Ever since I was very young I often found solace in quiet places. Usually this would be any natural environment such as sitting under a large tree, running stream, natural lakes, the moon and stars, wooded areas, etc. This may have been a retreat from the noise and tension that originated from within the family and home. However, it may also have been something that is simply natural for us as humans to do. If so, I didn’t know anyone who talked about it as these were peaceful moments spent alone and in self-contemplation.

My mother was a very religious woman who insisted that we go to church every morning and who spent her days reading her Bible or crocheting. My father was a violent alcoholic when I was younger. I can remember more than one occasion in which I witnessed him hitting, kicking, and throwing my older brother and sister. In this first home, it was usually down the hallway that lead to the bedrooms. To the best of my memory, this was usually the result of a minor infraction such as spilling something on the floor, not cleaning a mess they’d made, or generally annoying this highly irritable man. While I loved my father, I don’t remember him kindly as a child. He was in the United States Navy and the routine was that he would go out to sea for several months. We’d miss having a father and he’d eventually come home. After he was home for about one and a half months to two months, he would begin beating and whipping us for every little thing we did wrong or didn’t do that we were told to. We couldn’t wait for him to go on his next tour which always seemed to take too long. Once he was finally gone again, we’d begin to miss having a father like other kids again. This cycle repeated endlessly and when my father was home his rule was maintained through intimidation and fear. My mother wasn’t too difficult to get along with when Dad was gone, but after he’d been home awhile she’d start becoming just as angry and volatile as he was though not quite as physical though she would hit too.

Nonetheless, I took great pleasure in the moments of quiet and peaceful aloneness. I looked forward to being alone, a lot! While my brother and sister and I would get into scraps now and again, we actually had better relationships than most siblings and we’d stick up for each other most always. If I had an opportunity to just lie down in the grass and stare at the sky it was very much appreciated. To me, this attitude toward nature seemed perfectly natural, especially for a kid like myself. However, the area that I always felt was different than other people was where the moon was concerned. I have always seen the moon as feminine. She has always been a goddess to me even long before I had ever heard of the term. This initial impression may have been something from the night I went out of body to my friend’s house while near the roof of my own but my memory is not clear on that. The first time that I remember actually mentally talking to the moon was in my parent’s car one night. My parents were arguing as usual and I mentally tuned them out and stared out the back window needing to find a place of solace. I found a big round moon in the sky and I remember having this strange feeling as if it was sentient and watching me. Along with this came a distinct impression of femaleness. Not only that but without constraints of time. Thus, She had no age that I could comprehend and became to me a sort of surrogate mother only this was a mental substitute for my own biological and thus a reversal of the standard usage of the term. She was also a sister and a best friend, and became my only confidant. Why I felt this impression or why I believed it I cannot accurately say but it has held with me throughout my life, even when I rejected it. Maybe it’s because I’m born a Cancerian or some other unknown psychological issues, but the moon has been a comfort to me all my life on many levels. There were years in my teens mostly when I felt that such musings were nothing more than childish thoughts but the power of this became undeniable as years passed. To this day, I still stare up at the moon with wonder and curiosity and sense a divine feminine wisdom emanating from it and the mood changes with its phases. Mostly, when I had nobody else to turn to or things became seemingly unbearable, I’ve gone to sit or stand under Mother Moon in silent communion. This has been a comfort that has helped me through many hardships as inexplicable as it may be. I have noticed a natural affinity toward natural lakes and streams and bodies of water in general during such times as well. However, in this case it is nothing like the intelligence I sense from the moon but instead a subtle energy and its cleansing powers. As you may have guessed, such thoughts have often made me feel like an outsider in the world of ration and materialism. Again, I often wonder if this is due mainly to the emotional aspects of my astrological sign or some other intuition, a subtle level of “reality” that possibly not everyone picks up on. Keep in mind that through all these years I had no exposure to anything occult or metaphysical and my only teaching in spirituality lay firmly in the hands of non-denominational Christian fundamentalism.