branches up, roots down

My friend Fern , who among her many talents is an excellent body worker, has been on me for quite awhile to go to her chiropractor. She’s insisted that my lower back is out of whack in a way that can’t be addressed with massage. I’ve resisted, for unclear reasons. I suppose it just wasn’t time. Last week I was ready for the changes realignment might bring and so I put myself into Eric’s hands, who turned out to be one of those intuitive healers the Bay Area is graced with. I came out of his office feeling the light headedness of big change. I had been “adjusted”. So, this week my body has been struggling between accepting this realignment and going back to its old way of holding itself. Mind and spirit have followed suite. Letting go of old pain seems to be the theme, as well as accessing more energy. Thankfully, body, mind, and spirit seem to be united in an effort to settle into this new alignment, to be less constricted. It was time. This week I exercised more than ...

Saturday night found me at the Grand Slam Finals of the Annual Youth Speaks Teen Poetry Slam . Riding thru a city with people in green spilling out of every vaguely Irish tavern, it struck me as fitting that I was going to a poetry slam. The Irish love the word, and words were what was being celebrated tonight at the Masonic Hall, high atop one of our most prestigious hills, Nob Hill. Perfect too, given my current ruminations on listening, silence, and speaking. The Master of Ceremony of the evening was the incredible Beau Sia , and he started out saying something to the tune of “Make some noise; your silence won’t protect you”. “Make some noise” is the refrain of all the Youth Speaks events I’ve gone to. It means giving the poets a rousing applause, and of course, it means speaking out. In Youth Speaks culture, speaking out and speaking up is a virtue, each sentence crafted to be an arrow of truth aimed at opening hearts and changing minds. The teenagers are courageous, r...

I like the wearing of green. That's good, and I tend to do it every year on this day. Any rituals that the overculture does that remotely connect to anything celebrating the natural world I breathe into heartily. A number of my ancestors hail from the Emerald Isle, and I know they smile on the big party that celebrates all that is Irish. Saint Patrick, well, he is a damn problem. How can a good pagan get behind the guy who is purported to have run the pagans out of Ireland? It can't be done. Yet, strangely, the holiday has hints of paganism attached to it. I can just feel it. The green, certainly, not to mention the drinking, and the kissing. And if the pagan magic was really run out of Ireland, why the ever pervasive leprechauns ? If ol' Patrick really had such a problem with pagans, wouldn't he be having a fit to see those little people used to symbolize his day? Come to think of it, THEY should be having a fit about it. Don't we pagans have a better relation...

The Spring Equinox is drawing near, that one day when light and dark, night and day hang in perfect balance. It’s been warm here in San Francisco , one of those glorious weeks of clear skies. The tulips on my deck burst open yesterday, and this afternoon I’m writing on said deck, with some bird twittering away in a nearby tree and the rumble of freeway off in the distance. All week I’ve been ruminating on listening and silence and been thinking about the witch’s pyramid ; to know, to dare, to will, and to keep silent. This is said to be the building blocks of creating magic. But what does this mean? The longer I’m a witch, the less I ascribe or am drawn to magic that involves a high level of secrecy, a feeling that what is being worked with is so powerful it would be dangerous in the wrong hands. I know the power of casting a circle and using the secret names I was given at initiation, but frankly, I’ve found that cleaning my house with intention is more often than not just as ...

This morning I luckily read Sara's blog, Pagan Godspell, before I went to work. She writes about feminism, International Womens Day , and blogging against sexism. All day I thought about this, and about how I am devoted to no longer focusing on what I am against, but what I am for. How nice to see, when I went to the site on Blogging Against Sexism, that they had this point covered. I could be against sexism, or for women's liberation, wimmin's liberation, or gender liberation!!!!! Today, being International Women's Day, I am taking a stand FOR women's liberation. I'm also for women being able to spell that anyway they want, taking men completely out, and I certainly am for gender liberation as well. But today, women's liberation takes precedence. I am for it. Completely. I remember vividly the moment I picked up at sixteen the book " Sisterhood is Powerful ". I remember the thrill as I read it. I remember my teacher's looks of horror as I w...

The older I've gotten, the more I trust my intuition. Once again, I'm trying to trust it, but it's not exactly easy. My intuition has guided me once again to being on a witchcamp team, and not only that, it's a team I never expected to be on. Have I done the right thing? It remains to be seen. Last year the team I taught with at Spiralheart had the great honor of being asked back. We were a great team, and I am proud of the work we did together. We treated each other with respect, had each other's backs, encouraged each other to stretch, and modeled the values that shine from Reclaiming's principles of unity , something that does not always happen in a witchcamp setting. It helped that the Spiralheart community was actually that.... a community. I loved the setting in West Virginia, loved the people, loved the magic that unfolded, and even loved the food. It was great experience. After being asked back, despite the positive experience, I kept having the nig...

photos from home, from that rooftop garden I talk about, and of my altar to Elvis and some of my Spirit Bottles and Goddess Chalices I make. Gawd...it turns out I love taking pictures!!!!!!!

The candles are lit and the house vibrates with the thrum and hum of magic, that change of consciousness that opens up the lines of communication with the elements, with the sacred, with the divine. The tulips, daffodils, and blossoms of plum on the altar attest to the beauty of this green planet, beauty beyond comprehension. Tonight I honored earth, air, fire, water and spirit and asked for their help. I called to the ancestors and those who will come in the future. I invited and invoked the mysterious ones, all those deities and guardians who are able and willing to be of assistance, who might also need or want my assistance, or at the very least my attention. I dropped down and felt the change that has already begun, the polar ice caps that are melting, the rising of the ocean, the changes in temperature, the changes in seasons. How hard it is to really sit with this, to feel it and keep breathing. And I prayed and asked for assistance in people having the strength to change. T...

When I was young I yearned to be Catholic or Jewish. Raised Episcopalian, I found nothing in my family's spiritual practices which seized my imagination. I longed for candle lighting, holy cards, eating proscribed foods, mezuzahs, hairs of saints, bitter herbs, and statues of Mary or Jesus around the house. What I wanted was more stuff. Stuff that symbolized something else, that was ascribed power and meaning. No wonder I eventually chose to become a witch! A Pagan Sojourn turned me on to a great series of articles by Jeff Lilly at DruidJournal on choosing a religion. He makes the excellent point that this is the first time in history that so many of us have choice in regards to religion. In the past, if you were raised in the Catholic, Jewish, or Episcopalian faith, that is what you were. Not now. The majority of us witches come from other faiths, and our children by far know they have choice around whether or not to claim themselves pagan. Even within the Craft, we have a...