Savage Daughters

Weather: We’re slowly warming up to spring, though we had a touch of SNOW! SNOW, I SAY! to keep us on our toes.

I mentioned in my previous post that I would continue on my essays about housecleaning for Spring. Last post was about the physical. This will be more about the spiritual.

The title above is in reference to a song that I heard on TikTok and went in search of because it touched me so deeply. It’s a song written by Wyndreth Berginsdottir, who sings songs in the style of old Norse tunes.

The first verse is this:

I am my mother’s savage daughter
The one who runs barefoot
Cursing sharp stones

I am my mother’s savage daughter
I will not cut my hair
I will not lower my voice

My mother’s child is a savage
She looks for her omens in the colors of stones
In the faces of cats, in the falling of leaves
In the dancing of fire
In the curve of old bones

Wyndreth Berginsdottir

It’s a much longer piece and the rest of the lyrics are rife with references to heathen songs, and witchcraft and old things reawakening inside of us. It hit a nerve for me. My husband was the first to hear it and made sure he sent it to me, knowing that it would strike a chord.

You see, I come from a long line of strong women, Nordic on 3 sides (Swedish, Danish and Finnish). There’s an innate attitude of DIY and perseverance that borders on self-destructive stubbornness in all of us, and I am not immune from the effects or repercussions. I’ve inherited blue/green eyes from my great grandmother, and bad knees and arthritis from this same family line. I research our lineages on all sides, and have tracked (with my late father’s research) the Swedish and Finnish lines back to the 1500s. I’m not an obsessive about the bloodlines, but I do find the patterns of behavior and recurrent facts fascinating.

But the relevant point is that I also inherited a deep respect for nature, a love of the stars and a deep affinity for the water, whether lakes, rivers or oceans. All of those things have managed to spread out tendrils into every aspect of my spirituality, and inform my creative pursuits.

My belief system has morphed and changed over the years. I was raised Methodist, got confirmed and everything. But my parents were very much of the mind that as I was growing up, I should learn about their beliefs, and then I could make an informed opinion about how I believed. Pretty damn progressive, truth be told. During the process of my confirmation, we attended (as a class) services at different denominations to show us some similarities amongst the religions. Even with all this, after confirmation, I started researching Egyptian gods, and deep diving into other mythologies, not sure what pantheons would find me, or what my burgeoning belief system was comprised of at the time. Christianity didn’t really work for me. I had a lot of respect for the tenets but didn’t see a lot of it being practiced. I dipped my toes in paganism, deep diving into the books of Raymond Buckland, Margot Adler, Scott Cunningham and several other authors of basic witchcraft and nature based religions. (This was back in the early 80s).

Still nothing really resonated. Bits and pieces latched on, and by the time I was in my late 20s, I’d kind of formed a bit of a pastiche that didn’t really seem to fit with any particular flavor of paganism. Wicca didn’t work for me, because the rules were just as rigid as Christianity (not the same type of rules, mind you, but the same rigid calendar of rituals and rules of behavior). I was reluctant to use the word “witch”, because there were multiple subdivisions there as well. So I kind of lumbered on, in my vague cloak of beliefs, a combination of philosophies that were pinched liberally from a lot of religions, without taking the applied practices. (Appropriation is not in my nature anyway. I don’t believe in half-assing things, especially where dipping your toes into someone else’s pool is concerned. There are a lot of negative repercussions there, and I’m not just talking about judgmental feedback on social media. Universal energies do not like to be disrespected, and you won’t like the consequences.) I picked up tarot, learned to create detailed astrology charts, and garnered an impressive number of tools & herbs. I’ve had many people cross my path, who tried to use their practice as ways to garner power or attention or just as a form of manipulation. Those people I studiously sidestepped and kept on my own path. I’m a deep studier and like to make sure I thoroughly understand something before I claim it as part of my practice.

So here I am, in my mid 50s and after a lot of deep conversations with people, and much reading and practice, I’ve come around to calling myself a witch. I fall into the category of Hedge Witch, or Forest Witch, with some shamanistic views, but I’m not really comfortable wearing any of those labels whole-cloth. I am very in touch with the natural energies that run through this world, and I respect the source of those energies, though I don’t try to personify those sources. Is that a vague enough sum up for you?

Now, after that lengthy trip down memory lane, let’s get back to the idea of spiritual housecleaning. I’ve become comfortable with who I am and what I believe and how I practice it. There has been an awakening of sorts the past few years, as though I finally got the right pins in the right slots to make everything click. It required a lot of scraping off other people’s opinions, judgements and condescension to get here. I still attend Mass with my husband for some holidays, more out of habit than practice. But one ritual, if framed in way that works for you, is not that unlike any other. The housecleaning that I talk about is needing to flex those muscles again, and get in touch with the energies that I felt and know deep inside. It’s about clearing out the dreck of self-destructive behavior and listening to the world as it hums alongside us. It’s clearing out the cynicism, and the anger. Reducing the negativity so I can hear the flow. It’s a tricky thing: hearing that, sensing it. You need to have peace of mind and stillness of thought. I do hear the voices of my ancestors in the waves of the water, and the healing nature of the women of my line in the thrumming of the earth and the connection to the life it feeds.

I don’t need anyone else to believe the way I do. I also don’t need their permission, or acceptance, or even their prayers to be in touch with what I consider a higher power. I also don’t need to proselytize my beliefs or condemn their beliefs. It’s a delicate balance, that could make things so much more easy if we could all stay in our lane. Harm none- it’s at the foundation of every belief system. Not everyone realizes it, or practices it, which is a shame.

I know that we all have a connection to each other, and to the earth and its life. That is where my spirituality lives. Moving forward, I am practicing my faith, for want of another term, as unapologetically as I can.

(art credit unknown. Search in process for credit)