“Oh, Drambuie…I adore the socks! I didn’t even know when you put those on, you dear sneaky donkey.”

“Why would you? You were floating out there in lala land. I could have played the role of a serpentine prankster and you would never have noticed, you were so far out there. Have a good time?”

“No. It was a journey through the heart to a past that was painful.”

“You humans are too stupid to live sometimes! Why would you deliberately cause yourself pain and suffering?”

“It is how we learn our lessons and helps us to let go of what pains us so that we can move forward in our growth.”

“So let me see if I have this right. You have an experience that hurts you deeply. You carry it in your heart until later; decide to check out  on the first flashback to lala land missing some of the most beautiful scenery you will ever see while on the trip of a lifetime just so you can remember how painful the past is so you can let it go and grow and move forward another painful inch in your idotic life? And it was your decision to hold on to this crap in the first place? Well, here’s what I think about that!” Drambuie let loose with the longest stinkiest donkey fart. “I ate something that made my stomach hurt, processed it, and let it go! Get it, crap for brains?”

“You are such an ass. Just shut up! Shut both ends and don’t make a sound until we arrive at the House of Serpents!” I scream at Drambuie not sure why I was so angry. “Being human is much more complicated than being an ass, road apples for brains!” And with that I let go with my own gaseous seranade.

The most infectious laughter came from the tree we were passing. I looked into the boughs above us and saw this woman of undeterminable age with rosy cheeks, a broad smile, dimple in her chin, and bare feet mere inches from the top of my head. I don’t know how I could have missed her.

“My, what a darling pair you are! Have you been married for long?” she giggles.

“Very funny,” I retort. “It’s a little difficult returning from an incredibly deep journey through the heart to an ass such as this.”

“Yes, I hear that a lot on this road.”

“Hey, woman!” Drambuie hollars. “What’s with the bare feet? I’d be glad to give up my socks.” He stands on his hind quarters, propping his front legs on the bough next to her.

“Aaaaah! Ouch!” I slide right off on to my tailbone. I actually keep sliding on the slick serpintine stone while spinning on my butt! Drambuie is laughing so hard he is unable to breathe. “Hee snort haw!  Hee snort haw!” The woman in the tree joins him in his melodious, tinkling giggle. She laughs so hard, she falls over on Drambuie’s head and slides down his back sliding on the serpentine stone spinning on her butt.

“YOU SUCK, YOU ASS!” I’m not sure whether to laugh or cry as I am still spinning faster than a rap star on a well-worn piece of cardboard. Now I have a partner in our unrehearsed, unchoreographed spins.

When Drambuie catches his breath, he chokes out, “You fell off your ass onto your ass!” I don’t know, there was something that pulled a ripchord of tension that I had been holding onto and I melted into a puddle of jovialty that could no longer be denied. I, too, was laughing and snorting which set Drambuie off again causing him to lose his balance and slide on his hind quarters down the road in the opposite direction.

The woman from the tree screeched “Your ass fell on his ass!” and I had tears rolling down mycheeks from this latest development. “Hee snort haw! Fart! Hee snort haw!” There was just no denying…we all were completely out of control. We simply couldn’t gain control of ourselves. When one of us caught a breath and seemed to be able to stand, the other would continue in gales of contagious laughter that would spread to the others.

“Sally met Drambuie in the alley. She hopped upon that ass. They made the journey through her heart til she fell of her ass, alas, the lass, was spinning on the stone away from home on her own…asssssssssss.” Drambuie sang in his best imitation of an Irish tenor snake.

“Ple- ple- please make him stop,” I begged through my hilarity. “I’m hurrrting. I’m gonna pee. I can’t breathe. Please.”

After awhile, the three of us were splayed on the Serpentine Road looking like roadkill. No one dared look at another. We simply focused on breathing. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out.

The woman from the tree was the first to revive herself. She stood up, ran her hand through her hair and surveyed the damage. I was face down on the serpentine stone. My chin laid in a puddle of drool as I was too weak to swallow my own saliva. A short distance from us, Drambuie was laid out like a stuffed toy dropped and forgotten then stepped on.

The woman helped me to my feet. She told me the seat of my pants were as shiney as the stone of the road. Together we walked over to Drambuie and tried to help him to his feet. He was too heavy for one to take each end so we both pulled this head and front up, then the back. As we pulled up the back of his body, his front feet slid apart and the front slid back down to the road.  The opposite occurred when we returned to the front of his body. I’m sure we would look like a cartoon to anyone watching.

“I’ll take care of this,” the woman from the tree said. She took a large safety pin from her pocket and stabbed Drambuie right in the butt. “What the…” he bellowed as he jumped to all fours.

“Time to get on your way, my four legged friend. I am so very glad that we were able to have such a riotous time together. Thank you. Thank you so much!” She tucked her pin back into her pocket and climbed back up the tree.

Drambuie headed back up the road to get me. I climed on and shook my head. “What the hell happened?” Drambuie demanded to know as we traveled back towards the tree and the woman.

I smiled knowingly. “That, my friend, was known as laughter therapy. It is one of the most healthy activities known to woman and beast.”

“Yeah, right. Laughter therapy. Do you have to go to school for that?”

“No. I was trained in a single afternoon.” I quipped.

As we passed under the woman in the tree, I noticed with great interest that her feet were no longer bare. She had Drambuie’s socks on her feet…well, two of the socks anyway. I leaned to the left until I could see Drambuie’s feet. He still had socks on.

Each sock was similar yet different. The words stictched on the socks were simple and stitched only around the top.

“LAUGH YOUR ASS OFF!”

“LAUGHTER HEALS”

“LAUGH TIL YOU SPIN ON YOUR ASS” 

“Get off your ass and LAUGH!!”

Drambuie and I both fall into silence as we follow the path to the Serpentine Road. Drambuie’s hooves clip clopping on the well traveled surface and the motion of riding upon his back lulls me into an alternate state. I feel the need to “unravel my heart” to help ease the ache.

While Drambuie and I physically travel away from the Valley of the Bones, my soul returns to a pile of bones that spell out my name in the heart of the valley.  I kneel nearby and hear the whispers of women who call me by name; women of my blood who came before me. There are two in particular that are louder than the others and I am startled when I realize I recognize my maternal and paternal grandmothers.

Sarah Julie Elizabeth Gregg was born in West Virginia in 1884. Sometime between the ages of 18 and 24, my paternal grandmother saw a newspaper ad “young women 18 to 30 years of age, of good character, attractive and intelligent, as waitresses in Harvey Eating Houses on the Santa Fe Railroad in the West.” My grandmother became a Harvey Girl. Harvey Girls were wholesome, moral girls hired by Fred Harvey to provide food to railway passengers from the many resteraunts built along the Santa Fe railway line. These women braved the uncivilized west and its perils in exchange for adventure, $17.50 per month, room and board, and generous tips. The only catch was they had to sign contracts for six, nine, or twelve months promising they would not marry. If they did, half of the salary they received to day would be returned.

It is said that over 100,000 women became Harvey Girls over the years. These women changed the history of the west as over 20,000 of them eventually married their regular customers who were cowboys, bankers, ranchers, railmen, etc.

 In a time when women stayed home until married, my grandmother left the proper life of an eastern woman and became a Harvey Girl. I don’t know the details, but she apparently chose New Mexico as her station; possibly because of her Native American cousins, the Rainwaters. Regardless, she fulfilled her contract and married my grandfather in 1909.

Grandma Sally had three daughters before my grandfather left. She was 41 when my father was born after my grandfather paid her a visit. At the time of my birth, Grandma Sally was 72. I remember her as a strict, religious woman who ate vegetarian chicken from a can and hand made beautiful quilts. She claimed to have hearing problems, but seemed to have no problems hearing all the naughty things her grandchildren whispered. I guess her hearing was selective or would come and go…

I liked to hang out with Grandma Sally even though summers meant going to bible school. She had a piano (which I now have and found out she traded for my father’s trumpet) and I got to help her quilt. She taught me to crochet and knit. I became very interested in reading the bible and religion. She would answer some of my religious questions while ignoring others.

Grandma Sally swore man would not walk on the moon in her lifetime as it was just so ungodly. She passed away three days before Neil Armstrong took his giant step for mankind. In the weeks prior to her passing, my aunt said Grandma Sally was completely deaf. However, she could hear angels singing and told my aunt of the sweet songs being sung to her. I’m glad that heaven opened those pearly gates and those deaf ears to her before her passing so she wasn’t afraid.

Thelma Louise Keith [?] Hill [?] Webster was my maternal grandmother, but we called her Dima. Dima was a beautiful, elegant woman who worked almost all of her life on construction sites. Dima had two daughters and was widowed twice by the time she was 25. Her father, brother, sister, and both husbands lived and worked in a logging/lumber community called Somoa  in Northern California near the Oregon border.

When Dima was married to Ellwood Hill, my grandfather, she had uterine cancer. My mother was born two months early weighing just over two pounds. By the day after my mother was born, Dima’s blood had seeped through the mattress and pooled under the bed. Mom was put in a dresser drawer with a warm brick and Dima was put on a train to San Francisco to the hospital.

My mother is a survivor and that will to live started at birth. She and my grandmother were reunited and life went smoothly until my mother was three and her father died of tuberculosis. At this point in my family’s history, it gets a little fuzzy. For some reason, my grandfather’s family, the Hills, tried to take my mother away from my grandmother. That wasn’t going to happen. They left Eureka.

Again, the history fades and the only facts that are clear are that Dima marries a man from a town near Sacramento. He is a man with secrets and schemes. They move, possibly to hide from the law, into a chicken coop. With the help of his sister, Dima, my mother and her older sister get away from this man, Mick, and begin anew.

Dima goes to work for a construction company. Through the years, her oldest daughter gets married young and leaves. She leaves my mother with other people depending on the where the job takes her. World War II comes and they end up in San Francisco.  It was a frightening time for women who are unprotected. One night on a dark street, a man steps in front of the car and they run over him. They are too afraid to stop.

I have happy memories of my grandmother and the grandfather I remember, Pops who eventually adopted my mother when she was in her forties. We would visit them at various construction jobs. My sister and I would play in Dima’s jewelry box.

Things changed somehow when my parents divorced. The change was subtle and I didn’t always notice. I do recall, though, my older sister and younger brother receiving birthday cards while I did not. I got married and my father didn’t come to my wedding. I got divorced.

I met and fell in love with Scott. We moved in together and my mother told me, “why buy the cow when you get the milk free.”  Several months later I called Mom and said, “Mom, he’s buying the cow!” At a visit with my mom and grandmother, I knew something was up. I could feel something coming. My grandmother asked me who was going to give me away at the wedding. I said my dad was. My grandmother turned real cold towards me after that. Shortly after that, I heard through my sister that Mom wouldn’t be coming to my wedding.

My sister, grandmother and I went out for drinks a few months later. Dima bragged to other people about how beautiful her granddaughter was and introduced my sister. She spoke to me very little despite my attempts to engage her.

When I returned from my honeymoon in Bora Bora, I went to visit Dima. I wasn’t quite in a place or frame of mind where I could see Mom yet. I told Dima about Bora Bora and brought her a present. I then asked her if I could have a tea cup or handkerchief; something that I could have and say, “My grandmother gave me this.” She told me no. It was devastating. I knew that she had given my brother and sister several things already. I had no idea what I ever did to her to make her so hurtful towards me. Maybe it was the simple fact that I was my daddy’s girl and she hated my father.

My grandmother had a stroke during a time that my mother and I hadn’t quite worked things out after I got married. Mom called and told me Dima had a stroke but not to come down. She wouldn’t know me. I went out into the back yard and had a serious talk with Dima. Of course, I did all the talking just like I would have if I had gone to see her. I told her how hurt I was by her, the things she said, her absence at my wedding, her refusal to give me a tidbit of hers. I let it all out. She died soon afterward.

It was her death that began the healing between my mother and I. Mom wanted me to be with her the next day when she drove to the place my grandmother would be remembered and buried. Although Mom was heartbroken, it was a day unlike any other I had ever had with her. We talked about many spiritual things, feelings, and life though stayed far away from the wedding. 

I guess Dima thought she got the best of things by refusing to give me anything of hers. But I came out ahead. It was because of her that I began to get my mother back.

The love I was feeling for my mother snapped me back into my body. I realized how difficult her life was as a child spending periods of time without her mother. Her life was difficult later on when she and my father developed their feud and mutual desire to make each others’ lives miserable in every way possible. But now I had the relationship with Mom I had always dreamed of having and my heart was so full of love.

I had unraveled my heart and it no longer ached. I had picked through the last of the bones that needed my attention. The bitter taste in my mouth was gone and I thought about all I had learned about healing…that bitter tasting foods were very good for one’s digestion…

“Ya ready now, my gal Sal?” I heard as donkey lips nuzzled  my lower leg. “I am, my ham Dram.” I replied wrapping my arms around Drambuie’s neck. “Then let’s make like a bananna and split!”

“Let’s make like a tree and leave!”

“Let’s blow this popcicle stand!”

With a little buck, a donkey fart, and a “yahoo!” we got stepped on the Serpentine Road. I gagged…got back on the saddle, rode down the road with a fist in the air, an unraveled heart, and a bitter-free being.

“That’s the best idea you’ve had since we left,” Drambuie interjected into my thoughts. “You must be sobering up.”

“You talking to me?” Ms. Gigi pokes her head out of my pocket. “Yo, Sal. You OK? Your voice sounds a little deeper than usual.”

“That’s not me, my dear Ms. G. May I introduce you to Drambuie, our guide and mode of transportation?”

Drambuie turns his head. “Hey, Ms. Gigi. Nice to see you again. How are you feeling? Headache? Hangover?”

“Hey, Sal,” Ms. G whispers. Did you see those nice donkey lips? Betcha that would be one nice kiss!” She gives a quiet gecko guffaw. “Good evening, Sir Drambuie,” she says, drawing the words out in her best Lon Chaney voice. “Actually, I am feeling quite fit though a little dehydrated. I think…I’d like to drink your blood!”

“Then assume the mosquito shape. But be warned…I’m pretty good with this tail. One good flick and I’ll strike you dead. Hey, Ms. G…ya scared? You always joke around when you’re scared.”

“Nah. We’re going to where? The Valley of the Bones? Nothing to be scared of there!” Ms. Gigi bravely retorts.”Nothin’ a-tall…”

A cloak of silence has descended upon the entire group. The only sounds are the occasional “pwwwwwft” of the donkeys in their own language and the sound of their hooves upon the hard packed earth. As we ascend a hill, I can sense the forward lean of all our bodies; as though there is a taut ribbon of energy connecting us through our hearts, pulling us forward.  

We crest the hill and stop unconsciously forming a horizontal line; all gazing down into the Valley of Bones. It’s a waning moon, about three or four days past the full.  It’s enough light to reflect off the bleached white of the bones giving the illusion of bones glowing in the near dark.

One by one, in no particular timing or order, we descend into the Valley. I am the last to go. I am not delaying because of fear. Quite contraire. I am waiting until the right moment arrives. Drambuie moves as if on cue when that magical moment appears.

I close my eyes and raise my arms out from my sides, palms out. I consider what I know about bones. They consist of living and dead cells when still covered with living flesh. Bones are brittle but have some elasticity. They are not uniformly solid but have spaces between hard elements. Inside bones are filled with a porous network of spongy mortal remains that allow room for blood vessels and marrow. Bones are calcified connective tissue.

Hmmm…Bones are calcified connective tissue and I feel I am connected somehow to this Valley of Bones. “What’s up with that?” I am past the thoughtful stage here and have ridden by donkey straight to into Alley of Unknown in the Grandfather Zone. I didn’t know either of my blood grandfathers.

My maternal grandfather passed from tuberculosous when my mother was three years old. His family was from France and Scotland. They tried to take my mother away from my Grandmother when Grandfather Ellwood passed away. I’m not sure what happened, but it was ugly. I eventually met the aunts. One of them had a doll hospital. I saw the house where my mother was born in Eureka, California.

There was only one good picture of him, hanging in the house where Mom was born. It still hangs there, now a cousin taking the house and holding tightly to the picture. He refused to relinquish this beautiful portrait of a man to the man’s daughter. (Oh, that’s where my earlier musing came from.) “What’s up with that?!”

I’ve seen an old photograph of Ellwood, my grandfather. It’s from a distance and he is standing near the top of a tree. He was a logger. The details f his face are blurry, but I can see that his hair falls forward and to the front…just as my mother’s hair does…just as my hair does. It’s with sudden realization that I see where one of my physical features comes from. I recently found another picture of him with my grandmother, Thelma, and Aunt, Jeanne. Mom, Bev, is the youngest.

 T is with great resolve that I promise myself to get my mother that portrait of her father!!

My paternal grandfather passed when I was two years old. I remember going to the “big green hospital” to see him just before he died. None of his children would speak of him. Story is that Frank married my Grandma Sally and fathered three daughters.

At some point in time, he left the family. Then he returned; had relations with my grandmother; and left again. Oops! There was 11 years between the youngest daughter and the only son.  Meet Frank L., my father.

Dad was 12 years old before he ever set eyes on his father. My father had become quite ill and was dying. My grandmother tracked down Grandpa Frank living in a tar paper shack. Dad’s first memory of his father was this:

Grandpa Frank sat Dad down in a chair and stood before him. He rubbed his hands together quickly then held his hands about 18 inches apart. Dad said that there were sparks jumping between Grandpa Frank’s hands. Grandpa Frank moved behind Dad and placed his hands on the top of Dad’s head. He rubbed his hands down each side of Dad’s head, ears, neck; and off his shoulders very quickly and flicked both hands in the air flicking his flangies  as though ridding himself of some invisible liquid.

Suddenly Dad was well again. That’s one heck of a first meeting with one’s father! I heard later that my grandfather was a famous healer in a place called God’s Garden near Bisbee, Arizone. I have the letter that describes his meeting with the Holy Spirit and being told to heal.

I have a picture of my granfather and Flora, my step-grandmother, standing in the garden. There is a golden glow around Grandpa Frank’s head. If you follow his body down to his feet, his body disappears at the end of his legs. I once took the picture to a kinesthesiologist. She held the photograph between her hands and said she felt sparks jumping between her hands.

This is where I received my healing hands, from my Grandpa Frank. He was a complex man who no one would speak of for they had abandonment issues. He had a twin brother who had no children. He also had two other brothers, Emil and Charles. I don’t know anything about them, if there was children…But I know everything about all the rest of the family back to the branch of our family tree that predates those who immigrated to American from Bavaria in the 1700’s. There is still a family homestead in the family and a stained glass window in a spa with the family crest. 

My cowlick and hair falling forward from my Grandfather Ellwood and my healing hands and sense of humor from Grandpa Frank, the scallywag…I relish what I received from both though I didn’t know either.

Consider an event that took place in the nineteenth century.

An ancient Egyptian tomb was opened and in the tomb a portion of a tree was found. Embedded within the wood of this tree lay a seed. Scientists involved with this expedition planted the seed out of curiosity, merely to see what would happen. Low and behold, 3000 years later the seed grew and became what it was meant to become. It had missed its chance in ancient Egypt but its strength of life had remained intact, had lain dormant and waiting for the next opportunity.

The seeds that Enchanteur has collected are seeds waiting for an opportunity to become what they are destined to become.

Use the comment tool to consider what you think these seeds, waiting to be planted in rich Lemurian loam might grow to become. Meditate upon times that you have tried to plant such seeds and they failed to sprout. Contemplate why they did not flourish and what will be different now.

The Snake Woman at the House of the Serpents has been reading her cards and the card she has pulled reveals that it is time to move on along the road and head towards the old alluvial mines that have been worked for centuries.

It is little wonder that Purdie is looking more than a little anxious.

After Lemuria was submerged, thousands of years ago, it became a lawless land. Once the Divine Ones were gone there was no real rule or authority and communications between regions was cut off. Roads like the Serpentine Road became dangerous wildernesses. Those who remained knew little of the outside world and barely knew their neighbours.

After years of lawlessness a group of Amazonians gathered and began to restore order. They squashed tyranny and cruelty and kept a close eye out for fierce foreigners in long black ships who patrolled the region. Peace returned!

Yet some remnants of the bad times remained. In the dark impenatrable woods, in the clefts of mountains, in the honeycomb of subterranean caves strange creatures still lived. There were the survivors of earlier times and not all of them were friendly. Huge worms, massive serpents, batwinged birds can be found in these parts.

Today, you can only travel this road in safety because of the Amazonians who continue to patrol these parts. If you, like Crispin and I, are lucky enough to stumble into their camp you will learn more about some of the history of Lemuria, of things not altogether of this world or any other. Perhaps more importantly, you might meet some of the wild things that roam these parts and come to love the wilder part within.

It is a treacherous mountain climb to the mines, set high in the mountains like the snow caves of Austria.

Make a hiss-tory snake, like those shown here, by drawing a serpent and filling it’s scales with small scales that record your life. Mark things such as your first kiss, the day a precious pet died, the time you fell off your bike an grazed your knees. You may even use tiles to project the future.

When you have finished choose a section of your snake, draw your hand on a page and write five more things about that memory. Then write a longer piece that will tell a stranger more about what you remember.

On the Serpentine Road you have consistently seen the sign of the Ouroborus.
There have been manholes and votive signs.
Ouroborus has a cave in the rock face beyond the House of the Serpents.
It is time to visit and make an offering.

Far off, unknown, beyond the range of thought,
scarce reached by gods, the years’ rough haggard mother,
stands a primeval Cave in whose vast breast,
is Time’s cradle and womb. A Serpent encloses,
the Cave, consuming all things with slow power,
and green scales always glinting. Its mouth devours,
the backbent tail as with mute motion it traces,
its beginning. At the entrance Nature sits,
the threshold-guardian, aged and yet lovely,
and round her gather and flit on every side
Spirits. A Venerable Man writes down
immutable laws. He fixes the number of stars
in every constellation, makes some of them move and others hang at rest.
So all things live or die by predetermined laws…
When the Sun rested on the cave’s wide threshold,
Nature ran in her might to meet him; the Old Man bent
grey hairs to the proud rays. Of its own accord
the admantine door swung open, revealing
the huge interior, displaying the House
the Secrets of Time. Here in appointed places
the Ages dwell, with varying Metals marking
their aspect. Those of brass are there upheaped,
there stiff the iron, there the silver gleaming;
shy of earth-contacts, in a distinguished section,
is set the flock of golden years.”

from Claudian On the Consulship of Stilicho

Activity

Download and print a copy of an Ouroborus Mandala and use it and Claudian’s work as a meditative tool and guided imagery. Commune with the Rainbow Serpent who fills the cave that Claudian speaks of. Offer a gift! Share any revelations or responses.

In the House of the Serpents there is a very special bath-house, run by a Dame who rubs and scrubs and helps travellers release layers, serpent like skins.

During their time at the bath house, travellers invariably shed skins, wash aspects of themselves, pull away layers that they no longer wish to wear.

Shed the skins of years gone by
hang them out like was to dry
Blow the memories to the sky
Whispered prayers for days gone by
Stepping stones of hope and try

(c) 2009 Kerry Vincent

Like Tibetan Prayer flags the discarded skins of travellers on the Serpentine Road float on the breeze, carrying beneficent vibrations, near the House of the Serpents.

Some travellers inscribe their skins with auspicious symbols, prayers, invocations and mantras.

Serpent Prayer Flags, hanging near the House of the Serpents will surely bless the surrounding countryside and keep it safe from dark forces.

Perhaps you will leave a skin to hang from the quirky Hills Hoist in the gardens of the House of the Serpents, and, in doing so, promote peace, compassion, strength, and wisdom.

Enchanteur is waiting at the House of the Serpents. She is with Selene in the grove where the Listening Trees reside.
Make sure to visit this Grove while you are at the House.

The House of the Serpents is a welcome resting place for travellers on the Serpentine Road. It lies in a valley at the foothills of the Kerith Volcano.

Fate is smiling upon you all. It so happens that we have arrived here at the House of the Serpent in time for special festivities, beginning with the Day of the Serpents.

The Day of the Serpents is the day when serpents come from the forest to the house. On this day the people who live here shake the apple trees in the orchard so that they will be bear more fruit and wake the bees from their winter sleep. The awakening of the snakes corresponds with the awakening of nature, the beginning of life, the awakening of creativity and general creative regeneration. Honored as deities the snakes are invited to eat with us. Crawling out from their slumber they lie on the banquet table and make themselves comfortable. After tasting a little from every dish they return to their holes. This year you are invited to participate. You watch fascinated as the snakes emerge to join us at the filled banquet table, sample the food and then slither back to their holes. Once the snakes leave you sit down and enjoy the banquet, chatting with everyone, meeting the local resident seated beside you. The resident tells you how it is now predestined that everyone who eats from the table will enjoy creative fertility and you marvel at the concept. Custom demands that in return for this gift, in return for being blessed by the snakes, you must perform for the veiled Gorgon who sits on a throne made of red coral.

The residents points to the Pandora’s dressing room which is full to overflowing with wigs, hats, costumes, masks and props and tells you that performers whose voice is authentic not only witness the Gorgon remove one of her masks but are given a piece of wisdom. Be wary Shane! No man has ever lifted the veil that covers her ‘real’ self

Task

Explore all that is to be found at the House of the Serpents. Make sure to visit the Grove where the Listening Trees have wisdom to share. Dip into Pandora’s Box and engage in the Festival of the Serpents. Prepare a presentation for the Gorgon.

There is this place, beyond the Valley of the Bones, not so very far along the Serpentine Road,  where an old woman sits in the tree, waiting, for the right person, the right donkey, to stop and come into her garden. I cannot tell you how far down the road she is, anymore than I can tell you how long the piece of string I am holding is. What I can tell you is that if you go through the door and into the world behind the fence you may be surprised. Rumour hath it that she reads soulful soles. It is said that there are rooms full of the soles of travellers. Perhaps you and your companion donkey will call in and leave sole prints in the House of Soles.

To make a footprint take off your shoes and socks and put your foot on your journal page. Trace your foot and then carefully draw in the toenails.

Meditate upon your footprint and consider some of the footprints that you have left behind, the things that people will remember you for. On each toe, write an impression that you have made, a footprint that you have left behind.

Make imprints of the soles of your feet and leave special footprints for the old woman who sits in the tree, waiting for the right person, the right donkey, to stop and come into her garden