Oliver Lee State Park
I was inspired by a post on Cat Heath’s Seo Helrune blog titled The Land as Witchcraft Teacher.
The post made me recall my experiences growing up in Southeastern Arizona and Southern New Mexico. It is a unique landscape, starkly beautiful and a willing, sometimes harsh teacher.
I am a child of the desert.
I have lived the majority of my life less than 80 miles from the Mexican border in both the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts. How I ended up following Irish Polytheist and Heathen paths is still a little bit beyond me, but reading Cat’s post helped some of the pieces fall into place and make a little more sense.
I have lived most of my life rurally, growing up with horses, cattle, and other forms of livestock in what is generally termed “the middle of nowhere.” I was an isolated and often friendless child who spent a lot of time living in my imagination. I was socially awkward, did poorly in school, and preferred to spend most of my time alone or in the company of my horses and dogs. I wandered the desert, talking to the rocks and the chaparral bushes. I spent hours building elaborate miniature compounds, complete with tiny furnishings, in the arroyo behind my house as an offering to the Othercrowd. I would watch the sky in the total darkness of the rural desert night, breathing in the darkness and imagining what else might be sharing that space. I looked deep into the night terrified, but also hoping that something would look back. I sang spontaneous charms to flowers that bloomed briefly after the late summer monsoons, raised my hands to the sky and called out to the beings that live there. I sat beneath the weeping fall of salt cedar trees and traced sigils of my own design into the dust. I confided in my horses and dogs like any best and dearest friends. Like equals.
American Blacktailed Jackrabbit
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I spent my time at school being bullied. I would ditch class to hide in the sanctuary of the library. I was a voracious reader of fantasy, mythology, and fairy tales. These well-spun tales guided me in building private worlds in my own imagination.
At home again, I would listen deeply to the land around me, filling the empty spaces with a deep yearning for connection, sending my soul sonar out with all my might and listening intently for the ‘ping’ that indicated something was out there. In retrospect, I realized I heard many ‘pings,’ many voices.
I realized only after I moved away it was the voices of the land around me. At the time I didn’t recognize it for what it was because I was too busy imagining and wishing for the far-off lands I read about in books. The green and verdant fields of elsewhere.
I was blinded by fantasy, unable to see the riches of my own reality.
When I took my first steps on an intentionally pagan path, I would say that I really didn’t know anything or have any experience with magic or witchcraft. Now I know better.
I grew up and moved away from the desert, feeling that I needed to escape to something “better.” I landed in Denver, but could never understand why I felt so disconnected there. Colorado is truly beautiful, but I had never felt so adrift before.
I have always been a deeply believing person. I had tried many paths up to this point, but found myself disappointed, and disaffected with every one. Then one day, by accident, I encountered Irish Polytheism. As I learned, I became very excited. This was what I had been looking for. It gave me words that helped me understand what I had been feeling.
It was only through understanding the Irish concept of Dindshenchas, the lore of the landscape and its value that I realized what I had when I was younger. I now understood the reason I felt so disconnected from Colorado. I had never built a relationship with the land there, not like I had in New Mexico. I didn’t understand that before because I took my relationship with my old home for granted.
Chihuahuan Raven
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In New Mexico, it had been effortless. I grew up there, my parents lived there, my grandparents were buried there. I grew up on a farm, planted gardens, walked in the desert, dug into the earth and taken that soil into myself.
Whenever I returned home I felt the overwhelming magic of the New Mexico desert welling up within me (they don’t call it the Land of Enchantment for nothing).
I didn’t know Colorado, we weren’t acquainted.
But here I was. I lived here and if I wanted anything meaningful I needed to get to work.
I worked hard for over 10 years to develop a relationship with the landscape of my new home. Hiking, camping, discovering native plants, learning how to grow a garden in the very tricky soil.
I spent a year finding native cognates of the tree Ogham. I sat and meditated with them, getting to know each one. I did magic in my yard, following the cycles of the moon and the cycles of the year. I honored the Goodly Inclined Spirits, the Not Gods, and the Spirits of Place.
I finally had friendship with my Colorado surroundings but it was time to move on again. Although it was exciting to return to the land of my childhood, I felt a deep sense of loss and mourning for what I had built on the Front Range. I could sense those feelings being returned to me from the land I had placed so much love and care into. I had connected, made magic, and built a relationship.
One of the things I learned very early on in my Irish path was to value where I was situated and honor the Spirit of Place where I lived. We do not benefit from imagining ourselves in some iron age hillfort in Ireland (Norway, England, or anywhere else, for that matter).
Santa Gertrudis Cow and Calf
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It is a place and time that no longer exists, to which we have never been, nor could we ever go. We can take inspiration from it, but to build a relationship, we must be present. We must be IN the present.
Our Gods may be the Gods of our ancestors, but our practice is here, now, in this place, on this land where we live our daily lives. We must acknowledge and honor that. It is impossible to practice a nature-based religion without developing a relationship with the nature that currently exists around you. Get out of your imagination and go outside if you are able. I understand that roaming out into the landscape is a privilege. If you are not able to range far and wide, just step out into your yard. Befriend the beings that live there, talk to the sky, feel the sunlight. If you are not able to go outside, perhaps you can sit near the open window and converse with the breeze, or speak to and build a relationship with the spirit of your house.
To the best of your ability, know the native trees and plants, and understand the native geology. Know, acknowledge, and do your best to address the history, loss, and struggles of the native people. Do what you can to heal, serve, and make reparation.
Love the land you are on, dig your hands into its soil, speak to it, sing to it, learn about it, love it.
If you do this, I promise you… It will teach you its magic.
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