Ahhhhhh…… blessed October…. The sacrificial month of death and rebirth. It’s the season of the witch, my friends, and I’ve been living amongst the dead; revisiting the stories and practicing the traditions of the lineages from which I was born and into which I have been initiated. October is a time of reckoning. What did our summer harvest yield and will it get us through the long and looming darkness? Did we tend our physical and metaphorical soils well and were we blessed with abundance to keep us warm as the deep cold sets in? Did we remember to celebrate the bountiful gifts of the year with gratitude so that we may rest in peace awaiting renewal? Or did we leave our fields untended, loose ends untied, relationships unmended? Are we scrambling to cull fruit already rotting on the vine? The spirits are here, my pretties. Do they bring us messages to soothe or to scare? Usually, it’s a little bit of both.
It was subtle but still apparent that the veil between worlds was thinning early this October, but the Apache in me, traditionally a death-phobic people, chose to look away and ease into the more quaint offerings of the season like cooler weather and the first healing rains. But death comes for us all, and this year, the veil definitely gave up the ghosts. I had been gone for a week in England for my bodywork intensive when Skeets told me what had happened. He had been in bed one night lingering a while in that place between Awake and Asleep and it was there that he distinctly became aware of their presence. “They are Portuguese farmers from this area,” he said, and they had come in curiosity to see who was living on this land. He voiced our intentions to them: to live peacefully here, to do no harm and to care for the land, people and creatures as best we could. He showed himself humbly and honestly to them and “they seemed satisfied.” I wasn’t thrilled to have ghosts in the house and I wasn’t sure I could trust Skeets’ male-brained assessment of what “satisfied” looks like on long-dead Portuguese farmers but I didn’t really have a choice. I acknowledge that I am a guest here and that there are realms of existence beyond what is visible to my eyes. Also, I stand by these intentions. We told no one and went on with our days.
Medicine: “Get Dirty” as channeled from the young oracle
Two weeks passed and I found myself back at home, reunited with Phoenix but without the company of our manly protector. Skeets was one week into a four week Tantra Yoga teacher certification course up on the mountain nearly two hours from here and the kid and I were alone in the house in middle-of-nowhere Portugal. We had just finished stories and were laying together quietly as Phoenix drifted into that place between Awake and Asleep. “Momma,” he said softly, his eyes half closed. “I have a strange feeling in my head.”
“Like what, baby?” I was already on alert.
“Like someone is watching me…. And you,” he added as he turned to look at me.
Goddammit. I hate when kids are creepy. “Ok, baby. We’re safe here and everything is ok. Just try to rest.” I mustered every ounce of calm, nurturing, diversion-heavy Opossum Medicine available to me in the moment, but deep inside I was choking down panic. Not that there’s anything really to do when the spirits arrive. Just stay calm and connect with your intention. Breathe. And definitely don’t make any sudden moves.
“I’m thirsty,” he said. “Can you go to the kitchen and get me some water?”
Dammit. This kid better not be levitating when I get back.
The Oracles Dream
For a few days after that he had some trouble getting to sleep and seemed uneasy about something around. We isolated it to the floor length window in our bedroom and closed the shutter which seemed to help us both relax. I told Skeets about it later and he confirmed that just outside that same window, which is actually a door, is where he saw them too. For some reason I had imagined Skeets’ encounter happening inside the house somewhere and at once I felt both relieved that they were outside but more nervous by the affirmation that he and Phoenix had seen them unbeknownst to the other. “Just speak Portuguese to them,” Skeets said nonchalantly. “That seemed to help.”
A few days later, I went out with my mom for lunch and started recounting what had happened with Phoenix. Before I could even get to Skeets’ encounter she interrupted excitedly saying, “I know who it is!”
“You do?!” I asked, shocked.
“Your dad! I’ve been talking to him and asking him to watch over you and Skeets but especially Phoenix.”
“Well ask him to take a night off. It’s getting a little crowded over there,” I said half sarcastically. She offered a Solis eye roll, apparently unsatisfied that I would not want all the help I could get.
Invitations
It wasn’t my dad; not the ones Skeets and Phoenix felt. But it was feeling crowded and I began to wonder if he was there, too. What about my sister? I had avoided making spiritual contact with my sister for years after her death, but finally last year in a particularly powerful EMDR session, I was able to make contact and make peace. Before then, I was just too angry… too hurt. There’s still some of that lingering deep down, so I don’t make it a habit to communicate with her too much. I just let our relationship heal in rest. My dad, on the other hand, I’ve channeled a few times for various reasons. Was he here now? Who else was around? It was time to put up the ofrendas and gently offer the invitation to the others.
The kitchen is the heart of the home and this is where I’ve set up two ofrendas. One is for our family members. There are photos of my dad and sister and both sets of grandparents and great-grandparents as well as Skeets’ brother and his grandparents. And, of course, Saguaro. There are tiny urns of remains, hair, shoes and my dad’s backpack. There is a small chess piece that belonged to Blake. There is garlic and herbs and candles and fresh picked marigolds. The other ofrenda is for the unnamed Portuguese who are here with us. There is a large mirror for divination and channeling and offerings of fruit, dried herbs and oils we’ve made from gatherings from this land. I keep the candles lit while I’m home and I make sure to sit and spend time there meditating, remembering, talking and listening. Mostly listening. I’m listening. Tell me what you want to say.
minha casa e sua casa
I clear the channel and open the seance alone and it isn’t long until all the seats at the table are full. And I start to remember….
Every Friday, my mother’s grandparents, my great-grandmother Vicenta and my great-grandfather Jesus would get dressed up and walk to “el centro” to visit the spirit medium for their seance. This was Puerto Rico in the 1950’s and Afro-Caribbean style Santeria and espiritsmo were how my maternal ancestors related to the Divine Wow. Kids weren’t allowed and my mom remembers being a little afraid of all that anyway, but she remembers that they went every week and that sometimes, they would return home especially happy, presumably after having made fruitful contact with the ancestors. Her mom, my grandma Elizabeth, was clairvoyant and Mom remembers many times of eerily accurate prognostications. My favorite of these stories is when Elizabeth, “Tatita” to us, foresaw my parents’ marriage. My dad had only met and seen my mom twice before he was shipped off again from his Naval station in Puerto Rico. They had decided to write each other, but when Tatita soon announced his imminent return with intentions of marriage, my mom, then nineteen years-old, disregarded it as ridiculous. Only a few months later, the prophecy was fulfilled and the rest is herstory. My mom always said that the gift skipped a generation and went from Tatita to Melanie, but now that they are both gone and I am the age that my sister was when she died, I am aware of a kind of transference of power… a regifting, if you will. I hold Melanie, Tatita, Vicenta and all the men who love(d) us in concentric circles cast around the center of our shared existence and around the family table.
Save yourself
My favorite magic is done in the bathtub. Aside from the kitchen, this is where the ceremony often offers its most profound insights. The ritual of preparing the space immediately induces the altered state of consciousness I seek and once the herbs are chosen, the relics placed, the oils mixed and poured, the candles lit and the lights turned off am I able to slip into the steaming hot cauldron and journey for whatever I wish through the steam, smoke and firelight. The bath is safe and here is where I invite the rest of them in if they wish to break bread with us this festival season. The shapes and shadows come forth and retreat, ebbing and flowing, ethereal as ever, and somewhere in that place between Awake and Asleep, I sink in deeper and smile into reflected faces. There is my dad- dark and joking. There is my grandpa, Raul, all determined resilience. His dad, Samuel, a Mexican outlaw from who’s lineage comes the union with the Lipan Apaches. And there’s all the women who love(d) them. I see my life stretch backward through the antecedents and forward through the descendants to come and feel the breath of life enter where the two farthest points of the spectrum meet, closing the circle of eternity. I am never alone in this life. Let it be felt and known. Soil of my soil, root of my root, bone of my bone, blood of my blood.
I’d like to share an edited passage from one of my bibles, Hedge Witch by Rae Beth. It’s about Samhain (pronounced Sow’-en), the ancient pagan-Celtic festival from whence our modern Halloween is derived:
This festival is about the year’s death and therefore is the New Year, for death implies rebirth. But at this time, the death is more obvious than the intangible rebirth. Fields lay fallow, the sap has sunk down into roots and all of nature rests. There is an atmosphere of weirdness in the autumnal mists and the smoky colors of evening. This is, in fact, the Festival of the Returning Dead, as well as an acknowledgment of the end of one solar cycle. The old year dissolves, it breaks down, at Samhain, and the result is a breakdown of all boundaries, including those between the living and the dead. It is therefore more possible than usual to perceive the psychic presence of those who have died before us but who are still connected, still watching over us. Today, as in the past, the Goddess as Wisewoman and the God as Lord of Shadows are guides through death’s realm and the uncertainty of this most mysterious of all the seasons.
Mysterious, indeed. This season calls for juniper, cinnamon and rose. I let the heat create the union and take them in slowly, feeling them ease open the heart and inviting the breath that feeds the flames of the eternal hearth.
A blessing to you and your ancestors past, present and future. May there always be honored seats for all around the celebratory tables of the living.
“…these practices are political, in that they hand back power for meaning-making and directly challenge hierarchy, allowing the seeker to make direct contact with the wisdom inherent in their body and experience, and form alliances and friendships with the agencies that permeate the human world. Conversation, connection, and community are the antidotes to oppression – so extend this to the non-human world too! This is the deep relevance of magical practice to the queer and feminist movements – it allows us to short-circuit the patriarchal systems of knowledge and relationship that surround us, and instead forge new and direct contact with our potential both individual, social and ecological. It's also why it is so important that we start experimenting with and developing our own magic rather than re-hashing old white men's power-hunger or appropriating other cultures' rich heritage – developing our own magic is the very beginning of culture, of knowledge, of society, and it is through magic that we will reinvent what it means to be human.” Rhodri Karim