I’ve always loved Greece. Never been there, but one day I hope to be.
Greece has always had a special place in my heart- ever since I picked up that book of Greek mythology from the grade school library.
I read it, front to back, again and again. I can still recite some parts of it from memory, although not the title. It was a YA novel, set in the present day, about a young man- a teenager I think- regaling stories about the Greek myths to a group of older, interested neighbors and their kids. God, I loved that book.
I must have read it twenty times.
And I read the rest. I read and reread every book I could find about the Olympian mythology. I know I almost memorized every book in the genre from my grade school library, and I at least checked out once every such book at the local public library. I loved it; all of it.
Before I even became aware of pop culture, I was interested in the Greek myths. The gods were my celebrities, then. I used to write my own myths- I wrote page after page of stories about them. I mean, I wrote books. I had grown so bored of simply re-reading the same stuff, re-told with minor variations in each new library book, that I wrote a volume of my own myths. It’s what I dreamed about in math class.
I used to practice rituals, even. The Greek myths became my religion- I still went to church, but not before conducting a private ceremony to Aphrodite and Apollo before going. I was dedicated. Luckily, I saw with my unsuspecting parents a PBS documentary about modern Greece which had a segment detailing the rituals of pagan Greeks. I adapted their rituals to my own life (without candles, say) and practiced my faith in my own way, privately, on the weekends and before school.
It was the Greek myths that broke me away from the Stepford suburbanite routine. I suppose that given my personality, that would have happened eventually, in some other way, later, had I not picked up that first mythology book, but that book resonated with me and opened my eyes and my mind early and powerfully.
Through the myths, I learned that my parents and Sunday school teachers were wrong. Pre-Christian, pagan people were not dumb. They weren’t ignorant. They were… different, and different could be good. And… if my parents and the nuns were wrong about that, then what about other things? This is what turned me into a questioner of authority. It’s what set me upon the path I’m on today.
I’ve long since moved on from Aphrodite worship, but the feelings are still there, I guess. And maybe I’m being histrionic on Twitter, but it upsets me greatly to see how Greece is being treated. It’s personal to me.
What’s happening is appalling. The country is being destroyed. Important things- important Greek artifacts and symbols, not to mention vital businesses and industries- are falling into the hands of who I believe are the most despicable people on Earth, the Wall Street bankers. Well, them, and some corrupt Chinese oligarchs. And God knows what their plans are.
It’s wrong that this is happening. I want to stop it, somehow, and something tells me that Putin will be better for Greece than the EU and Obama.
I know I’m being loud and grating. And shrill. But this stuff means something to me.
In the back of my mind, I’ve always kind of planned on returning to the Greek pagan religion at the end of my life. At least, that was the plan back when I was a kid.
Since then, I’ve been involved deeply with Satanism and a bit with Odinism, but IMHO, neither has really resonated with me as powerfully and completely as the Greek myths.
I’ve always wanted to visit Greece, but I’ve intentionally avoided doing so. That’s an end-of-my-life thing. It will mean I’ve come full circle and have finished my real work, so I can be free and be myself again.
But for that to happen, Greece needs to be Greece. It needs to stay as it is. I don’t want it to be Morocco and it shouldn’t be. Greece should stay Greece- I don’t want its heritage destroyed because some Islamic fundamentalists took over and destroyed everything that isn’t Islamic. And I don’t want it to be a smoldering ruin because the EU’s constant raping of the Greek economy has destroyed the country.
So I’ll continue to fight for the country, in the best ways I know how.
I’ve always loved Greece. Never been there, but one day I hope to be.