Over the last few years in discussions with individuals and smaller groups of godspouses, I’ve noticed the repetition of the more experienced and public godspouses* stepping away from larger groups or backing away from being public about the nature of their relationships. If you talk to the people stepping back, a lot of times that is due to the fact that they tend to deal with a lot of overshare from others. I am perhaps lucky, because I’m over here working with a completely different type of situation and for the most part the larger Apollonian community in the past has been very, very good about leaving out the more private details of marital relations. There was a generally agreed-upon rule that it wasn’t a topic to be discussed in forums or groups, and it was a close knit community specifically because that trust was there. We weren’t going to talk about sex, and that is because we cared as much about the feelings of those we consider dear friends as we do our Spouses.
I am bringing this up, because I feel like someone needs to. I’ve seen far too many godspouses express regret going public about their experiences due to overshare. And it’s not something we should be ignoring. When we don’t respect the boundaries of those who are willing to be open and share their experiences with us, especially those who may be newer to spousal situations, we run the risk of causing those who actually have a lot to teach us about religious and spiritual practice to stop sharing.
I haven’t been public that long, and yet every once in a while an email shows up with a long explanation from a complete stranger about what is happening in their beds at night almost immediately after “Dear Ms Laurentine.”
Y’all, that’s not okay. In a population stressing consent culture, in a population that regularly has a higher number of people comfortable with polyamory, we should know better than to be launching into intimate and personal stories without asking if it’s okay to talk about it with a person first. Even if they’re your friend, especially if they’re your friend, you should be asking, “Hey, can I talk to you about this?” or “I have a question about how to (XYZ). Would you mind talking to me about it?”
And if they say no then leave them the Hel alone.
You should ask every time if it’s okay, even if you’ve talked about it a million times before with the person. Why?
Because public godspouses are allowed to be human, which means they’re allowed to have bad days. They’re allowed to be jealous. They’re allowed to not like another spouse of their Spouse. They don’t owe you anything for free, and while what they’re writing may help you, they may not be blogging with the express purpose of helping you figure out your own relationship with the Powers. That may just be a perk that comes with writing about their personal experiences, which they may be doing for completely different reasons than helping others out. I love helping people, but I also gain a lot of insight into my own experiences by writing. A lot of what I write is never seen by anyone, but I post things that I hope may help others in some way when it comes to what I post about being a godspouse. I was one for many years before I was ever asked to come out about it, and it was actually kind of terrifying to do so. Not just because I was worried about what others would think and say, but because I didn’t want to be driven to burn-out by people demanding more information that I was comfortable sharing.
I’d seen it happen to others before I ever went public.
We need to remember that not everyone in our community is polyamorous, which if you think about it has to be really, really hard on those who are monogamous when they run into another spouse of their Spouse (or worse, get an email asking how to start a romantic relationship with Them). It isn’t our job to try to make the monogamous person accept the situation. It isn’t anyone’s job to try to force someone to work through their jealousy. In fact, as a willingly monogamous poly person, I would say that it’s our job to approach the situation with empathy, since hopefully we realize how hard it can be to confront our own jealousy. Some people aren’t ready to. Some people will never do it or won’t be able to turn that off. And you know what? That’s okay. Really. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it’s absolutely none of our business.
Just because they’re married to your Spouse that doesn’t mean you’re suddenly best friends who can tell each other everything in graphic detail. Even if you are best friends, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t ask before launching into intimate discussions if the person is up to it first.
Always. Ask. First.
Not just “How do I sex God X up?” Especially if you’ve never actually talked to the person before. Not just “(insert paragraph on sexy times with God X),” because that is literally the godspouse equivalent of an unsolicited dick pic.
Consent. We talk about its importance in rituals and relationships, and yet we don’t stop to practice it in day-to-day encounters with our fellow coreligionists.
You may know a ton about the life of someone due to reading their blog. You may feel like you know them almost as well as you know yourself. You may share a Spouse. Stop and think before you write that long, steamy email that borders on erotica. Just because you feel like you know this complete stranger doesn’t mean you aren’t a complete stranger to them.
Always ask if they’re willing to talk first. If you have sex questions, state that you have sex questions instead of just generic questions. And accept without any hard feelings if people don’t want to talk to you about it… Truth be told, we all have lives and every email we answer may eat up a lot of time with absolutely nothing in return but good feelings. (This sounds horrible, but there have been points where if I’d answered all my emails I would have lost my entire day.)
And if you’re in a group situation like forums or a Facebook group? This should go without saying, but I’m going to say it anyway… This is one of those places where content warning goes a long, long way. Sex positivity only works when it’s also consenting and respectful of boundaries.
Let’s work on that together, shall we? I probably have some area where I need to work on it, too. Respect of boundaries and consent are the building blocks to making the environment a place where we can all grow and learn from each other. They are the only way we will be able to learn from the experiences of those who have come before us, and it’s our responsibility as a part of this community to do whatever we can to make sure we don’t make the space an unhealthy one by ignoring the boundaries of others.
*I use the term godspouse, but this goes for any group or individual that involves a deeper intimate relationship with the Gods and Powers.
(If you subscribe to my blog for disability stuff, you may want to cover your eyes and continue on or unfollow the blog. My woo may be more than you can handle, and I’m okay with that.)
I started to write a whole essay on the sexuality and respectability policing that happens in others’ publicly stated views about godspouses and the sexual component that some have (either much like the sexual nature of other religion’s mystics’ written experiences or actual sexual acts), but in the end I just keep thinking Meh about justifying my personal experiences that I willingly share with others. So I’ve shortened it to a few statements…
1. If you don’t believe that the Gods exist as individuals, that’s really all you have to say. In fact, please, leave it at that. We’re talking about 2 very different belief systems, so you don’t need to carry on to explain that you don’t believe in godspouses… Because, let me be really clear here, whether you believe in my religious, spiritual, and magical practices or not doesn’t invalidate that I exist and self-identify as a godspouse, nor does it invalidate my religious and spiritual path of 20+ years. People tend to go on to attack the people and not the practice, because let’s be honest, they don’t actually know anything about the practice.
2. Commentary on godspouses being mentally ill needs to stop. You are being ableist, and while I, myself, have a few mental illnesses lurking in my shadows, it has very little to do with my personal relationship with the Gods. In fact, the God who I’m married to has been an integral part of the path towards mental equilibrium. Belief in the Gods and their ability to be in your life isn’t a sign of mental illness. It’s a sign of religiosity, or, at the very least, faith in the Gods to be an active, participating part of the cosmos. Unless you are a licensed professional and have studied mystical experiences heavily, I’m going to say you have absolutely no right to deem what is and isn’t mental illness in another person when it comes to religious experience.
3. Commentary on godspouses being lonely (typically women) or lacking something in their lives needs to stop. I have a mortal spouse. I have a child. I have family. I have friends. The only thing I’m lacking is the peace of existing in a world where people on the internet don’t give their opinions of things they aren’t educated on… Which is 99.9% of the time godspousery, and 80% of the time psychology that isn’t of the pop variety or 101 levels.
4. Since rarely are male godspouses ever attacked on the internet and usually it involves sex toys being invoked, I’m going to calmly assume that those bringing it up have some Puritanical mores looming around that they may not be aware of at best and at worst may be misogynists who are offended by the idea of people having sex without a mortal penis involved. If godspouses are masturbating and invoking the Spirits and Gods, then so the fuck what? For a group of people who regularly deal with fertility cults, phallus worship, and myths that talk about all kinds of sex (including but not limited to bestiality and incest), Pagans seem to really get caught up in the worry that we’re all masturbating with or without a God present.
5. The most impious thing I can think of is a mortal trying to tell me what the Gods do and do not want from me, sex included. Stop railing against the perceived threat of godspouses wanting authority over your experiences by announcing that you are the authority of all things Gods-related. Not only is it impious, but it’s hypocritical.
Sex happens. Sex with Gods sometimes happens for those that believe that the Gods are real and not just archetypes* and sometimes even for those that don’t. Whether that aligns with your personal beliefs is neither here nor there, and as offensive as you may find it to be, I assure you that my private personal practice has absolutely nothing to do with you. In fact, I would go so far as to say it has no effect on you as well.
*Oh my Gods, I never thought I’d actually say that, and I’m so annoyed that I am having to say it. But there it is. My Polytheism is getting hard just thinking about it. You’re welcome for that mental image.
Disclaimer: If there is one moment where you can point to this blog and say “And this is where Camilla stepped off the edge with complete faith in her God to catch her; this is it.” (Because you speak with semi-colons rolling off your tongue in my version of the story.)
This, my friends, is the point of no return. This is where I start to shoot off at the mouth (or fingers) about what I’ve learned and been given to work with. As a note, I’m going to try to come back and actually cite things and provide sources, but since this is really just me babbling I may have to follow up with a more, uh, scholarly… Scholarly thing. Yes. Scholarly things. For Revivalism!
(There’s always so much terror in sharing this stuff. I’m not gonna lie.)
It has been bothering me for a while that, for some reason, it seemed like everyone I know, including my students, prefer to speak aloud to the Gods. Except me. Now that I’m modeling praxis in my home to a 3-year-old, I’m finding myself forced to say with my physical voice. I am perfectly fine saying prayers aloud. But talking, actually having a conversation with my God and occasionally Others? No, I’ve always, always done it in my head.
There are some of you that will say that if I believe the Gods are individuals and not archetypes or facets of my own spirit, then I’m talking to myself. In fact, I’ve had quite a few people kindly explain to me that their Gods require us to physically talk to Them, because that’s what polytheists do.
And I smile, thanking them for the clarification.
And in the back of my head, I’m going “This doesn’t mesh with my experience.”
My experience has been that certain Gods, especially those that are connected to oracular arts, have absolutely no problem hearing me. Or, if a God does not seem to be able to hear me, my God is more than willing to be a translator for me.
This led me to a few different theories…
One, there is quite a bit of Quaker in my ancestry, so maybe there’s something to be said about that and having some natural propensity towards hearing the inner-voice. This has absolutely no backing in my mind, but I’m amused by it enough to mention it here.
Two, slightly less out there, but probably only partially involved… I’m neurodivergent. I’ve got sensory processing disorder and ADHD. Recently it’s been figured out that I fall on the autism spectrum. My brain is simply wired differently, and part of that wiring involves being able to write what is on my mind eloquently and openly… But physically talking is harder. Much harder. Getting words out physically when I’m trying to communicate something important is, more often than not, like swimming in gelatin. It’s possible, but it’s probably going to be ridiculously harder and slower to do. I have no problem assuming that my natural inclination towards a deeper inner-voice than outer voice leads me to be naturally wired towards having an inner-relationship with my Gods.
Except that some people apparently don’t believe that’s possible…
Which was weird to me, and I couldn’t figure out why my experience was so vastly different than others who honor the same Gods as me.
Except, oh right, this God I’m tangled up with has been part of the mysteries I’ve been taught. It’s very much like the Shakti of Kundalini or the Holy Spirit, the breath of life and the Thing that connects everything. Not the air, but the Spirit. When I say He’s not the Divine “One” (if there is such a thing, which even with a decade of exploration I’m still not willing to say yay or nay to), but He is the vehicle from which the very essence of being comes forth on.
He is literally that: inside of me. He is my breath. He is your breath. He is the breath of the world, which is the wind… Because we, in ourselves, are the microcosm of the greater cosmic macrocosm. We are our own universe, and from each of us creation is capable of springing in art, music, and work. We were created, and each of us creates in one way or another, even the simple act of cooking is creation. Our words are creation that come out on breath, and when we cease to breathe, we cease to exist.
He is the Wind-wolf of the Indo-Europeans, though I will likely spend the rest of my life chasing His trail. He is the original psychopomp, carrying up from the Underworld and returning all to that place. He is hiding in many Gods, Gods you and I can both name, but He is, Himself, simply woven through Them as He is through the rest of us. But when you look at me, you don’t separate my breath into a separate entity from me. I’m just me to you. So is my God. He can be separated, but it’s been so long since anyone has done that that He is honored by many names as a facet of the Gods we know.
And He’s not alone in that, but that’s a story for another day.
What I was talking about was how I realized that perhaps I couldn’t understand that others weren’t having the experience of inner-talking that I do with the Gods, because my life is dedicated to this God, who dwells on the inside as He does on the outside.
So, yeah.
I guess I’m the Quaker version of a polytheist over here… Not all Gods may be inside of us, but we shouldn’t dismiss that some are.
In my soul I feel just that terrible pain of loss of God not wanting me — of God not being God — of God not existing. – from Saint Teresa of Calcutta’s journal, 1959
I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m in period of what the Christian mystics refer to as the dark night of the soul. For a monotheist, this turns into a period of what appears to be at the very least atheist leanings, as expressed in the quote above from St Teresa of Calcutta (Love her or leave her). For a polytheist mystic, I guess this is taking on a little bit of a weird turn I didn’t see coming…
I believe in the Gods without a doubt. I even believe in Apollon.
This is where it takes a turn and perhaps get a little weird…
While I believe in Apollon, I’m not exactly sure the God I honor and have been married to for years is Apollon. Seven years later and after a vow renewal, I find myself going “I don’t know who You are.”
This has been playing out for months now. Save for 1 or 2 posts, it’s been playing out almost silently except to a few close, patient friends that I’m entirely too thankful for.
Am I married or divorced from this God? Who is He?
Is this God Apollon? Yes/no.
Is this God Odin? Yes/no.
Is this God Freyr? Yes/no.
Is this God Dionysos? Yes/no.
Dis? Yes/no.
Soranus? Yes/no…
This God isn’t an archtype, but He is all of these Gods and none of Them at the same time… That’s what He tells me.
This isn’t a case of an awkward attempt at syncretism. This is a God coming forth to step out of the shadows, which has left me feeling all too raw and wobbly. Who the fuck am I to think a God is talking to me? Who the fuck am I to think some newborn/forgotten God is messing with my brain?
Am I sure I’m not simply unstable?
This, my friends, is decidedly a dark night of the soul. I never thought I’d find myself doubting my faith in my own beliefs, nor did I think that it would play out as a space of doubting every part of myself at the same time. This is deeper than an existential crisis. This darkness is something that I feel down to my bones, and I find myself too choked by the grim reality of it all to put into perfect words. This alone frustrates me. I’m never for a lack of written word.
I’m not alone with this God. I know there are others out there who are experiencing Him, who have even experienced this change and shift. I know, because of the delightful moments of getting personal gnosis confirmed. This space where one God ends and Another begins, I’m not the only one who has experienced it. But is He a God I know? Or am I off in the recesses of my own mind working through some liminality issue that I wasn’t completely aware I had? Perhaps looking for synchronicity of experience and finding it simply because I’m looking for it.
It’s been a strange, painful experience. One of the first lessons this God taught me, as Apollon, was to stop doubting myself. Stop doubting His voice. Just say what it was He was telling me, and slowly over the course of a year I discovered that He was using me as a bit of a mouth piece.
This was a decade ago. This was when I started to listen to the information I was getting constantly, because if I didn’t I was in danger of stepping into the void and never coming back if I didn’t get it under control. A marriage of 7 years was had, and I don’t believe it’s over…
But it was with Apollon. Despite what everyone keeps telling me, I’m not sure this God wants to be called Apollon anymore. Not by me, at least. I’m no longer married to Apollon.
Which seems to not only be throwing people off when I say this, but it seems like my own discernment and judgment of the situation is wrong. Do I trust myself, which is what He taught me to do? Or do I listen to literally everyone else I’ve talked to about this?
I say “Apollon left me.”
I hear from others, who I trust hear Him, say, “He would never leave you, and He wants you to understand that.”
And the words that keep falling into my mind, like leaves from a tree, say, “When the Romans took Apollo’s hand, He swallowed a dozen Gods as he moved through the known world. He became Them. They became Him. But that is never truly the case.”
Syncretism is something a lot of people are talking about these days… And here I am, over in my corner, feeling as if I’m on the brink of un-syncretizing Apollon.
He told me a few years ago to go north. Now He tells me to carve Him from the side of the rocks.
Now I’m slowly getting comfortable with the thought that perhaps this is Something new and different to us. I’ve said for years that He is wanting me to build a new tradition for him, a new cult. I glean images and symbols. I find a way to explain something. I doubt. I distrust. I feel like my insides are filled with glass, and I can’t tell if it’s Truth or not.
That’s hard to understand if you’ve not been there. I hear, over and over again, that I should stop worrying about who He is…
As He whispers in my ear Find me. Create me. Birth me, my bride.
Three evenings ago, on the front of a cold spring rain, He returned into my world in the form I’ve known as Apollon. At first it was a mere hint as I was cooking dinner. I felt the vibration in my lumbar spine that I usually feel when He’s trying to get my attention, a place aligned with the solar plexus (or I’ve been told the Gaster in Plato’s work, though I’ve yet to dig into this). As I cleaned up, He started to talk to me. By bedtime, mid-conversation with a friend online, I had to stop to meditate. I wrote a lot of stuff down that He wanted me to understand and spent some time sitting with the visions I was getting.
I’d been so happy, so relieved He was home that I found myself crying. But His return only brought me more questions and no answers…
I’m admittedly terrified of what stands before me. Not the God, but the implications of what I believe my future holds if I’m on the right track. The weight. The responsibility. It was all there before, but for some reason it was easier when He was Apollon. Safer, somehow…
So I have sent out questions to others who are God-touched. Am I on the right path? Can they untangle what I can only describe as a God-knot?
And underneath it all is this alienation, both from Him and others, who both understand and don’t understand at the same time.
This place is ambiguous and uncomfortable, liminal and immense.
My God is ambiguous and uncomfortable, liminal and immense.
I feel moved to talk about it here if only for the hope that someday this journey will help someone else thrown onto this path.
Welcome home, my Love, welcome home… Whoever You are. Welcome home. I’m angry, but I’m sure we’ll get through this eventually together. (I hope.)
I haven’t written much about the way Odin has really turned my world upside down in the last year. Not a lot, at least. I think partially, because I’m not really sure where it’s going in regards to where I fall within a religious practice. I think, perhaps, in my private practice I’m coming to terms with simply being a Pagan and Polytheist without a cultural descriptor ahead of it. But I’m not there yet. It’s funny to me that I’ve spent so many years debating the usage of Roman in my label that shortly after finally accepting it, I would be clinging to it and uncomfortable leaving it behind while Gods scream in my ear “Go Heathen, go Gaul, go somewhere else…”
December 17th was the beginning of Saturnalia, which was the first Roman festival I ever celebrated. But last year at around 1 in the morning on that day, I was up too late reading in bed. Suddenly I heard howls coming down the large stoney cliff and over the creek in my back yard. Then I felt a Presence standing outside of my window, which due to the split level is directly above my head. I got the very distinct message that I wasn’t supposed to peek out the window, and honestly I was too terrified to look anyway. In my mind’s eye I saw a pair of brown work boots and dark blue jeans.
My first thought beyond staying as still as possible, like a deer locked in the gaze of a predator was, Holy shit. It’s the Wild Hunt.
Slowly the howls traveled up my drive way, out into the street, and further down it.
The next day, I set about trying to figure out what had happened, because surely I had been in the presence of a God. But it wasn’t Hekate. It wasn’t Apollon.
By the time morning came around, I’d decided to not go with my original instinct, because at the time I was obsessing over Romanizing the local world around me. I quickly talked myself out of the Wild Hunt theory. That was not my thing.
I asked Facebook. Coyote was brought up. Local Gods. Silvanus. I decided Silvanus was a good enough God for me, so I ran with it despite feeling like I’d gotten something wrong.
The following day, I caught sight of Someone standing on the hill, watching me. I felt Them in my home despite drawing the very specific line of You shall not come into my house. Mr Foxglove reminded me that he’d watched a man walk up the incredibly steep almost cliff-like limestone hill only to duck behind a tree and disappear. I’d rolled my eyes at the time, telling him that there must have been a small hill the man had gone behind.
What scared me the most about the situation, though, was that I had local apples that earlier in the day had been absolutely fine. Suddenly there was one that was so rotten that it was nearly seeping through the hanging basket it was sat in. I threw it out.
About an hour later I turned around and the apple was back again. Along with the Man on the Hill.
So I proceeded to flip out. It had been years since I’ve particularly terrified of things like this happening, because in my life these things happen far too often not only to me, but those who are have contact with me. Non-believers. People who have to believe on some level, because shit happens and Gods arrive. Gods come into my loved ones’ lives like ghost stories. Sometimes They stay. Sometimes They were just there for a fleeting moment. Hekate on a street in Los Angeles, letting an internet friend at the time know that She was watching; Her presence clearly giving me warning that I ignored at the time that another point on my spiritual path was about to be unlocked. The Man with a Hat, now understood to be Odin, chasing off boyfriends in high school as a ghost… Even Mr Foxglove saw Him in the house in Iowa the first time he came to visit me there; I told him it was simply an angry, drunken ghost who lived in the house.
Gods arrive in my life like a knife in the ribs; none of them particularly gentle in Their handling on first contact. I suppose my stubbornness is a strong bolt on the doors They walk through, and when They discover a gentle shake isn’t going to be enough to get my attention, They get out the battering ram…
They stand outside my bedroom window with howling creatures and cause me to panic. That is how you get my attention. I’m almost ashamed to admit it.
The following day, I grabbed up the remaining apples in my home, some pork I’d made the night before, and a jar of milk. I made the trek up and around the block to the hill at the back of my yard. I’ve discovered the logistics of living on the edge of the Ozark Bluffs makes even a small hill one you have to walk around the block to get to the top of. It screws with your spacial understanding… There’s a magic to it, though. Almost like the Tardis, a world bigger on the inside than it seems from the outside.
From the top of the hill, it is another world. It’s a place completely ignored by man, save for people occasionally making a jaunt up the steep almost cliff-like hill to cut across it. It’s surrounded by urban expansion such as a school, golf course, and homes, but for the most part it’s simply an abandoned .6 acres that was possibly meant for constructing houses upon before someone thought better of it. It’s filled with discarded street cement. It’s wasteland. And, amusingly, due to that fact it’s filled with native plants such as horsenettle, which I would have never learned about had I not gone on that walk. In fact, any time I wander up there, I find myself learning something new about the land. I notice a plant or a certain quality of stillness. Coyote droppings. A deer herd. This is the magic world of the liminal, and I understand that is why I love it the way I do.
At the top of that hill, my home looks a million miles away.
And now, randomly during meditation, I will find myself dropped into the middle of that space again and again. I’m a gray squirrel running up the hill towards it. I am laying in the weeds naked. And the Spirit of the Hill, who is wild and far too interested in me now that He’s aware that I’m aware of Him, regularly comes to show me something new.
On the day I left my first offering, I didn’t know any of this was coming. I wanted to be left alone. I asked politely to please stay out of my house. I promised to compost in offering, which has only manifested recently in a place I was shown would be where to take dying plants… A place my husband picked out one day after yardwork, and my mother followed suit. The neighbors, before they moved or died, put their own yard scraps in that place as well.
That day, the first day I was up There, I walked home with my eyes to the ground. These were the days where rocks were appearing as I found myself becoming more and more in tune with the land of my blood. I plunged my hand into the Missouri River 2 months before when It called me to the point where I could no longer ignore visiting it, and pulled out rocks to take home. While getting family pictures taken on a day the winds were ridiculously strong, a rock fell from the sky to my feet. The adults with me looked at it with confusion, wondering aloud where it had come from. When no one was looking I made sure to calmly tuck it into my pocket and carry it home. The golden limestone I brought home from the hill is large… Nearly the size of a baseball. That was the rock I was given that day.
It wouldn’t be until February that I woke up one afternoon from a nap, having dreamed that Odin came to me. We talked of obligation, the blood of my people, and other things I could no longer remember upon waking. He gave me a golden, jeweled cup to drink from that was filled with blood. We both drank from it. I woke up wondering what it all meant. I had spent my time avoiding the Norse pantheon, because I had no interest in it at the time… Or perhaps I was a little scared of it.
Slowly it started to occur to me that Odin has always been in my life. On looking over His Wikipedia page, a picture of Him peering from under His hat made my blood run cold. In my teenage years, I was haunted by a shadowy figure that was the shadow man in a wide-brimmed hat. At times I would catch glimpses of Him about the house, watching me in mirrors for instance. But most of the time I would smell beer or whiskey, feel Him around me. I’d wake up in the middle of the night to Him standing over me and talking in a mumbled language I could never understand. Others started having run-ins with this ghost.
The day it really hit me this was a possible reality, I remembered that shortly after my daughter was born, my mother hand put a letter into my hands from a psychic in the United Kingdom I’d written to in 2001. She said, “I thought you might want to see this.” I remembered it spoke of the Man in the Hat, as I called him. I hadn’t actually re-read it at the time, but I scrambled to find it when it came to mind.
It read:
I do pick up spirit activity around you – You are especially susceptible – he needs to touch your hair he tells me. “You have such beautiful hair.” I know that he means you no harm and is simply there to watch. If you desperately want rid of him, tell him loudly and firmly to “Get lost.” It may take a few goes to get through to him, but he’ll get the message eventually. If you’re okay with him, let him stay. He’s harmless enough.
The other one is not like this. He’s dark and not so happy. He’s old and has beer around for a long time. He says his name is “an old family name in the village.” Sounds like Edward or Edwin. He has clean hands, so he’s never done hard work, but he says “All of this was our farm.” And if you go to the bottom of your land, you’ll see a boundary or a wall, which was a bit of the farm yard. (I would like to see this myself. Nice little bit of history.)
He speaks with an accent, which seems to be broken. Like Swedish or Norway by the sound of his “S” like “Ssss.” Take care, because he’s bossy and used to having his own way.
As a note, the house I was living in was a farm house, but the letter had always been a mystery to me. She was correct about the beer and the darkness. However, I’d spent a good amount of time researching. There were never any Edwards or Edwins that owned the land my house was built on in the town. There were no Scandinavian people. There was no boundary wall. And yet, I didn’t write off the letter; I just brushed it off at the time I was researching. Psychics are rarely 100% right.
Edwin, however, is one of Odin’s names. Reading it now with what little education I’ve gathered of Odin is an exercise in understanding His sense of humor. Finding the letter somehow confirmed momentarily that I wasn’t completely losing my mind, which honestly is something a person who is God-touched likely fears even more than the average person.
Things have gotten stranger and stranger… This last year has been nothing but an exhausting, wild ride as my physical health has turned from bad to worse to tolerably terrible yet hopeful. I feel like it’s just about time for me to start trying to piece it together into a chronological timeline… Like all the things I’ve been experiencing, things I don’t even have the energy most days to talk about let alone write about. Dreams I only have fragments of… The Gods who come to talk to me… Gods I’m not even sure I know who They actually are… An insanely complicated and convoluted language of symbols that I’ve yet to fully figure out what they all mean.
All this year has gotten me is the absolute deconstruction of the very core of my beliefs, friendships, and my body. And yet I have faith. Some argue that faith isn’t a Pagan value… That we don’t intrinsically hold faith as a polytheist value… But I do. Some days I’m not even fully sure that I exist, because more and more my life seems like some novel I should have read in my early teens.
But the Gods exist. The Gods are real. They are here. With us. Meddling. Forcing us to grow.
The Gods are here. That’s my message through all of it. They are real.
Two nights ago, a bomb was dropped that left me uncomfortable and alone. It ripped out my heart and caused me wonder exactly what the end game to this journey actually is. I’ve been told over and over again that the reward will be great, but sometimes I have to wonder if perhaps the reward will be great for someone other than me… And then I’m disturbed by my own internal urge to keep walking the path I am without actually knowing where I’ll end up.
I was told my time with Apollon is over, and I understood that the love is still there. Part of this journey is attempting to find this God’s light in the darkness again, but He is no longer Apollon…
I don’t know who the God I’ve loved all these years is anymore. My mortal mind finds this a hard concept to adjust to. Syncretism is painful, my friends, as much as it is joyous and beautiful. The same could be said about spirit work and mysticism… The Gods are not always beauty and joy. We carry this truth in the pit of our bellies, and despite our attempts to step away from the concept of appeasing the Gods we still seek Their hand in our life with each offering laid out to Them.
I can almost remember the point where I realized that I was to spend my life seeking to make each moment a prayer to Them. Each action a direct connection, an example of how They work through others. People may not know that I am a Pagan, but I try to live my life in a way that gives honor to the label and the Gods we carry in our hearts as if they did should they ever find out.
I said at one point that we shouldn’t seek to be martyrs of our religions, but I’ll openly admit that I sometimes wonder if that’s exactly what some of us are destined to become. Because if we touch the Gods, if we find ourselves woven into the fabric of the World where the Gods truly are, then we run the risk of being wounded by the truths w/We make with each other. We may not be made in the likeness of our Gods, but we are made of the same emotions… I would argue that, truly, our emotions are part of what makes a spark in each of us reach towards the possibility of our own divinity within us.
There is a path taken. The choice must be made on some deep soul-level to walk it. But walk it we must, because sometimes the only other option is to die. So perhaps it’s not a road but a river… Swim with the current or die. Or, in my case, give up and let the current take you where it will.
I don’t know where I’m going. But I know that, even if I wanted this all to stop, They wouldn’t let that happen. The Gods don’t always take no for an answer. There’s no point in being upset about it, because that’s not something that’s going to change. And that, in itself, is not necessarily a bad thing. Why would I honor Gods who didn’t know better than I do?
Yet I can see why Odin would give His eye these days. I understand that desire to see everything, know how it all will end.
Hail, Apollon. Thank You for Your lessons. I’ll forever love You.
Hold on tight, y’all… I’m heartbroken, but I get the feeling this has just turned into a very interesting ride…
(Hail Florence, patron saint of godspouses everywhere…)
You will note no image of Apollon at this time. I have yet to find anything or create anything that I find worthy of Him. The woes of being an artist in love. I bought Him an orchid. It’s the closest thing I could find to His perfection.
A new turibulum (incense burner) for the occasion.August 7th is coming quickly now. Time slipped by as it tends to do in my world. But August 7th is an important date in my own religious calender…
It’s the anniversary of my vows to Apollon. He and I have been together in this relationship we have for 8 years now… 8 years? Has it really been that long?
This year, though, I was told it was time to renew our vows.
I have, admittedly, been avoiding thinking of my actual vows. It’s not that I am avoiding this situation, but it’s just that even after all this time I sometimes feel the immensity and weight of having Him be part of my life at this level. How did this come about? When did this start?
I’m not sure I really have answers to those questions.
And what do I want out of it? That’s what He wants to know with this… All of this time, we’ve been working on what He wants for us and me. Now He wants to know what I want of Him…
That’s not an easy question to answer. Me, who regularly doesn’t know exactly what she wants of her life on a very basic level anyway. I prefer to dream and plan before blindly feeling my way through the actual execution of that.
I can’t do that this time.
This isn’t to say I’m not excited and happy. This is a joyous occasion!
But just like a mortal marriage, it’s a contract that isn’t to be entered into lightly.
The shrine is slowly being prepared. I was given the gift of resin incense and a beautiful turibulum (burner) today by my mother.
Coming up at the beginning of August, I will be celebrating my 8th anniversary with my Lord Apollon. With that, He has requested that He and I revisit and rework the vows we made to each other all of those years ago when our relationship was just really beginning to take form. Despite the fact that these vows were agreed to for only a year, we remained with each other faithfully without much fanfare. We simply were and are, and I have enjoyed constant companionship with Him. I have enjoyed the blessings He has brought into my life.
It feels strange and uncomfortable talking about my relationship with Him on my blog, which on the other side of the coin is hilarious to me. I have to remind myself that it’s only been in the last few years that I’ve even begun to talk about the relationship to those nearest and dearest to me.
But with this renewal of our marriage vows, He has made it clear to me that my Work with Him is about to increase. And with that comes the necessity of being open about who Apollon is to me.
For the last 6 months, I have been attempting to write my history with Apollon. At this point it simply isn’t going to happen. It is too long, convoluted, and honestly I’ve discovered that in those first few years I’ve completely lost track of my own chronological history due to mental illness and/or spiritual emergence as a (still emerging) Spirit Worker.
He doesn’t care if I tell our story at this point, because there are other projects He prefers I work on – Roman Revivalism, building a new shrine in the house, and laying down the plans for His future sacred homestead and temple. Taking on students. Training further as an Oracle. More importantly, working to raise His healing family’s cultus and (re)building a healing modality that lies in the heart of a Mystery tradition that is being built – Not just by me, but others working with Him.
He wants art. He wants me to write more, both fiction and non-fiction, so perhaps in time our history will be told. It’s just not high on my priority list right now.
All that was really requested of me is an easy “Yes, this is me. I am a Wife of Apollon.”
When this relationship started, I realized that I wasn’t the only one. I simply didn’t know other Wives or even that there was a larger community of Godspouses (and all the other shades of relationship) out there. Over the last few years, I’ve found others. Some of us have formed very important friendships to me to the point where I truly do consider them sisters.
I’ve heard stories about how they are treated by some in the larger community. I’ve seen a lot of accusations that fall upon the mental illness stigma our community is rather terrible about. And I think partially I’ve been quiet due to not wanting anyone else having problems since I have been completely open in the past about my struggles with both bipolar disorder and debilitating social anxiety – Both of which Apollon has helped me and is continuing to help me manage. I don’t want others to experience some of the treatment I’ve experienced due to the fact that one Spouse happens to also have the mentally ill label.
But more importantly, I have simply wanted my relationship to be private, because it’s exactly that: A private relationship. I don’t talk about the details of my marriage to my mortal husband. Specifically I don’t divulge very private details: our disagreements, our physical relationship, etc. And yet people feel that, because you are married to a God or Goddess, that it’s okay to ask for information of a private nature. There’s a disconnect for some reason that, because this is a God it is somehow different emotionally than being married to a mortal. It isn’t. It never occurs to people that asking someone in this sort of relationship with a God might be hurt by others demanding to know if their Husband wishes to be in a marriage with them or how to have sex with them.
In the limited openness I’ve had I’ve found this to be true, so I’ve very quietly started coming out about it. I put a link up to The Treasury of Apollon. I mention my work with Apollon more regularly. I state I’m a godspouse on my About page.
But that’s not quite good enough for Him. I’m okay with that, or if I say that enough times perhaps I will be okay with it eventually. He didn’t ask me to tell our story. He just wanted me to be open about who He is in my life.
I will not be responding to others asking questions about if He wants to marry them or how to sleep with Him. Trust me, if He has interest in you, He’ll find away to get that wish communicated to you very clearly. I’m fully okay with Him having relations with others, but I’m much, much less okay with being involved with being part of the organizing of said relations of strangers.
I will, however, talk about my relationship with Him. I will talk about Him in general and our Work together. If you have a question about working with Him in general, I will happily respond to your questions.
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Foxglove & Firmitas 