Earth, Air, Fire, Water; I am The Witch's Daughter
Do you have a magickal name, If so what does it mean?
I have two.
The first I got during a meditative dream when I was thirteen of fourteen. The four initials of which are painted on the front of my main book of shadows. The nickname from the first of the four is still the only thing My Wolf calls me, when our current lives wind into and out of each other paths. I have drifted a little from this one though. I would consider more my path name now than my magickal name, if I was being specific.
The second I have had for longer than I can even care to quantify, but I did not know it, until My Girl said it suddenly one night and the entire world went silent inside and outside of myself. Since that moment I knew what it was to be named, utterly and completely, to the core, by the right word and sound and idea. Something that stilled and sealed everything. And even though it has been years now, only this past month did a second person find it out.
How did you find Wicca/Paganism?
On the third day after I was born, Friday the 6th of May, 1983, I was dedicated by my Father to Diana and her waning crescent moon. My childhood was a complicated mess of being raised both Episcopalian by my mother and Pagan by my father, but somewhere between eleven and twelve I made the choice for myself for good. But I had been raised around it, the community of it, my father's every Sabbath huge gatherings, and especially my best friend's family and their coven. It's always been there in some part of my life.
How long have you been practicing?
Twenty-seven years.
Solitary or group practitioner?
Both, collectively at the moment. Which is different from being either or and I have been either and or at different times in my life, when needing different things, or reacting to the actions and repercussions of events in my life. I presently have two groups I worship with (and a third brand new group I've been invited to come see this month for Litha), as well as I have courses of study I am doing on my own with books and journals in my house.
What is your path?
Unconditional Love, above and beyond any other words or descriptions I can give you.
Beyond that, I would consider myself a priestess and a dedicant (because I priestess to other men and women of the knowledge I've been taught, learning in hand everything they are willing to teach me), a witch (who chooses to believe, will, know, dare the arts of witchcraft), an oilist/herbalist (because I feel drawn to the making of things with the essences of this earth between my fingers and against my skin), a dedicant of the sabbat (in line with the season of the world changing around me). I divine cards and stones, I love to work with crystals and minerals.
I trust my intuition before almost all facts, and what my heart says before all things in this world. I am more spiritual than religious. I will, and would, hazard to call myself Pagan when ask for a descriptor, as words and names and boxes and affiliations help others to have a sense of how to handle you or what you might be, but I feel no massive need for any religious nomenclature for my path. Only to worship at the feet of the world around me.
Are you out of the broom closet?
Very far out. I never had one, because of how I was raised...and I think that is why it took me a while to come to terms with the idea the broom closet existed and then to learn to deal with the great sadness in my heart earned by understanding why it still exists in other people's lives today.
Who is your patron God?
Probably Ganesh, as his likeness has been my altar the longest in my life, but it has been known to fluctuate through any number of names, depending on the year and the work that I am doing. Some high notes perhaps, for past work, would include, Apollo especially, then Jack in the Green, The Holy King, The Oak King, Hades, Buddha, and many others.
Who is your patron Goddess?
Though I have frequently dedicated myself to one specific goddess for the year usually, this year I chose not to. Goddesses of major import from the past, some of whom are as relevant and some who aren't now, are Diana, Persephone, Selene, Hecate, Morgaine, Kali, Lilith, Saraswati, Isis, Gaia, Quan Yin. More often in the last few years I've also leaned toward the 'She who ...' aspect introduced to me by RCG
What Goddesses do you worship?
If we want to get technical, which is not embraces below by any other questions I've glanced over, I believe in high divine power that is genderless and free of all preconceived connotations of division at its truest source. I believe that force can be broken down into a division of many things, including male and female, and all the religious faces (pantheons and religions and features) necessary for the set up of religions all across the globe. Because a red headed man on a flying horse would not have worked in the middle of Africa, but both places and their religions are just as important and as true and as defined by where they were worshipped.
Do you fear dark aspects in Gods/Goddess, or rather respect them?
I respect the darkness in divinity, and from that I'm still working to embrace and respect the darkness that reflects in it through me. The same with all things in their time and place and balance.
Do you worship the Christian God?
No, but I feel it is as equally important to say that I do believe in it -- in The Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, for many of the reasons listed two questions above. But, also, because I cannot find fault with the teachings of a man (no matter what his mortal followers may have enacted in his name, for we are thin and reach for divinity but are not of it) who preached the highest of love and forgiveness for all your fellow man.
Do you ever worship animals?
I would not say I specifically worship animals, any more than I worship the sun, itself, or trees, or stones, or colors. I work with them hand in hand. I believe they have messages to share and mutual work which can be done. I look at them as teachers and helpers, contemporaries and family.
Or plants?
The same as above, but I hold a preeminent esteem for working with plants.
Do you regularly commune with nature?
About as often as I walk to and from my house. I cannot emphasize how important this wide swath of green grassy land and it's forest, in all the arrays of sun and moon, how important it has become to me. Or the tree that hangs over my steps and patters on my window, and peeks in through my top one. I am one with the world around me. The ground beneath my feet and the grass and trees with give me my oxygen, the deep places of forest and ocean, that set my soul free.
Ever walked barefoot in the woods?
Often.
Taken a camping trip just to talk to nature?
Often.
Describe the moment you felt closest to Mother Earth?
Dear. I don't even know where to start. I spend most days feeling beyond words connected to this world and all the things, the people, in it. Perhaps, I will have to settle for the first big event, when I was off the coast in Australia, where the waves were bright blue, but coasted silver, when I was aware so suddenly and perfectly of how very small I was and how integral to the universe all at once, at one with the same beauty in every other person and creature and creation.
What is your power animal?
It depends on my work, as I have worked with many. Cats, wolves, horses, dragons. But I think some part of me will always well and wisely return with this question to the moment when i was fifteen or sixteen and someone said I reminded them vastly of a butterfly. There are so many truths in that statement, and I love them dearly.
Do you have a familiar?
I have before, yes, but not at present.
Have you ever called upon the powers of an animal in ritual?
Yes, I've called upon animals themselves, the spirits of animals, the correlations of animals to elements, quarters, colors, attributes, the list goes on.
Or a plant?
Herbs, flowers, trees, the green grass in sidewalks, the grandeur of forests and a seedling in a cup planted in my window sill. Yes, I've called on these things and more in my work before.
Do you hug trees?
Often.
Give them gifts?
Yes.
What is your favorite flower to work with?
The wildflowers I find growing around me whenever I begin to do the work I've newly found myself attached to. I like being in key with the Earth near me.
What is your favorite tree to work with?
A Weeping Willow. But I also feel a strong, strong, undeniable love and respect for working with Ash, Oak, Maples (themselves, and Japanese ones), Hawthorn, Birches, Pecan trees even.
What is your favorite Sabbat?
I am shamelessly ever always knowing this one, as clear as the heart beat right after I read the question. I am merry-be-got and thus by answer has to be Beltane, which happens two days before my birthday each year. But I have a true and deep abiding love for celebrating each of the sabbats as they come. I have books full of activities, stories, and foods for each thing and they keep me in touch with all of the changing years and focuses.
What is your least favorite Sabbat?
I don't have one.
Well. I will say I do find myself annoyed sometimes at the over-populated society-reaction to Samhain, but it's for this reason that I, also, choose very carefully what and who I am doing things with during that season. But it does not affect my love for the sabbat itself.
Have you ever held a ritual on a Sabbat?
I think the better question would be how many years would you have to count back to find a year when you hadn't?
Ever taken a day off work to celebrate a pagan holiday?
Yes.
Do you celebrate Yule on the 21 rather than the 25?
I celebrate Yule on the 21st of each year with my chosen family, and then I celebrate Christmas with my parents, and their children/my sister-brother-in law, their nieces, anywhere around the 25th dates. Both with great, boisterous, fanfare and religious respect. It's actually worked out amazingly well this way.
Have you ever felt the Veil thin on Samhain?
Every time.
Ever danced the Maypole?
Yes, many times. Best done with ribbons streaming from one's hair, laughing and dancing, and playing with all the other maidens and men alight beneath the wonder of it, too. I very much so missed getting to take part in one of these last year.
Know what the Maypole symbolizes?
The pole itself is a vastly phallic symbol, wrapped in ribbons and sheathed by the dance of youth in lust and love and gaiety. It can stand for a lot of things. There are a lot of different meanings that come to mind that I've heard added on to this over the years, too. That it's height connects divinity to the Earth for this night to mingle in their acts, whereby we get the merry-be-gots. As with the season and sabbat, there is a lot of sex and fertility magic that goes into the symbolism.
Ever made love on Beltane?
Yes.
Do you usually celebrate the Pagan Sabbats?
I feel we already addressed this, but I looked above and it did ask about rituals on where as this one is celebrations of, but the answer is still yes. They are high holy days, and it means I frequently break out cards that symbolize these days, decorate altars, do activities, make the kinds of foods that are associated with the season and sabbat. It's part of what makes me feel all connected and giddy in love with my path.
Do you use Tarot?
Yes, though my main tarot deck I use as an oracle deck. But I own several tarot decks.
Do you use runes?
Yes, and my main set was a gift of large moss agate stones, etched in silver, kept in an emerald green bag. I, also, have a rune cards deck and rune dice and a book on runes read in the lines of the palm, because they had such a strong pull in my life for so long.
Do you use a pendulum?
Not as often as I used to, but that is because I need to release the hanging chain for my favorite one, as it broke in Korea and I am looking to replace it with another chakra stone chain again.
Do you use dowsing rods?
I have listened about and held one before, but I have yet to have a reason to use one.
Do you use astrology?
I didn't for a very long time. Then, when I was nineteen, My Girl showed up during a weekend I was visiting two people I dearly loved, and when got home and said hello on aim the first time, she told me to tell her nothing about myself except my astrological data (including the brilliant adorable detail that I was not, by birth certificate, born in a city, but a county). I did and she spent the next two hours telling me exactly who I was, what i loved, how i lived, reacted down to a precise t.
All my doubts vanished in those minutes.
And in all honesty? I am every inch my Taurus sun, Pieces rising, Capricorn moon, with my adorably conflictive three counts of Sagittarius, the arrow, thrown on top of it.
Any other form of divination?
Any and everything I can call to mind almost? Tarot, oracle, color cards, runes, dices, flipping to the first sentence in a specific books,
What was the first spell you did?
I haven't the faintest clue even. Something when I was tiny?
What was the latest?
A love spell on my Spell-A-Day almanac to increase love in all the areas of your life where it is and isn't, which has inspired a treatise in my head that needs writing up on the love spells as a social pariah term and topic and why this is a horrible thing for such a beautiful work of art for the heart, the soul, people, families, communities, the world, the universe.
Ever done a Love Spell?
Ha. Um. Okay, maybe I could put it here? Yes. Endlessly uncounted numbers of them.
Now before you go making confused faces, I don't do any magic involving the harming of a person or the re-orienting of anyone's will on any subject of any kind. And I feel the quintessential assumption when anyone hears the word Love Spell is that their mind automatically jumps to "Love Potion #9" at the softest and at the largest stalker-addiction, loss of self and choice. It's also quintessentially in this assumption a spell that is only between two people drawn together for love, lust, relationships.
This is like saying all magic, or witches, must be black or white, or all politic or education or sex is evil. That the stigma on books being banned obviously means there is no worth within their pages.
Think of the word Love. Love as a word is not bound to these things by any means. It's the undercurrent of a vast endless supply of subjects, topics, lives and life. Yes, I've done love spells. For family communication. For breaking of barriers. For friends in times of dire need and emergency. For no other reason than my heart was filled with boundless love and gratitude for someone or something or some group and I wanted to send that message out into the universe for or because of them. For refugees in times of great world disasters, for families caught up in wars.
Have I done relationship love spells? Yes, to this, too. Both on my own, and with the person I was in a relationship with (and helped others to make/do them, with clear intent and no forcing of will). Because it is just another part of my life, just as practically magickal as putting jasmine in my shower gel or lavender in my bug spray or carnelian stones in my perfume or colored sugar crystals in my purse. To make me see clearly, to make it so tempers can abate and honesty can be heard, for love, for sex, for trust, for healing, for our mutual lives entwining deeper together.
Love is just another part of every moment of my life, and I wish the love spell wrap would fade away, but not the necessary respect for knowing you should never force anyone to anything they don't chose themselves.
A Job Spell?
Yep. Even if I fall far too often into not wanting to do magic for myself, even just setting out a green candle, lighting and talking to the universe in a calm, quiet tone and asking for some help with this part of my life.
A healing spell?
Quite a bit, for myself and many others, but then I feel that my calling is wrapped deeply into this.
What was the most powerful spell you've ever performed?
I am not at liberty to share this actually, which says something after the length of some of these answers. But I very much do believe in the fact that some things are too big and too personal to those involved to be spoken about plainly, and this falls under the rule of "To Be Silent" for me. It is enough to know I have been part of things and have it within me to be something big, just like every other person standing next to me.
What deities do you usually call on?
The Lord and Lady.
Do you see a rabbit, a man or a woman in the moon?
I can blame my birth right, but when I look at the moon and talk to her it is always as Diana, Selene, Persephone, Hecate, La Luna. As an embodiment that has been watching over me each day of my life no matter her shape or shade, to whom I am dedicated and dedicant, belonging to her sway always.
Own a cat?
I do not, but I live in a house with two, if that counts.
When you mediate what does your happy place look like?
There is a very specific place I go, with an endless rolling landscape beyond it, which how it looks tells me how my inner world is reflecting how I really am. There is a great tree with a door that leads inside it to a place I have decorated over and over in my head since I was a child. There is a pool outside of it, and gardens before it reaches the endless landscape reflection. There are so many descriptions of what it is, what more there is, all the little pieces, but it is mine the way my heart beat is mine and I have never shared it fully with anyone anywhere.
Do you work with Chakras?
Aside from the fact RCG is working down each Chakra, at one a month and this past weekend we just finished the work for the Solar Plexus, I am beyond enamored with Chakras. I have cards for them, books for them, box sets. I own a large and small chakra wands. Jewelry. One set of chakra stones with their symbols etched into them, and another one set of flat circles. I own a set of chakra dolls. I love working with them and the body.
Do you believe in past lives?
Very much so, to the blessing and detriment of certain periods of my life and relationships therein.
Do you believe in soul mates?
I do, and even more I believe in them beyond the idea of simply just finding one person who has always been with you throughout your lives. I believe there are people we've gravitated toward, slipped in and out of different relationships and kinships to, who change with the necessity of the lessons we're learning in the incarnation. I, also, think that soul mate isn't always singular and doesn't always mean the person you were with last time is always the person you are unequivocally bound to be with this time, as I've seen both sides of that road in this life already.
But, yes, I believe and have experienced these, wholeheartedly.
Do you have a spirit guide?
A few.
Is it always love and light?
For me, for every second that I am drawing breath, unconditional love will always be a part of it, but there is no life, that is well lived and loved and experienced, that is always light. That is why we are here, to learn and grow and remember.