Cal Garrison - Witch on the Go: A Book of Spells to Take With You

First published in 2005 by

Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC

York Beach, ME

With offices at:

368 Congress Street

Boston, MA 02210

www.redwheelweiser.com

Copyright 2005 Cal Garrison

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC. Reviewers may quote brief passages.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Garrison, Cal.

Witch on the go: a book of spells to take with you / Cal Garrison.

p. cm.

ISBN 1-59003-071-0 (alk. paper)

1. Witchcraft. 2. Charms. 3. Magic. I. Title.

BF1571.G37 2005

133.44dc22

2004020010

Typeset in Kennerly 10/13 by Garrett Brown

Printed in Canada

TCP

12 11 10 09 08 07 06 05

8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48-1992 (R1997).

N ote to the reader: This book is intended as an informational guide. The spells, remedies, and techniques described herein are based on tradition and long years of practice. They are meant to supplement, not be a substitute for, professional medical care or treatment. They should not be used to treat a serious ailment without prior consultation with a qualified healthcare professional. Neither the author nor the publisher accepts any responsibility for your health or how you choose to use the herbs in this book.

I don't know how qualified I am to write this book. It took me forever to get my show on the road. To be honest with you, being on the go has never been my thing. My mother still goes on about how my birth was induced with a bottle of castor oil because I was three weeks late and the rest of the family needed to move to New Hampshire.

My reluctance to incarnate on the Earth Plane was punctuated by the fact that when I finally came out I was born sideways. I didn't learn to walk until I was eighteen months old, and I didn't own a car until I was thirty-five. Up until then I used a bicycle and walked a lot. I took the bus. I bummed rides. And hitchhiking was resorted to on occasion.

The simple act of getting from A to B has always been a little different in my world. And as far as ambition is concerned, forget about it! I prefer to float around in the aether, and I don't even have a one-day plan, let alone a five-year one. Back in 2001 the universe forced me to abandon my laid-back ways the night my editor, Jan Johnson, called me up and asked me to write my first book. Waking up to the whole concept of being on the go was more or less induced at that point, the same way my birth was.

In thinking about how to write this book, I realized that being on the go has something to do with going out and getting a life. And if that's something you've already handled, then being on the go simply means that you have a life. When a woman has a life, she's connected to herself and, by extension, to many other things. And all these things she's connected to require her to be moving around a lot.

Keeping it together is a full-time job. Not only do you have a million external things to be responsible for, all the inner stuff needs to be maintained too. If you don't do your spiritual work, you get mired in the outer stuff and completely lose your way. Any card-carrying witch needs peace and quiet because magic is an art, and witchcraft takes time. Peace and quiet are hard to come by when your schedule is full.

If you're a witch and happen to be on the go as well, spending half a day or longer out in the woods conjuring things up is out of the question. When I was younger and freer it was totally within my time budget to dance around a fire and grind herbs in my mortar and pestle for hours on end. And there is something absolutely incredible about being able to do this. It's hard to beat. Back in the old days, I could even get together with good friends and share the experience.

Now that I'm post-menopausal and graced with the wisdom that comes with cronehood, it seems as if I have more responsibility for what I know about being a witch. And the way things are at this point, on the day of any major cross quarter I'm either on my way to a book signing or sitting on a plane heading off toward one of the Four Directions. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term cross quarter this refers to a major turning point in the yearly cycle. There are eight of these Wiccan holidays. On these dates the veil that separates the world of spirit from the world of the living is so thin that it makes all your spell work more potent.

It may have taken me eighteen months to learn to walk, but since 2001 my life has been a space odyssey, literally. Going at warp speed is just as much fun as mixing potions at the kitchen table, but it has its drawbacks. When your life is full you don't have time to honor the Great Mother in the traditional way any more. At first this bothered me. It seemed so ironic that I had turned into sort of a spokesperson for the Craft, yet I couldn't even fit a spell or two into my scheduleuntil I figured out that magic is everywhere, all the time, and in everything we do.

While I am rarely able to do it up and go full tilt the way I used to, I have found ways to do magic wherever I am, with whatever I have, and it works just fine. In a lot of ways it's more creative because you have to be very observant, inventive, and clear.

One of the things that being a witch on the go has really taught me is that, when you're doing spell work, it truly is your intention and what you hold in your mind that matters the most. You don't necessarily need to go through a lot of rigmarole. You don't need sacred space, because all space is sacred. You don't need an altar, and an Athame, otherwise known as a ritual blade, isn't necessary either. Your lap is the ultimate altar, and a Swiss Army knife, or even a plastic one, works fine. You don't even need salt to cast a circle if you don't have any on hand. And you can call in the Guardians any time you want because these archetypal beings who watch over the Four Directions live in your mind and heart as well as in the spiritual realms. They are always there, wherever you are.

Traditional witches may have a problem with everything I'm saying but, hey, let's get real! If your life is such that you have the freedom to honor every cross quarter and lunar phase in the grand manner, more power to you! This book is being written for those of you who are just as busy as I am but who don't want to lose touch with the magic in their lives.

The spells that follow will give you something to go by, but the whole point here is to free you up to find your own unique approach. There's no excuse to pass up doing spell work just because you're on the highway, at the airport, or too busy handing out candy to the trick-or-treaters on Halloween. Be creative, give yourself permission to dispense with ritual, and trust the fact that what you do while you're on the go will be just as effective as what you would be able to do if you had more time. You will find that magic outside of the box works like a charm.

Have fun with these spells! I hope they serve to introduce you to a whole new way of relating to magic, and help you to maintain your connection to your inner work in the midst of all the other wonderful things you got put here to do.