Changing Tides of Practice in the Covid-19 Pandemic

I moved from England to Wales ten hours before the UK coronavirus lockdown began. I didn’t even know I was definitely moving until the previous Friday afternoon, giving me just a weekend to arrange transportation and finish packing.

Ten hours. Ten hours before the UK housing market came to a halt, like most of life in general.

I made it to Wales to start a new chapter of my life. Barely. By a cat’s whisker. I don’t believe it would have happened without relentless moving magick.

The time before the lockdown, when I had organised cupboards of magickal supplies and reference books on bookshelves, has gone. I moved without bringing furniture and the shops are shut. Tarot decks, books, altar items and other materia magica are still in their moving boxes, stacked in the dining room. They wait there until they have somewhere to go – a cupboard, a shelf, a bookcase – and they also wait for me to miss them.

I do have my essential and special items at hand. Two tarot decks, a Rider Waite for clients and a Thoth deck for personal readings; a couple of pendulums and shells for divining. I also know where my herb and incense supply are located, just in case.

I’ve also misplaced my notes on both Baba Yaga and the history of witchcraft. They are somewhere, I’m sure of that, I just haven’t a clue where. Both sets of notes are for future books as well as my talk on Baba Yoga at next year’s Magickal Women Conference in London. While not traditionally a practice, research sends me to a place where I can touch the past. I get lost in my own world where time ceases and I feel led on a breadcrumb trail of discovery. Before lockdown and that distant memory of a sofa, I’d spend hours curled up with books, notes and a semi-reliable internet connection.

I’m still researching – I can’t help myself – but with a new focus on something dear to my heart: the sea and witchery. The sea has called me for as long as I can remember. I left London for the south coast of England and spent the past twelve years just a short drive from the beach. I have now swapped ten minutes in the car with a ten-minute stroll.

I’ve been threatening to write a book on sea witchery ever since I published the Sea Whispers oracle cards. Moving, lockdown and misplacing my other notes has given me space to pursue this project.

The sea is the place that feeds my soul and where I feel a connection to the Infinite most closely. Now I live minutes away from the Irish sea and stunning north Wales coastline. It takes my breath away with its beauty. I am never without my camera: my photography is a sacred devotion to the Divine and I am happy to worship daily.

During this time of the pandemic, my magickal and spiritual practice has streamlined and decluttered out of necessity (or perhaps laziness as I really can’t face shuffling around heavy boxes to find that one thing, which will always be in the last box I search). While my tools and witchcraft items are stacked away, my spirit feels unboxed.

I have found new tools through beachcombing: slate, shells, driftwood, bones. I need very little, nothing really, but still the Sea Mother provides. And I rejoice in her bounty. My current spiritual practice is intimately entwined with Her and it moves me more deeply than I’ve experienced before. There are no words.

Since lockdown, I found myself more connected to the tides of the sea than other natural cycles such as the moon phases and the seasons. Every day, I check the tide times and I revolve my walking (and photography) around that. I’m more observant of the weather and respectful of the power it wields. Working with short, changeable cycles suits me well and I find all the elements on the seashore.

I left a coven last year, finding it no longer a good fit. I am happy being a solitary practitioner, which is just as well as I wouldn’t be able to practice within a group setting right now. I have a couple of very good friends that I miss though. We’d get together to practice, talk and eat together. I’m looking forward to those times again.  I’m grateful for technology so we can keep in touch but you can’t share a homecooked meal over Zoom.

These strange times have been a blessing to me as it’s given me an opportunity to pause and reflect.  Not only in my spiritual practice but with life in general.  I have fallen deeper in love with life, aware of its cruel brevity, and fallen further still into connection with the beautiful Limitless.