• About Catherine Castle
  • Blog
  • Book Shelf
  • Contact Catherine
  • Copyright Permissions
  • Gardens
  • Guest Blog Information-A Writer’s Garden
  • Guest Blog Information-Musings from a Writer’s Brain
  • Guest Blog Information-Tasty Tuesdays
  • Guest Blog Information-Wednesday Writers
  • WIP

Catherine Castle

~ Romance for the Ages

Catherine Castle

Tag Archives: paranormal

Musings from a Writer’s Brain–Learning Welsh by Carol Browne

01 Monday Nov 2021

Posted by Catherine Castle in Blog, books, essay, Fantasy, Guest Authors

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

An Elf's Lament Upon Leaving, Carole Brown, Elves, essay on Learning Welsh, Fantasy, Musings from a Writer's Brain, paranormal

From Carol Browne

a few weeks ago I made a serious attempt at tackling a life-long goal. I have always wanted to learn Welsh and now that I am semi-retired, I have the time and the inclination to take on new projects. I already have a good grounding in French and a smattering of German but Welsh has been what you might call the Holy Grail for me when wanting to learn another language. There are a number of reasons for this. As a Brit, I believe we in the UK should value and preserve all our languages. It is a shame they aren’t taught in schools. The UK comprises four nations so why should English alone be the national tongue? Welsh is a British language and the Britons were here first!

Apart from the historical and cultural reasons for learning another language, it has been shown to help with cognitive function and to ward off dementia. It opens up neural pathways in the brain and is especially good for the mental development of children. Other languages can stretch our minds with their varied uses of syntax and imagery; it is a different way of looking at the world.

I have another reason for learning Welsh, however. This one will ask many of the people reading this blog to suspend disbelief. I did have another attempt at learning Welsh a long time ago. I was about eight years old and had inherited a bookcase with its contents from my great uncle. In it was a Teach Yourself Welsh book. So I tried. I desperately wanted to learn Welsh because being Welsh was an obsession of mine. Coincidentally, all my family holidays were spent in Wales as we weren’t too far from the Welsh border. Trust me, once you cross that border you feel different. There is something a bit magical about Wales. Druids, castles, dragons, yes! But the whole ethos of that country feels otherworldly. The beaches are gorgeous too and there are stunning waterfalls and lush woodland that seem to be a natural haunt for the faerie folk.

My attempt at learning Welsh on my own at such a young age was a failure. I could write the words but had no idea how to say them. No Internet then. There were no evening classes and no college courses in Welsh, even had I been old enough to attend. I was forced to abandon the attempt. But my obsession with Wales persisted. I didn’t just want to speak Welsh; I wanted to be Welsh. Being English instead actually caused me considerable depression. Bonkers! Why would a child have such outlandish thoughts!

Fast forward twenty years to a morning bus ride on my way to work. I remember it clearly. I was gazing sadly out of the window, thinking that if anyone were to ask me what my biggest regret in life was, I would have to say, “Not being Welsh”. Only one thought cheered me up. That evening there was something to look forward to. A neighbour and I had booked readings with a local clairvoyant medium. Although we both had an interest in spiritual and esoteric matters, we had not been to a medium before and it was a bit of a giggle; but I was not prepared for what I was to hear.

When my turn to sit with the medium came, she told me about my present life and quite a few things that would happen in my future (I dismissed them at the time but they all came to pass!). She said that I could ask her some questions before I left. Something prompted me to say, “Can you see people’s past lives?”

“Oh, yes,” she said. “I can see some of yours. In your most recent past life you were Welsh.”

Yep, I almost fell off the chair! How could she know I was obsessed with being Welsh? Nobody knew that!

She went on to tell me I was a woman with a smallholding in Maesteg, South Wales, and I loved animals but didn’t like human society so lived like a recluse. She said, unfortunately, I had brought that vibration with me to this lifetime (I have. My bad, but it wasn’t a conscious decision!). I died of cancer in about 1874.

“One day, you will go back to Maesteg and recognise where you used to live,” she went on.

So far, I haven’t made it to Maesteg, but you never know.

The funny thing is, as soon as she told me I had been Welsh, my obsession with being Welsh evaporated along with the sadness. Something lifted and I was content with my Englishness from that point on. Fortunately, my love for Wales and the language did not go away. Now, thanks to Duolingo, I am learning Welsh and I know how to pronounce it this time, so I have more chance of success.
For all those years before that clairvoyant released me from my past-life enchantment, I endured an inexplicable longing for a place with which I felt a profound but irrational bond. It was nostalgia for a home that no longer existed and a sense of deep sorrow and regret to have lost it. I experienced something for which there is no word in English.

But there is a word that encapsulates all of those feelings. The word is hiraeth. It’s Welsh, of course!

Here’s a brief intro to my latest book. I hope you enjoy it.

An elf laments a passing era,
But truth and beauty will survive,
For they live on in stories and verses,
And in our imaginations thrive.

Nature, nostalgia, mystery and magic,
In twisty tales and poems that rhyme,
Are here, with myth and fantasy blended,
To capture another place and time.

BUY LINKS

Amazon UK

Amazon US

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Once upon a time a little girl wrote a poem about a flower.
Impressed, her teacher pinned it to the wall and, in doing so, showed the child which path to follow.
Over the years poems and stories flowed from her pen like magic from a wizard’s wand.
She is much older now, a little wiser too, and she lives in rural Cambridgeshire, where there are many trees to hug.
But inside her still is that little girl who loved Nature and discovered the magic of words.
She hopes to live happily ever after.

Stay connected with Carol on her website and blog, Facebook, and Twitter.

Advertisement

A Writer’s Garden—Finding #Peace in Mother Nature during #COVID-19 by Carole Ann Moleti

11 Thursday Jun 2020

Posted by Catherine Castle in A Writer's Garden, Covid-19, garden blog series

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

A Writer's Garden, Carole Ann Moleti, COVID-19 Garden, Fantasy, flowers, Garden blog, Nature, paranormal, Unfinished Business Series

Welcome to A Writer’s Garden where writers who are gardeners or just love gardens will be sharing their garden and flower stories, as well as a bit about their writing. Today’s writer/gardener guest is Carole Ann Moleti, who is talking about how her garden helped get her through her COVID-19 experiences this year.

Welcome, Carole, and thank you for your front-line service during this global pandemic.

This past winter was more like an endless spring of damp, dreary days with flooding rains. The camellia bloomed, blood red, during the final days of March.

Camelia

That was right about the time those of us in health care raced in blindfolded, with one hand tied behind our backs battle to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic.

In those early days, adrenaline pumping, I’d return home from what was supposed to be an 8-hour shift that lasted 10-12 hours. I’d pull into my driveway, and Mother Nature would welcome me home to my garden.

The world was silent to human ears, with New York City on PAUSE and battling a killer virus. But, like before we dominated the Earth, the flora and fauna breathed deeply of the fresh air and thrived.

By March 27, the chirping robins had returned, and were building their nests in the trees. The camellia was fading but I cut a bumper crop of daffodils and made nosegays with the grape hyacinths, which brightened my mood.

Daffodils and forsythia (upper right)

 

 

grape hyacinths and heuecera

 

 

 

 

My tulips did not fare well, with only four pale purple blooms, but the forsythia was a wall of bright yellow. Squirrels darted about. And there was not a single human sound, other than my waterproof clogs tapping the slate before I left them at the back door.

The streets were deserted, but nature didn’t care. There was no traffic, less smog, more parking and the sunrises and sunsets over the South Brooklyn waterfront conveyed peace and serenity moments before I entered the chaos that loomed beyond the door I was about to scan myself through.

May was soon gone, lost amongst 60-hour workweeks, and I never realized that Memorial Day weekend had passed. By June, the azaleas and irises were spent, and the mountain laurel, rhododendrons, and peonies were finally blooming.

peonies

The hydrangeas are in leaf. Who knows when their blossoms will emerge in this crazy year? I finally planted my vegetable garden.

hydrangea

The most amazing gift was the frog. We have lived in this house for thirty years. My young son had once hoped for a frog or toad, just like the ones in the legendary books by Arnold Lobel. We even had a toad house in hopes of attracting one, or both, but had no success.

Frog

As if it was waiting for curfew and COVID 19 restrictions to be lifted on June 8, as I walked past the pond, a frog leaped across my path. I thought it might be my imagination, but later I spied it on a rock. The next day, its eyes peeped out of the murky water, then disappeared. Hopefully it is here to stay. We all need health and peace and happiness.

Mother Nature has issued a stern rebuke. Human habits are driving many species to extinction, and we might be next unless we pay attention to the environment and take meaningful action to avert climate change.

We learned a lot about COVID 19 this spring, and about the best and the worst of human spirit. We’ll be better prepared for the next round, but hopefully the Earth can recover and we can avert another viral pandemic and violence epidemic.

Mother Nature spoke to me loud and clear this year, without saying a word. I just had to PAUSE to open my eyes and my heart to hear the message through the silence.

 

About the Writer/Gardener

Carole Ann Moleti lives and works as a nurse-midwife in New York City, thus explaining her fascination with all things paranormal, urban fantasy, and space opera. Her nonfiction focuses on health care, politics, and women’s issues. But her first love is writing science fiction and fantasy because walking through walls is less painful than running into them.

Excerpts of Carole’s memoir, Someday I’m Going to Write a Book: Diary of an Urban Missionary range from the sweet and inspirational in A Quilt of Holidays to the edgy and irreverent in Not Your Mother’s Book: On Being a Woman. She has a essay in the acclaimed Shifts anthology, https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01CB4XEIM/

and one in the forthcoming Impact: Personal Portraits of Activism due out September 2020.

Carole’s work has appeared in a variety of literary and speculative fiction venues. Short stories set in the world of her novels are featured in several of the Ten Tales anthologies. The Unfinished Business Series, a three volume paranormal romance, was published by Soulmate.

 

 

Social Media Links

Amazon:  Twitter @petitemeetstree  Website: Facebook

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

#Nature #flowers  Unfinished Business Series #fantasy# paranormal

Catherine Castle Facebook

Catherine Castle Facebook

Follow me on Twitter

My Tweets

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 1,708 other subscribers

Recent Posts

  • Wednesday Writers–Shadow in the Dark by Antony Barone Kolenc January 5, 2022
  • Musings from a Writer’s Brain—Reality or Make-believe? by Amy R Anguish December 27, 2021
  • Wednesday Writers—When Love Trusts by Judythe Morgan December 22, 2021
  • Wednesday Writers–Defending David by Barbara M. Britton December 15, 2021
  • Wednesday Writers–An interview with Lady Fallon from Susan Hanniford Crowley’s YA Fantasy Lady Fallon’s Dragons December 1, 2021

Archives

Categories

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

Writer's organizations

  • ACFW Ohio Chapter
  • American Christian Fiction Writers

Blog Stats

  • 62,223 hits
  • RSS - Posts
  • RSS - Comments

Blog at WordPress.com.

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Follow Following
    • Catherine Castle
    • Join 627 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Catherine Castle
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...