June 21st, the longest day in the Northern hemisphere, otherwise known as the summer solstice or Litha.
In the UK, the solstice is widely associated with Stonehenge and the druids with crowds gathering ever year to watch the sunrise. Stonehenge dates back to 3100BC with the famous standing stone circle itself dating back to 2600-2400BC but did you know that the summer solstice has been celebrated around the world for over 10000 years?
The ancient Celts worshipped Bel, a god associated with the sun, light, healing, and fire around the time of the solstice although there is a strong connection now to Beltane which is celebrated around 1st May to mark the mid-point between the spring and summer equinox.
The Romans honoured the goddess Vesta around the time of the solstice by celebrating a weeklong festival, the Vestalia. Vesta was attended in her temple by the Vestal Virgins who tended her sacred flame. It was said that if the fire went out then Rome would fall.
The Vikings also celebrated the summer solstice with fires and feasting. They believed that at the solstice the veil between worlds was thin and used it as a good time to communicate with the spirit world to divine the future. They too lit bonfires that were intended to drive away any malicious spirits.
In Celtic mythology, it was believed that the summer solstice (Litha) was a time when the veil between our world and the faerie world was at its thinnest. Mythology also marks the solstice as the time of the annual battle between the Oak King who ruled for the first half of the year and the Holly King who ruled until Yule (winter solstice).
Slavic nations historically celebrated Kupala Night at the summer solstice. This was a celebration of fire and water where young couples would jump over the fires to ensure fertility and single girls would float flower crowns down rivers to attract love.
Modern day Litha is celebrated in s similar way by Pagans and Wiccans with bonfires and feasting, the wearing of flower crowns and with rituals to honour the sun and the earth, showing gratitude for a successful harvest to be gathered in.
It fascinates me to see how ancient traditions, myths and rituals remain entwined in 21st Century life.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to make my flower crown and to build a bonfire. Anyone got a match?
(Images sourced via Google – credit to the owners)
Oh, now there’s a question! Who among us doesn’t dream?
I dream on a regular basis. No, I’m not talking about the snatches of dreams that we recall after a night’s sleep but instead I mean our hopes and dreams. If you could wave a magic wand and bring your dream life to life what would your world look like?
Personally, I would start with my kids. I’d love to see them both settled in their dream homes and following their dream careers and living their best lives. All I want is for my kids to be healthy and happy.
For myself, I dream of finding my “and she lived happily ever after” life. This isn’t a pity post, but those who know me, know that life hasn’t always dealt me the kindest hand. Let’s leave that thought there.
In an ideal world, I’d live in an ocean front house like Jake and Lori’s house from my Silver Lake series of books. That really would be my ideal house and location. I’d have enough pennies in the bank not to have to worry about money. (I’m not putting a figure on it.)
I’d be a beach bum cum author. No surprises there!
Every morning, I’d walk the beach at sunrise before enjoying breakfast on the sun deck with my book before spending a few hours writing. There would be no writer’s block! Words would flow effortlessly onto the page. (Well, this is my dream life so why not. LOL)
It goes without saying that there would be at least two large fluffy cats sharing my home in my dream world too.
In this dream life, my books would be on the shelves in the bookstores and be selling well. If I saw any in the stores I’d autograph whatever was on the shelves as a surprise to the reader who eventually picked it up.
Life would be filled with family and close friends and unconditional love.
Evenings would be back lit with stunning sunsets and sleep at night would be sound and uninterrupted.
Oh well…..a girl can dream…..
What would your dream life look like? Please comment below.
Since mid- March 2026 I have been corresponding with the Meta Pro Team in an effort to resolve an issue around unauthorised payments that were debited from my bank card. These potentially fraudulent payments total around $200 with a further $10 remaining as an outstanding balance on my Meta account.
Despite literally hundreds of emails over the past 12 weeks, I am no closer to a resolution or even an explanation about these payments thanks to the AI generated nonsense that the Meta Pro Team issue by way of a response.
I have refrained from going public with this up until now as I believed naively that I would eventually reach one of the remaining humans at Meta and get either a satisfactory explanation and hopefully a refund of these charges.
As a rule, I do not advertise via Facebook as historically adverts have failed to generate an increase in sales. However, in February 2026, for the first time in 5 years, I set up an advertising campaign for my book, Riley. I paused it after a few days as it was not generating the anticipated result and I paid the bill of around $25.
At the start of March over a period of 8 days, my account was hit with multiple charges ranging from about $3 up to $18-$20 and coming to a total of circa $200. As soon as I spotted these I reported it to Meta and froze my bank card. Trying to get a response to my report of potential fraud proved challenging but eventually case 1206XXXXXXXX7513was created.
Please see below some examples of the Meta Pro Team’s responses to my complaint –
Hi Coral,
Greetings for the day!
This is Patricia from Meta Pro Team and I am contacting you in reference to your ticket number: 1206xxxxxxxx7513.
Thank you for your response .This is to inform you that we have already worked on your issue and the case has been closed as necessary information have been provided from our end .
Thank you for contacting Meta Pro Team. We wish you and your business well.
Regards, Patricia Meta Support Pro T
Hi Coral,
Greetings for the day! This is Elias from Meta Pro Team and I am contacting you in reference to your ticket number: 1206xxxxxxxx7513.
Thank you for your response .This is to inform you that we have already worked on your issue and the case has been closed as necessary information have been provided from our end .
Thank you for contacting Meta Pro Team. We wish you and your business well. Regards, Elias Meta Support Pro
Hi Coral,
This is the final decision.
This is Gracie from Meta Pro Team and I am supervising the team that was assigned to handle your case earlier. We have well received your request wherein you have contacted us in regards to your hacked Account and your reference number is: 1206xxxxxxxx7513.
Coral, kindly accept our sincere apologies for the inconvenience that may have been caused during the chat interaction with our representative. We definitely know how important this is for your business and we are willing to help you as much as we can. We also do apologize on the extended time it’s taking for your concern to be resolved. I understand how important it is for you to get this issue fixed as soon as possible. I will be more than happy to assist you.
To help you best to get this issue sorted for you, we had raised the concern with our specialized team to review the compromised of your Business Manager, and we got an update on the review as well where after the careful review we don’t believe there is evidence to suggest there was a compromise.
As a workaround if you lost the access on this business, you can check with the other known admin of the business to assign you an admin access. I am sure this should work in your case.
Finally, please be aware that the case shall be closed after the indicated solution.
We hope that we have provided you the necessary information. Since the problem appears to be clarified, we will proceed to close this ticket.
This is Akruti from Meta Pro Team. I just wanted to follow up with you on Email for the same Reference Case ID: 1206xxxxxxxx7513.
I’m sorry you’re having trouble logging into your account. If you think your account was taken over by someone else, enter your Facebook password at this link and we’ll help you secure it:
Once you’re able to log in to your account again, let us know and we’ll help solve your problem.
If there is anything else that you need help with, you may reply back to the email thread and I should be happy to assist you.
Thanks & Regards, Akruti
Meta Pro Team
Is this the standard of customer service that Meta advocate? This is only a small selection of the nonsense replies that my emails have attracted.
I had a chat with the Meta AI bot and it advised asking for the complaint to be put to the Appeals Board or escalated to the Meta Oversight Board. That sounded promising but the Meta Pro Team have failed to escalate this to anyone.
The consequences of this ongoing concern are that for the last 12 weeks I have kept the usage of my Facebook author page www.facebook.com/coralmccallumauthor to a minimum for fear of incurring further unauthorised charges. This has restricted my ability to connect with my readers and generate potential sales resulting in a loss of income.
I am going public here and now in a final attempt to track down a human being at Meta who is capable of investigating and resolving this complaint case.
Checking the hidden inner pocket of his ornate silk doublet, William breathed a nervous sigh of relief. It was still there. He had been anxious that it might have been lost on the ride out to the picnic spot under the giant oak. Their favourite spot within his father’s estate. When Elizabeth had insisted that they give their horses their heads and set off at a gallop, he had been forced to give chase.
Glancing at the headstrong young woman who had stolen his heart, he knew this was his moment.
“Lizzie,” he began as he went down on one knee before her. “Will you do me the honour of agreeing to become my wife?”
Tears of joy filled her blue eyes as she replied, “Yes. Yes, I will.”
Smiling, William slipped the gold pyramid diamond ring onto her slender ring finger then lowered his lips and kissed her hand.
Autumn 1992
Around her, the house was blessedly quiet after her fraught day in court. In the bedroom next door, her twin daughters lay sound asleep, oblivious to the bitter divorce battle that had raged in the courtroom all day. Hearing that she had been granted sole custody was that Lizzie had needed to hear. She didn’t want that monster near her precious girls. Details of the generous divorce settlement had washed over her. Afterwards her lawyer had said she should have pressed Bill for the house in Devon and for a larger share of the firm that they had run together…her firm originally.
Seven years of a toxic, emotionally abusive, adulterous marriage were finally over. She could scarcely believe it. There was only one thing left to be undone.
Carefully, Lizzie slid her antique Tudor gold engagement ring with its pyramid point diamond from her ring finger.
She was finally free.
Winter 2022
An old-fashioned bell jingled as the young man entered the high-end jewellers. Dressed in black leather from head to toe, his long dark hair falling over his slender shoulders, Will wasn’t the usual style of customer that the antique jewellers attracted.
With two free days between gigs, he had seized the opportunity to check out a Tudor ring that he had seen advertised online. He needed the ring to be authentic when he finally plucked up the courage to ask Lizzie to marry him.
When the manager brough the ring out for him to view, he knew instantly that this was “the one.” A pyramid point diamond, set in a simple gold rectangle with some worn engraving on the ring’s shoulders.
As he slipped the ring in its black velvet pouch into his inside jacket pocket, Will wondered how many true loves it had shared over the last five centuries.
(credits to the owner of the image – sourced via Google)
Sometimes in life you need to pull up those “big girl panties” and step out of your comfort zone. Sometimes you need to challenge yourself. It’s never easy but it’s there to be done.
I did just that recently.
I stepped so far out of my comfort zone! So, what did I do?
I took part in my first ever trail race.
It’s been almost a year since I last ran but when I entered the inaugural Witchwood Run at festival level, I felt confident that I could at least walk a couple of laps of the 5.9km course. The event was being run by a friend so I had also volunteered my services as a marshal for later on in the day. (In fact, when I submitted my entry weeks ago, he messaged and asked, “why have you entered my race?”- a very good question!)
The Witchwood Run was badged as a family affair so we took that literally – Girl Child also offered her services as a marshal while Boy Child took things a step further and entered the full 24 hr event, despite never having done any trail running and only ever having run 20km on the road.
Shortly after 7:30am on the Saturday morning, we made our way up to the event’s base camp at Everton Scout Camp in Inverkip, weighed down with bags full of clothing, food, juice and a pop-up tent. Least said about the walk up that hill the better.
We set up camp then Boy Child and I went across to the scout hut to complete our race registration, collect our numbers and our all-important timing chips. The whole area was buzzing with runners arriving and making their final race preparations. From the size of the tent village near the start line, many of them had camped out the night before. Hardy souls these trail runners.
Weirdly I wasn’t nervous. I can get nervous about going to Tesco so feeling calm felt bizarre. That calm feeling lasted until the race directors gave the assembled runners their pre-race briefing then panic rather than nerves hit me like a tidal wave!
What was I doing there? Running races were the late Big Green Gummi Bear’s territory not mine. I felt like an imposter! Fear flooded through me that I was about to make a total fool of myself. Riddled with self-doubt and anxiety, I let the whole scene play out around me. Could I do this?
Still feeling totally panicked I walked across the start line.. well, the clock was ticking. Time to find out what I was made of.
Boy Child crossed the start line with me but quickly forged on ahead. He had his own target in his sights.
My target? I’d told myself I could complete three laps.
As I climbed the stile at the start of the first ascent, I continued to question my sanity. The initial climb up a narrow steep trail criss-crossed with tree roots was tougher than it needed to be. Still panicking, my breathing was shallow and I was quickly gasping for each breath.
My inner voice of reason kicked in and told me to stop being a wimp and to get the job done.
The trail emerged out of the trees onto a fire break road that the course followed downhill for over a kilometre before it took a turn through a gate onto a forestry track. At the end of that undulating track was a gate that led into a field. It was all uphill as the route followed the field’s perimeter round to a second gate that led into a very boggy uneven field to be traversed. Once out of “Shrek’s swamp”, it was across a cattlegrid, back up the long drag of a hill on the fire break road (that gentle downhill on the way out became an endless hill on the way back) then it was back down through the trees, over a second stile then downhill over the timing mat.
At one point while I was walking down the fire break road on the first lap there was a hoarse crow flying above me cackling loudly. I swear that that was The Big Green Gummi Bear laughing at me!
What was I doing there in among all these experienced runners!
Gradually, as I talked myself down, I realised that several of the other competitors were walking with many of them looking as out of shape as me. Whew!
The course was tough going but after two laps I felt ok. Conscious that I hadn’t eaten much, I decided to take a pit stop for dome food before tackling lap three.
As I descended down towards base camp, my calves began to cramp up and I really struggled to get over the second stile without falling.
Duly fuelled up for a third lap, I set off again, cursing that first ridiculously steep section under my breath. This lap, I felt more relaxed and was even enjoying the whole experience. The fear was subsiding thanks to largely to the encouragement of my fellow competitors. Everyone was rooting for everyone else and there were lots of shouts of “well done” and “keep going”. Seeing and hearing such camaraderie warmed my heart and helped to raise my spirits. Halfway round lap three, my brain began to contemplate that maybe there could be a fourth lap…
As I crossed the boggy field for the third time, I could feel both knees protesting. Walking back up the fire break road seemed to take forever as my knees grew sorer and sorer and my calves began to tighten again. The descent down into base camp was agony. It felt as if someone was stabbing knives into the sides of my knees with every step I took. As I climbed over the stile at the end of the lap, common sense prevailed and I decided to call it quits, (I knew I still had to be on my feet for several more hours to complete my marshalling stint.)
I had done what I set out to do. I had put my money where my mouth was and completed three laps (18 km or thereabouts) and had earned myself a stunning bronze Witchwood medal.
Go me! LOL
Reflecting back on the event, with my knees still aching, I’m proud of what I achieved. That’s not something I acknowledge very often.
While I had been undertaking my marshalling duties deep into the night, I had been swapping timing chips for medals. It planted a seed. The silver medals are very pretty….. to earn a silver medal, you needed to complete six laps… could I manage that in a couple of years’ time? Was four or five laps a more sensible target for 2027? Time will tell.
As for Boy Child, I’m super proud of him! He managed a fantastic fifteen laps (88.5km) and earned one of the coveted black medals. Quite the achievement for him and a proud mummy moment for me.
To find out more about the event and 2027’s event details please check out.
Every picture tells a story or so the saying goes…. wonder what the story of the establishment that that sign belongs to is….. I’ll leave that your imagination for now.
A bit of a flippant title but hopefully it grabbed your attention.
What do you want to do when you grow up? Or have you fallen into the trap and grown up?
I’m of an age that I am now in twilight of my “corporate” career and the question “what do I want to do when I grow up?” has crept up more and more often of late.
I’ve half-joked for years that I joined the organisation that I’ve worked for all my adult life to make up my mind what I wanted to do when I grew up and decided that I really didn’t want to actually grow up. There’s more than a grain of truth lingering there.
Growing older is unavoidable and to be embraced as too many people don’t get the chance to grow old. As the years have passed, I have done all the usual adult things- I took out a mortgage and bought an apartment with my then boyfriend and when we got married we upgraded to a house, then another house and another, I had children, I became a widow at 53…. all decidedly adult facts of life but at heart, I still haven’t grown up.
My inner child is still very much alive!
Like most children when I was a little girl, I couldn’t wait to grow up. I dreamed of being an author, of being a doctor or a forensic pathologist. I dreamed about meeting rock stars. I dreamed about living in New York and about owning a beach house (that dream is still very much alive but will require a significant lottery win to make it happen.) All the usual things that kids dream about. What were your childhood dreams? Have any of them materialised?
Let’s face it- adulting isn’t much fun at times. We all need something to dream about. Being a responsible adult, especially if you are a parent, is hard bloody work! I’ve done more than my fair share of adulting over the years but I still don’t view myself as a grown up.
I passionately believe that it is all a state of mind. Being a woman in her mid-50’s doesn’t automatically mean that I want to fall into the trap of the “twin set and pearls” look with the highlighted hairstyle to hide the emerging grey. Maybe it’s a Gen X thing but I still wear my hair long in the same style that I have since high school complete with increasing grey strands of glitter. I spend most of my life dressed in rock band tees and jeans along with my trademark Converse. (Everyone who knows me knows of my love of and addiction to Converse. Please don’t ask how many pairs I own.) I’ll happily wander around barefoot in shorts and vest tee all summer long. I love listening to music especially hard rock and heavy metal and yes, I have several tattoos.
Back to those childhood dreams for a moment. It took 44 years but I did finally become a self-published author. I’ve also been fortunate enough to meet several of my music icons on more than one occasion. True, I never got the college/university degree to become a doctor or a forensic pathologist but I have continued to explore and learn alternative, natural healing techniques.
So, to return to the original question, what do YOU want to do when you grow up?
I don’t want to grow up!. I have no intentions of growing up! It’s bad for your mental wellbeing.
I’ll continue to chase those dreams in my jeans and tees while listening to loud rock music and strive for something more important that being a grown up. I’m on a mission to live “happily ever after.”
I saw the above picture on Facebook last weekend and it struck a chord.
Change is afoot in my world and I’ve spent the last few days contemplating it. That picture filled me full of a renewed sense of hope.
“So, what’s Beltane got to do with it?”
“What’s Beltane?”
Beltane is a pagan/Gaelic celebration that marks the midpoint between the spring equinox and the summer solstice. This year that’s 1st May. As a festival it was gradually dying out by the middle of the 20th century but since the late 1980’s it has seen a rekindling. (See what I did there? Hee hee)
Beltane is a fire festival.
According to Irish mythology, Beltane marked the beginning of summer when farmers would lead their cows out to the summer pastures. To celebrate this, ritual bonfires were lit and the local people would walk round or in between the fires with their cattle. These fires were believed to have protective powers. At this time too, every household’s fire was doused and relit with embers from the Beltane fires. It was a time for feasting and celebration.
Beltane is a celebration steeped in the shedding of darkness (winter) and the welcoming back of the light (summer).
It’s a time of change. A time of transition and this year for me personally, its significance isn’t lost on me. (More on that another time.)
If you feel stirrings of passion for something or a need for new beginnings this week, trust your gut instincts and let the Beltane fires energise your soul.
That new project that you were thinking about…start it!
The book you plan to write…start it!
The new whatever it was you have been dreaming about…start it!
I have!
(picture sourced via Facebook – credits to the owner)
I can’t believe that my blog has hit this milestone! WOW!
Thank you from the bottom of my heart to each and every one of you who have spared some of your precious time to read my posts. I really do appreciate it.
Coral McCallum 