Keep the Home Fires Burning

In Goddesses for Older Women, JeanShinoda Bolen suggests that when women are younger their goddesses are a committee with ego as the strong chairman. As a crone, my goddesses sit around the fire, speaking when so moved and waiting for consensus. This brings me to Hestia, a goddess who is not really personified but is represented by the fire in the hearth. I was so yearning for that after years of hotel living. It seems so synchronous to me that we started a major remodel that included a wood stove last summer. We lit the beautiful red wood stove on a green stone hearth the same week my chemotherapy started. Dave worked hard to keep it going, starting a new fire everyday, working up a huge woodpile for next year, hauling all the wood inside. I could barely keep up with it when he got sick for a few days. So our home fire was burning this year; I needed it, hungered for it. A Hestian tradition is for the first fire in the newlyweds' house to be started from the embers of the parents.
Hestia is also the goddess of women sitting in circles. My cancer provided me with that opportunity as well this year as I joined a circle of women on a common journey of cancer that meets twice a month. Here we can speak our truth to those who really understand, other cancer survivors.
Another Hestian impulse I have had is to become a nun, to live a spiritual life among women, forsaking worldly things. I did look like a nun with my shaved head, but as a happily married woman, that is an impulse I am unlikely to act upon. For me that impulse is a signal that I want to deepen my spiritual practice. Currently my practice consists of Jin Shin Jyutsu almost every day, sitting in meditation many days, yoga sporadically, mindful housework and cooking sporadically. Doing my pages every morning is another very important practice as is an artist walk and artist date every week.
So yes, Hestia is definitely an archetype for me as I enter my crone years. Hestia is currently guiding me toward more home comfort and a more centered life. How about you? Do you long for a space of your own or more solitude? Do you long to tend mindfully to your household chores? Hestia might be calling to you.