A Moment in Crete

One of the factors that made the fall tour of Crete (www.goddessariadne.com) so powerful was the community that the participants became.

Often before walking a site, such as the ruins of Knossis, we would learn about its history and significance and approach it with the respect and in the manner which it deserved.

Still, one of the most powerful experiences I had, happened on the day I got lost, with one of the tour's leaders, Mika. The group was to gather at a Minoan tomb, Tholos, near Kamilari. Because of back problems, I walked so slowly that Mika and I lost sight of the others and wandered around for an hour before giving up and creating our own little ritual on the side of a dirt road, in the middle of nowhere important.

Sitting in a little patch of rocks, we set our goddess images on their mineral perches and poured our respective libations as we remembered aloud our female ancestors. I invoked my paternal grandmother, Edna Miriam Thacker McClure, her mother (my great grandmother) Nell Miriam Fowler Thacker, and the generations of prior Miriams recorded on a sampler that hangs in my guest room. The ritual prompted me to renew the honor in which I hold my own name (Miriam of course) and its heritage/ my heritage.

After the ceremony, we found our way back to the bus and eventually the others joined us and the tour continued with, as I recall, an incredible (and incredibly late) lunch at a seaside restaurant in Kamilari.

That private ceremony still reverberates in my memory. I have no pictures of that pile of rocks (my camera was temporarily jammed).

Sometimes photographs are redundant.