The Craft of Witchery

When I was your age, I started making potions. Witch's brews. No one taught this craft to me. It was a knowledge which seemed to have been imprinted in my DNA.

Remember that song you sang in Kindergarten? Stirring and stirring and stirring my brew, OOOOOoooooo! I sang that song, too. And it meant something to me. It stirred a longing deep in my chest. And then I heard - from who knows where - a Shakespearean couplet: “Double, double toil and trouble: fire burn and cauldron bubble.” I knew that sensation – that fire burn and cauldron bubble sensation. Innately, I knew it.

I would go to a secluded part of the woods and set up next to a creek. I dug my fingers into the rich black dirt creating a hole big enough to accommodate a standard mixing bowl from my mother's kitchen - one which I had taken for this purpose. The bowl was placed into the earthen pit. And then I gathered my ingredients.

I collected creek water in a cup, ceremoniously walking down the bank to the edge of the water, filling my cup, walking back up the bank and emptying the cup into my “cauldron.” I repeated this process until there was enough water with which to create my base. I added soil, which I stirred in sweeping circular motions with a stick. Stirring with a stick was elemental in the process. Sometimes the brew was thick, sometimes not.

I gathered ingredients as they spoke to me: the prickly sweet gum balls, which looked like futuristic modular housing for alien beings. These would invoke a higher knowledge, one with which this world is not acquainted. The seeds of maple trees resembling tiny fairy wings would, so I believed, imbue my potion with a bit of fairy magic: part mischief, part delight. The flower petals from the tulip poplar tree - sometimes whole blossoms - would be included. Bits of moss. Oak catkins, which when intact, resembled stringy green caterpillars. But I crushed the stamens releasing the granular bits of pollen and stirred them into my brew.

When I had been jolted out of a synergy, whenever I felt displaced or disconnected from everyone around me - but most importantly, from myself – I would make a potion. It wasn't even a conscious decision. I just found myself going to the creek bank and setting everything up. The potion's purpose, which was not known to me at the time, was simply to bring myself back to my core, back to my heart and spirit. It was to reunite me with magic and hence, with life.

Considering circumstances that arose when I was six, it makes sense to me that I would embark upon this practice of making witch's brews. I was deeply injured by someone I trusted. I was violated in a way only a woman can understand. I sought justice from my parents on this occasion but it was to no avail. Some things are better swept under a rug when you are a working parent, exhausted from long hours of a thankless job. It takes less effort to stifle a child and pretend nothing happened than to confront a wrong and stand up against it. I completely understand their perspective now. But at the time, I retreated to my own world of making something new from preexisting crap in an attempt to order my world, to make sense of it all.

Soon after that, I began to make potions. I cast spells of wellness out into the world. Spells of justice, of making things right. As I meticulously selected my ingredients, I felt a personal sense of well-being. I felt right with my world. As I combined my ingredients into the basin I'd planted in the earth, I felt my sense of wellness being projected out into the universe. I felt a powerful force field growing larger around me. I was creating a charm of protection, of self love, and of well-being. I see this now. Back then, I acted on impulse.

As I grew older, I fell out of the practice of casting spells. I followed in the footsteps of those who had come before me. I found employment in order to make money. I married a man. I gave birth to two children. The wildness within me was tamed. I stayed in a small box of acceptable behavior. And this box grew tighter and tighter, compressing me, stifling me.

My daughter began making potions around her sixth year. She gathered rainwater and rich black dirt from the woods. She too stirred her potions in a sweeping, circular motion with a stick. She selected tree bark and acorns, pine needles, leaves and rocks to go into her brew. One day, she found a dead bat in her brew. This was both alarming and mysterious. But we are taught by our Native Ancestors that bat medicine signifies a rebirth – the end of one way of life and the beginning of another. We were getting ready to move to a different state, away from the only home my daughter had known. And so it seemed that the bat had found it's way into the brew for a reason. I cried the day my daughter found the bat and I did not understand why.

In time, I reached a point in which I could no longer breathe. I could not speak. I felt a heaviness in my heart. It became necessary to break out of my small box and to set my heart free. I planted seeds and pulled up weeds. I caressed earth worms and carried water to my plants. I again experienced the sense of well-being that I had known as a child. I grew wild again.

We have a wild streak that should never be tamed, you and I. You will notice when people try to tame you. They will tell you that you can't do something that you want to do. They will tell you that you do not have the wisdom to make choices for yourself. They will tell you how to behave, how to dress, how to manipulate your face and hair to fit their definition of acceptable beauty. They will not see the beauty of your heart. They will not see the beauty of your wildness. It will be hard for you to keep your wild heart alive. But this is necessary to your survival.

When we lose our connection to nature and our urge to create, we lose our life force. We begin to feel sad and lonely, or strangely empty inside. This is because we are neglecting our wild and magical nature: that which creates a desire to dwell among forests, mountains, oceans and rivers, to interact with all living creatures and to make things.

This is why magic is necessary for you to practice. This is why you must make your own potions. It will help you to put order to a world which makes no sense. It is necessary to invoke the help of our Mother Earth because her strength cannot be conquered. Through Mother Earth, we experience the mysteries and wonders of nature. Through her, our urge to create grows strong.

The knowledge of crafting witch's brews can take many forms. Sometimes it is in the form of paint on paper. Sometimes it is in the form of a mask one paints on one's face. Sometimes, it takes the form of words on a page. It could be a cake you bake. Or a song you sing. You must find your own means of crafting a witch's brew. And you must hone your craft well. Do this for your own protection. Do this for your own sense of well-being. It is up to you to carry on the tradition of magic-making.  

Life is a Video Game

I have recently become slightly addicted to a silly little video game called Little Big Planet in which cute characters of one's own design run throughout various obstacles to pop blue bubbles and collect "new objects."  I have never been much of a video game player, so my eye/hand coordination needs fine-tuning.  Every time I die, rather than get upset, I simply re-play the level in which I died so that I may utilize any new information I have ascertained, formulating a strategy for my ultimate survival and the completion of said level.

This is a new mindset for me: this notion of practicing again and again until one masters a particular level.  It shouldn't be, though.  I was subjected to various music lessons as a child, the result of which was this understanding that daily practice was necessary in order to progress in skill.  For some reason, that just didn't stick.  Not in the same way as playing Little Big Planet has made it stick.

As ridiculous as it may seem, all my life I have struggled with the perceived constraints of the "real world."  Things such as time and money.  I have been so busy resisting the ills of a capitalist society that I never learned simple things like budgeting and being on time.  I've never devoted time to the practicality of personal economics and never made concrete decisions to "be" one thing or another in terms of a career.  I have never been able to look at Life as a game.  I've never understood that one must master certain skill sets and conquer various obstacles in order to progress to the next level. It's that simple really.

Recently, I had an extended conversation with the manager at Planet Care.  I expressed to him the various discoveries I've made about myself recently.  Some of these discoveries are positive.  Some not.  Under the category of not-so-positive discoveries is my propensity for tardiness.  I am habitually late.  Every day.  Six to ten minutes.  It is a habit of which I have never fully cared to rid myself. I have never understood a reason for punctuality.  It has always seemed an arbitrary imposition on my personal freedom against which I have rebelled.

The manager of Planet Care told me in a matter of fact manner that it is against the rules to be tardy all the time.  And now that I have confessed my propensity for tardiness, I have put myself on his radar.  He then challenged me to be on time for the next thirty days that I work.  "This is not a threat," he said.  He merely wants me to change my habit and has set me the challenge to do so.

Something strange happened when he set this challenge for me.  I imagined myself practicing a certain level in Little Big Planet.  And then, the awareness sank in.  This is a game.  There are certain perimeters within which I must play this game.  Being on time is one of the perimeters.  Just as I must be careful to leap across the burning coals in the Burning Forest level of Little Big Planet, I must be careful to be on time in order to avoid being burned at Planet Care.  In this case, being burned means losing my job.

Hence, I set myself the task of being on time for thirty consecutive work days.  I've succeeded for the first three days of my personal challenge.  While this may not seem like much of a challenge to most folks, it is a significant one to me.  I have Little Big Planet to thank for making it make sense.

The Rainbow Inside

During my stint in what felt like a third world country but is better known as West Virginia, I encountered a remarkable woman.  She came to the site of an "intentional community" to which I belonged to conduct a weekend-long seminar called "Opening to the Creative."

At barely five feet tall, Dr. Edith Wallace was a force of nature.  Her brilliant white hair was accented by the rich shades of purple she wore.  She was elegant and filled with a divine Grace.  Yet her eyes spoke of mischief - past and present.

Edith created a form of art therapy involving tissue paper collage. This was a focal point in her seminars.  She supplied every color imaginable, all cut to her size specifications.  These were laid out in an order dictated by Edith on long tables.  We were instructed to select the colors that appealed to us in the moment.  We took the tissue paper to a work station where there were pieces of poster board, paintbrushes and a watery glue mixture.  We were instructed to tear the tissue paper into pieces, assemble them on the poster board, and immediately brush the glue mixture over them to secure them into place.  We were told to work in silence, not to belabor this process and not to attempt to create recognizable forms or something of beauty.  After we completed one collage, we were to sign it on the back and draw an arrow indicating which way is up.  We could make as many as we wanted during the allotted amount of time.

At the end of the collage-making process, Edith would ask each participant, one at a time, to set their collages up on an easel in front of everyone.  She would make comments based on any impressions she received from the assemblages.

The first set of collages I made were of muted colors: gray, brown, pale pink.  On one, I pasted bright red, yellow and green and then covered these up with black.  When I displayed my collages, Edith asked me if I had children.  I was startled by this question.  "Yes," I said, rather timidly.

"Do you ever play with them?"

"I used to."  I broke down and cried, blubbering out all manner of excuses for why I was no longer able to play with my children as I once did.  Edith listened patiently.  And all she said was, "You must find you inner jester.  You must allow yourself to play."   

At that point in my life, Edith's words were monumental.  They shook me to my core.

I had been severely depressed.  Ex-husband guy had violently attacked me.  My world was collapsing in around me.  I had no hope.  And in Edith's simple question, "Do you play with them?" I realized how far removed I had become from my core, from my delight.

After lunch one day, I went to the room I was sharing with other participants and stretched out on the twin-sized bed.  The surroundings were lush for me but rustic for others, I'm sure.  The seminar was housed in a  200 year-old mansion built by George Washington for his nephew Bushrod Corbin Washington.  My room had a lovely upstairs view of the apple orchard out back.

I lay on my bed looking up at the high ceiling, aware of the afternoon colors, and trying very hard to feel some warmth.  I thought of my murky collages.  And I thought about my daughter, who was at this time, six.  My daughter, who radiates warmth, was going through a phase of drawing rainbows.  Self portraits, tracings of her hand, landscapes.  No matter what the subject was, each drawing had a rainbow. 

I wondered about this.  How did she become that way?  How did she become so bright, so warm, so full of color?  I had nothing to do with it!  She just is that way.

But then I thought, wait a minute. I did have something to do with it.  I housed her in my body for 40 weeks.  I gave birth to her.  Whatever is inside of her that creates rainbows has to be in me as well.  It has to be.  Right?

It was time to reconvene in the main room downstairs for more collage-making.  As I selected my colors, I was drawn to the colors that had danced around in the room upstairs when I was having my revelation.  And then, I selected the bold colors of the rainbow.  I made two collages and felt satisfied - as if there was nothing more to express.

When Edith looked at my two collages, she remarked that she saw birds in flight in both of them.  She was glad, she said.  I seemed to have connected with precisely what I needed in order to heal: play.  Indeed, I felt worlds lighter.  Almost giddy in fact. 

We chose a collage to "dance," to bring to life with music and movement.  We selected a piece of music, and we performed our dance for each other.  I do not remember the piece of music that I selected.  But I remember moving my body as if every limb, every gesture was an expression of a rainbow.  Full of a vibrant radiance, a warmth and most of all hope. 

It is incredibly easy to become absorbed in the act of day-to-day living, so much so that we fail to notice the beauty inside us and around us. If we allow the daily grind and the unkind people around us to continually drag us down into despair, anxiety, or hopelessness, our experience of life becomes dim and colorless. But we all have a rainbow inside that is ready to radiate out. We all have a vibrant joy that is uniquely ours. It may seem very far away. But I guarantee you, if you look for that inner jester who loves to laugh and play, who is filled with wonder and a tiny bit of mischief, your rainbow will appear. And you will be so glad. 

So I invite you, dear friend, to go outside and play today. Jump in a mud puddle, or a pile of leaves. Tumble down a hill, or climb a tree. Assemble a crown of clover. Then wear it. Because you now occupy your royal station. You have found your inner jester. 

~For Brooke Edwards~