Discovering what you are.

[CastingCrown]

Admittedly I'm having a little difficulty navigating this site. So I hope this is exactly the right place.

Magic in everyday life, seems like it would be.

I grew up Southern Baptist, but that wouldn't really be fair to describe the nuances of faith at home. My maternal grandfather had been a Mormon, so I familiarized with that as well. Though certainly not formally or in a way affiliated with them.

My fathers family, nominally Catholics who weren't very religious.

It could sometimes be quite confusing, x isn't really a Christian. We are.

None the less I threw myself in, around the age of 14 I noticed I liked my own gender. Uh-oh.

The greatest evils of the Christian community. In adulthood I'd learn the pastor who had been so firey and passionate about that topic was because he himself deals with that. He wasn't talking to us, but himself.

He's actually a good friend today. Oh the irony.

I had like many children born in the 80s who grew up in the 90s some exposure to paganism and witchcraft though movies, tv shows.

Captain Planet, no idea that was. Only knew my mother didn't like me watching it.

Earth, wind, fire, water, heart... Adult me wait a min, that's the...

And the duality of Gods, Gaia spirit of the Earth, and Captain planet, a male deity who would appear when those were combined.

Didn't really teach anyone about environmentalism. I think about the plastic toys from that show. 🤷‍♂️

Then of course, Hocus Pocus, that certainly wasn't a positive reflection.

But I gained one important thing, the term white witch. A circle of salt, that came in handy later.

The Craft, seriously stealing from a magic shop. Y'all were insane.

Charmed, Buffy.

But these were just shows right.

Well I'd lose my faith around 18, years of casually finding my way back only to realize why I'd left to begin with.

But odd things about me, born on the cusp of an air and water sign, the day of I might add. February 19, 1985, also the last day of the Rat Zodiac.

I remember at first dishearteningly learning about that one.

I eat at a particular restaurant quite often, when they updated their calendars, that I spent decades looking at under the glass of their tables they gave me one of the old ones.

When's your birthday anyway, oh you're on an Ox you're a rat. This isn't for you, it's to simple here read this.

Book on Chinese Philosophy.

Hmmm, that began a surge of something inside of me.

Learning about how the elements go together.

It's not just Fire, Water, Air, Earth, Spirit.

Oh no, it's Wood, Fire, Metal, Earth Water.

Learning about how the two major schools of astrology work together but are different.

Nothing written, just my own personal, hmmm.

They're both true.

Collecting various stones, as a child I had a geology book, as an adult I had amazon.

Those aren't just pretty rocks, I was especially drawn to three. Amethyst Citrines and clear Quartz.

Of course, eventually I learned about Indian Philosophy and how I had a field of energy and how those stones reacted with them.

And then life got to me, I met someone who a sheep, and a very devout one at that endlessly hounded my "clusterf**k" belief system.

You just take what you want and leave the rest.

1) you shouldn't let sheep lead.
2)I wasn't strong enough to deal with that yet.

I didn't want to be the older guy dominating someone, I'd been there. Only six years but it feels like more when you're 26 and they're 20.

Two unstable years of that and eventually we parted ways.

Oh, but he's right, this is ridiculous. It's as ridiculous as how we were raised. He's right I'm just holding onto this afraid to face the cold reality of a scientific existence. We don't have souls there's no magic. And when I thought I'd had elemental moments and influenced the weather or talked to a spirit. That's mental illness.

So I put away my books, threw out my writings, and my pretty rocks were just that a collection.

Then I'd meet a snake, (1989) and oh boy, was he. But I loved that snake, and he loved me. He loved to spark me back up, get me ranting passionately about my beliefs. He helped me rediscover a lot of what I'd lost.

And then he gets killed.

I remember feeling like I could connect to something, back to the elemental forces I had. Different now stronger full of grief and not really understanding exactly what I was doing.

I felt myself reach north, feeling the cold Arctic air, seeing the landscape.

And I dragged it right on down singing the song let it go.

I mean for real, actually dragged it down right to me.

What had been a spring day, was a sudden freak cold snap.

Did I do that? Nah couldn't have.

Later arguments, storm right above me, freak incidents on the Doppler radar. A friend texting are you alright, it just got tornadic above you.

And of course when I'd visit that grave, it always rained, the rain matched the intensity of how I felt. Staring at that fresh red clay grave.

Did I do these things? Hmmm.

It wouldn't be until I cast my first intentional spell.

Grief, desperation, and google.

Reading about others I decided I'll write my own.

One red candle, a smoky quartz, and my favorite "seer" stone in hand. I set out to draw someone new to me.

Of course couldn't get that snake off my mind. It had been nearly two years why wasn't he going away.

And that's when it happened, it wasn't the freak weather, it was that spell. My first intentional intent spell.

And there he was, an almost exact doppelganger. I mean I've to this day never seen two people who looked so much alike.

Same shade of black coffee dark brown eyes, looking at me the same way, same hair texture cut just the way I remembered it. He even smelled like him. I bumped right into him at gas station on my way out. He'd parked right behind me. Hi, hell he even sounds the same.

And then I nervously stammer out, I had to flip the car around I forget which side it's on.

Reply, oh yeah that happens to me too when I drive MY WIFE'S CAR.

Well, damn, that's enough for me.

I remember watching him stair almost like he was enchanted somehow that's never happened before. And looking at him as I drove off.

Oh he was indeed. I'd cast it, I'd asked it, unknowingly, when I thought about it my mind hadn't been clear to possibilities, nope I enchanted a look alike stranger and brought him right to me.

That would begin a much clearer more intent driven path.

Magic in real life.

Oh you bet, and you get what give.

[PerditaPickle]

And then he gets killed.

So sorry for your loss.

[CastingCrown]

So sorry for your loss.

Ah such as we have then loose, it's loss that teaches us appreciation. But it was a hell of thing to go through.

It's been a few years now, four in a few days. I don't feel like it was as much as loss more of an experience.

I'll see him again, another time another place. Sometimes I do now anyway 😉

We all have a thread, we never know when it's going to be cut.