January, in Ireland. We woke this morning to a dazzling frost and bright, clear sunlight. Stunning after so many days of constant rain. Coffee laced with cinnamon in the kitchen, candles burning low as soft jazz mingled with the joy of my son at play. I hold my blessings close.
The light is on the ascent, already more than thirty minutes added to the day. The solstice and Christmas have come and gone, the Oak Moon too, the new calendar year, and tonight as I write it is the feast of Epiphany, Twelfth Night and here in Ireland it is also Nollaig na mBan. Woman’s Christmas, a day when women are celebrated, when we down tools and have some time free of household chores. In years gone by women would have taken to the pub or called on friends whilst the men stayed home with the children. The busy work of Christmas finally over and more than a minute given to themselves. It is, however, the day that superstition dictates the Christmas decorations must be removed. The 6th of January, not a day earlier and not a day later. Twelfth Night and Nollaig na mBan. And the two do not marry well.
I’ve spent all day feeding holly and ivy, fir and mistletoe to the hearth, my boy revelling in chanting banishments at the smoke. I’ve packed away the charms from the Christmas tree, safe in layers of tissue for another year. And cleaned the debris left behind. I count my blessings. Again and again, a roof over our heads, safe and warm, clean, and dry. My child sound asleep in his bed. When I next hang those decorations on a tree, we will be settled into another house on the edge of the sea. I count my blessings again. And my heart shatters. Tonight, I have a candle lit for all the women of Palestine. May they know gentle ease, may they know the relief of their children safe in their beds, may they know the sweetness of freedom. May we all.
Twelfth Night also brings to a close a yearly divination practice I have long kept. A paying attention, keenly for twelve days and nights, deep in the dreaming of the year. We are still deep in Cailleach territory, another few weeks yet before she softens into spring. The nights are still long and deep despite the stretch in the evenings. And in that space between Christmas and Epiphany, the Solstice and Twelfth Night we collectively fall out of time.
The Gregorian Calendar we all follow messed with the rhythm of things, we went from following the moon in her thirteen cycles round, to a rigid set of dates bound in twelve. Days had to be added to account of the mess of it. And so, we have the period of time, deep in the belly of Winter Caitlin Matthews describes as intercalary days. These days, writes Matthews became “Omen Days” in Wales and France. Here in Ireland, there was no such name for the practice as far as I can find, but there was, and continues to be a deep paying attention. It is this practice I have observed, a dreamtime within the dreaming of Winter when dreams are more potent, divinations more astute. The eldritch power of the in-between. Since I was a young teenager, I have used these days to map out my year ahead, each one for a calendar month, much as is the Welsh and French practice Matthews writes of. And yet more than that, I pay attention, I divine but I also plan. A magically infused roadmap for the calendar year ahead.
And so tonight I want to bring you a little of that roadmap, at least for this dispatch and a glimpse at my personal divinations for the year ahead.
The period between the Solstice and Twelfth Night is one of sacred, quiet, stillness for me. This has since moved to Christmas Night as I busy myself with creating all the magic of the season for a small boy. And so, I owe you December’s Oak Moon, oak lore and fiction. Our new house has a mighty oak tree right outside the door, my desk will sit at its roots, the ground floor study looking out at its trunk, its canopy stretching out towards my son’s room on the upmost floor. I will bring you copious amounts of Oak lore as we continue to renovate and then move under the boughs of this beautiful tree.
We have now gathered a full calendar year of Writing Down the Weeds, my project writing up botanical folklore and using it as prompts for fiction, shared each New Moon. I will continue this project for another trip around the sun, there are so many fascinating plants to work with. I may begin to include prompts for you, dear reader, should you want to practice with me? January’s New Moon falls on Thursday 11th and the folklore and fiction will be with you the following Sunday as has become our usual.
We have two more full moons together before I have written a full year of them. I started last March and so January and February are yet to be written. I want to ask for your input here, I can continue to write down the moons come March, but it means you will not gleam any new folklore on them from me, and so my idea is to begin a new project. Sent to you close to the moon as is our routine but based on local folktales and legends. I will retell the original and then use it as a prompt for new fiction. There are more than twelve tales from the immediate vicinity around our new house, so the project would be a rooting down into the tales of our landscape whilst I tend a new home in it. What are your thoughts? I’ll add a poll below and leave the comment section open.
Finally, as it is well past midnight here and I have my last divinations to do. I offer you a glimpse of two. My energy for the year ahead is the Queen of Swords, nothing which threatens my peace may be allowed to stay. I claim this energy with every inch of me.
And then my coffee grounds from this morning. I have never seen such a clear image in a cup before, I hesitate to share as it truly looks painted in… tell me, what do you see?
Thank you for being here, for spending such time with me in this space and for your continued support as I’ve taken this first tentative year in sharing my words with the world. You have emboldened me and held me, and I am incredibly grateful. Xx
Wow, yes the bear! And so similar in posture to the Queen of Swords.
....and perhaps, at the bottom, there is another bear.