God Is She

I was brought up Catholic, but from a young age, it stopped resonating for me. I could talk about that in another post, but I’m also thinking of writing about it for the introduction of my next book, as a prominent theme in the book is how Catholicism and Christianity didn’t work for my characters either.

Phew. Okay. Here we go, delving into that…talk about spelunking, am I right?

I think it stems from my love of horror movies, if I’m honest. I was afraid of so many things when I was a kid: Beetlejuice, Drop Dead Fred, Edward Scissorhands, The Hand that Rocks the Cradle, Pet Sematary 2, even Hocus Pocus. I got introduced to Freddy Krueger and A Nightmare on Elm Street when I was way too young and the Internet was all too new. So, if I was such a big chicken, how did that switch around and what does it have to do with how I chose my spirituality?

Well, like I wrote, I was introduced to Freddy Krueger when I was way too young. My cousins played a clip they found on the internet, and it happened to be the clip of Nancy running up the stairs. At a party my aunt was having at her and her husbands house, some of the adults were watching New Nightmare, and I’ll never forget the first time I saw the kid’s babysitter getting killed in the hospital, dragged up the wall and into a corner of the ceiling.

I loved Practical Magic and The Craft, but my mom covered my eyes during the scary parts—my mom was usually the one covering my eyes any time anything scary or sex scenes were showing. We saw The Mummy seven times in theaters, and after a while, I got brave and told her to stop covering my eyes. We saw Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow three times in theaters, and that was when I got brave again and asked her to stop covering my eyes. “The witch looks a lot like Grandmother Willow from Pocahontas when she changes.” But with snakes, Mom. But with snakes.

Maybe part of my love for things scary came from the rainy days I’ve written about before: There was a girl I grew up with, and on rainy days, her grandma wouldn’t let us go outside and play. We’d bring in mud and make a mess. We could build a fort, but we’d have to put everything back. There weren’t much games we wanted to play inside—video games were a new thing, and I was horrible at them. I liked watching her play, especially in the haunted castle that belonged to Bowser…for some reason, I thought that was the coolest… But I digress. We’d end up telling each other scary stories. At some point, she got the Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books by Alvin Schwartz. My second grade teacher read us “The Green Ribbon” during a reading session. I got pretty obsessed with that story, and I still am. I think a lot of us are.

I think that’s when I really embraced liking being scared—movies and stories. When I was in fifth and sixth grade, I was determined to face my fears. In sixth grade, I dipped my toes into horror with the promotion of Edward Scissorhands for Sleepy Hollow. I’m not too sure where Carrie came in, I just remember reading the book and hating it, but enjoying the original movie and the sequel. I decided to face my fears of Freddy and watched the Nightmare on Elm Street movies. I have an incredibly extensive horror movie collection, and Nightmare on Elm Street is just part of that collection. I was very into slashers when I was younger—I wanted all the blood, sex, and rock and roll I could get, and horror movies fed that.

And then I started seventh grade at St. Michael’s Middle and High School. I didn’t know a whole lot of people, I was shy…puberty fucking sucks, no matter who you are. Horror and music set the tone. I’d tried some spells when I was younger, asking God to participate or partake or make something happen, like make this guy I thought was cute like me, make me pretty…mostly make this guy like me. (Thank goodness those never worked, in retrospect. Way too young.) Middle school was no exception: I’d pray and do some spells. The spells didn’t work, and my prayers didn’t feel like they were being answered. I felt empty. I didn’t feel like I was being heard, and I certainly felt misunderstood. I started questioning things…and then I found Wicca. I found it in young adult books I was reading: Sweep by Cate Tiernan was my favorite, and I’m rereading the series again this fall! Such an easy and nostalgic read. Circle of Three by Isobel Bird was another favorite that I’m also working on rereading. Daughters of the Moon by Lynne Ewing was my third favorite; it was a little harder to get into, and I’m finding that as an adult as well, and knowing what I know now about writing for young adults, I can see why it’s a harder read, why Sweep could only go so far with things like cussing and horror and sex. Sweep is by no means horrific, not in the vein of R. L. Stine’s novels or even Stephen King, but there are some things that happen in the books that are chilling, harrowing, sad…and psychologically horrific. I don’t want to spoil a fantastic series for you if you decide to read it, and yes, I’d read R. L. Stine as well. Goosebumps was another show I was afraid of; I didn’t read the books, but I did get into the Fear Street Sagas so heavily that I own both of the omnibi and almost the entire series. The last book is elusive.

With Wicca, I felt heard. I felt understood. I also felt like asking for a guy to like me was petty and not worthy of my guides attentions. Asking for rain was okay. Making wishes on the candles I’d use during a bath or shower was okay. Calling the corners and just sitting there, in the middle of a circle, was okay. Meditating in the shower and dancing with the Undines in the meditation was bliss.

I’ve mentioned before that I struggle with depression and anxiety; I’ve mentioned that I got help for my cutting—that I told a teacher, that he told the school counselor, that my mom came to the school, I told her, she took me out of school for the day, we told my dad, I got a psychiatrist whom I saw until I graduated high school. I’ve glossed over a person’s suicide—they were younger than me, and I’m not going to touch on it out of respect for the person or their family. I got incredibly lost after this person committed suicide. I had been Wiccan for a couple years by the time this happened, and looking back, I can’t imagine how I’d feel if I were Catholic. Suicide is a sin in most monotheistic religions—I could get into a certain forest in Japan that’s known for people going to it to commit suicide, but let’s not get into that just now. Maybe in the future, but not right now. I struggled with suicide and suicidal ideation when I was the person’s age—a freshman in high school. I got help, as I mentioned. I still struggle with suicidal ideation—the romanticization of suicide…but then I remember what suicide looks like after the fact. It’s not beautiful, it’s not glamourous. It hurts and affects everyone for a long time. Catholicism and Christianity teach that it's a sin against God and you’ll go to hell for it. There is even a special circle in hell for suicides, according to Dante’s Divine Comedy: Inferno.

The Gods and Goddess don’t like suicide either. But you don’t burn in hell for eternity because you killed yourself. It just hurts them a lot, hurts their feelings, upsets them and the balance. In high school, Wicca and Witchcraft was so new, the only way to really learn about it was reading books, and my parents monitored my reading, what I listened to, what I watched…I’m an only child, and I have a feeling they appreciated Regan’s Explicit Lyrics sticker on CD’s at the very least… Let’s not get into Regan in this post either…maybe later, but not right now. What I’m really getting at are Soul Contracts—I didn’t know those existed until I started working more with coaches Nikki Colmone and Kristen Ramezzana, let alone that they can be negotiated…except for the life and death parts. I do believe in free will in both Wicca and Catholicism and Christianity, but I really feel that it should be based on whether or not a person is a good person or not, and if they live as a good person. That’s something I can believe and get behind, not the “if you repent for your sins, you can go to heaven.” If that’s true, Ted Bundy just might be up there, and I’m good. I don’t want to meet Ted Bundy, who supposedly repented for his sins, among which aren’t just murder, but also rape and necrophilia. So…there’s that. I’m so good, please don’t put me anywhere near that guy.

All of this is my really long winded way of saying that Wicca and Witchcraft gave me peace and solace where Catholicism really brought out the worst in me. I was hypocritical, and I’ve always had a thing about hypocrites. I started hating myself because I realized how hypocritical I was being. Wicca and Witchcraft was more gentle to me, more forgiving. It brought out my better sides. It saved me in so many more ways than Catholicism. I was afraid of the dark—I still am, to an extent. I can’t sleep in complete darkness. I need to have a movie playing, and when it ends, the menu needs to play on a loop or play the movie again. I can listen to sounds…but…I have a bit of a problem with that…it’s a funny problem, really: If I listen to Beatfulness, for example, or my lovely Chilling app, I have a tendency to wake up in complete darkness, get a little scared and think “okay…that’s enough…” open my Spotify app, find Motionless in White, click on a song, and go back to sleep… Happy Birthday, Chris Motionless!!!

So, I get a little afraid of the dark and have a hard time sleeping in complete darkness. Part of my practice when I was younger was meditating before bed every night, and eventually doing a simple sleep spell for myself just after meditating. I’d see things in the dark—I’d tried to tell my parents, but they didn’t believe me, so I stopped talking about it. I got the feelings that the things I’d see in the dark weren’t good. If I told anyone, they didn’t believe me…until I told Kristen and Nikki, anyway. I’d been seeing Trickster entities, but didn’t know. Praying to God, Mary, Jesus, angels, anyone like that just made them laugh. But when I started meditating every night and talking with one of my spirit guides, the entities went away.

When I was Catholic, I was angry. I realize I was twelve and thirteen and going through a lot. However, Wicca and Witchcraft didn’t make me as angry as Catholicism did. When I was in college, I did try going to church again a couple times. My second year of college, I had a couple roommates that went to church with each other and they invited me to go with them and join their bible study. I trusted them both. I told them both at different points I had been Wiccan in high school and I was trying to figure out what I was, because I was depressed and felt lost. One of the roommates told the instructor of our bible study, and they had an intervention for me that I had no idea about in the Student Union Building on campus. I walked away furious. I hadn’t been practicing Wicca at that time. They didn’t want me to go down that path, they wanted to see me in Heaven. They needed to save me. I hadn’t been aware that I’d needed that much saving. I told talked with my other roommate about it. We lost touch with the roommate that held the intervention for me, but keep in touch—I visited her in Massachusetts in 2021. We bonded over having read Sweep—it was our favorite, to the point that she named her son after one of our favorite characters, and her son is amazing and brilliant, as is her daughter. I’m so grateful to have her in my life still, so glad that she embraced me and who I was, and who I am. (Yes, we went to Salem together, too, and a few museums with her and her kids. It was a wonderful vacation.)

Not all Christians and Catholics are bad—I do have friends who are Christian or Catholic. I have no problem with them, and I’m happy to pray with them, as long as it’s not forced on me, or it’s some kind of conversion. I don’t want or need to be converted anymore than I want or need to be “saved”. I’m perfectly capable of saving myself, and I have saved myself numerous times, with the help of my spirituality, beliefs, and inner and moral compass. This is part of what I appreciate about Satanism in particular: One of their Seven Tenets basically boils down to “don’t be an asshole. If someone else is an asshole to you first, you can be an asshole back, but never instigate it.” I try to approach people with respect and kindness, unless they approach me with disrespect and unkindness; this is applied for everything from my personal space to abusive comments to trying to save or convert me, just as it’s applied to their being okay with me and who I am to realizing that I’m not just my spirituality and beliefs. Yes, they are a part of me, but they aren’t everything that makes me. I’m a person, a whole person. Just because we don’t see eye-to-eye about this doesn’t mean we don’t or won’t have other things in common. I’m okay with agreeing to disagree on beliefs and have the theological conversations, as long as they remain respectful. If I feel disrespected and walk away angry, that’s not okay, and the same goes for the other person/people in the conversation.

This is a huge topic, and I tried to narrow it to a single blog post. I don’t want the entirety of my blog to be this or to be defending what I believe. This will have to do for now.

As the Devil in Repossessed said: “Mayii! I’ll…be…back…”

If you aren’t saying “Oh, shit,” in response, I don’t know what you’re doing with your life…go watch Repossessed! It’s a spoof on The Exorcist, starring Leslie Nielson and Linda Blair. It’s fun!

And in the meantime…

Keep it Spooky!

P. S. That introduction is now an afterword. Grave Matters: The First Necromancer is now available for Kindle on Amazon! The paperback will be available soon!