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Hollow Bones

"In our life there is a time of wonder. Walking with the ancient ones as they share their world. And the dancing voices are carried by the wind. As I walk this sacred ground, I know I'm not alone, and I thank Mother Earth."  ~Alex Davis, Seneca Cayuga

Dumb Supper

10/31/2019

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One of the most touching and memorable Samhain celebrations I’ve ever attended was what’s known as a “Dumb Supper.”
 
It was so memorable, in fact, that I incorporated my experience into a scene in my first book, Song of the Ancients.
 
Samantha Danroe, the main character, is just dipping her toe into witchcraft, so she is experiencing all of this for the first time. Enjoy! Maybe you’ll want to hold your own Dumb Supper this year for your ancestors--
 
When Samhain night arrived, I was ready. I had a picture of my mother when she was about my age. She was photographed from behind, walking on the ties of a railroad track, her hands reaching out to the sides for balance. Just as the picture was snapped, she had turned her head to smile at the photographer – my father, I assumed. It was my favorite picture of her. When she died, I framed it and placed it by her casket at the funeral. Tonight I had also selected one of her sable hair paint brushes and a charcoal pencil, to represent her artistic talents, and tied together with a black ribbon.
 
The ramada was already half-full when we arrived, and several dishes of food lined the center of the feast table. Rumor and I added our tureen of spicy pumpkin and squash soup and homemade bread, placing it next to a platter of ham and roasted turkey.
 
The next table was labeled “Ancestor Altar,” and held offerings brought to honor loved ones. I excused myself and walked over to add Mom's picture and art supplies to the altar. A book open in the center said "Ledger of the Dead." Several names were already listed on the open page. I added 'Nancy Campbell, beloved mother' below the other names, surprised to notice my hand trembled. Is it possible she will actually show up? And what does one say to a ghost? Should I tell her what's been going on in my life, or can she see my day-to-day activities through the veil? Mom had been polite, but cool, to my husband. I had a feeling, if she'd been alive, she would have supported my decision to get divorced. Actually, she probably would have seen the signs of his infidelity, and urged me to file sooner. Mothers are preternaturally wise when it comes to their children.
 
The back of the altar was lined with unlit votive candles. I lit one for Mom and turned around to look for Rumor. She was standing in the clearing, talking with Nuin, so I walked along the feast table to see the unusual decorations and calm my jittery mind.   
 
At the head of the table was the spirit chair, shrouded in black satin. The side chairs were empty, each with a place setting of black dishes and goblets. A glowing black candle and a vase of black roses and bittersweet sat in the middle of the empty seating arrangement. Further down, a length of shimmering black fabric hung suspended from the ceiling of the ramada, puddling on the table and dividing it in half.
 
Past the veil, the other side of the table was set with white china, white candles and white flowers. I looked down the table and mentally reviewed what I knew about the dumb supper. We were to sit on the white side, our ancestors on the dark end. The entire meal was to be conducted in silence, in respect for our ancestors who could no longer speak.
 
Someone pulled a chair out beside me. Startled, I looked up into Nicholas' dark eyes. He motioned for me to sit. I began a comment, but he touched his finger to his lips and gave me a stern frown. Oh, right, I corrected myself.
 
He took the chair to my right and handed me a slip of parchment. Thankfully, Rumor had reviewed this part of the ceremony with me, so I knew what to do. I wrote a simple prayer for Mom and handed the paper back to Nicholas. He rose, walked around the hanging veil, and slipped each of our prayers under a black plate.
 
As we passed the serving dishes around the long table family style, and ate our silent meal, I stared at the luminous half-moon just rising above the tree line, and thought about my mother. She had been blessed with a unique connection to nature. Neighbors marveled at her green thumb. Her garden grew vigorous and lush each year, producing enough vegetables to feed the families up and down our street.
 
Unfortunately, she was less comfortable with people than with plants. She hated going to Dad's office parties; small talk was painful for her, even among friends. But her artwork was mesmerizing and always accepted into the city's juried art show. People would stand in front of her watercolors with happy, glazed expressions. Afterwards, they reminisced with her about a particular location in a painting, although I never heard her tell them where she had painted the scene.
 
By the end of our meal, my impressions of Mother had shifted. Before tonight I had thought of her as kind but shy, never one to shine. Now I wondered if my opinion was superficial. When she wanted, she could fold and knead a person's perception like warm dough between her hands. Was the quiet, solemn-eyed woman just the façade she wore for this world? Were there other faces I had simply never noticed? She dressed as a gypsy every Halloween, and the neighbor children gathered around her for stories, not candy. She had the odd habit of fanning playing cards out on the table, studying them one by one, when she had to make an important decision. What else had my childish eyes missed? Did she practice witchcraft without me knowing? What would Mother think of this bizarre dinner in her honor? My eyes filled with tears. Yes. She would approve.
 
After eating, we joined hands in silence. Nicholas squeezed my fingers. I studied his profile, wondering who he'd thought about during our silent meal. Who had he loved and lost?
 
Maya gathered the prayers from under the plates and burned them in the flame of the candle, catching the ashes in a container. While the Priestess finished our memorial, I closed my eyes, blinking away tears. Of all the strange things I had been asked to do in these last weeks, communing with my mother's spirit in silence for an evening was the easiest. I had dropped my guard completely, suspended my rigid, rational beliefs, and allowed myself to be comforted by the thought of her spirit joining me at the table.
 
I fingered my tears away and looked down the candle-lit table. Most of the diners had their heads bowed, and a few were dabbing at their eyes or sniffing quietly as they composed themselves. 
 
Except for Nicholas. He was watching me. When I met his eyes, he squeezed my hand again and nodded, his eyes bright with unshed tears.
 
When we left, stopping by our ancestor's plate on the way out to nod goodbye, I wondered if such a ritual would be comforting for families who had lost loved ones in recent tragedies around the world. So many dead, so violently and abruptly ripped from the land of the living. What of their souls? Are they still staggering, lost between the worlds? Have they found rest? Did they have a chance to say goodbye?
 
I kissed my fingertips and caressed the back of an empty black chair. "Blessed be all," I whispered to those souls as we silently filed past the row of vacant seats.
* * * * *
Have a magical Samhain, Halloween, All Souls. May the spirits be gentle and abundant.
 Blessed Be.
 
 

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Bringing Your Shadow Side to Light

10/23/2019

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Everyone has a shadow side, the side we don’t want to show the world. The things we don’t like, can’t feel, can’t do, do too much of feel shame about, can’t tolerate.

Over the years, these behaviors, thoughts and things are hidden—they are our shadows. But they also what makes us whole.

Carl Jung studied man’s shadow at length. His theory is that when we are not willing to embrace all of our psyche, we will end up splitting parts of ourselves off. These parts, if left unacknowledged in the unconscious, will manifest internally as harmful inner voices (the Inner Critic), or externally as projections, blaming the inner nastiness we avoid onto other individuals or groups of people. Because, you know, as long as we are blaming others, we aren’t taking responsibility for our own shadows.

Something else that most of us have tucked away in our shadow is our feelings about death, dying, and our own mortality. Whether we want to or not, there’s a deep need for us as humans to recognize the spiral of life, death, and rebirth.


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And that brings me to Halloween. This holiday allows you to literally live and play inside your shadow. You can dress as your darker side or lighter side. You can pick a gender side to act out. You can try out your power side. Or your latent naughty child. The trick is to learn more about yourself while playing.

So while the veil is thin and ghosts abound, I invite you to embrace your shadow. Attend to the part of you that never gets a look in.  Do it safely, and creatively, do it with consciousness, without harming yourself or anyone else.

This spell puts a twist on “traditional” pumpkin carving by creating the face of your shadow self.

Perform the work on Halloween evening.

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​​How to Find Your Shadow

For this part of the spellwork, you will need a hollowed-out pumpkin (or an artificial one with the top cut off), carving tools, and a pen or sharpie marker.

Find a comfortable place to sit alone for a while. Turn off your phone, kiss your loved ones goodbye for a bit, and close the door.

Sit down and feel the ground beneath you, feel some deep breaths in your belly, and have a little check-in. How are you?

Run your mind back through the last week or two. Were there any points during that time when your shadow/inner critic made an appearance? Choose a moment.

Take yourself back to the memory and replay it. Where were you? Who was there? What was said? How were you feeling? Frightened? Angry? Passive-aggressive? Filled with hate, jealousy, sadness. You get the idea.

What were your shadow’s words in this moment? Replay the scenario and listen to your shadow as if it was a voice of another being, speaking about you (i.e. “You are…” “You’re not…” “You always…” “You should…” “You can’t…”). Choose a few shadow critic phrases and repeat them over and over in your shadow’s voice.

As you listen, notice which part of your body feels activated, this is where your shadow lives. Breathe into that part of you, keep repeating their phrases.

Now imagine your shadow as a creature that lives inside of you (not a person).

What’s it like? Does it have feathers, scales, claws, legs? How many legs? Wings? What’s its face like? What are its eyes like? How about its mouth? What size is it, and how is it sitting/standing? Look around. What is its home like? How does it move? Does it scuttle, slither, slide, fly? When it reaches its full height how big is it?

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Once you have a clear picture of your shadow critic, draw its most important characteristics AND attitude on your pumpkin. When you have the drawing the way you want it, carve it into the pumpkin.

Releasing Your Shadow

For this part of the spellwork, you need:
1 white candle
Scented anointing oil (clove, cinnamon, any scent of your choice) mixed with olive oil.
Protection incense (sage, copal, sandalwood, sweet grass, cinnamon, evergreen)

Anoint your candle with the scented oil, then roll it the incense.
Light the candle in your pumpkin to signify the light inside that will guide you through the darkness, and that despite any darkness, you are pure light in your heart.

Release your shadow critic into the pumpkin. You can’t kill it (it’ll just come back in another form!).

Come back to the ground beneath you, come back to the breath in your body, back to the room you are in. Take a look around at the familiar surroundings, touch something soft, something warm, to bring you back to here and now.

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Take a good look at your shadow in your pumpkin, while it absorbs the cleansing light of the anointed candle. Feel what you feel. Place it somewhere that you can see it for the rest of Halloween night. You can make an altar for it if you like.

Keep coming back to it, noticing your feelings each time. You may want to journal your changing thoughts and feelings. Your curiosity is a vehicle for change.

After 24 hours, you can make the choice to keep displaying your shadow or set it free, making sure you leave it in the light. Some people leave their shadow in Nature (tree, stream, a park). Some took theirs home and put them in their gardens, so they could watch them gradually de-compose. Follow your instinct, do what feels right. Be sure to dispose of your pumpkin and candle also, in case it contains remnants of your shadow.

Until next week, Blessed Be. And have fun decorating!

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Samhain: Run Toward the Dark

10/13/2019

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Halloween. Samhain. My favorite holiday. Seeing the orange and black Spirit stores pop up overnight in the strip malls brings a maniacal smile to my face. Yes, it’s true that Halloween’s a monster of an industry. But it’s more than that. It’s magic in the truest sense. A time when all bets are off, and we can act out--children and adults--without restraint or fear of judgment.

This holiday is the dark aesthetic blended with romance, myth, and rebellion. When the leaves change and the evenings go chilly, I’m transported back to running the neighborhood with my pals in Zorro capes, witch’s hats, and black cat costumes complete with swishing tail. I recall a knot of children screaming on a front porch when the homeowner, a normally mild-mannered adult, opens the door in full wolf’s garb and growls, “Do you dare ask for candy?”
 
On this one extraordinary night, we willingly run toward the dark, rather than away from it. We grope in through cornstalks, brittle and bleached white like bones in the light of a crescent moon. We pay to scream with strangers in dark haunted houses, stuffy with billowing fog.
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Wait! Listen: I think I hear something scratching outside. Halloween awaits. Let’s have some fun. You coming?

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Make a Samhain altar.
​Go right now and do this. I’ll wait…Be sure to display it somewhere you’ll see it every day. Include photographs and mementos of loved ones and pets. Add a skull or bones and some soft candlelight. It doesn't have to be elaborate...it's the sentiment that counts.

Read One Book about Witchcraft or your particular brand of paganism. Listening to an audiobook totally counts.
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Visit a Cemetery.
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If you go on November 2, you may get to witness a family’s Dia de los Muertos graveside celebration (see below).


While you're there, have a conversation with a resident. If you don't have a family member there, pick someone with the same last name, and ask them about their lineage. Or, talk to a stranger.
It's polite to leave a silver coin at the graveside as thanks.

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Go Ghost Hunting.
​Many Arizona towns have places reputed to be haunted: Bisbee, Jerome, Prescott, Tucson, Flagstaff, Phoenix, Tombstone, and the Grand Canyon are just a few. I’m sure your state does too. Sign up for a tour and try your hand at paranormal investigation. The tours often provide you with detection equipment, and bring your digital camera to capture orbs, shadows, apparitions and other phenomena. 

Stay at a Haunted Hotel.
Lots of hauntings are reported at this popular ghost location, including former patients when the building was a hospital, and the hospital’s former maintenance man, Claude Harvey, who was killed by the building’s faulty elevator. That old elevator, now repaired, is still running people up to their rooms today.

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Grand Hotel
Jerome, AZ

used to be an asylum. 



One of my personal favorite haunted hotels is the Vendome in Prescott AZ. The entire B&B is charming, but room 16 is said to have a permanent ghostly resident: a cat.
 
One of the most famous in Arizona is Bisbee’s Copper Queen Hotel. Julia Lowell was a prostitute in Bisbee in the early 1900s; she favored Room 315 at The Queen when plying her trade. Sadly, after being rejected by the man she loved, she took her life. Today, her restless spirit lingers, appearing in 315, now dubbed the Julia Lowell Room, most often to male guests. She smiles and whispers, even dances seductively at the foot of the bed. 
 
Google your area and make an October reservation.
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Binge Watch Your Favorite Halloween Movie.

My all-time favorite is Practical Magic. But you may be partial to It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Or House on Haunted Hill, The Shining, or Sleepy Hollow. And yes, I’d highly recommend binge-watching all eight Harry Potter movies this month.

Go Outside and Bathe in the Moonlight.
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Howl at our beautiful orange Hunter’s moon!

Celebrate With Loved Ones Passed.
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In Mexico, death is to be celebrated, and November 1 is Dia de Los Muertos, a national holiday. Every home has an offrenda, or offering altar.
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Offerings consist of a wash bowl, razor, and soap so the traveling spirit can use to clean-up after the journey.

Pictures of the deceased are displayed along with personal belongings and toys for children. Candles help light the way for the spirits: pink for love, white for hope, and yellow for celebration. Favorite foods are also placed on the altar to help nourish the traveling souls. While the dead may not actually eat the food, it’s believed they feast on the smells.

Try to have the offerings also double as the four main elements of nature — earth, wind, water, and fire. Use bells or movable or light-weight items such as tissue paper cut-outs (wind,) a bowl of water, candles and copal incense (fire) and food (crops, earth). Finally, add a calacas, a whimsical skeleton, and a sugar skull, so the living have something tangible to represent their loved ones’ spirit.

Dress a Black Candle
with your favorite oils and herbs, and light it on Samhain night.

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Deal a Tarot Spread. 
Samhain is also considered the perfect time for divination. Here’s a fun reading called “Haunted House.” In dreams, a house often represents you, the chambers and passages symbolizing your own inner dwelling place. So light your candle, open your mind’s creaky door, and peer into the darkened corner of your own Halloween haunted house!

Shuffle your favorite tarot deck in your usual way. Lay out seven cards as follows: 
1  The Forbidding Foyer: What has been trying to enter your life (for good or ill) that you have been warding off?

2  The Perilous Parlor: What aspect of yourself do you need to spend more time getting to know?

3  The Lurid Library: What lore or study is calling to expand your esoteric knowledge?

4  The Atrocious Attic: What neglected treasure should you dust off and use now?

5  The Chilling Cellar: What should be stored away and allowed to ripen for future use?

6  The Ghostly Garden: What needs to be weeded out?

7 The Twisted Oak Tree: What needs to sink roots and deepen?

Now, draw one more card for a message from an otherworldly visitor to your Haunted House. Boo!


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Visit a Corn Maze.
The corn maze is the epitome of Halloween and Samhain, the last harvest season.

Mazes have become popular tourist attractions and a way for farms to create additional income. Many are based on artistic designs such as movie characters or current events, and some are even created to tell stories or to portray a particular theme. Most have a path, which goes all around the whole pattern, either to end in the middle or to come back out again.

In Arizona, my annual go-to spot is the 10-acre maze at Schnepf Farms. Last year, my son resorted to GPS on his phone to get us out. If you’d like a real challenge, navigate by moonlight instead of flashlights. Or combine the maze with a really scary haunted house and visit a really scary haunted house or other attraction.

Play Some Tricks.
Do something extra for trick or treaters.

Over the years, I’ve set up a Severus Snape Potions Lab in our garage, complete with Veritaserum (hot cider in a carafe surrounded by fog). The whole family has dressed up and posed in the front-yard cemetery display, rising up to greet trick or treaters as they come up the driveway. I’ve done tarot card readings at the local Halloween carnival; thrown chicken bones for divination around a neighborhood fire pit after we put the kids to bed; read palms by candlelight.

You have a latent talent buried within. Unearth it this Halloween. 


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Practice Psychometry.  
This is the ability to sense or “read” the history of an object by touching it. Impressions may be images, sounds, smells, tastes, even emotions. 


 A practiced  psychometrist can hold an object—an antique glove, for example-- and be able to tell something about the history of that glove, what the owner was like, what they did and even how they died. Perhaps most importantly, the psychic can sense how the person felt - the emotions of the person at a particular time. Emotions especially, it seems, are most strongly "recorded" in the object.

Don’t believe me? Try it at your Halloween party. Have each guest bring one or two items that have a strong history and sentimental value. Take turns exchanging tokens. Hold one in your hand and relax. Share the impressions you get, and let the owner tell you how close your information was at the end. If you’re having trouble picking up information, silently ask yourself questions to help trigger information such as, “how many owners has this object had?” “Where was this object purchased?” “Was it given as a gift?” “Did a male or female give you this object?” And so on. You may be surprised at the accuracy.

Make a Will.
If you don’t have a will or living trust, do one this month. Why is this activity in my Halloween list? Our society spends most of its time trying not to think about death. Halloween, on the other hand, celebrates death. It fills our imaginations like no other day. Take advantage of that openness. Get it done. Then make a point to review and update if needed on future Halloweens.
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