“When did you become so political?” my partner Joey asked me. I set down the irreverent flipbook while laughing at his response to the image that I posted with much glee on my Instagram page. “Mommy, when I grow up, I want to smash the white racist, homophobic, patriarchal bullshit paradigm too.” “I have always … Continue reading The Face of Courage
I’m barefoot and braless without a stitch of makeup and that’s no different than any other day in the last three years I have lived in the rural mountain home built by my partner Joey. "The Mountains are Calling and I Must Go" - John Muir I’ll see no one today but family but that’s … Continue reading Barefoot and Braless on Earth Day
Sometimes all you need is a bulldog in your corner. My sixth grade teacher, Miss Kneece, championed her students with a tenacious, sometimes, well actually oftentimes, blunt manner. At a time when all I wanted to do was hide my vulnerbility and pre-teen angst, Miss K would look right through my guise and remind me … Continue reading Mentors, Teachers, Sheroes
I wore out the cassette tape of Jagged Little Pill by Alanis Morrisette while writing The Teen Spell Book: Magick for Young Witches. Unapologetic lyrics about the pain of perfection or daily indignations women endure, while striving to love ourselves just as we are, could bring me to my knees with wracking sobs or raging … Continue reading Unapologetic At Last
To publish a book is to look inside your heart, describe what you see, feel, hear, taste, smell, and know, then share that with the world. Signing The Book of Spells for Kimmy Tejasindhu, my editor at Ten Speed Press who came out to my book launch party at Copperfield Books with designer, Sara Weitzman. … Continue reading Vulnerability of the Heart
I carried a vial of water from the creek that runs through my backyard and poured the water on the top of the Jorba castle in Catalunya with the prayer that the colonial mind be quenched of its desire to dominate and take more than it’s share. Within minutes, like a house of cards, my … Continue reading Mabon Shadow Work
Originally published on Manifest Station March 30, 2018 She was a mystery, a ghost as close as my skin. I discovered her love through the scent of old photographs and White Shoulders perfume. And there she was: Della Ruiz Martinez, my nana. I bought a bottle of White Shoulders when I discovered it was her … Continue reading Hidden Love
It's not recommended to travel during a Mercury Retrograde, but I like it. It's kind of like being the ball in the pinball machine. You just don't get to move the levers - that's up to the mischievious, mercurial God of Communication. Mercury appears to retreat its steps from our two-dimensional perspective four times a … Continue reading Touring with the Book of Spells
Threadbare is to be without comfort or coziness, so they say… The old woman walked down the street with the remnants of a long sweater that had once been beautiful. Each time she connected with a new friend or for each birth that she attended as midwife, she gave a thread from her multicolored woven … Continue reading Threadbare
“Stars!” Leslie exclaimed as she stepped out of the white SUV and gazed at the indigo sky strewn with glittering lights. I laughed and pulled my sweater tight to shield off the mountain air. Leslie’s face transformed from wonderment to joy when she saw me. She ran toward me with her arms outstretched and hugged … Continue reading Mammoth Flashbacks
