sheer drapes, and pillowed with cushions of many textures of white. Under another window was a desk and chair. A tall amoire stood against one wall, my back pack contents already stowed neatly away. The bed was in its own alcove, also curtained with billowy drapes and laden with blankets and more pillows of downy comfort. There was an adjacent sitting room, and water closet.

Twilight bathed the room in a sleepy blue light. Lucia turned back the covers as I stumbled groggily to the bed. I was asleep before my head met the pillows.

* www.luckymojo.com/esoteric/occultism/magic/folk/031.html
Unable to get permission to use as the domain had expired and there was no link to author Gregory S. Van Etten

si-Si-Gwad

It had been more than a year. With the coming of the snow her husband, Dassonag, Many Canoes, had departed on his journey to the Spirit World. Now the time of snow had passed and the crows had come again. Si-Si-Gwad sat silently before his grave house remembering. She placed an offering of manomin, dried meat and berries, a fresh cone of sugar inside his grave house. She sang again the song that came to her dreams after he died, “How strong, my beloved! Your spirit is strong in my heart. You cannot stay. I cannot follow. You are strong in my heart.” It comforted her in the long days after his death. It comforted her now that her days of mourning were over, when she would wash her face and body again, put aside her ragged clothes, then braid her hair once more.

There had been other deaths since Dassonag. Fever had taken many, among them her dearest friend, Lissette. Lissette and her husband Jean Luc were foreign, from faraway Montreal. Jean Luc was renegade voyageur, leaving the trading company to live among the People. Lissette had been an indentured servant, bound to serve the woman from Fort William. Lissette served her mistress for seven years, then was free to join Jean Luc. He built her a cabin apart from the white fort in the woodlands. Jean Luc and Dassonag trapped together, hunted together like brothers. After her husband died, Jean Luc continued to give her meat, although her in laws were responsible to support her. From where she sat on the hillside, she could see the smoke from where Jean Luc was burying his wife and her friend.

Si-Si-Gwad missed Lissette as keenly as she missed her husband. The child of Jean-Luc and Lissette, White Flower, was born one moon after her own daughter, Bear Rose. Lissette became her friend as they nursed their daughters together. Si-Si-Gwad taught Lissette the ways of the People. So quick to learn was she! So many questions, how and why! Si-Si-Gwad learned from Lissette as well. Things like knitting and embroidery. Miracles to Si-Si-Gwad, seeing the yarn unraveled from blankets take new shape in toques and mittens, socks and shawls. Shawls were new wonders too, so useful for carrying firewood, gathering food from the garden, drying a child wet from falling into the stream, carrying a sleeping child outgrown from it’s cradle board. Lissette had made her a black shawl with red fringe, colored by the dyes Si-Si-Gwad had taught her to use. Si-Si-Gwad fingered the fringes as she remembered her friend.

In the winters they visited between Si-Si-Gwad’s bark wigiwam and Lissette’s log house. Lissette was as eager to hear the winter stories of the People. In return Lissette told stories of the Christian God, of the God-Son Jesus, which fascinated Si-Si-Gwad. “No greater love has one than this, that he lay down his life for a friend, ” murmured Si-Si-Gwad. Lissette laid down her life for the People. Jean Luc and Lissette had nursed the sick and dying of the People. Lissette had succumbed to the illness and had been the last to die. She lived the life of the God-Son she taled about. She was a real person.

Si-Si-Gwad cared for White Flower while Jean-Luc had nursed Lissette. Lissette was her heart sister as White Flower was now heart sister to her little Bear Rose. As babies in cradle boards they would look at each other and chatter. As toddling children they sat together, passing a willow doll back and forth between them, feeding each other, patting each others faces. As little girls, they shared work together, played in their wigiwam in the bushes, learned from Si-Si-Gwad and Lissette the skills of women. They slept curled like puppies in the same litter, while their parents nursed the ill and buried the dead.

Little white Flower was at home in the wigiwam of Si-Si-Gwad and Bear Rose. She was beloved by Si-Si-Gwad’s mother, her unmarried sister, two boys orphaned by the fever, and Old One Eye, the man her grandmother had married so many years ago.

Si-Si-Gwad had never understood why her grandmother had accepted him as husband. Nor why Dassonag had chosen Old One Eye to be namesake for their child. Old One Eye was cursed. He followed a bear from the time it left its den in spring until it took to its den in winter. He called the bear his son, protecting it from hunters, trappers. Old One Eye was a Mide of great power, he made beautiful carvings, created charms that never failed. Nanabojo gave him those gifts to compensate for his loss of eye and son. People from others bands came to trade for his skills. He was Elder and Mide, so Si-Si-Gwad respected him and obeyed him, but she feared and resented him just the same.

Yet he doted on Bear Rose and Little White Flower, which softened Si-Si-Gwad somewhat. Bear Rose was his only namesake, as others shared her apprehension of choosing as namesake a man so cursed. Bear Rose adored him. He had carved a bear charm from bear bone, the only bit of a bear anyone had ever seen him touch, carving a rose on each side. He, himself, had sewn and beaded the little bag that kept it around her neck. He spread rose petals on both girls’ sleeping mats in summer, and collected rose hips to make a special tea just for them every autumn. To One Eye, Bear Rose and Little White Flower told their night visions upon waking each morning. A child’s dreams were not meaningful, but Old One Eye listened attentively.

Si-Si-Gwad watched Jean Luc, leading Little White Flower by the hand, come toward her. He carried an iron pot, which he silently laid at her feet. She reached for it, and found a bundle inside. The cloth was plain muslin, ready to be dyed. There were also three pieces of trade silver. If she accepted these gifts, she accepted Jean Luc as husband. Si-Si-Gwad knew Jean Luc would come to her thus. Little White Flower needed a mother, she needed a provider. Though there were many men among the People who would gladly fill Dassonag’s place, she preferred Jean Luc. She loved little White Flower. The wife of a voyageur offered many advantages to a woman, living in a log house was pleasant. This would be a good thing for Bear Rose as well. Mostly, filling Lissette’s place brought both Lissette and Dassonag closer, they did not seem as faraway. Life had been good between the four of them, becoming wife of convenience for Jean Luc would be as close as she, or he, could come to keeping that golden time a while longer. To marry any other would change everything forever.

Si-Si-Gwad looked at him gravely and nodded. She held the cooking vessel to her chest and rose gracefully to her feet. Together they walked to the wigiwam. Si-Si-Gwad collected her and Bear Rose’s belongings. Bear Rose and Little White Flower ran to each other, happy to be together once more. They solemnly accepted packs and parcels to carry, and followed their parents home.

Much, much later, Casala del Parco, Umbria, Norcia, Italy

I disembarked in a new world. Leanardo Da Vinci Airport, Rome. Everyone is in a hurry, except me. I listen to the flurry of Italian around me. I wish I understood it. All the Italian I know is from Pucinni, which does not translate well for hailing a cab, or asking where the rest room might be. I shoulder my pack and follow my fellow passengers out of the plane. By looking around me I will figure out what I need to know. Signage is in Italian, then in English. I understand the tragedy of ethnocentrism when I overhear the woman ahead of me say, “Shouldn’t the big words be in English and the translation ones in Italian?”

I am saved from figuring out how to get to the train station from Leanardo Da Vinci by my husband’s worst nightmare. Waiting beyond the barrier is a man who looks like he stepped out of the pages of the racy novel I read on the plane. Tall, muscled, olive complected, black curling hair, black eyes, cleft chin. He holds a sign with my name written in elegant calligraphy. And he holds a red rose.

I square my shoulders and walk to him, outstretch my hand, “Ciao, Signore…’

“Ciao, Signora. I am David Palermo, my sister has sent me to bring you to Norcia.” He takes my hand, bows gracefully as he raises it to his lips. I am melting. My insides were already quivering from reading, now I can barely keep standing. I will never read another romance novel as long as I live.

“Grazie, Signore Palmero.”

“Ah, call me David. You speak Italian?”

“No, no. But I think one should never travel to another country without knowing how to greet properly, say good bye properly and express gratitude.”

“You are a woman of the world I see.”

“Hardly. This is my first trip out of my country, except perhaps Canada. But I live so close to the border that other parts of the United States seem more like a foreign country than Canada.”

“You have the heart of a woman of the world, to believe as you do. Come, I have reservations at a restorante nearby. I will find a taxi.”

He left and I followed dazedly, wondering if I looked nice. Wondering where I was going. All my husband’s misgivings came roaring into my head.

“What if this is a fence for trafficking white slavery?”

I was dressing for bed in our room. I looked at my bulgy, forty something body in the mirror. There was the hip to hip Caesarian scar. There was the navel to pubis hysterectomy scar. Not to mention the hundreds of silvery stretch marks, the blue veins in my thighs, my breasts sagging almost to my waist.

“They’d pay you to take me back.”

“You are being naive.”

“No,” I sighed, “I am being stubborn.” I pulled on my nightie and climbed into bed. “Look I know this is risky, even dangerous. I was reading in “The Things They Carried” how after a battle or ambush, after a comrade died, how the soldiers felt so alive. It was the brush with death that gave them that feeling. I’ve read the same thing about extreme sport fanatics. That’s why they do what they do, the rush from risking death is exhilarating. I want to be alive.”

“So learn to parachute. It would be cheaper and safer.”

I kissed him. “I love you, but I am going. If you love me, let me go.”

“I’m letting you go because I can’t stop you. But I don’t like it.”

“I’m not asking you to like it. I’m not even asking you to understand. I don’t understand, but this feels right somehow.”

“Since when did you start making decisions based on your feelings? You have counseled countless clients not to make decisions based on feelings. You tell us to carefully think things out. Look before you leap.”

“And she who hesitates is lost. I read somewhere that if you have not changed your opinion or mind about something in the past year to check your pulse, you might be dead. Maybe there is a time to trust your gut. I’ve told clients that too. Look, I am as confused about this as you are, but I have to go.”

“Is this a mid life crisis?”

“Probably.”

“What if you never come back?”

“What if you aren’t here when I get back?”

LIfe is about taking risks, or risks taking you.

The taxi pulls up and David Palermo opens the door for me. A moment of decision. What if I never come back? I could back out now, say I’ve changed my mind, go home, or find a hotel and see the sights of Rome. I could be safe. David offers to take my backpack and I relinquish it. I get in. He shuts the door. He enters the other side, gives the driver instructions in Italian, turns and smiles at me. What if I never get back?

“I thought a nice lunch before the drive to Norcia. It is about two, maybe three, hours drive from Rome – after we get out of Rome! I thought a lunch and walk before we leave.”

“That sounds heavenly.”

“I am sorry you will not be able to see the sights of Rome. She is a beautiful city.”

“I am sorry too, but I understand. I can not see and do everything there is to see and do -”

Saying ‘yes’ to one possibility is to say ‘no’ to a thousand others. What has this ‘yes’ cost me? How kind the gods are that we never know!

The restorante is not very far. We sit at a table near a window and I drink in the brilliant sky, sunlight on the buildings, the pass of people. David asks what my favorite Italian food is and I answer unhesitatingly ‘Ravioli’. He laughs and orders for us. And he orders wine. A Baptist preacher’s wife drinking wine with a man who is not her husband in Rome. Scandalous. Terrifying.

Our talk is small talk, he is interested in my life in The Village of the White Deer, enchanted by the history of the deer. I ask about Sybilla, the adventure awaiting me.

“I promised Sybilla I would say nothing, though I can tell you about Norcia and the Casa where you will stay tonight. That I will do on the drive there. We must keep you awake to offset the jet lag so you are ready for tomorrow.”

After lunch we walk and look through shop windows. One is a shop of knives and scissors. I spy Swiss army knives, and enchanting embroidery scissors. Remembering my confiscated treasures by airport security- I give an “Oh!”

“You see something, Signora?”

“Si, the airport confiscated my Swiss army knife and embroidery scissors. I would like to replace them.”

“Of course. Please, let us go inside.”

David holds the door open for me. Such a little thing but it makes me feel like a princess. It takes no time to make my purchases, which David pays for. “You have no need for money on this trip, Signora. The Sybilla has spoken.”

He is so charming. I am giddy with the romance of the city, his manners, the wine from lunch. We walk some more, to a sleek limousine which is waiting for us. David opens the door for me. This is my second moment of being able to turn back. I could say no, and run and find my way back to the airport and back home. I could. Once I get in, I am committed.

The car is luxurious. I sink into the upholstery. If this is a trap, then I am an easy mark. What a world I live in, to be suspicious of kindness and manners!

This time David gives no directions to the driver. The car pulls away into traffic and I am on my way. I am entralled by the golden and green Italian countryside. For a while I watch out the window. I can’t believe I am here. Eventually I turn to David, “Where are we going? You said somthing about a place called ‘Norcia’.”

“As I promised, I will tell you of Norcia. It is an ancient place, northeast of Roma. It sits like a jewel on the Castellucio plains, encircled by the Sibillini Mountains. It is so beautiful, mountains, karst, rivers and ancient roads through it all. The forests are ancient as well. No white deer, I am sorry to say, but if you are lucky you might see wolves, wildcats, wild goats, peregrine falcons, and perhaps the wild boar. Tomorrow we will go through the National Forest into the Sybillini Mountains where you will meet my sister.”

He talked animatedly about the skiers and hang gliders who come more and more to the area; the new road from Marche, bringing more tourism and therefore boosting the economy, but also brings trouble. Touriste are noisy, leave litter and graffiti, demand amenities that are contrary to the simple, quiet life of the town folk. I nod my agreement, it is the same in the Village of the White Deer. Tourists keep the economy alive, but we like them best when they leave.

He described the recent fair celebrating St. Antonio Abate’s Day, the Patron St. of Norcia. St. Antonio Abate is the patron saint, and the Saint Benedict and his sister Saint Scholastica where born here.

“If Benedict and Scholastica were born here, why are they not the patron saints of Norcia? I have never heard of any of these saints.”

“That is because you are an American Baptist, not an Italian Catholic! But I tell you, who knows why the old ones choose one over another? Perhaps it is because St. Benedict and Scholastica did not stay and do their good works in Norcia. Perhaps it is because St. Antonio is patron saint of swineherds. Norcia is famous for it’s pig butchers. Anything that can be done to a pig, Norcia butchers can do. It is fact, the name of shops to sell pork are called ‘Norcineria’ and butchers of pork called un norcino, after Norcia.”

“Perhaps it is kismet for me to come to Norcia,” David’s talk of pigs brought to mind memories of when I was little on my grandfather’s farm. I loved to play in the octagonal shaped hog house, climbing over and under the slats between stalls. My brother, angry with me for something long forgotten wrong, locked me in. My grandparents searched frantically for me for hours. I had long ceased to cry and scream, finally falling into an exhausted sleep in the clean hay. They were furious when they found me, and I never dared go into the hog house again.

Another time we were visiting a friend’s farm, having a beautiful picnic on the lawn beneath willows. We children were left to our own devises. There is so much to do on a farm! We ended up in the hog house, daring each other to ride the pigs. We ended up covered in pig muck, but the wild ride was exhilarating! My memory glows, despite the fact I had to be housed down and ride home in the bed of the truck in soaking undergarments. My beautiful white dress with blue roses and sparkling Mary Janes were ruined, I had disgraced my family. Still, I gloried in riding that pig.

“Signora, where are you?” asked David.

I told him my porcine memories and he laughed heartily.

“Perhaps Saint Anthony is your patron saint as well, the patron saint of pig riders!”

“Perhaps. I heard my grandparents laughing over the story years later. “tell me, who are these saints?”

“Saint Benedict and Scholastica were twins, born in Norcia as I told you, only it was “Nursia’ then, a place of healing. Nursia was famous for its doctors and surgeons then. Their mother, she die at their birth. This is maybe 500 years after the Christ. Their father, Eutropius, he raise them. Saint Benedict, he makes studies of literature in Rome. There he lives the state of civil and moral decadence in which the capital of the empire has reduced itself. When he is more or less twenty years old he starts his hermitage in a cave near Subiaco. His example leads some friars to join him. Though later, the rigidity of his rule will take them to such a big exasperation that they try to kill the Saint. Evenso, there are still Benedictine monks. The Saint he founds some monasteries at the limit between Lazio and Abruzzo. He founds also the Monte Cassino north of Naples, where once the people worship the Apollo. In 1964 Pope Paolo VI proclaims him “Patron of Europe”. So, in a way he is patron saint of Norcia, as Norcia is part of Europe.

“Before that , the folk of Norcia build him a Basilica. His statue is in the Piazza San Benedetto. There is also Casa Religiosa San Benedetto, a convent with the nuns. That is where you will be staying tonight. It is very plain, but very comfortable. “

“What of Saint Scholastica, his sister? Scholastica means ’she who studies’, doesn’t it?”

“Si. You are educated also, I think.”

“I graduated from college, and I read a lot.”

“Scholastica, she was dedicated to God from her birth. When Benedetto founded his monastery at Monte Cassino, Scholastica deeply desired to follow him. Eutropius let her go. She followed her brother’s hermitage, and women followed her. Saint Benedict ordered the rule, ora et labora, pray and work, but Scholastica she oversaw the virgins who joined her. They lived a simple life, working, praying, but that was best. The times they were not good in Italia then. Many invaders, Attila the Hun, and others. But the Holy Father in Roma stopped them at Rome. In the countryside, the peasants, they suffered. In Norcia many hide in the karst caves of the mountains.

“Scholastica was a woman of simple faith. The story goes that she and Benedict would meet at an inn halfway between their orders once a year. They were near to each other, about ten kilometer apart. There they would spend the day talking about spiritual things, and return home before night. Once Scholastica begged her brother to stay and talk through the night. He could not, it was improper for him to be away from his order at night. So Scholastica, she fold her hands, bow her head and pray. She pray and weep. Suddenly a fierce storm come, though the sky had been clear and sun shine all the day. The storm is so big, no one can even open the door.

” ‘Sister,” cry San Benedetto, ‘what have you done?’ “I ask you to stay and you do not listen. I ask God for you to stay, and He listen.’ So the brother and sister saints talk all the night. In the morning they say arividerci! Three days later, Benedetto look out his window and see his sister’s soul rise to heaven like a dove. He send his brothers to bring her body to his monastery and he buries her there. When he die, he is buried with her. “

“That is a beautiful story. How does Norcia honor Saint Scholastica?”

“There is a church in the cemetery for her honor. And the basilica is build on the ruins of the house of their childhood.”

“I see. Is Scholastica the patron saint of grave diggers?”

David laughed, “No. She is the patron saint of rain and storms, of children with the epilepsy, and nuns. It is interesting you should say ‘gravedigger’, Saint Anthony is the patron of gravediggers and cemeteries.”

“Gravediggers and pigs? I can understand Scholastic as patron saint of rain and storms and nuns. I can understand her as patron of Epileptic children, perhaps she was kind to them and cured them. But how does a saint become patron of graveyards, grave diggers, pigs!”

“And amputees, the tarfuti, domestic animals, basket weavers, brushmakers, butchers, pizzamakers, taxi drivers, pets, swine and swineherds, ergot, hermits, hospitals, monks, relief from pestilence, eczema, skin diseases, epilepsy, St. Anthony’s fire, and protection against fire.”

“That is quite a list. Explain it to me, por favor.”

“It is logical. St. Anthony was born in Egypt -”

“The patron saint of Norcia Italy was born in Egypt?”

“Si. Born in Egypt in a small village. When he was about twenty years he heard the words, ‘If you want to be perfect, sell all you have and follow me’, from the Christ. So he sold all he had. He used the money to ensure the education of his sister, and he went into the desert to live the life of a hermit. Later he meet his sister and you will never guess, she is a nun! Other men follow his example and become holy hermits in the desert. Anthony, he is often visited by holy people and the sick. At this time he use the lard to treat sickness of the skin. This makes him patron saint of pigs and anyone who does anything with pigs, as well as hermits, and those with skin diseases.”

“Saint of those who work with pigs, butchers, swineherds. In America we have football which is made of pig skin. So St. Anthony is the logical saint of football?”

David laughed,”That is logical. Those in his order made baskets and brushes like the broom from what they gathered at the River Nile.”

“Saint of basketmakers and brush makers.”

“He is patron saint of graves because he buried his friend St. Paul the Hermit. He is the Patron Saint of Naples because once when the Vesuvius erupted, the lava stopped at his statue and the city was saved. This is why he is patron of pizza makers and the saint to protect against fire.”

“Is that what it means ‘St. Anthony’s fire’?”

“No. St. Anthony was tormented by the devil. The devil would come to him as a monk with bread to tempt him when he fasts, or a beautiful woman, or beat him with whips. The marks would be on his body, but fellow monks could not see. The saint’s prayers would drive the devil away, but the devil returned again and again. It is a disease, St. Anthony’s Fire. The poor victim writhes in pain, they feel as if they are being burned alive, they see things, hallucinations. The toes, the fingers, hands, feet, fall off. The people suffer like Saint Anthony suffer. Now we know St. Anthony’s Fire is caused by the ergot-”

“A fungus on rye. My grandfather burned a whole field of rye when he found ergot on a stalk. He never recovered the income lost from that crop, and ended up selling the farm. Now I understand why.”

“The rye become tainted, and people eat the bread. They are poisoned. Whole families died. Terrible. Monks built a hospital in France where victims went to be healed. Thus he is saint of hospitals and monks.”

“How is he patron of taxis? Those are modern invention.”

“Ah, but the taxi replace the horse.”

“And St. Anthony is patron of horses? Where do horses come in?”

“With the pigs, pigs are farm animals, horses are farm animals, cows are farm animals. So it grows. Now St. Anthony is the patron saint of all domesticated animals, all pets. When the dog cannot find the tarfuti, the truffle, prays are raised to St. Anthony and viola! the dog he find the truffle! On his saints day people bring their pets to the priest to be blessed.”

“I have heard of that,” and I tell of Our Lady of Perpetual Responsibility, the Catholic Church in the imaginary town of Lake Wobegon. Since before we were married, my husband and I have listened to the Radio Show with Garrison Keillor’s famous monologue about the little town time forgot and decades cannot improve. I tell David about the Prairie Home Companion, and how true to my life experience it was, the little town I grew up in is in the same proximity of Lake Wobegon.

“In many ways your wobegon is like Norcia, a little town time forgot and the decades cannot improve. We do not lock our doors here, or the bicycles. Everyone know everyone.”

By then we arrived at the gate of Norcia. David walked me from the town square to the Casa Religiouso San Benedetto. The sisters showed me to a small. plain room with a bath. It is mid-afternoon, I have been in Italy about 5 hours. On my body clock time I arrived in Italy at 3 AM. Now I am at 8 AM. I slept little on the plane. I am edgy from being cooped in a plane, a long car ride, a strange climate, thoughts about saints, and anxiety about tomorrow’s venture. I decide to go for a walk. I believe I can find my way back to the square by myself . And I do.

The afternoon sun is golden and rose on the cream buildings of the city. I am shy to go into the shops, I feel so foreign and I have no money to spend. The towns people look at me, and greet me. I return the greetings. I see the Torre Campanaria del Comune, and touch the lion on the base of its banister. So old, so beautiful, but I cannot focus. My mind is still stubbornly focused on saints. In the Piazza is a statue of San Benedetto. I look at him long. He is glowing in the sun, his beard flows down his chest, he must have lived to a ripe age. His hand is outstretched as if to say , “Behold!’ There is something I am missing, something important I must see about the saints. I remember that I do not know what Saint Benedict patrons.

I enter his basilica, it is quietly still. I sit and try to think, looking around for clues to who he is. I wish I had taken art appreciation, learned to read the symbols in art. To me art has been about aesthetics. Now it strikes me how art is so much more than being pleasing to the eye. There is a code of symbology used to teach and I do not know it. I want to learn, but there is no one to teach me today, and no Internet to browse.

When I leave the Basilica de San Benedetto, David is waving goodbye to a group of young people. He sees me and smiles. “I see you have become acquainted with San Benedetto.”

“I tried, but I know so little, I cannot understand the paintings. I have more questions, but where do I find answers?”

David’s smile broadens. “That is my role, signora. Come let us eat. Over good food I will tell you anything you want to know.”

Norcia, David tells me, is famous for its foods. The best pork products come from Norcia, as he already told me, and the finest farro and lenticche, spelt and lentils, some which cannot grow anywhere else! Rare goat cheeses are produced here. There are funghi and tartufi, the mushrooms and the truffles. The festival for truffles will be the last weekend in February. It is truffle season now. Yesterday’s rain provides them fresh for today.

We enter a small restorante. David orders for us. First comes fresh, hot bread topped with truffles. Crostini ai tartufi neri di Norcia, David calls it. We dip it in olive oil. It is so good, words cannot describe. Next we are served Zuppa di lenticchie, a lentil soup, smooth and creamy as butter. This too is so good, comfort food, accompanied with more wonderful bread, and green onions, wrapped in bacon and grilled. I can eat only the one bowl, and am stuffed. More food comes, a sauce of cream, a ham which David calls ‘prosciutto’, mushrooms and ground sausage that is put over pappardelle- long, wide and flat pasta.

“You have questions, Signora?” David says, as he spreads chevre montrachat, goat cheese, on sliced pear and hands it to me. I nod, eyes closed to savor the sweet, sharp delight in my mouth. He pours me a goblet of golden wine. The wine too is superlative.

“I am thinking over and over about the saints. I do not know what San Benedetto is patron to. Can you tell me?”

“Such a simple question! Of course I can tell you. He is patron of Europe, and the city Heerdt in Germany. He takes special care of farm workers, civil engineers, coppersmiths, architects, especially the Italian architects, monks and nuns, those who go in the caves -”

“Spelunkers.”

“Si. and he is also caring for the servants who break their master’s belongings-”

I giggled. Oh, I have had more wine this day than in my forty four years preceding!

“- and of the school children and those who are dying, those with the sicknesses of the skin -”

“Like St. Anthony.”

“Si. He is saint of those with the pain of stones, they pass in the kidney and gall -”

“Gall stones, kidney stones.”

“-and fever, and the poison. He protects against witches and temptation. Any more questions, signora?’

I shake my head. My mind is besotted with indescribably delicious food and golden wine. “I want to know everything, but I cannot think!”

“Come. I will walk you back to the casa.”

The air is an elixir of peacefulness. Children ride their bicycles about the Piazza, they chase each other on foot. One child runs with a small brown dog. Older people are chatting with happy faces. David tells me of the history of the city, from the days of the Sabines until the last world war. We arrive at the convent.

“I will return in the morning, about 7:00 AM. We will have breakfast and set out. “

It is only 6 PM in Norcia, noon on my body clock, when we parted. I have spent the past few hours journalling in my room. I am missing something important, something about the saints, but I just cannot put my finger on it. Perhaps a long hot soak and to bed. Sometimes answers come in dreams.

Jean-Luc

Flames rose in their dance to the sky – reaching, touching lightly their sister spirits dancing in the borealis. The fire’s dance was a dance of death, for the flames would thaw the ground for Jean-Luc to dig the grave of his gentle wife, Lissette. Perhaps she danced in the spirit realm of the borealis with the spirits of the People, as there was no priest to commend her to the Christian God.

The fire spoke his grief more eloquently than the tears flowing into his beard. It spoke his pain as keenly as the sobs choking past his throat. The cracking of the timbers was the breaking of his heart. He wept as he watched the fire, cradling the golden haired child that was so much like Lissette. He cried in anguish, cursing himself, the cold, the wild, for her death, for a burial without a priest. He struggled for breath, the cold air fire in his lungs. His pulse pounded in his temples, his chest heaved, ready to burst. He felt nothing but the pain of his loss, not the cold ground, not the shivering of his little girl.

As the sky lightened to day, and the flames became glowing embers, his grief subdued. He became aware of his heavy cold limbs, and his child trembling in his arms, clutching fiercely to his capote. The spirit of Lissette chided him, their beloved daughter, their precious Blanche LeFleur, forgotten while her papa wept like a fool. He groaned, and looked into her wide eyes. She stared back at her father, her pupils dilated her until blue eyes were black, saying nothing. Only trembling, waiting for her father to put things right again.

“My little one, my dear one, I am so sorry!” he whispered, . He drew her deeper into his arms. He had wrapped her in three good blankets, the fruit of his trapping skill. She was not cold or chilled. She trembled from fear mostly. Frightened by seeing her papa lost in grief, frightened of the dancing shadows cast by the flames. She was frightened, too, by her mother’s absence, missing her musical voice and loving touch. Afraid to ask, but asking anyway, “Where Mama go?”

Jean-Luc sighed. “Gone to the angels, la petite cherie,” he answered sadly. In his mind he saw his golden haired Lissette, shining among angelic spirits, smiling at him, as she turned to join the dancing around her. A glint of comfort eased his sorrow. He turned his attention to the sad eyes looking so earnestly at him.

He stroked her cheek gently as she huddled against his chest. She did not understand angels, only ‘gone’. Gone was her little pine needle doll down the stream, gone was the rabbit running away in the woods. Papa was sometimes gone; but he always came back. She knew sometimes with ‘gone’ was ‘came back’, but sometimes ‘gone’ was always. She knew gone, but Mama gone?

“Mama come back?”

Her father did not answer. He tucked her hands inside his shirt and held her head to his breast. Blanche could hear her father’s heart. Its beat was steady. Lub-dub, lub-dub. She was warm here, against his rough calico shirt. His skin was hot beneath her small hands. He smelled like tobacco, wood smoke, buckskin, wool, and the musky smell that was Father. Familiar, safe, here, now.

“Non, mon petite cherie.’ She had never heard her father sound so sad. Her father was laughter and song. A booming laugh, deep baritone singing, his blue eyes sparkling as he sang voyageur songs, songs he learned from his Chippewa friends, songs he remembered from his cradle days in Montreal. His tears more than his words, told her the truth. Mama was gone and would not come back.

She closed her eyes to shut out the grief. Grief spilled into her anyway, cutting her heart. Her sobs and tears shaking her like wind in the branches that might tear her apart.

Jean Luc held her, keening softly. La Petite Blanche LeFleur. Little White Flower, the image of her mother. Her weight in his arms comforted him, comforting him more as her sobs slowed to hiccups, then stopped with the ragged breath of a young child’s sleep.

Jean-Pierre wrapped her snugly, laying her gently, securely into the dogsled to sleep.

Shouldering his shovel he dug through the embers, ashes and soil to make a grave for his Lissette, beloved wife and mother.