My walk with witch craft only increased with time. Eventually I got into a relationship and began to teach him about paganism. He got very interested in it as well, and soon we were doing rituals together. We also played music and wrote poetry together. It was not a relationship I envisioned myself in long-term, because I had big dreams of becoming a dancer or a writer or a rock star. I moved away from my goth style and into a more hippie style. Free and wild and in love with the earth and nature. We were young and in love and I didn’t worry about birth control and before I knew it I was pregnant. It kind of threw our lives into a tail spin. I felt trapped in a relationship that was supposed to be fun and temporary with a baby I was not ready to take care of.
Our relationship was fraught with problems from the beginning. As the relationship continued, with the added stress of a baby coming, things only got worse. We argued often and I had an idea of changing our pot smoking lifestyle to be more responsible while he did not. That made things worse. By the end of my pregnancy I really felt that we should get married. Believe it or not, deep down inside I was a traditional kind of girl.
We were married in a Celtic Hand-fastening Ceremony in a friends back yard. He was ordained as a minister online, so he performed the wedding for us. They were also witches, and there back yard was a pagan haven of sorts. It was the perfect atmosphere for two hippie witches to get hitched. The ceremony was a complete ritual in every aspect. Somehow when we were fighting just minutes before hand I knew it was doomed.
Months later he would cheat on me, with a friend of mine. It killed something inside of me. I never felt so betrayed in my life. I wanted to kill him, but mostly her. We had a baby together, only 4 months old. I did not think I could ever trust another man again. He did not want to be married any more. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, but now that we had a family I just wanted to keep it together. Because that is what is right. I couldn’t live with him cheating on me, and well he wouldn’t come home. He stayed with our two friends – also witches.
I moved in with my parents house and it was like hell all over again. Back in my old bedroom where I had tripped out on drugs so many times, and cried from depression and loneliness. Now I was back again with my precious little son and I thought my heart was going to crawl out of my chest and explode all over me. I had hurt before, but this was a new level of hurt unlike anything I knew existed.
I decided to move up North, about 400 miles, into a tiny hamlet where a cousin I barely knew lived. He lived in a mobile home park and offered to pay my first month rent. At the time, the escape sounded great, so off I went. I couldn’t take much, and because I didn’t even know how to drive (remember I rode my bike everywhere) my parents had to drive me and a little trailer full of stuff. It was about the most depressing drive ever.
This tiny village was in the middle of a national forest. There was a mobile home park, a gas station, a diner, a post office, and some scattered homes. That was it. Nearest real town was 20 miles down a long and windy road. I was officially stuck with no car, no job, no friends, and family I didn’t even know. Talk about jumping into a decision.
It didn’t take me long to regret that decision or for my husband to want me back. Problem was we still couldn’t stop arguing and he was 400 miles away. After a few months he decided to move up and be with us. As good as intentions we had, we were both too messed up to have a healthy relationship. Things went from bad to worse and escalated into physical fighting. It was a nightmare.
We were still practicing magic all the time though. As a matter of fact being in the forest made the magic more, well magical. To be so close to our mother goddess was amazing to me. I remember one Samhain (Halloween) doing a ritual to contact the dead. Samhain was a very special night as a witch, a night all about celebrating death and the witches new year. On Samhain, the veil between the worlds is the thinnest, and so it is the best time to contact the dead – our ancestors. It is a beautiful night, filled with reverence and awe. A Hallowed Eve, or Holy Evening for witches.
Out in the dark forest we built a fire and began to summon the dead. We were chanting and calling upon the goddess and god. The energy was stirring and the wind was blowing. Suddenly a giant face, pale and ghostly loomed before us. We had achieved our goal and reached through to the spiritual realm! It was exciting and scary all at once.
Our magic began to cross the line from white to grey. White magic is done with the intention of doing good, and grey magic is the intention not to harm, but not to do good. More moving into a selfish territory, but not harming anyone. Well we had a big problem with another man. He was going to do something to get us into trouble and we wanted to stop him. So there we were again, out in the forest, around a bonfire, casting a spell to keep him from doing any harm to us. We took something of his and burned it during the ritual.
This was just normal life for two witches. We loved Halloween and were proud to dress our young son up as a wizard. He would follow in our footsteps of course. I was a witch, and a pagan, and I would die that way as far as I was concerned. It was real, it was the truth, and I felt sorry for all those silly little Christians.
Well it wasn’t long after that our relationship ended permanently. I had wanted it to end, because I was so miserable, but when it did I could hardly bear it. You see I was pregnant with our second child. He left and moved in with another woman he had been seeing and I was alone again, with no job, a 1-year-old, and a baby on the way. Misery was like a bottomless pit that swallowed me whole. I was so deep inside that pit that I could not see out. I had no hope. I begged him over and over again to come back and make our family work. Reality is sometimes an ugly thing when it slaps you in the face.
I could not eat, could not sleep, could not function. Just the bare minimum to take care of my son and that was it. I was loosing weight and I was desperate. I began calling psychics to find out if we would get back together. Finally I concocted a spell that would bring him back to me and keep him from her. Except it did the opposite, and he was gone for good. I did not see him again for over a year, when our second son was 6 months old.
I moved back to my parents house again. I was more depressed than ever. Something really died in me then. I had no luster for life anymore. I started to feel those old feelings of wanting to just die. But I couldn’t because I had a son and another on the way to take care of. My parents helped me a lot. Somewhere on the way to maturing I stopped hating them and realized they did their best as parents. But I didn’t have it in me to do magic anymore. Not that I stopped being a witch. No. I could only focus on what I could, and that was getting through each day and taking care of my kids and picking up the pieces to my broken life/heart/family.
I am saved now. Saved by grace and mercy. Saved by Jesus Christ. I do not celebrate Samhain or Halloween anymore. I do not take my kids trick or treating, or to harvest festivals. We do not want to be associated with the evil of that night anymore. We want to honor Jesus now, because he is King here. Thank you God for taking me out of that life, and giving me hope and love. Thank you Jesus for loving me enough to heal the wounds from paganism, and to give me a new life. I am a new creation. I wish you could have seen me then and now, because you would be shocked at the change. That girl died the day that I accepted Jesus and as He hung on the cross, bleeding and dying, He took that old life with Him. Thank you. I have hope now and it is in Jesus Christ.