EXCOLO

The third day of the full Anthesterion (Saturday, February 27th)

A cool day yesterday was, but despite the louring sky we stood under it clad in our finery and embraced one another, for we welcomed into our midst a new member. Better it would be to have baptised her under a spring sun, in an orchard blooming, or at harvest time under trees ripe with fruit, but we did what we could to make it joyous. Dried fruit we shared, and winter apples stored in the cold, sweet and fresh as the day they were plucked. She put off her old name and took on a new - Halie, after one of the Nereids.

Came into town I did early today to visit the market, and as I approached the place I saw the first flurry of snowflakes come down. I buy what I need, and I should hurry home, but the snow does not seem to be falling faster - same steady whiteness - and so I decide a warm drink and a meal after time browsing and bartering would be best. So I take myself to the cafe, and I ask for whatever is hot and ready. A slice of chicken pie I get, crust puffed and steaming, vegetables on the side, and hot cider. Good food for a cold day.

[OPEN]

The second rising, Anthesterion (Wednesday, February 10th)
Early evening; Follow Me Boy

It has been a dull day, damp air and leaden skies, and after the events of Monday not at all sure am I that I should go into town. My daughter was caught up in that riot, and it might have gone ill for her. But she was safe, Ladon be thanked! I think on the matter a little more, and I change from my work clothes into something smarter. I hope it is appropriate.

Many months it has been since I laid down with a woman, and far longer since I bought a woman's time. The places where one can find servants of Sappho are rarer than I might like. I debated with myself over whether this was the right thing to do - not the morality of the act, for I do not mind that, but the spending of money on something for myself alone - but I at last decided I could be indulged. I have a very little coin set aside for my own use, and I think I may be allowed a little pleasure for myself alone from time to time, as long as it does not distract me from my duties. And indeed, perhaps it will help me in them, for it will, as a common phrase puts it, scratch an itch, and then I can put aside such wishes for several weeks. It is one of the benefits of ageing, I have found, that physical desire does not occupy so many of my thoughts. There is no sin in desire itself, but it can be a great distraction from one's duty.

Town seems thankfully quiet when I reach it, and the woman at the reception in the brothel pleasant and apparently unflustered that a woman of my years should be seeking a female companion, and I am pleased when she confirms that the woman is no girl; I do not like the idea of bedding down with a woman younger than my daughter. She tells me that she has a suitable person to whom I may speak and see if we get along.

[Open to Parras]

Who has not seen in imagination, when looking into the sunset sky, the gardens of the Hesperides, and the foundation of all those fables?

- Henry David Thoreau

Tuesday, February 2nd, early afternoon

A bright day it is, sun gleaming in a wintry sky. It's hard not to be optimistic on a day like today, especially when I set out in the morning on the road to town. I have always felt great comfort in travel - at least, travel I have done alone, for the travelling to Excolo was exhausting and depressing. But when I have only my feet or my horse to worry about, my own agenda to pursue, then I am as content as can be. I have felt some guilt in the past over the pleasure I feel in being on my own on the road - it seems a selfish sort of thing - but I console myself that I do my work for my community. Once for my town, now for my new Temple.

It is a good town, this Excolo. I like it well, the two clean busy main streets and the tidy houses. There are some derelict spots, and a rather sad looking carnival (and there might be a good place to look for new members of our family! I have seen that many of the folk look tired and thin), but there is no filth, no polluted water, no sign of widespread disease or poverty. The people in general are slimmer than in Ladon, and it surprises me when it's such an apparently prosperous place, but they do not appear sick with it. And there are two churches - both sites of misguided follies, of course, but it gives me hope for the open mindedness of the population.

I take a walk through the town again, memorising the geography. I'm good at this; I now have a map in my mind of the location of every store and of the layout of the streets. I buy a cup of coffee at the cafe - such a luxury, and yet it seems an everyday thing here - and then I walk to the park. It isn't warm, but I like sitting in the sun when I can, and so I find a bench and tilt my head back and smile.

[OPEN]

The later tenth, Gamelion (31 January), the Temple farm, afternoon

Horizon to horizon the sky is the same lowering slate. My muscles are burning, but it's a pleasant sort of ache on a cold day. There is not yet much to be done in the garden, not in the earth's slumbering season, but I am doing what I can. This place was in disarray when we arrived, the gardens and orchards badly kept, and so we have been cleaning away the debris. It will make things easier come the spring. And there have been the cows to attend to, and the house and cottages to clean up and make habitable. It has been a long stretch of days, especially since we were already tired when we arrived. We walked, the horses pulling our two carts of possessions slowed by the heavy drag of their loads and by the state of the roads. And we had heavy hearts, not just baggage, and I had to work hard to keep everyone's spirits high, to assure them that we are walking to a more important future, not walking away from our lives. This is the right thing for us, the necessary thing, but after days of rain and sleet on roads that were sometimes not even gravelled I could understand that this was hard to see.

Since arriving here the mood of my family has been better. No more sleeping by roadsides, huddled together under tarpaulin, the weakest and oldest shuffled in around the goods on the carts and the rest shivering on a groundsheet. There is much to do inside our new homes here, but they are homes, and for that we praise Ladon. Now we can begin to look ahead to our great mission, and the relief of that makes me straighten up and smile up at the sky. I have already been into town, in the middle tenth to sign the paperwork for this place and yesterday to trade for provisions at the market. It seems a bustling place, Excolo, a place that is growing. Not like Ladon, turning in on itself, its population ageing, weakening. Excolo is in rude health, and we can do some good here, I pray. Now our home is in better order, the real work can begin.

[closed]