Buto: Cobra Goddess

“Why am I so cold, Chris?”

My own icy hands chill my belly through my summer cotton blouse. I feel Mr. Mew, Chris’s cat on my shin bones, but there’s no warmth, only pressure.

“Sometimes, astral travel can do that. You’ll warm up when you’re all the way back in, Melinda.”

“What a trip!”

I have been following a mentor/guide who presented herself to me in this healing session. I’ve been working with Chris once a week since February, when flash-backs began to happen. She does laying-on-of-hands healing and shamanic journey work. My goal is to clear the effects of growing up with my dad. 

In this journey, a cobra goddess with gigantic wings protects me from my pursuer - holding me with one wing, and barring the chamber door against him with the other. 

When our father, who aren’t in heaven, Howard was his name, surfaces in a fountain pool coming toward me like a shark as I bathe, this winged goddess opens her cobra mouth so wide I can see all the way back to the inside of her tail. She turns and bites off his penis. The pool turns crimson. I see him sinking. I reach the side of the pool and am lifted by this cobra goddess and put gently onto a soft mat. The blood of my father has not soiled me

Sitting at my head, Chris asks me to survey the scene and determine how the cobras know who is friend or foe. Egyptians keep them as protection from their enemy, the Hittites. 

I am by a fountain pool where I see women and children bathing. There are four cobra baskets in the corners of this temple pool area. I see a nursing mother approach one of the reed baskets, kneel, and tap on the marble floor. A cobra emerges from deep within the coiled container, undulating side to side like seaweed in an ocean current. The movement is hypnotizing. This is when I first notice how very cold I am, back on Chris's healing cot, but I continue to watch the vision in fascination as the woman manipulates her breast to squirt some of her milk into the open mouth of the snake. She repeats this action at each of the baskets.

Chris and I surmise that the ritual gives the deadly protectors the genetic imprint of the race they are to defend unto death. Hittites “smell and taste” differently from Egyptians.

“Here, sit up and have some hot tea.”

Chris has moved to my feet.

I’m stiff, and still cold, but manage to sit up. Mr. Mew’s sharp claws register his complaint as my shins slide apart with the effort of coming back and sitting up. 

“Ouch!” 

Strong sensation does help me come back.

“Thanks... I think, Mr. Mew!”

Chris and I laugh. Mr. Mew looks bored, yawns, and jumps off the massage table onto the carpet with a soft thump.

As is our routine, we move to the couches and I wrap up in the soft ochre blanket which was around me on the table. I'm clutching my tea cup to my breast bone trying to warm up. It’s 95 degrees outside. Inside, I’m still shivering with cold.

After about ten minutes, I am warming up.

We chat about this and that, but not about the content of the session. I make out a check and hug her good bye until next Tuesday.