The Thrush Family

As I work my way through the Ogham alphabet, few (letter) by few, I’ll be working with some of the associations of each few – primarily trees but also birds and deities/heroes.

The Beithe few is normally associated with the Pheasant but I do not know where I might reliably find Pheasants on the Isle of Thanet, where this journey is taking place. I’m also not using this bird because it is not a native to Britain and although generally ‘farmed’ outside of the farmyard in the open countryside it is still essentially an artificially raised bird bred for shooting.

My first thought for a suitable replacement was the Blackbird. The primary properties of the Beithe few are new beginnings, cleansing and protection. The male Blackbird is one of our most recognisable birds so it can certainly be seen as the beginning of the hobby of birdwatching. Its colour is pure, clean black and its well-known alarm calls are commonly used to protect its young.

Out in the field watching, however, made me realise that this is also a good time of year to watch other members of the Thrush family as our familiar Song and Mistle Thrushes are joined (during the winter months) by the Redwing and Fieldfare.

Redwing, (left) and Fieldfare (right)

There are other notable members of this family, especially the Robin, but I didn’t want to extend this to birds that look and feed distinctly differently to the Blackbird.

So our five chosen Thrushes are most often seen in areas with fruit berry-baring trees, especially the Hawthorn (Whitethorn) and searching through the leaf litter during our cold winter months. They are seen less in their familiar surroundings of gardens and parks. Like many birds, they seek protein rich diets when raising young but have to switch to fruit and seeds in the winter months.

The Redwing (with its distinctive orangey-red flanks) and the Fieldfare visit the UK each winter, mostly from Scandinavian countries. They are joined by a number of migratory Blackbirds, notably, instead of having the usual bright orange bill they having a much darker one.

All these birds tend to be quite nervous this time of year, perhaps conscious that they are quite exposed in the bare treetops. In my experience they fly from tree to tree to escape approaching humans – you’re lucky if you can get within 10 metres of them, so binoculars are required if you want to watch them.

I think, particularly with the Blackbird, it is like our familiar friendly garden birds have “gone wild” and the same bird that may dive under the garden fork to grab worms when you’re digging your garden will be much more aloof when encountered in the countryside in the winter.

I’ve always had a bit of a soft-spot for Blackbirds and Thrushes. The beautiful songs of the Song Thrush and Blackbird (which can be distinguished by the former repeating each phrase two to four times and the latter never repeating) fill the heart with joy in Spring and early Summer. The Mistle Thrush smashing open snail shells on your garden path is another familiar sight and sound – though becoming much less familiar as Thrush populations are being wiped-out by excessive use of slug/snail poisons in our gardens.

Although these birds are common across Northern Europe, to me, there’s something distinctly British about them in my opinion (though I would guess that people in other counties might have similar nationalistic feelings about these birds). All in all, I’m very pleased with my choice of the Blackbird and its close cousins as my bird for the first letter of the Ogham alphabet – B – Beithe.

B – Beithe – The Birch Tree

Well the time has almost come for me to begin my year-long journey through the Ogham. For those who don’t know, Ogham (or Ogam in Old Irish) is an Old Irish alphabet that has been found inscribed into stones (vertically from bottom to top) and into wood or other materials (usually horizontally from left to right – as shown above). The message inscribed normally started with the ‘feather mark’ as shown above. Sometimes it was inscribed along a corner (especially on stones) but when written nowadays it usually has a centre line as in the example above.

There were originally fifteen consonants, divided into three groups of five. The first group, B L F S N, were signified by one to five notches below (or to the right if vertical) of the corner or line. The second group, H D T C Q, were signified by one to five notches above (or to the left if vertical) of the corner or line. The third group, M, G, nG (or GG), Z (or SR), R were signified by one to five notches diagonally across the centre line or edge.

There were also five vowels, A O U E I, which were signified by one to five notches vertically across the line (or horizontally if the edge or line is vertical).

At a later date, five further letters (known as the forfeda) were added to accommodate sounds from other languages but I will not be working with these this year.

Many people only know the Ogham as a tree alphabet (Crann Ogham), but actually most of the Ogham letters have other meanings and the trees were added later – along with a great many other, less well-known Oghams such as the bird Ogham.

I start my journey with B – Beithe, the first letter of the Ogham alphabet which is one of the letters which is believed to have the meaning of a tree – the Birch Tree. This means that for the first 18 days of January 2021, I will be working with:

• The true meaning and Inner Meaning of Beithe
• The Birch tree itself (meditating with the tree and studying it)
• Birds of the Thrush family (Blackbird, Song Thrush, Mistle Thrush, Redwig and Fieldfare)
• The Goddess Brighid or Bride

During this time, I plan to write a piece of prose and a poem, carve a stave onto a piece of birchwood (to make a full set of Ogham staves by the end of the year), make an incense from the tree’s bark and finish the work with a Shamanic-style journey with the tree.

By assigning 18 days to each of the original Ogham letters it will take me 360 days to journey through the twenty letters.

Out of Darkness

“Cá Filidecht?” (Where is poetry?)
“Ní hansa. I ndorchaidheta.” (Not hard. It is in darkness.)

As we approach the Winter Solstice, the time of the longest darkest night, I thought I might share some ideas upon the nature of darkness.

Many people are afraid of the dark. They see the blackness as the unknown and if you don’t know what is there, it could be anything. Those who fear the darkness create their own monsters to inhabit it. However, the darkness is a place of potential; the place from which things can be conceived and grow. It is the place where magick can happen. New life is conceived in the darkness of the womb when sperm meets egg. It will spend months there – gestating – waiting for the right moment to be born into the light.

Seeds also lie deep in the ground – the womb of Mother Earth – waiting for the right time to sprout open and reach for the light.

So too, is poetry born in darkness. There are few great poems (or songs) about happy times – it is pain, heartbreak and misery – the darkest of days – that give birth to the greatest works of art.

In our polarized western society, we think of the darkness as bad and the light as good, but this is just wrong thinking. Imagine a black and white photo you’ve seen – any photo – a family portrait, a country scene, a city-scape, it doesn’t matter, just imagine you’re holding this photo in your hands right now. Now imagine taking away all the darkness – all you’re left with is a white rectangle. Taking away the darkness is just the same as taking away the light – you’re left with nothing – you’re left blind.

The Yin-Yang symbol represents darkness and light, chaos and order, negative and positive. However, what this symbol really tells us is that these seemingly opposing forces are actually complementary, interconnected, and interdependent in the natural world. They give rise to each other as they interrelate to one another and each contains the seed of the other.

The symbol also represents feminine and masculine. Some may object to the idea that feminine is equated with darkness and chaos but remember that it is from the darkness of the womb that new life comes.

Darkness and light do not equate to evil and good – the darkness is just as important and necessary and the light. Returning to the Yin-Yang symbol, it is the line where darkness and light meet that really matters – this is the path that you should seek to tread. The only monsters that exist in the darkness are those that you bring there.

Every year we celebrate, around the time of the Winter Solstice (albeit this year our celebrations may be more subdued and limited to our immediate household). Isn’t it strange to be celebrating the time of greatest darkness? Of course what we are really celebrating is the beginning of the end of the darkness – the days finally begin to grow longer and the nights shorter but through this time of darkness what seeds are you sowing for the New Year?

“An Ogham Rethink” Revisited

I posted a blog named “An Ogham Rethink” a few weeks ago and I wanted to update my thoughts for three reasons:

1. I tried working with Ash connected to the Onn few and Cherry replacing Ash on the Nin few and it just didn’t work for me.
2. I have decided to spend a year working with the Ogham alphabet (Starting January 1^st 2021) – 18 days per letter/few to deepen my understanding and connection to the letters and trees.
3. I wanted this to be based on locations near to where I live on the Isle of Thanet. Some trees are not found here (or at least I don’t know where any are), some are not suitable for carving a stave (such as Reed) and some I’m not comfortable with as they are not really native species, such as Vine.

So here is a list of the twenty letters of the Ogham alphabet with the tree normally associated and my replacements.

B – Birch

L – Rowan

F – Alder

S – Willow

N – Ash

H – Whitethorn

D – Oak

T – Holly

C – Hazel

Q – Apple

M – Vine – I could only source this from someone’s garden so I am using Bramble; I think it is more authentic as a native species anyway.

G – Ivy

GG – Reed/Broom – As mentioned above, Reed is not suitable for carving and I can’t find Broom locally so I will use Wild Rose instead.

R – Blackthorn

Z – Elder

A – Pine

O – Gorse – I can’t find Gorse locally and so will substitute Sea Buckthorn which has many similar properties.

U – Heather – Not found locally and not suitable for carving, using Wild Cherry instead.

E – Aspen

I – Yew

For those I am substituting because of lack of local availability (by which I mean within a few miles of my house), I may go back and use the original if I find a source locally before the allocated 18-day period – this is possible with Broom, Gorse and possibly Vine if I can find it in the wild.

In addition to Tree associations to the Ogham there are many others, notably Birds. As a keen bird watcher I feel I should really include a bird to watch for each few but again I have made a few substitutions for much the same reasons as before.

B – Pheasant – this is not native so I’ll substitute the Blackbird.

L – Duck – I’ll use Ducks in general as the are several species around here as well as the common Mallard.

F – Gull – Gulls are so common on the coast here that this is just too easy so I’m going to substitute Waders since that’s more interesting for me.

S – Hawk – I should be able to see Kestrel and possibly Sparrowhawk and Peregrine.

N – Snipe – Hard to find here and would be included above as a Wader so I’m substituting Skylark (see below).

H – Raven – Not common here so will use Crow if I can’t find any.

D – Wren

T – Starling

C – Unknown (possibly Crane) – I’ll use Cuckoo since they should be calling at this time.

Q – Hen – Clearly not native so I’ll substitute Owl.

M – Titmouse – Archaic name for the Tit family.

G – Mute Swan – Surprising rare near me, I’m using Magpie.

GG – Goose – Quite uncommon in August when I’ll be doing this letter so doing this in Winter

R – Thrush – Seem to be very rare near me, so I’ve chosen Jackdaw instead.

Z – Rook – I feel the Crow family has been covered sufficiently so will have Robin instead.

A – Lapwing

O – Scrat – No idea what this is, some think Cormorant… that works for me.

U – Lark – The Skylark doesn’t perform in November so I moved this earlier and will replace with Pied Wagtail.

E – Swan (Whistling) – Rare here so will substitute Brent Goose (and any other Geese that are around).

I – Eaglet – Unclear what this is, young Eagle? Not likely around here so I’m suing Little Egret.

As you can see there are many more substitutions here. I think there are several reasons for this:

1. I suspect the original list was mostly of birds they could eat and so there are very few small birds, something I wanted to correct.
2. Because of the temporal element that I’ve introduced (an 18-day window) several of the birds aren’t found on the allocated dates.
3. Birds don’t stay put like trees do, if I find a tree it will very likely still be there when I look in its 18-day window – I can’t say the same for birds unless they are fairly common at the time of year.
4. Pheasants were introduced, hens are only around as a domestic (farmed bird).
5. As a bird watcher I wanted to make it interesting for me – hence no pigeons or gulls.

As I said earlier, there are a great many other associations with the Ogham alphabet but for the course of my study over the first 360 days of 2021 (20 fews x 18 days each) I will limit myself to the following in the order of priority:

1. The original meaning of each few.
2. The associated tree for each few (includes field work).
3. The associated bird for each few (includes field work).
4. Associated deities and heroes from Irish mythology – more on this later…

Update, 1st December 2020 – I found Broom. I feel pretty dumb because there are two very large clumps that I must have walked past about fifty times over the last five years. Still, I’m very pleased as I wasn’t very comfortable with Wild Rose as a substitution for GG/nG.

Update, 9th December 2020 – I have found some Gorse. Once again I’ve walked past this on numerous occasions without seeing it. I was happy enough to substitute Sea Buckthorn but this is no longer necessary.

In Search of Rowan

First of all, a quick note to my WordPress blog followers. I will continue to post here but only the longer articles that I write. Most of 2021 I will be posting about my journey through the early Irish alphabet called the Ogham and many of the shorter articles I write will only appear on my Facebook page “The Pagan Punk”, so you might want to check that out.

https://www.facebook.com/The-Pagan-Punk-111350967454901

My Ogham journey will consist of me working through the twenty Ogham letters (B L F S H D T C Q M G NG(GG) R S A O U E I) throughout the next year, starting with B – Beith (Birch tree) in January. I’ve been going on walks in my local area to locate suitable trees to work with for both meditation and to cut a stave from. I want these trees to be within walking distance of my home in Thanet so it is possible that I may have to make a few substitutions from the accepted tree associations in the Ogham alphabet, but one that I really didn’t want to substitute is the Rowan (also known as the Mountain Ash or Quicken Tree). This is connected to the second letter of the Ogham alphabet, L – Luis. The problem is that there really aren’t that many Rowans growing in Thanet, apart from those in people’s gardens.

Yesterday I had diverted my normal clifftop run to take in Ellington Park to search for suitable trees, but the area just feels wrong and the trees seem lonely and isolated – not to mention the fact that there are no Rowans. So today I set out on a walk to try to find a suitable one in a public space where I could easily work with it.

My first stop was to be the King George VI Memorial Park in Ramsgate. After an invigorating walk along the seafront, waves crashing against the promenade in the brisk wind, I climbed up the steps to the park. This place is very popular with dog walkers and very few of the trees would be suitable to work with because they are close to public thoroughfares and many are heavily clad in Ivy – mixing the energies of the two trees, especially in winter when the deciduous trees are dormant and so the Ivy would dominate. After walking around for about twenty minutes I was able to locate a small Rowan near the Italianate Glasshouse but it was on the junction of two paths so would be difficult to work with unless I went very early in the morning or after dark. All in all, not a great start.

Not far away though is the little bit of Montefiore woodland. Although a very small area it is much more natural – the trees being largely left to their own devices. It’s also pretty quiet there. I found a couple of young trees that I was pretty sure were Rowan, but identifying trees in mid-November is always a challenge.

The leaves (which were thankfully still present) certainly looked right, and the bark was smooth and grey. The deciding factor though was the buds – if they had been black then this would be an Ash tree, but thankfully these were grey.

Smooth, Silver-grey Bark

Grey Leaf Bud

So this is certainly a Rowan tree I can work with.

My third and final stop was Ramsgate Cemetery, again not a very long walk away. There are many excellent mature trees here and it is a very peaceful place. I found more Rowans here but all the low, reachable branches had been removed, so no good for staves. A feature that really did interest me though was something I may use for the very end of my journey – I – IDAD – the Yew tree, which I will be working with December next year. What better way to end my journey than to pass through this Yew arch on the Winter Solstice.

Spiritual Awakening Through Pandemic

It may sound counter-intuitive to suggest that Covid-19 could have been the path to spiritual awakening for many people but this is exactly what I’m starting to see. Many people go through this kind of awakening (or often a series of awakenings) through suffering some kind of unpleasant event, such as the loss of a loved one, serious illness or some other kind of major change brought on through external circumstances and forced on them outside their control. A pandemic can cause any or all of these.

Obviously, the loss of a loved one is a painful experience – the closer you were to them, the more painful it will be. The experience will change you, it will make you think about the fragility of life, not just your own but that of others around you. When you have passed through the stages of mourning it will make you appreciate your own life all the more; it might also make you appreciate the loved ones who are still around you more than you did before.

Very much the same can be said of serious illness. I myself suffered from a very serious case of Lymphoma in 2002; it was so serious in fact that I really thought I was going to die. This was my big awakening – it totally changed me – from someone who only believed in science to someone who now calls themselves spiritual (and believe me, before 2002 I would have laughed in the face of anyone who suggested I could be). Nothing will ever make you appreciate the life you have like the thought you might lose it.

The change in circumstances that Covid-19 brought upon us is more subtle but no less intense. The combination of social isolation, change in work practice (working from home instead of going to the office every day) and buying more on-line rather than going to the shops has left people with a quite different life situation and possibly more free time on their hands; time to think about their lives and reassess what’s important to them.

The upshot to all this, in my opinion, is a sea-change in our society. As more and more people are able to work from home, the large office complexes in our city centres will be increasingly and permanently abandoned – I don’t believe we will ever go back to mass commuting into the city. Also more and more people will want to move out of their flats and small houses in cities and large towns so that they can live in more rural areas. I predicted this as soon as lockdown was announced in March and we are now seeing this happen – expensive city-centre flats being traded in for spacious detached houses with big gardens in the countryside or smaller seaside towns. Those who act quickly will do well but those who delay will find the value of their urban dwellings will fall quickly while the prices of rural properties will become unaffordable and the dream of moving to the country will never become reality.

Am I going too far by calling this spiritual awakening? Well perhaps, but it is a step in the right direction. Many, many people are now thinking in different ways, they have reassessed their priorities and realised that such things as family, friends and community have real value; that having cleaner air, a bit more space and a garden are more important that a shorter commute to work. History will look back on the time of Covid-19 as a time of major societal transition – hopefully towards a better future.

An Ogham Rethink

Ogham is the ancient Irish tree alphabet, strongly associated with the Druids. It was initially carved onto standing stones or wooden staves in the bottom-to-top direction but later writings, on parchment, are left-to-right. It consisted of twenty letters or “fews” marked alongside an edge, to the right, to the left, diagonally across or perpendicularly across in groups or “aicme” of one to five notches. An additional aicme was added in later years to accommodate new vowel sounds but I will not be talking about those here. Below is a picture of a piece of contemporary Pagan jewellery, read clockwise spelling B-L-E-S-S-E-D-B-E or “Blessed be”. The fishtail marks the beginning.

If you’d like to know more about the Ogham, there are numerous web resources – just google it.

I have always felt uncomfortable with some of the “trees” in the accepted Ogham alphabet; it’s a hard push to consider Heather to be a small tree but Reed is just ridiculous. Recently my attention was drawn to an article on the O.B.O.D. web site entitled “A Re-evaluation Of The Ogham Tree List”.

https://druidry.org/resources/a-re-evaluation-of-the-ogham-tree-list?fbclid=IwAR2sHf1lfUln2WO1NZpHbRgQ6l0x-_p0Gk-Qs3_k2r_HFOrj-9ghliWUfag

I really like some of the ideas in this and so decided to take some of them on board and produce a list of Ogham tree associations that I felt more comfortable with. I do not claim to be a scholar of either the Ogham or ancient Irish but I’ve read quite a lot about the former. What you have to understand is that while some of the original Irish words do specifically refer to trees, many do not. For example, Ruis, associated with Elder is generally accepted to actually mean “red” or “reddening”. Now Elderberries can certainly give a red dye, as anyone who has picked them will know so there is a strong connection between “Elder” and “reddening” but Ruis does not directly mean Elder. Some of the other ancient Irish words have much less connection to the “trees” to which they are connected. This leaves scholars to try to riddle out the cryptic Bríatharogams of Morainn mac Moín, Maic ind Óc and Cú Chulainn, which for Eldar are “most intense blushing”, “reddening of faces” and “glow of anger” respectively – not particularly helpful.

A full list of the Bríatharogams for all the Ogham letters can be found here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bríatharogam

For my personal rethink I used a combination of the articles above, other books I’ve read, logical reasoning and a certain amount of intuition – i.e. does it feel right to me. Here is a list of my major changes from the accepted “trees”.

Firstly – N, Nuin or Nion usually associated with Ash but is accepted to mean “branch-fork”, which could refer to any tree. However, the few O, Onn is accepted to specifically mean “Ash tree” so I will move Ash to the letter O and bring in Cherry for N. Why Cherry? Well the first article suggests that Nin refers to Cherry. Logically the Cherry tree would have been of importance to the ancient Irish as a source of food and of course it is very beautiful when in blossom in springtime. Two of the Bríatharogams cryptically refer to beauty; “boast of beauty” and “boast of women” with the third, less usefully being “establishing of peace”, but since Ash is associated with spear shafts unless you are establishing peace through threat there certainly does not seem to be any connection.

The second change is M, Muin, which has several meanings “neck”, “trick”, “love” or “thicket”. The accepted tree is Vine but since the grapevine wasn’t introduced until the end of the Roman period, this sounds unlikely. The Bríatharogams are very unhelpful here, “strongest in exertion”, “proverb of slaughter” and “path of the voice” do not really suggest any trees. I used pure intuition here and selected the Bramble.

My third change is to place Gorse for the letter G, Gort. I used the arguments from the O.B.O.D. article for this as I did for my fourth and final change of using Elm for U, Úr.

My final list is:

B             Birch

L              Rowan

F              Alder

S              Willow

N             Cherry

H             Hawthorn

D             Oak

T              Holly

C             Hazel

Q             Apple

M            Bramble

G             Gorse

NG         Broom

Z              Blackthorn

R             Elder

A             Pine

O             Ash

U             Elm

E              Aspen

I               Yew

I’m still not entirely happy with some of these selections but this is my choice for now and the list which I will take on to the next stage of my project, which is to create a list of associations between these trees and the wheel of the year, by connecting them with the twelve signs of the zodiac and the eight neo-pagan festivals. Watch this space.

The Beer Meditation

This is intended as a serious meditation – and is not to be taken as a joke. It may be engaged in as a solo, or group activity with like-minded people. I have chosen beer as my subject, but it could easily be adapted for cider or other drinks and food. Avoid highly commercial brands; real ale or craft beer should be used and only use this with your first drink of the day or even better first drink after a longer period of abstinence. This is a multi-sensory experience involving touch, sight, sound, and smell as well as taste.

Begin by clearing your mind of non-beery thoughts, focus on the treat to come. Those working with a group should not discuss their thoughts until all group members have finished their beer. If the source is a can or a bottle, study this, noting the feel of the container in your hand – the texture and temperature. Study the name and logos used and read any notes about the beer or the brewer. If a draught beer, study the pump clip or even Google the beer to find the brewer’s information about themselves and the beer but don’t read the opinions of other consumers at this time.

When you’re ready, open your bottle or can (or order your draught) and enjoy the sound of the beer pouring, the colour of the beer, the way it clings to the glass and the patterns the bubbles make. Once poured, set the glass down in front of you for a while, notice the colour and continue watching the bubbles rising to the surface. Take your time, don’t rush but keep your focus entirely on the beer.

Once the head has settled down and you feel the time is right, raise the glass to your nose and inhale deeply. Savour the overall aroma and try to pick out the individual components which make up the aroma. Don’t take any notes at this time and once again take you time, don’t stop until you’re sure you’ve picked out everything you can from the odour then gently set the glass down again.

Continue looking at the beer, thinking about the colour and savour the anticipation of the first taste. Stop yourself from drinking the beer for as long as possible as you contemplate the delight to come then, when you feel the time is right take a mouthful. Swirl it around in your mouth a little and note the sensation of the beer in your mouth, the texture and the bubbles as well as the taste. Hold the beer in your mouth for a while before swallowing and when you do swallow continue noting any changes in the feel and taste of the beer. Now feel the cool liquid travelling down towards your stomach and note the aftertaste. Pause for a while, considering the experience so far. Feel free to nose the glass again to see if the aroma profile has changed.

When the time feels right take a proper drink of the beer, several gulps, again savouring the sensations in the mouth as well as the taste. If you wish to take notes, do so now while you’re finishing the beer – remember to note if the flavour profile seems to have changed between the first sip and the last.

Once the beer has been finished, spend some time in contemplation of the experience. Consider how you feel about the beer and whether consumption of the beer has changed your feelings internally and your feelings about those around you. Once all group members have finished their beer and post-beer contemplation feel free to discuss the experience or to post your feelings onto a web site such as RateBeer.

A Druid at Walt Disney World

You’re all probably wondering what a druid like me was doing at Walt Disney World in Florida. The answer is quite simple, my partner loves it and had a significant birthday so I agreed to go – and spend 10 days in the parks! My primary objective was to make sure that my partner had a great time and I quickly realised that I wouldn’t be able to fake it – if they just thought I was tolerating it for their benefit it would have ruined the whole thing so I had to do my damnedest to have a good time while I was there too.

The Good

Disney World certainly does have it’s good points (even for a spiritually conscious and environmentally aware person such as myself), for example in Epcot we learn that they are doing lots of research into improving the productivity of the land – increasing the crop yield and developing crops that can grow in more challenging environments. While doing this research they actually grow quite a lot of food which is then used in the restaurants of Epcot.

In Animal Kingdom there is an area where they will happily tell you all about the environment and how important it is that we all do our bit to help by reducing consumption, thinking about (and minimising) our environmental impact etc. All very good.

As someone with an interest in IT I was very impressed with the use of technology there. There was good (free) WiFi coverage in all the parks and resorts – a not insignificant feat as I can very well appreciate as I struggle to do the same over a vastly smaller area). Also the wristband system was very impressive – the band didn’t just open our hotel room but allowed us into the parks and (throught the meal-plan) and allowed us to pay for meals and snacks. In fact if we’d chosen to attach a credit card to the system we could have paid for pretty much everything simply by holding the watch-like wrist-band up to a sensor.

I was also very impressed with the logistics – I don’t know how many hundreds of thousands of people visit the parks each day – surely a logistic nightmare to get so many in and out, onto and off of rides and of course fed, but it was done very efficiently.

The most important lesson you quickly learn there is patience, of course. You have to queue for absolutely everything – and yes, I really do mean everything. Just to get into the park you have to queue to have your bag searched, then for the airport-style metal scan and then again to actually get into the park – this is before you queue for any rides or food. Such patience is surely a good lesson to learn.

The Bad

Did I mention the queuing?

Seriously though there were several points which caused my great concern. Despite the fact that at least two of the parks are happy to offer advise on minimising ones environmental impact one has to think about the extreme impact that these parks actually have. Pretty much all food is served on disposable plates, with disposable cutlery and all drinks are served in disposable cups – a logistic necessity I suppose but this alone must generate an absolutely vast quantity of rubbish – the disposal of which must be a whole new logistic nightmare! Although there was the option for recycling plastic bottles and cans everything else went into general trash and a lot of people I saw just put their recyclables into the general trash anyway, rather than carry it a few more yards to a recycle bin.

Staying with the food, because of the generous quantities and set-meal options I witnessed a very large amount of food being thrown away.

The whole Walt Disney World site covers about 40 square miles or 25,000 acres and has hundreds of thousands of visitors each day. I can’t help but wonder where all the food comes from, where all the materials for the disposable cups, plates and cutlery comes from – where all the toilet paper comes from! How much water is used each day just to flush the toilets? And how much electricity to power all the rides and lighting? The environmental impact is difficult to imagine.

The Ugly

Walt Disney World is described as being the happiest place on earth, but at what cost comes such hedonism? And is it really so happy? Nearly everyone walks around with a smile on their face, to be sure but how many are secretly worrying about the bill when they get home? Then there is the overall rudeness as people rush to get to their next FastPass ride or get to the next queue in front of as many others as possible. I witnessed a lot of selfishness and arrogance there, all thinly veiled behind the facade of those happy smiles.

In Animal Kingdom you will find the “Tree of Life” you would thing that, as a Druid, this would be listed under “The Good” but let me tell you, this tree of life is quite dead. Indeed it has never been alive as it is an entirely artificial construct, made of concrete and plastic. What could be more oxymoronic, more of a contradiction in terms, that a tree of life that has never and will never live.

The Conclusion

I had a good time a Walt Disney World but I won’t go back. I’m sure Disney fans think I’m raining on their parade (of which there are many) but this is a place of pure escapism and hedonistic fun. For many, I feel sure, this is enough. Most are, I feel, happy with the bright and colourful facades and have no desire to think about what goes on behind the scenes – about the waste and excessive consumption that goes on. For me, as a Druid, I feel I have to think about such things – in many ways you could say the Walt Disney World (and other similar institutions) represent all that is wrong in the world in a (large) microcosm – the pursuit of happiness at all costs, waste, excessive consumerism and, above all, turning a blind eye to the true cost to the planet.

Letting it Break

I think there are times when we are all guilty of not letting things go. Whether it’s a job, relationship, project or anything else for that matter we just keep patching it up to keep things going a bit longer – sometimes keeping it around for much longer than is good for us. My argument here, is that sometimes it is better to just let things break.

I think the Tarot card “The Tower” perfectly represents this and once again I am using the Druidcraft Tarot for my representation – respect to Will Worthington for his excellent artwork.

Many people view “The Tower” as a very negative card to receive in a Tarot reading – it represents everything literally falling down around you. This is a very definite end of things as they used to be, but I prefer to use a more positive viewpoint. Every ending is the opportunity for a new beginning and often having our hand forced to make a fresh start is exactly what we need. How many people have you heard say that their redundancy from a long-term job is the best thing that ever happened to them? I’m sure that on the day when they were called into the HR office and informed that their services were no longer required they could only see the tower collapsing and could only think that their world was ending. Speak to the same person a year later and in many cases you’ll hear a very different story (it’s happened to me twice and both times my life has turned out much better).

It’s a completely natural instinct to want to save things – when we see something is going wrong it’s only natural for us to want to fix it and of course this is usually the right thing to do – why wouldn’t it be? Well saving things is only good if they are worth saving, if you’ve been fighting to save something for years it’s probably time to let go. This is easy to say but very hard to do – it goes against our instincts – but there are times it’s the only way. Sometimes you have to stop fighting and let that damn thing break properly because only when something is really broken beyond repair do we realise that it hadn’t really been serving us for a long time and replacing it or building something new and better is long overdue.

If we were talking about something as simple as a car this would be a lot easier – I’m not talking about a classic car that you’ve been lovingly restoring for years but the car that you depend on every day to get you to work on time. As the car gets older the garage bills get higher and most of us are quite happy to cut our losses and trade it in for a newer, more reliable model. It’s not so easy with things like jobs and relationships because of the emotional attachment but if you’re spending more and more time trying to fix it, it might be better to let it break.

Take the example of the new employee in your team. When they start you try to help them because they’re new and there’s a lot to learn but if you’re still giving them lots of help two years in then there’s something wrong – perhaps the boss didn’t give them the training they needed or perhaps they just aren’t up to the job – are you going to just keep on carrying them or are you going to step back an let them fail? If you decide to step back it becomes someone else’s problem – in this case, the boss’s problem – the boss has to decide whether the individual needs training, moving to an easier job or being let go. This may sound cruel but all the while you’re helping them out you’re unhappy, they’re unhappy and the chances are the boss is unhappy because the department as a whole is less productive than it should be. In the worst case scenario the person you’ve been helping might get the sack, but if that happens then they were almost certainly in a job they couldn’t cope with anyway and a few months later, everyone (including the sacked employee who’s now got a more suitable job) is happier.

If something is no longer worth saving, it’s best to step back and as that well-known Disney song says:

Let it go!