I have a new dream to add to my journal, it’s incomplete, one scene out of an entire adventure, most of which can’t be remembered, but it’s visually memorable:  An Indian (Native American) village is burning.  I don’t see the flames, but the smoke is thick and curling, sulfurous, twisting through the air like dirty gray clouds.   I feel appalled, and yet can do nothing but watch, from whatever invisible perch I’m allowed to view this scene from.

And watch I do, though as an unseen outsider watching a disjointed scene develop.  Occasionally the clouds of smoke will part, and I can see the steep sides of a teepee constructed from buffalo hide.  Other times the thick smoke separates to reveal the wall of a modern home…and this is shocking and unexpected.

And that’s the extent of what I remember, though I know that there was a much broader scenario, lost now in my sub-conscious.

 Tarot Card of the Day
(Deck:  Handle)

White Buffalo woman
Daugther of Stones in the West
Princess of Stone

I feel a theme here, unintentional, yet somehow connected to the scheme of things.

From this card, I get…strength; individualism; great effort under duress; quiet fortitude; power that’s understated.  Also, I sense a grounding to Earth, to the Mother Goddess, creativity, and manifestation into the physical realm.

http://ladyamythyst.webs.com/tarotreadings.htm

Night before last we had heavy rains here in Nebraska, which resulted in a flooded basement for us.  This sounds awful, and it certainly wasn’t fun, but it’s been worse.  This time the floor was completely soaked the length of the room and all the saturated area rugs had to be drug outside.  We’ve had flooding before that’s left us with ankle deep water downstairs, so I’m not going to complain about this episode.  It was actually fairly easy to get cleaned up.

I took a picture of the ditch ahead of our house about mid-morning the day after the rain.  On the night of the storm, this ditch was filled to the brim with water.  As you can see, it had already gone down quite a bit.

Welcome to Hedgewytch Hollow:

You can see two of our feeding stations here, at either end of the front yard.  These will become much more interesting and ‘wild’ looking as the season progresses because we allow the seeds from the birdfood to sprout and grow beneath and around the feeding stations.  These plants include milo and towering sunflowers.

The center of our front lawn remains uncut.  My husband mows around them, creating a sort of ‘wild island’, where a gorgeous bed of clover is allowed to grow, along with grass, dandelions, and my beautiful wild violets.  There are also large stones in there– I mean ‘large’ stones– that he brought back from Iowa, and a barrel containing columbine and marigolds, along with a statuette of a white sow (for the goddess, Cerridwen), and a black cauldron in which I plant something different each year– this year, it’s marigolds.

So funny– just last week there was a man going door to door in our neighborhood trying to drum up business for a local lawn service.  I answer my door, and he points to this ‘wild’ area in our front lawn and says, “I see you have a few ‘trouble spots’ there.”  I told him that we certainly don’t have any ‘trouble spots’, and that stretch of lawn is just exactly the way I want it.  He looked stunned.

We allow plantain to grow throughout our yard, wherever it may have a hankerin’ to do so; and this plant seems to favor a large area of our front lawn.  Not only is plantain edible, a nice wild green you can add to your salads or cook up and eat with a little butter and salt and pepper; but it has magickal properties as well.

I use plantain to create mojo bags for safe travel, which we keep in our vehicles.  In my old Suburban– the ‘She-Sub’– is a black bag containing plantain, calamus root, a pinch of sea salt, and a stone of tiger’s eye.

For plantain the planet is Venus; the element Earth; the energy feminine (receptive); and the magickal energies are geared towards healing, strength, and protection.

This is the columbine that’s growing in my barrel in the center of our uncut area of lawn.  It seems to like this spot.  I only wish that it’s blooms lasted longer through the season; I think they are so beautiful.  Columbine also has magickal purposes, but if you use it, you should be aware that the seeds to this plant are poisonous.

For columbine the energy is feminine; the planet is Venus; the element is Water; and its magickal energies include courage and love.

When we first moved here, fifteen years ago, there was a huge gorgeous cotton wood tree in the front yard, on the east side of the house.  It faithfully shaded my daughter’s bedroom window throughout three seasons of the year.  In the autumn we were treated to a beautiful golden display of large leaves that made the most magickal sound when the wind moved through it.  But alas, the tree eventually died, and we had to have it cut down for fear of the brittle tree damaging the neighbor’s house, should it go down in a windstorm.

I told them to leave the tall stump, and here it is, yet today, wearing a garland of virginia creeper, standing as the centerpiece in another wild garden spot.  This area, towards the back of the front lawn and to the east of the house, is overrun with virgina creeper, as well as day lillies, dahlias, purple cone flowers, and a baby lilac bush, as well as other foliage that decides to make this magickal spot its home.

I have a magick wand made from a twig saved from the majestic old cotton wood tree.  It’s served me well, as an old friend, which of course, it is.

The growing season is just getting under way in our area, so this space has just begun to fill itself in with this year’s growth.  I took the bottom part of the metal bunkbed I turned into a bird feeding station, and I put it here, using it as a trellis, in anticipation that the virginia creeper will cover it by mid-June.

 I have two potted plants hanging from the bunkbed birdfeeder in the front yard.  One of them is pansies, which remind me of my daughter, Anne.  When she was a little girl, I called her ‘Annsie Pansie’.

 The planet for pansies is Saturn; it’s energy feminine (receptive); the element is Water; and the magickal energies include:  love, rain magick, and divination.  It’s said that if you carry this plant upon your person, you will draw love to you.

The other potted plant is violas.  This plant reminds me of springtime in South Dakota, knowing that a long summer was just around the corner; my grandmother’s house; paved walkways; morning sunshine; and cold dew.  Childhood memories.

 This is clover that covers much of the ‘wild area’ in the front lawn.  I took this photo the morning after the rain storm, and as you can see, raindrops still sit upon it.

This clover holds an attraction for the wild things.  I was coming out of the kitchen one day, and there were my cats– Salem & Pixie– frozen in awe, watching something out of the glass on our front door.  I looked to see what was holding their attention, and sitting in our clover patch, watching the cats with just as much curiosity, was a very large rabbit, one of the largest I’ve ever seen.

We’ve spotted this rabbit in the clover patch now and then, but each time I run for the camera, I come back to find it has disappeared.  I’m beginning to think, half whimsically and half seriously, that this rabbit is not just any ordinary old rabbit, but perhaps a magickal creature.

The cat is Baby (aka Duchess), sitting on one of the large rocks in the front yard.  This photo was taken the night of the thunderstorm, during the evening, before the storm hit.  This photo is full of orbs; not only is there a large one on the barrel, the sky is full of them.

This is a photo of my latest aquisition– a goddess ring.  It’s sterling silver, citrine, blue topaz, and the goddess’s face is carved from bovine bone.  And no, this one is not for sale– it’s a keeper!

Jewelry is my weakness, particularly rings– no idea why– and my daughters know that someday it will be passed on to them.

The energies for this ring will include:

Citrine…the energy is projective (male); the planet is the Sun; the element Fire; and the magickal energies protction and psychism.

 Topaz…the energy is projective (male); the planet is the Sun; the element Fire; and the magickal energies include protection, healing, money, and love.

From Hedgewytch Hollow
Blessed Be!