Alexandra
Logan
Priest Therapist Encourager of Other People’s Eccentricities
An Anglican priest and a psychotherapist . I find myself in a life riddled with stories, spiritual rabbit holes, and the intriguing lives of others. On these pages I am scooting around trying to capture the spirit of a soulful life in a little fishing net. If you want to know more about my work as a psychotherapist please go to -
https://www.alexandraloganlancastertherapy.com
“Ten times a day something happens to me like this – some strengthening throb of amazement – some good sweet empathic ping and swell. This is the first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness”
- Mary Oliver
The Singing Wilderness
Vicarage:1994
I am standing on the vicarage doorstep on a warm summer day. Trying to make my body, my young and pliable exterior, tell the story that I want it to tell. That I am a fully grown adult woman and not a four year old in a badly fitting suit that I haven’t yet grown into.
The doorbell is a metal button, probably original, worn around the edges by a hundred years of persistent church wardens, swaying drunks, and funeral directors in tall hats. I press my thumb against its least worn edge and hear it clanging through the old house.
I am waiting for someone to answer the door in two different centuries. Two different life-times. As I wait the concrete step metamorphoses under my feet and becomes an entry point. The start of my adult life.
The 21 year old me has no idea what the next twenty years will look like. Will there be a decent view; an attic window open to the breeze. Or will it be a shrinking sandbank which the tide, which comes in from all angles, will almost certainly devour.
The woman who answers the door is not going to know the answers, although she wears a white clerical collar and her blouse has blue stripes, which makes her look like someone who might be decisive.
Very quickly she will be decisive about me and my small spirit will need to flee before she dismembers me piece by piece.
Today, though, she smiles as she answers the door. Her hair is a comforting grey bob. Her feet are sensible and sensibly clad.
At the moment that is all I need.
She shuts the door behind me, and we begin.