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I'm an atheist. An agnostic, at a push because I dont claim to know the unknowable. But I do know the power of ritual and magic. I know our ancestors had the right idea when it came to getting us through darkness and being comfortable within the cycles of life and death. So:
For Samhain, I went for a walk in the woods. To see the end of harvest. To feel the coming darkness. To know that it is turning, even as it settles. In the darkness, we still walk.
I went to feel my heart quicken in the deep forest but to know the path was sound. I went to hear the rustle and squeak and screech of other beating hearts and know they are my kin.
I walked without my torch because I didnt need it. I walked until the dark felt warm and safe and alive with its own beat. I walked because when darkness comes, we'll know each other. Old familiars.
As I went, the sound of water streaming through the galleys and across the paths, I picked up emblems. Seed pods from the hogweed. The fallen leaves of the oak I sat beneath this summer. Russet beech leaves and rocks from the ever-moving stream.
And I walked. And I took the light, burning inside me.
At home, I made an alter of my finds to remind us that all of this will pass. That we know, in our being, how to walk through the dark. Ill keep a light burning until we can walk together again. Jx
