Greetings, Karen.
News: The Goodreads Giveaway ends at 11:59pm PDT. Enter here for a chance to win a free copy of Book One of the Enemy Glory trilogy.
Creative life: Spring Equinox / Ostara arrives on Saturday, March 20 at 5:37 AM EDT, approximately 42 minutes before dawn, and under the dark of a waxing moon. That is, the moon is waxing but invisible until she rises at 10:30am.
This is perfect. Here’s why.
Every witch knows that something balances and then shifts at each equinox. At Ostara, balance yields to increasing light. Here’s a way to use this natural energy shift to frame your creativity.
While it’s still dark, and just before Ostara arrives, fill a seed tray with mud. Mud is easy to come by in the middle of a southern New England March, but if you live in the northern regions, a little snow and potting soil will also work. The point is to mix water and earth (an ancient analog for fertility/creativity), and to hold that symbolic fertility in this last darkness before spring, sending love to your current or next creative project, as the unseen moon waxes and the dawn is about to break into the light half of the year.
Nature is poised now to create anew. This simple act of combining earth and water affirms that you are part of nature and that it is your birthright to do the same. The point is to go outside of your usual life, be alone with the universe as the energy shifts, and to unreservedly honor your creative life with Ostara as your stage. To remind yourself that your writing, music, painting, cooking, magic – whatever form your creativity takes – is as much a part of nature – your nature – as the unseen waxing moon and soon-to-be rising sun and the happening-right-now change of seasons.
Bring the tray inside and plant seeds in it at dawn, the new spring’s first light. Later, when the plants are ready to transplant – root them in their own protected space on Mother Earth, just as your creativity should occupy its own protected space in your life.
Of interest: March (named for Mars, the ancient Roman war god) was originally the first month of the Roman calendar, and also the first month of military campaigns. Because energy's energy, so why not start the year with a bloody fight?
New England history: And then there’s Maine. The District of Maine was part of Massachusetts until March 15, 1820. Just as Bostonians had resented rule from London, Mainers resented rule from Boston. Resentment peaked during the War of 1812, because Massachusetts failed to protect the Maine coast from British raids. Also, Mainers felt they were not getting fair representation in the Massachusetts legislature and that Massachusetts was imposing unfair, heavy-handed taxation on them. Sound familiar?
The upshot was that the people of the District of Maine wrote their own constitution and affected a bloodless revolution against Massachusetts by getting their statehood approved. Today is the 201st anniversary of the State of Maine.
Karen Michalson
