May 1 2022: There’s a sweet scent in the north woods. It’s Beltane and everything is blooming, the currants, the little wild roses, the rhododendrons. The wheel is turning and it’s cause for celebration!
Warm winds and sweet flowers are a welcome blessing. The winter rain comes down so hard and cold here that it’s impossible to meet outside, and since outside is the only place that’s been safe to meet, winter has been isolating. Spring means seeing someone besides my family pod. I am so happy to be back in the park again.
My working partner Ted and I did a circle out under the hawthorn tree to call the Goddess of the Moon and the Horned God. It felt so sweet and, well, actually Witchy to call them out in the woods under one of their beloved trees.
Since I left the O.T.O. (no drama) I’ve been sinking back down into my Wiccan roots. It’s not that I ever stopped practicing Witchcraft, my coven has met every sabbat for more than thirty years, but my focused energy has been channeled elsewhere. Turning back to the first magical energy that embraced me has a bit of a homecoming feel to it.
Getting the word out about my latest book Cord Magic has put me in touch with new friends and old in the communities of Witches. There’s a language people speak when we share the same experiences. It’s so charming how excited Witches get about fiber magic – we love to braid cords and make knots. I have absolutely adored introducing a whole new batch of people to the magic of the twist.
The pandemic lockdowns have had a bit of a silver lining for people like me who live outside the major cities. Everyone learned Zoom and staged classes and conferences online. Now that the in-person festivals have started up again I’ve been asked to present, but I have had to decline because I can’t leave my disabled husband (Alex) that long. Happily though people are still doing podcasts and video presentations. I’ve got at least one appearance on the calendar each month.
That is, I have one appearance in addition to the monthly Living Theurgy roundtable hosted by Hercules Invictus. I’m always surprised when people mention they’ve watched it since I think of it as our personal get-together. When I make a formal presentation I tailor the material to the audience and make sure that terms get defined and ideas flow together so it’s accessible. It’s a completely different flow when Apollonius, Jean-Louis, Tony, Patrick, Hercules and I start chatting about theurgy. We bounce off each other’s ideas and build thought structures up into the sky. I find myself telling them “you’re the only people I can talk to about this!” It’s very much my friends inviting me along for a conversation, we just do it on camera so other people can join in the fun.
Now that it’s warm enough to meet in the park again the Isis-Nephthys Temple of Sisters of Seshat has resumed our initiation series. We just finished one batch in April and we’re starting another series in May. The rituals were published in The Woman Magician but they continue to evolve in our practice. We’re now doing group initiations with all the candidates going through at once rather than sequentially one at a time. It’s a great time saver. We did the last batch with just three officers but we’re going to do at least some of the next batch with five. I’m always amazed that my friends can make time for one more type of magic in their lives and I’m enormously grateful whenever we successfully complete another ritual.
When we finished the Sun Initiation last weekend the sun had actually come out. I started singing “Little darling, it’s been a long cold lonely winter…” George Harrison wrote Here Comes the Sun in a moment of personal relief that perfectly captures the present mood: “It seems like years since it’s been clear.” It’s been two years of pandemic and five months of Northwest chill. I think we all deserve a deep breath of spring sweetness and a few moments in the sun with our friends, don’t you? It’s all right.
