Although speaking of my dead selves, I have to say Hekate absolutely did as she promised and upended my life since I committed to working with her for six months. My life is drastically different: I don't just have a different job, but I'm in a different field, and one I hadn't really considered before. I hit a point a few weeks ago where I suddenly began to pass with regularity. I'm taking a course in creativity and spirituality and actually working on the assignments, writing creatively after a long dry spell. I'm doing regular meditation and spellwork. I'm sleeping better. I'm a better dad and I'd like to think a better spouse. I can think clearly for the first time in years thanks to starting Prozac.
I'm a wholly different person than I was six months ago. That person isn't exactly dead, but he's gone. Hekate kicked my ass in the most necessary way.
And when I did my reading on Mabon, I got a clear indication that means she's not going to be extending the contract at Samhain.
This has happened before - in fact this happens most of the time. Powers come in, we get some work done on both sides, and they wave goodbye when we're done. The ocean gods took their turns, Kuan Yin is there if I need her but she told me I was ready to stand by myself at a certain point, and even Odin and Loki wander in and out as it suits them. I move around, so many of my wight relationships are time limited. The only power who's always there is Mara.
So I'm not exactly surprised, and instead I'm trying to pick apart my disappointment. I think I was hoping I'd get something that allowed me to feel like part of something bigger- Hekate is a very popular deity, after all. I joined a Facebook group devoted entirely to her, and considered taking a course that was just about working with her. I never lacked for other peoples' input on what it meant to work with her.
Maybe that was part of the problem. I have too much history with my own Dark Lady for her to really be anyone I've read about in existing mythology, which is of course the thing I realize every time I come to this point. She didn't introduce me to Persephone and Hades, but to Redbird and Tzymir, wholly different powers with differing stories.
When I try to connect based on belief, I fail. When I try to connect based on practice, I fail. When I try to connect based on values, I am more likely to succeed. I know this. And yet...
Well, it doesn't matter. I have just shy of three weeks left with my Dark Lady, as we settle into the dark of the year. In November I'll be participating in the King's Ride in tandem with NaNoWriMo.
Part of me wants to move on already. I keep catching myself being vaguely surprised that I'm still doing my homework for Hekate. I always have a tendency to check out as soon as I know I'm going to be moving on; as soon as I think about moving, I want to declutter, downsize and start packing. On the first day of camp I was always thinking about the end of the week.
My old selves get left where they fell, their work never done, their bones never buried so much as left to gather dust in a folder labelled Unfinished Drafts. They pile up after a while, but I ignore them. They're behind me. That whisper about all the things I've failed at? Just the wind. Definitely not the Ghost of Projects Past.
But now this is about follow-through. If the self who made the deal with Hekate is dead, well, this can be the wake for him. I have an obligation. I'm not going to let it slip now, for fuck's sake. I just need to keep doing the thing until the end of the month, and then I can move on to the next thing without having an excuse to be down on myself, and that's a benefit unto itself.