It is after midnight in mid-November, and my hands smell of earthy dried goodness from this year’s gardens: oregano, lavender, anise hyssop, bee balm, mint, and dandelion greens. This day was unsettling and long, and I found it difficult to maintain my balance. Thinking sleep would help, I went to bed early, but woke in the grip of a nightmare and with a restless spirit.
I left the warmth of flannel sheets and wandered through the house in the way one moves when seeking undetermined comfort in the middle of the night. The bookcase in the living room called to me, and I paused in front of it, right hand raised and moving to touch first one spine, then another, then another. No, not this old friend. Nor this one, nor this. Divination decks brought the same hollow rejection. Next, the refrigerator: open, look, close – pause – open, look, close. I repeated the cycle once more, just in case three was the magic number. The light still worked, but nothing interesting appeared on the shelves between openings.
Lavender from the author’s garden [S. Barker]
I sorted through the baking supplies to see if something would spark the flames of culinary or Witch-crafty creativity, but there was nary a hint of heat. The spices caught my half-hearted attention, and I rearranged them in careless alphabetical order before I closed the cabinet and turned to lean against the kitchen counter. That was when I noticed the drying racks with the herbs dangling from their hooks. Over the harvest season, putting herbs in jars moved to the bottom of my to-do list so many times that my eyes stopped sending images of them to my brain. Situational blindness of a kind, I suppose, but now here was the grounding agent my spirit had compelled me to find.
The movement required to gather the necessary tools and supplies eased me into the work. By the time I had everything assembled on the kitchen table, restlessness was somewhat soothed by a sense of purpose. I sat down and, after doing an exercise to ground myself, began the moving meditation with which home and hearth keepers, metaphysical practitioners, and kitchen Witches all over the world are familiar.
Some of the grounding aspects of this work come from using favorite, well-loved materials; others from the direct connection to earth that is the natural by-product of handling plants. And still another is the awareness of liminal connection to the sense of sameness with other people in those borderless and boundless communities.
In my own sphere of favorite and familiar, I like the sensory awareness and naming magic involved with handwriting the name of an herb on a brown kraft paper tag, then attaching it to a jar with a piece of twine. Glass jars in different shapes and colors please me, and the shelves in the pantry hold mason jars as well as repurposed food jars. Working on pieces of wax paper laid out on the kitchen table reminds me of doing crafts and preparing food with my mother and my grandmother, and those sweet memories opened another liminal connection.
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I process one bundle of herbs at a time, slowly stripping dried leaves from stems and crushing large leaves into smaller pieces. Those actions released rich, fragrant aromas that transported me away from the chilly night to warm days when I had my hands in the soil, working in my gardens, immersed in earth, air, water, and fire. Grounded, safe, and whole, the same way I feel sitting in my kitchen tonight.
But – that thought, right there. That awareness was my temporary undoing. The depth of connection made me feel safe enough to finally allow myself to cry, and I sat in my kitchen in the middle of the night and wept for people I will never meet, but nevertheless I know them. I know them. We are connected by garden dirt under our fingernails, by love poured into preparing a meal, by cups of tea and drinks of water, by homemade bread, by the herbs we grow or buy at market and hang to dry.
If I did not already understand that sometimes it is impossible to cry or release emotion until one feels safe, I might think I was losing my mind. And if I were not nearly 40 years into being a magical practitioner, I might be upset about not being able to maintain a continued state of perfect balance while the world tears itself and innocent people apart. I am, though, and so, I am not.
The truth is, being a Witch and having a daily spiritual practice in magic does not allow me to create my own situational blindness to what is happening within the borders of my own community and country or in the world that is really not so far away. I cannot remain connected and be oblivious at the same time.
Herb jars in the author’s kitchen [S. Barker]
My restlessness is not a new thing, and lately my sleep has been filled with horrific nightmares. If I possessed sufficient shallowness of spirit and character to compare them to the living nightmares happening all around the world they would fade into nothingness, but they are terrible, nonetheless. These are dark, sorrowful, heavy times. We can cheer the patriarchy falling, but it was never going to go without a fight that left countless victims along the way. It is not hollow or performative or useless to grieve for those who are suffering or who shall suffer no more in this realm.
I have talked to people who have thoughts and feelings similar to my own. Yet, it seems difficult or even unacceptable to talk about the emotions surrounding current events. Many of us feel alone in our sense of despair and helplessness. It seems there is nothing we can do to make a difference, and for some folks, the work suggestions shared by others are inaccessible for a variety of reasons.
Even as I write this, I am thinking, who do I think I am? What is wrong with me? The world is on fire and people are dying, and I have nothing but words to throw on the flames. Who cares about what I am doing in my kitchen in the middle of the night?
The answers to those questions are surprisingly simple, whether I am talking to myself or to a broader audience.
Who do I think I am? I am a Witch. Seeker, knower, learner, woman, mother, human being who knows and values the power of connection and compassion.
What is wrong with me? I am experiencing multiple shared traumas with millions of other people. It is a normal trauma response to doubt myself and the worth of anything I do, say, or am. It is normal to feel numb and overwhelmed, or to have a crisis of belief just as it is normal to be unwilling or unable to avert one’s eyes.
Who cares about what I am doing in my kitchen in the middle of the night? Once upon a time this question would have hit me like a badly thrown curve ball. But that was then, and this is now when I have danced with the Wheel another turn or two or ten.
My words share stories of the magic in everyday life. I care about what I am doing in my midnight kitchen because I know that the sharing of each story weaves connection. I care that my stories might help someone feel less alone or isolated, and remember that they too, have power.
I care that putting dried herbs in jars is something I have in common with people I will never meet, and that our common interest connects us and weaves more and stronger strands in the web of community and life. I believe that if enough of us add to that weaving, we will do better than just survive in this changing world.
I quietly cried my way through these thoughts as I worked. I thought of friends and strangers who preserve food and make tinctures, salves, and syrups. I wondered what kind of herbs I would find hanging in a kitchen in another community, whether down the road or around the world. I wondered what jars or containers a maker in another place might prefer to use; and how many of those remain unbroken. I thought about other things, too, and folded them all safely into the earth as it was represented in each jar now standing in front of me.
The author’s peace altar [S. Barker]
My tears had dried by the time I slid the last of the crushed dandelion leaves from a folded piece of wax paper into the opening of a canning funnel seated atop a purple mason jar. Before I sealed the jars, I took a pinch of each herb and dropped it into a round-bellied brown ceramic bowl, then set that to the side. My ancestors were present, so there was no doing anything else until I cleaned up the mess from my work in the kitchen.
Once that was done, I carried the brown bowl to my study, and with a small bit of candle magic added it to my peace altar. There it will continue to do its work, just as I will continue to do mine. It is a hard thing for some folks to remember, whether in time of personal trouble or world crisis; that we cannot all do the same work, but we can each do as we are able.
And so we must. So mote it be.
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