Speaker 1 0:00

What if I told you that curiosity is your free will speaking to you and by affirming it you take back the power of your life and unlock the deepest truth of your own soul? I can't tell you what it is exactly you'll find in the fairy ring. It is my hope that everyone will experience it a little bit differently and draw their own conclusions a little bit differently and draw their own conclusions. But I will tell you this the darkness of you and of this world is something different, when brought into the light that you being alive is rare and a precious thing and not random, that you are not late and you are not lost. But you are here now, now and now. Now, now and now. So what if I gave you a choice Stay on your current path or enter the fairy ring. Where would you walk? The radio behind the bar begins to play static as thunder rolls into the city. The entire day had been gray and calm, but you knew that the storm was coming in. You could feel the anticipation of it. A cigarette burns out on the ashtray. A cigarette burns out on the ashtray and ice cubes clink together as you take one last drink from your glass, setting it down and leaving money for your tab beside it. And while you're putting your jacket on, the bartender gestures to the storm outside. I'd wait it out, love, says, pouring beer into a large glass. You smile at her and tell her that you'll take your chances. There's something in your energy tonight that just feels alive, restless even Like a firefly caught in a jar, afraid that its light is about to go out. Maybe wandering out into a storm wouldn't fix the way that you feel, but it could be a start.

Speaker 1 2:16

You walk into the gray, pulling your hood up. The streets are nearly empty, save for a 24-hour bodega and the sign for a palm reader that promises to show your fate. You could have sworn that all of these signs walking into the bar Were different colors of neon, but now all of the signs are red, casting the street in a strange ruby glow. You put it out of your mind as you keep walking. You have seen strange things before, miraculous things, even A place where time and dreams and reality merged. When you sank into the earth, when you became one with the moon and the ocean, it had been a long time since you felt any magic in your life, so long that you doubted if magic was even real at all. Maybe you dreamed the whole thing.

Speaker 1 3:21

You shake the rain out of your eyes as you keep walking, passing more red neon signs, all the same color of deep ruby red. The monotone red of the night begins to make you feel unnerved and you cut a sharp turn right to get away from the strange red glow. But the streetlights are cast in red as well. You take a deep breath, closing your eyes. Maybe you had just had too much to drink? Maybe you had just had too much to drink. You shake your head and keep walking, ignoring the red light, until you catch sight of an old cathedral that looks abandoned. You've walked this street many times before and you could have sworn that cathedral has never been there before. But the strange ruby red glow is cast inside of it. The building looks old, older than the city. Vines covering tall windows of broken red stained glass of broken red stained glass. You're not sure how, but you know that you've been to this place before your ears perk up and you feel a strange pulling sensation at the base of your spine, and before your mind can talk your body out of it.

Speaker 1 4:57

You are standing in the doorway of the cathedral. You look around On almost every surface available. There are red tea lights burning, with half of the roof missing. Rain spills in, but yet the candlelight does not go out. Zen, but yet the candlelight does not go out. You hold your right hand just above the flames, feeling the heat while looking up, seeing stars and feeling rain fall down your face like tears. Without warning, the rain stops as you hear the flicker hiss of neon again.

Speaker 1 5:41

The cathedral is an eerie quiet. It's more than quiet. It is the quiet that can be found outside of the city. You look down at the ground. Most of the natural floor has been corroded away with time and in its place dirt and weeds and mushrooms grow. But as you look closer, the mushrooms begin to circle. The circle of mushrooms is below you and you are standing in the middle of them.

Speaker 1 6:28

The fairy ring has found you again. You don't know whether to be unnerved or relieved, as we all might feel when we start to find our magic again. You feel the familiar sensation of being barefoot, without remembering that you had taken your shoes off. Your feet touch the cold stone and earth floor. You look up to see your shoes tied and hanging off one of the hands of a stone angel, their arms outstretched, their wings backlit with red neon. The earth begins to pulse under you, alive with knowledge, mischief and beauty. You can start to feel slick roots caress your ankles. As you begin to sink into the earth, red neon flares behind your lids. These roots go deeper than you can possibly imagine, old as creation itself and new as summer sun. And as you disappear into the earth, the fairy ring closes behind you and all that's left is your shoes being held in the arms of a red neon angel.

Speaker 1 8:04

The idea of seeking sanctuary is really beautiful to me. Way back in the day, like way back, like 13th century back, you could run into a medieval church if you were an accused criminal, for example, and seek asylum. An example of this can be found in Victor Hugo's novel Hunchback of Notre Dame, where Quasimodo cries out for sanctuary to save Esmeralda, sanctuary to save Esmeralda. But this tradition even goes farther back, back to ancient Greece and Rome. So even that, like a runaway slave, could seek asylum in the temple of a god or goddess.

Speaker 1 8:57

And this kind of got me thinking about. How does seeking sanctuary, how does that apply today? How we each seek sanctuary is going to be different for everyone. We can find it everywhere. We can find it in nature, we can find it in city nightlife, the coffee shops, the bookstores, the neighborhood bodega. Think of the place that is your sanctuary right now and take a moment just to be grateful for that space. And a fun thing. Go ahead and, if you want to ask the universe to give you sanctuary where you most need it right now and let that question, go and see how it comes back to you and it may surprise you and not be what you think, and that could be interesting for you think and that could be that could be interesting for you. But, in conclusion, thank you for listening to this first episode of season two, slightly delayed, but I hope you enjoyed it and I'll see you soon. You, you, thank you.