1 step forward, 2 steps back, 3 whopping steps forward

My partner knows just how upset I have been and with the Landlord demanding the return of the computer we had been renting, my hopes were dashed for the wheel of the year project.  All of my notes were on it and I had no idea how I was going to be able to work on anything without internet access.  I spent most of last night uploading to Google and stuffing my flash drives with my favorite programs, spreadsheets and things I've created.  There were tears at the frustration and the loss of it all, but aside from the occasional sniffle, I stayed quiet.  It is not my partners fault, it is the Landlords and one day soon he will get his comeuppance.  To be quite honest I have been feeling thin, like not enough butter spread on too much bread.  Everything has been lacking and my life has been dictated by this man, when I can come and go, what I am allowed to do, and he is rude to me, so I ignore him and pretend like he's not there and won't answer the door when I'm alone because nothing good can come of visiting a woman alone after 10 pm.

My partner has a way of pulling the perfect thing out of thin air, and after dropping me off to do the grocery shopping, he went shopping, unbeknownst to me.  As I shopped I stormed around, worried that the Landlord would break into the place somehow and just snatch my computer and with everything on it.  I got through the checkout and called my man to come pick me up... and it was then that he told me he was wiping my computer and making sure that everything was off it because he was going to go throw it at the Landlord.  He knows there are things on there that I created that are next to impossible to recreate, he also knows that those are the things I put on my flash-drive last night so he wasn't worried that if he wiped it clean that I would be missing stuff.  I told him thanks and the tears started to flow... I'd never been so glad that he couldn't see my tears, he didn't deserve them.  I walked my groceries outside and waited the 15 minutes it takes to pick me up, wiping the the tears from my face and neck, wishing they would stop.  They finally did just as he showed up and he helped me put the packages in the back of the car.  He started to tease me about how he had no money left and then realized I was too upset to wrap my head around something as mundane as a joke.  "I went to the pawn shop, Baby, and I spent some of the money we were going to use for the move on a new laptop for you. It's better than mine and has a nice big screen so you can work on your blog more easily."  I was so happy I burst into tears.  He knew how much I had been bugged by everything that has been going on since before my birthday, and he smiled, said happy birthday as well, and then he told me what he had discovered.

Tonight when he got home after buying the new laptop, he realized he had left his keys inside.  Now he needed to get in and he also had put in the lock that kept others out, especially the Landlord, who when we first moved in had been visiting while all of us were out.  So my baby used a credit card  and jimmied the lock, easily (which he didn't expect), when he got in he noticed that the weather stripping we had put up had been removed and the lock was easier to get at.  I had been telling my baby that stuff was missing and moved around, and he had returned to calling me wacko, so I stopped telling him.  As he showed me how easy it was to break in,  I told him money was missing from the jar, and had frequently been going missing.  I'm no longer the wacko.  I have a new kick-ass computer and I have been vindicated.  My day went from worrying about not being able to blog, study, research and write any longer, to the complete opposite.  I love my new toy, it's perfect.  My man is happy and I'm happy... and tomorrow the Landlord will be happy because he will have his lappie back.  I may have to kick around and wait until my baby is home so I can go for walks, but I have my life back again.  Looks like I won't have to give up my Witchy Fitness Challenge, which was of course my biggest worry.
You see being rather reclusive, it's important that when I reach out, I don't loose that life line and retreat all over again. :D

It all started with a root.

About 15 years ago, give or take a year, I lived on Haida Gwaii with my family.  We had a small piece of land, about an acre located off the Island Highway between the Skidegate dump and Tlell.  My kids were young and our property kept us pretty busy, so there was not a lot of time for me to practice witch craft.  However, I did a lot of knitting, sewing and cooking up there and got those skills up, and those come in handy for other witchy things.  I'm  getting off track here, so I'll get on with it.  I really wanted a wand and I didn't have one and I had no idea how to get one, so I called out to the heavens and I asked for one.  

In fact the truth of the matter was I'd been arguing with my husband all morning and he was being a bully and wrecking everyone's fun so I wanted to blast him in the ass with the wand. My kids were not allowed to run up and down the beach in case people were there.  My son was hyperactive and needed a run, but the way my husband (his step dad) made it out was that my kid was out of control and do something bad and unpredictable.  Not so, he was just exuberant at times not an ass.  Anyways I had wanted my son to have a good run and get a little tired and relaxed. Finally Valen capitulated and decided to run with Lloyd up towards the end of the beach but I'd have to watch Matt. So as soon as they ran off, I took Matt by the hand and got him to walk with me towards a grove of trees between the road and the beach.  I told him I wanted a wand and that I had a feeling there was one here.  We looked all over the place without finding anything and finally I get called over to where Valen and Lloyd were; they were ready to go home now.  As luck would have it I tripped over a root and loosened it. There at my feet was a stick about 15 inches long. 

The hairs on the back of my neck prickled up as I realized I found my wand.  It was old and gnarled, all covered in dirt, but I could feel this power emanating from it.  So I grabbed it and took it home without really looking at it.  First chance I got a lone,   I took a toothbrush to the root and flicked off all the dust, and left it in that state for many years.... Many many years... However, I kept it with me and used it in the state it was in.... a natural wand full of power is nothing to be sneezed at, specially when it's a gift.

Now I started to work on my Morning Glory wands just recently, and had a little luck with them, but not a lot.... the ink runs and I just don't feel the power like I do in my root wand.  I just had my birthday and of course we're broke, but my partner found a $20 and even though he didn't want to have to run around, he told me he would take me anywhere I wanted to go.... I now have sand paper... tons of it... well enough until I can get way more, and maybe a mask and a knife for cutting and well .... I'm doing it again and getting off topic...

I began to smooth the wood and what I thought was a plain brown stick with groves full of dust became something else....

So all smoothed up and polished with my seven league boot flying ointment, it looks like this, a rather gnarled stick, but such a brilliant red colour to the wood that used to look a sort of faded brown.  As you can see there is also a little dip there and that is perfect for my finger going in there for extra leverage... looks kinda cool actually when I hold it, and the very pointy end is the one I point with and I'll show you why.

It's a crow, it just appeared as I was smoothing things out... all on it's own, even the eye.   I've never really carved before and it was amazing the things I saw in the wood and how they just jumped right out at me... or I could be nuts LOL....

One thing I do know, this is my best all purpose wand and I love using it...

Something in the Air

There has been a strangeness in the air for months now.... a sort of heavy, somber, impending doom, this weather is all wrong, kind of feeling.  It's not just the weather though, for when you looked at how I described the time period it was emotion.  It has been strange indeed; full of harsh, unexpected break ups, fall outs in families you thought couldn't be touched, devastating illnesses that involve entirely too much sleep.  No, I'm not describing my life, actually I'm talking about the various blogs and forums, and social networks, I've been reading for months.  They are each filled with some kind of tale over the last 3 months of heart wrenching double crossing.

However, when I woke up this morning, in the wee early hours about 4:30 am, I couldn't get back to sleep for a bit and I just lay there enjoying the storm.  There was something so cleansing about it, as though it were sweeping away all the bad things that have happened since the spring.  All I know is there is a profound feeling of relief as I look at the steel grey sky and falling rain.  As grey as it is, this day is perfection.

I'm no expert in the stars, but I would have to say that something was misaligned somewhere, somehow and it took a good cooling autumnal gale to blow those nasty old cobwebs away, and return things to the usual upsets that I know how to deal with.  I'm just so happy to feel like things are going to be OK again.  My life does not feel stuck and I can move forward.  The funny thing with that statement is it has occurred in many forms over the last couple of days in emails, blogs, and other social networking forums all over the internet.  Now maybe things will start to get completed and I can once again know what it's like to feel like I've actually accomplished more than a load of dishes.

I love my Park

So, another fine day and another fine walk in the park has me feeling that all is well with the world.  Each time I enter, I return with gifts from the forest; today it was some arbutus bark, a rather large peice that had fallen off the tree in front of me and the spirit in the forest was urging me to take it because it will come in useful quite soon.  How exciting, I can't wait to find out what it's for.  As well I found a fourway crossroad and made sure to grab a goodly portion of dirt for drying, sorting and sifting later.
I was under the impression that Indian Pipeplant is rare, however everywhere I look these days, I see it.  Either it's not as rare as it's been made out to be, or the woods is full of mycelium of the right kind that creates this.  After all, in the early spring there were quite a few fly agarics everywhere I looked as well as emetic russela.  What with the strange year and it's weather patterns being unseasonably off kilter, and my suspicion that there is mycelium throughout the entire park, it is no wonder that there are so many Indian Pipeplants.  If that holds true, my desire to gather some beautiful amanitas to dry and prepare for teas and oils etcetera should happen in September and be ready for final consumption by Samhain.  What a way to start my magical year.
I think the next place we move I will have a motorized scooter so that I can get around.  I've been forming this opinion, and as the years grow so does my desire for this increases .... The desire to move into the woods and live a completely different life, all but off the beaten track.  That is probably more of a pipedream, \which makes sense when you consider all the pipeplants I've seen laterly. LOL

Do You Believe in Witches?

It has come to my attention that some people do not believe in witches, they think they are hogwash and well, that peole who think they are witches are nuts.  I'd be careful tossing that insult around, after all, what if you are wrong and we are right, we do have the ability to curse after all.  Now in the bigger scheme of things, I know that you are not going to be seeing huge fireballs errupting from my fists anytime in the near future, I'm not crazy.  However, in the past I have had lightening bolts, very thin, white ones emerge from my fingertips and head skyward.  I was sleep walking and my partner woke me, not so daintily I might add and I saw at that time the light from my fingertips and the look on his face confirmed I wasn't seeing things.  It was not some big glorious eruption, but it was a large enough shock to pretty much put an end to any life he and I had left together.  A couple of months later, my kids and I left him and the island.  It was not as cool an experience as one might have hoped for, perhaps had it happened in a more openly pagan town things might have been better for us.  Alas, the churches had one big agenda on their list... to pray for the heathens to join or depart instead of live and let live.
Lucky for me, my Doctor was awesome and we were in the same Women's are group.  She did not think me strange or perverse and said she had heard of cases where women pick up on the electric static in the air and channel it out when it becomes too much in a safe manner.  I felt better about the whole situation, and it made me realize, that yes interesting fireball or lightening strikes could happen under just the right circumstances, but that it was a rare occurance.  Besides where would one train for something like that. Yes once again I find myself wishing there was a real Hogwarts. 
One thing I always remembered about my Dad was that he wanted me to keep my feet on the ground.  He disliked me reading and thought that I lived in a fantasy world.  He kept telling me that one day I would grow up and see the world as it truly is.  Now I do a lot of reading and there is a plethora of people out there claiming to be witches, some are, some aren't, but it's those that are that intrigue me.
When you read their blogs you know that they walk the crooked path, or take journey's over the hedge.  There are so many ways of the cunning folk to travel and meet.  Yes the internet has made it easier to believe, I must admit, but then I never had a problem with believing. LOL!!! I think that ultimately, what I am saying is that things have turned around some.  I think that there is more of a belief in witches than there ever was, and this is for the better. We can preserve the knowledge at last and keep it safe for future generations, so that never again will it be banished to a broom closet and practised in fear, rather we shall hold it in reverence and supreme respect for the powers it brings.