I was raised in a small village in the chalk-heart of South Cambridgeshire, where medieval ridge-and-furrow still breathes beneath industrial crops and hedgerows mark the slow violence of enclosure. The River Rhee, a chalk stream born of ancient springs, carried the patience of deep time, its flint-lit shallows holding the memory of hands that shaped tools ten thousand years ago.

Multiple lineages meet in me. From the West, Celtic and Irish kin — keepers of circular songs, walkers of famine roads, gifted with second sight and the knowing of tír, place as sacred text. From the Industrial North, the hum of mills, the breath of coal seams, solidarity forged in the dark. From the East, East Anglia’s wide-sky country — horizons that dissolve smallness, fields where light remakes everything it touches.

I now call several places home. London, where I lived for 30 years, a city I love and a place from which I still work and spend time. And Tkaronto (meaning "where there are trees standing in the water”) - colonially named as Toronto. I followed my heart here, to be with my Love, and am paying careful attention to how I show up and tread on these lands.

* The photo is from a ceremony that I was lucky to be part of in 2024, led by Dr. Zhiish McKenzie who is Aniishnaabe from the Temagami First Nation. The ceremony began by Zhiish sharing the Eighth Fire prophecy - a powerful vision within Anishinaabe spiritual traditions which speaks of a future period of profound healing and reconciliation between Indigenous and settler cultures. It describes the emergence of "new people" who unite Indigenous wisdom with Western knowledge to create a just, peaceful society based on respect for all living things. This prophecy represents a critical choice point where humanity can move beyond destructive patterns toward harmony with each other and the Earth.

Each of us at the ceremony stepped over a threshold and made a commitment to bring forward all of ourselves in service of this prophecy.