Circe

Dear Diary,

Today my men and were continuing on our journey to Ithaca, already nine days away from Aeolia. Many of my men were acting funny for some reason, looking suspicious and whispering things in each other’s ears for me not to hear. But I didn’t mind and fell asleep, deep of exhaustion. Before we had left the island Aiolis, the king provided us with a bag of winds, but I didn’t tell my men. While I was sleeping, I guess they opened the bag of winds which brought us back to Aeolia, where I begged the king for more help. Aiolis realized how I was cursed by Poseidon which made him say no to me and he didn’t help my men and I. So my men and I left the island, continuing on sail for six more days. We came upon the land of Lamos, the land of the Laistrygones. The king, Antiphated greeted us by eating one of my men, and of course the rest of us left right away in fear of being eaten also. We continued sailing and came upon Aeaia, home of the goddess Circe. I sent my men to explore the island, obviously I didn’t go alone due to previous accidents. For some reason Eurylochus stayed behind when Circe invited the rest of the men in the palace. He watched the men secretly and saw Circe turn them into pigs. Eurylochus ran to the ship and reported to me what he saw and I grabbed weapons and armor to go save my men. Hermes came upon me as I was marching up to the palace, giving me advice and an herb, moly. I then got to the palace and saw my men, all of them in the form of pigs. Circe didn’t use magic upon me of course since I agreed to make love to her and she agreed to turn my men back to their natural forms. I followed all of Circe’s instructions, whatever it took to get my men back. Circe finally restored my men and invited us all to stay with her and rest, which we did, for a whole entire year. After a year was over, my men began to annoy me, asking when we will leave. I then asked Circe to help us get back to the sea and sail home. She told me I couldn’t return home until I reach the land of the dead to see Tiresias, who has further instructions for me, as she said. She gave me simple instructions on how to get there and what to do once I approach Tiresias. That night, my men and I slept peacefully, to be prepared for our travels to come. For some reason, one of my crew members got drunk, wandered onto the rooftop, and fell of the roof to his death. No one noticed because everyone was getting the ship ready, but I can’t believe we lost another member. Circe disappeared, leaving us with a black ewe and ram as sacrifice required to enter the Underworld. So much happened throughout this year of my life. Losing a crew member, staying with a stranger for a year, being disloyal to Penelope, and having more sufferings to come was not what I was looking for at this point in time. I need to just get to the Underworld and get to Ithaca as soon as I can to reunite with my love, Penelope. Diary, I miss her so much.

See you soon Ithaca,

Odysseus