I
was on a beach blanket-sized rug on top of concrete, and I was with 3 people: a
young white girl to my left, another person at the carpet kitty-corner who I
don’t remember much about, and a guy immediately to the left of the person
kitty-corner, and he was making charms and candles and potions, chanting or
touching something to his lips to kiss it now and then as we all sat there chit-chatting.
The
guy also had to each side of him and slightly behind him these tall glass pillars, like
easily 6-8 feet each and the size of a coffee can around, and they were filled with some
dark purple but nonetheless clear liquid.
Of
the 3, the young white girl to my left and the guy making charms were both
neo-pagans, and I had a vague sense that the other person was too, but that
person, who I think was a woman, didn’t talk much, so I really wasn’t sure.
The
young white girl seemed wistful, almost like she was disillusioned with
neopaganism, and she wondered out loud if she would always be a neopagan forever,
and she tried hard to say it casually like it was just a random thought that popped into her
head, rather than something that she had been thinking about for a while.
“Well,”
I was like, “I bet you’ll always mark the seasons with the moon. Will you always mark the year into eight parts? I think you'll always do that, you can’t help
it.”
“You’re
right,” she was said, thoughtfully but no longer wistfully, “I *will* always do that.”
“Every
person is affected by their religious upbringing,” I was like, “You can’t help
it.”
Then,
I smiled and said brightly, “Marking off the seasons by the moon is getting off pretty
easy, as far as religious upbringings go."
At that she laughed and was like, “I guess you’re right!”.
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