08/09/2026
Last summer I walked into the Egyptian sculpture gallery at the British Museum and completely lost myself.
We'd wandered through for a while, seeing so much, and then this appeared at the end of the gallery. A colossal scarab, over 2,000 years old, carved from dark grey-green stone and absolutely enormous. And something happened that I still can't fully explain.
It felt like walking under a spell.
All this emotion started rising up from nowhere and it took everything I had not to cry. Not because it was beautiful, though it was, but because it felt like seeing him made him feel seen. Like for a moment he wasn't a museum exhibit.
He was sacred again.
I wanted to touch him so badly. Not out of curiosity, out of reverence. Like some part of me remembered what that meant.
The scarab represents Khepri, the Egyptian god of rebirth and the rising sun. New beginnings rising out of what came before.
I didn't know that day how much that would mean to me later.
Much love,
Lucy x
📷 British Museum