"Fragile? Me, Fragile?!!!" I asked silently to myself, rather resentfully.

Gentleness, softness, fragility...and strength. Fragility isn't a weakness, it's an aspect of life...and water infused with blessings.

woman in a garden whose face shows disagreement with someone

“I think things like that happen to show us our fragility,” responded Martin, to the question I had just asked.

I felt my teeth clench in response a tiny bit and my hackles raised up a little.

Me? fragile. Me, the woman who had survived and navigated my way through family dynamics and a contentious divorce that still causes my energy body to quiver a bit when I recall it all.

I survived things. I learned from things. I scraped my knee and got right back up on my bike. I wasn’t fragile I told myself. But the voice was getting a bit weaker as I took in what he said.

We are standing together at the Chalice Well garden. Martin has been busy along with many others, preparing for this day and now it has arrived.

A large white tent stands nearby with various turrets below the Vesica Piscis pool that reminds me, as many things do, of a scene from a Harry Potter movie. This tent looks like the one that was raised from the ground by a bunch of magicians and was used for the wedding of Ron’s brother. It was one of the later movies and they had music and dancing under the tent. Martin, without a wand that I know of, has cut wood to cover the winding stream that runs through the grass and now the tent stands over everything, with something that looks like a natural fiber carpet that hides the work underneath he has done. There have been talks earlier in the day I attended from Dave, the dowser/gardener, from Dr. Michael White who studies water, from Pea Horsley, an animal communicator, and Casey, who makes healing tinctures from the water at the well infused with the energy of plants and animals.

After the talks, they served a beautiful, catered lunch to everyone.

Caroline introducing everyone and Dave the dowser/gardener in the background, wearing a hat made from the wool of sheep that live in the apple orchard here. She taught one of the workshops I took the next day.

I paid thirty five pounds, which is about $40 US dollars, for an annual membership to the Chalice Well Garden. That membership allows me to be included in this group that call themselves, “Companions.” As a companion, I can book a stay at Little Saint Michael’s house, visit the garden as many times as I like over the course of a year, and attend this annual event, including the talks. The only additional things I bought a ticket for were the catered lunch (which was priced quite reasonably…similar to a lunch I would have purchased in a cafe, except this one was much larger…and a ticket to the concert that evening). The event is intended to thank the companions, those who support the garden in this way. But, like so many things here, I feel I am the one receiving the gift.

When I had arrived earlier that morning to get a seat, I saw round tables with white cloths, and glass bowls in the center where colorful roses and flower petals floated.

The event had been magical and I knew Martin had worked hard to prepare for it.

He maintains things here, builds things, and is the go-to person who keeps the place running. There are some large, concrete spirals on either side of the gateway to what is called The King Arthur Court. I was told Martin saw them on the side of the road somewhere and brought them here. They must weigh a few hundred pounds each. When I heard that, I realized he was much more than a “maintenance man” for the place. Everyone here seems to be much more than they initially seem.

After the morning of inspiring talks, I had a few hours before the concert began and so I went for a walk. I needed to move and I needed to be alone to contemplate and rejuvenate. To say the energy of this place vibrates with a subtle intensity is an understatement. Top that with sitting in the middle of a large group of people for a few hours… Well, it left me in need of open space on my own. People have told me I am empathic. I think they are likely correct as I do feel a lot more when I am around people and sometimes, I want to slow things down a bit and give my own energy system time to breathe and expand a little.

So, I was happy to head out with my hiking sticks, up the hill next to the Tor.

The talks were percolating in me, but I wasn’t really thinking about them. I was just breathing in the misty green air, thankful to be alone for a few moments and to be moving. I approached one of many gates next to the narrow, paved road, that mark a crossing for people like me, through a farmer’s field.

The day before I had been in Dave’s dowsing class and he had spoken of thresholds. He demonstrated for us, as he stood at the gate that leads to the area around the giant Cherry Tree in the Garden. A place Toltec visitors to the garden said was the energetic center of things. (But I am coming to learn that this magical garden has many centers and that things are in constant movement and change all the time).

We all stood quietly, new, dainty copper dowsing rods dangling from our twenty sets of hands as we watched Dave, holding his rods, approach the wooden threshold to the cherry tree. The rods that were parallel and shoulder distance apart, level with his heart, swung and crossed in front of him as he reached the gate.

“Can I come in?” he asked.

He was asking that particular area of the garden and the energy field of the earth this question. He was asking permission. It was beautiful to watch.

“After you ask,” he told all of us as we held our breath, “you knock, like this.”

Dave raised the front of his well-worn, slightly peeling leather boot and tapped the thick sole gently on the soft ground three times.

The rods swung open, back to parallel again and Dave walked in.

the cherry tree and the gate Dave stood at

Now, I was on a walk ready to go through a gate. I hadn’t brought my rods, but I thought (since no one was watching and I felt less self-conscious), “Terra, why don’t you just pause and ask? Give the ground a little tap?” So I did.

“May I enter?” I asked silently as I shut my eyes and felt the energy around my body.

Since I wasn’t holding the rods, I tried to use my body to feel if I was welcomed. Moments later, I noticed a subtle pull forward which I felt in my body.

So I opened the gate softly and went in. I had been granted permission and I could feel it. This walk now felt quite different and I felt reverent.

It reminds me of when my Grandmother warned me not to step on the faeries in the garden. Her garden felt more magical then and I was careful when I tiptoed along the stepping stones next to her house where she told me they lived. The side of the house was lined with giant camellia bushes that towered over my head and blossomed like colorful roses next to the path. Surrounding the stepping stones were tiny leaves of baby’s breath that glowed fluorescent green with sunlight. Bits of black stemmed maidenhead’s fern fluttered at the base of the camellia’s. I think now, there may have been faeries who moved them.

Now, years later, as I stepped through the wooden gate, I was reminded that this particular field which overlooks the Tor is called “The Jesus Field”. An elderly woman had mentioned that to me once as I was crossing through it.

“I have had some lovely meditation experiences here,” she said in a Scottish accent. Her smiling husband with herbal compresses taped to his elderly knees smiled at me in agreement.

My three layers of jackets and puffy vest felt good in the damp, misty air. And I was feeling the magic of this place and why it is called Avalon…the place of mysticism as I crossed the threshold.

I looked to my left and noticed a group of cows grazing in front of me.

This is not a rare occurrence and the cows I have seen in the distance seem quite docile and used to people strolling through their fields of grass.

Sometimes, I notice them eyeing me from a comfortable distance as they chew their cud in what looks like deep contemplation.

I felt like I was on a roll with that gate. It felt good to be welcomed in. Earlier that morning I had enjoyed Pea Horsley’s talk on animal communication.

I glanced around for a moment and said to myself, “You’re all alone here Terra. Why not? Why not see if you can communicate with those cows?”

The cows, up to this point had always avoided me. I encouraged myself a bit, which I like to do when trying anything that I know the regular world would find rather odd and also that I think I might not be good at.

I also felt a bit silly asking a group of cows in the distance if they had a message for me. My mind told me it was silly. My mind told me nothing would happen.

But, like I said, since no one was watching, I gave my mind a pat and went ahead with my little experiment.

“Come on, what have you got to lose?”

So, I closed my eyes just long enough to take a calm breath and ask the question I had seen Pea ask during her talk.

“Do you have a message for me?”

Then I opened them.

It was both validating and disconcerting to see a large, white cow trotting towards me quite intentionally.

I stood my ground and did my best to stay calm.

“Just breathe Terra. I know the cow is big. It doesn’t have any horns. Breathe. You asked for this.”

Moments later it stood in front of me. I noticed the dampness of its great pink nose and wondered what would happen next? That is when it began….

…licking me.

It licked my hand gently as it gazed at me with its deep liquid brown eyes surrounded by white that looked a bit intense at times. And it kept licking my bare skin. Once in a while it softly nibbled at my jacket.

I reached out gently to see if I could touch it and it pulled away, so I kept my hand a few inches from its smooth, white hair. Only once, did I touch the fringe on the back of its neck a tiny bit.

The whole time, the rough gentle tongue continued licking my other hand. I watched it flick about as I took in the sensation of it.

That tongue was big.

“It only eats grass,” I reminded myself (as my mind was getting a tiny bit skittish).

After a few minutes, I felt ready to move on. The cow had responded to my invitation and I had been loved up in response. Kissed by a cow so to speak.

But as I felt the impulse to leave, another cow immediately headed towards me. This time, a chocolate brown one. It wanted to lick me too.

After a few more kisses, and saying hello to yet another cow who seemed to be appraising my kissability, I silently wished them well and exited the gate on the other side of the Jesus Field, back onto another narrow, paved road flanked by tall hedges of wild rose, blackberry, cleaver, elm, yarrow, buttercup, yew, oak, stinging nettle and a variety of plants and trees whose names I have yet to learn. The hedges are so tall, they are usually all I can see on either side of me as I walk along the deep green passageways that are silent at first, until I listen to the sound of wind, insects, and birds that make a music I have to remind myself to take in.

I hadn’t reminded myself yet. I was still thinking about those cows and my question.

“Oh my gosh! What just happened? I asked permission and the field listened! I asked the cows a question and they answered!”

I have to say I was feeling really loved by nature at that moment and the childhood part of me that my grandmother used to speak to was feeling very much alive.

“It is all so connected,” I thought to myself. “It’s so magical here!”

I had only gone about twenty yards when it happened.

“BANG!”

I felt the adrenaline rush through my system as I looked over at a branch that had just fallen, and missed me by maybe twenty inches.

Thoughts of gentleness and cow-kisses flew quickly away and the other childhood part of me did what she learned to do so well when faced by anything that feels dangerous. She asked herself what she had done to make this happen?

“Did I do something wrong? I thought things had gone well?”

I just didn’t understand.

And I realized that the branch, could easily have been the end of me, or at least of this physical form with which I dance through this life. The branch was big and fell from a great height. It had to have come down like a large six inch diameter, eight foot long club from twenty feet overhead.

My skull, if it had connected well, would likely not have had much of a chance (a bird just hit the window as I typed that…oh my). I could easily have been greeting my dear friend Fiona, who I sometimes feel with me, who passed so recently in a bus accident.

“What does all this mean?” I asked myself.

I have a practice of using a question to help me decide how I will spend my time. The question is: “What if this is your last day, Terra? Would you be doing this or something else?” I have written about that question and how helpful it is.

But this branch was different. And its coming at me after cow kisses and fields welcoming me in left me feeling shaky and confused.

If the earth is a gentle, connected energy field that is full of wisdom as I have been experiencing it, why did it just try to club me overhead with a large branch?

And my childhood self asked again, as I strolled back down the hill, now headed for a much needed sea salt infused hot bath, what I had done that had upset the world, or God, that had caused that?

Memories of my ex-husband’s passing after a concussion were vibrating in me as well. They had resurfaced. The coma. The ventilator. The weeks I spent and he spent in the hospital and his seemingly slow, lingering exit.

I told myself at least I might have gotten lucky. If it had hit me, it might have been quick. I prayed for future branches to make my exit fast.

I didn’t have far to walk to get home, but a lot can happen in one’s mind in a few moments. A lot of thoughts and memories were flowing through me right then.

For many years, I had a sense of when I would pass.

I have never been afraid of death.

And something inside me felt a sense of certainty that I would be here until age ninety five.

That had always felt more than long enough to me.

It actually felt like a long time to be on this planet, which I sense is a bit more challenging than the place I exist when I am not here.

Nevertheless, that was just the way things were and I accepted it and my mission.

I had about ninety five years to finish it.

Except a few months ago, that changed. I couldn’t feel it anymore. I realized I no longer have a sense of how long I will be here.

That doesn’t mean I feel I will pass away soon. Not at all. It just means that I really don’t know at this point, when my exit will be.

With so much changing on the planet, I imagine this shift for me has something to do with it.

But still, I was left feeling rather confused and troubled by that tree branch.

The hot bath helped and I put my layers of clothing back on and prepared to head over to the garden to the concert I had purchased a ticket to attend. But, I was feeling pretty tired. I found a seat back in the tent. The band was warming up and the huge speaker vibrated through me. It felt like too much after cow kisses and almost death-by-branch, so I retreated outside in search of earplugs. I thought they might help.

My mind was on repeat by now asking over and over, “Why did that happen?”

I planned to ask Dave the dowser about the branch, but I was pretty sure he had retired after his busy day and I was desperate.

That is when I spied Martin and his clear, kind eyes standing nearby.

“Martin, do you have a minute for me to ask you a question?” I asked, as we stood next to the table outside where they were serving coffee. Someone had just left to fetch me some earplugs from the guest house.

“Sure. Go ahead,” he said.

So, I told him the story I have just told you (and bless his heart for listening to all of it after working for so many days in the garden and then coming outside for a quiet pause before I corralled him).

“Something similar happened to me once,” he said. “Back then, I was still rolling my own cigarettes. I had been standing by a big tree and I had just stepped away to roll one when a huge branch fell right were I had been standing. It would have killed me,” he said with a quiet kind of contemplation only someone from Britain or Scotland can muster. “I think things like that happen to show us we’re fragile,” he said.

As I told you at the beginning, this brought up some internal resistance in me. But the good thing was that he didn’t seem to feel Gaia was out to get me or that the gate and the cow kisses didn’t matter. They did. Things like this just happen.

“We’re fragile,” he repeated.

Then he headed off to rest.

It took another day for it to sink in.

I thought of the tiny insect I had watched that looked like a dragon and it’s delicate wings. They were so intricate. They were fragile. It could be squashed in an instant.

I thought of the tiny bee that had danced around my dowsing rods in the class with Dave and watched me for a few moments. It was like bees I had seen in Costa Rica. They were smaller than the ones in the US. Much smaller. I learned they didn’t sting. It was fragile too.

I remembered Fiona, on a bus, headed to see the pyramids in Guatemala. The only one who perished in the accident.

“We’re fragile,” he had said.

I thought of the stump Dave had taken me to in the garden the day he walked me through with his dowsing rods and how we had paused to look at it. How it used to be a great tree and was now in the process of decay.

And I felt something differently and more deeply. I don’t know if I can say it. It is still growing in me somehow. It is a sense that I live as a glistening drop on the edge of the divine and that everything is connected. That in some way, everything flows in and out of this 3D existence. It’s all fragile.

And also, it isn’t.

I have to remind myself that everything is an expression of the divine and that love flows through all of it. Things come in and out of existence. Everything is part of this process. Nothing escapes it. It doesn’t happen because some things are loved and some aren’t. There is a simple flow. Sometimes a branch hits you in the head. Sometimes it misses. It doesn’t mean those cows weren’t listening. It doesn’t mean the field didn’t appreciate that I asked to enter it. I am pretty sure they both were happy to be seen and valued, and that I gave it my best effort.

And a branch fell from a tree and just missed.

That doesn’t make it a bad omen.

And I can learn from all of it. I can learn from the bird that hit the window while I was typing this to you, and from the branch, the gate, and the cow kisses. All those things are here to teach me and what I have come away with is this:

I and we…everything…is delicate. And that is a beautiful thing and not a weakness.

The following day, I was in two more workshops.

Like I said, I have signed up for everything they have offered as I see my time here as a great blessing and a gift. Or as a big cake that I am trying to eat with as much delight, and gusto as I can.

In the first workshop, which included sound healing, everyone was asked to listen for a blessing to add to a bowl of water. The blessings would be poured, after the water was imprinted with them, back into the Vesica Piscis pool, where they would flow wherever they were needed.

Water, beautiful water, carries information.

We all put our love into it.

And when words came to me to put in they were these:

Gentleness,

soft

fragile

I know they don’t quite work as words usually do… I know if I was writing a poem, it would be different. There would be more words and in different tenses. Maybe like this: “Gentleness, Softness, Fragility.”

But those words don’t feel the same. They don’t work and these did, because I could feel them as I held the bowl in my hand. I was the last one to put my blessing in. I wasn’t sure what it meant. I wasn’t sure of my wish. But I blew on the water as I wished those words into it and I cried a tiny bit.

water infused with silent blessings from a sound healing ceremony with Jooles

I know I am made of 70% water and so are you. I know those words are also infusing my system in some way.

And I am still learning from them and taking them in.

And they are flowing through this field of love and awareness that underneath hurricanes and rip tides and falling branches, seems to be to be infused with them. And I want to be delicate. There is something that is lovely, and not weak about it at all…after all.

Here are a few photos from Companions Day, at the Chalice Well, and Dave, preparing to teach his dowsing workshop:

I added the bunch of white tiny roses on the left of the wellhead cover, and I handed another bunch to a young woman sitting quietly next to me. She placed them on the other side near mine.

As I wrote about earlier, she journeyed to the Cherry Tree and back…and she does look happy to me… I imagine as Dave said, her mission was accomplished.

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