Sonya Cheney

Writer. Witch. Creatrix.

ostara intentions.

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Spring is coming.
(Some days, spring already feels like it’s here.)

I’m not Wiccan, but as part of my craft, I like to recognize the Wheel of the Year, to observe the changing of the seasons and the way it affects the everyday. This is my first year of actively observing the Sabbats, rather than simply putting them in my planner and doing a little mental acknowledgement when the day rolls around, so I thought I’d share my particular plans and activities for this Spring Equinox.

Plant Seeds
We’re moving soon, but I don’t want that to stop me from doing things I love, even if I might have to adjust the way I do them. One of the first things I plan to do on the Equinox is start planting some seeds for my herb garden. The nice thing about focusing on an herb garden this year is that it’s easier to transport than, say, a vegetable garden might be as we’re between houses. Planting seeds is a good way to acknowledge the birth and renewal aspect of the season, and I’m looking forward to getting my small selection started.

Spring Clean
This is a two-for-one activity because it’s a way to celebrate while also being a necessity as we get prepped for moving. To be fair, I spring clean every year (and not just in the spring), but the difference is that this year I plan to do so with the intention of a fresh start, a new animation of our space. If that just so happens to include an entirely new space altogether, well, that’s just taking it to the extreme. I am okay with that approach.

Go for a Walk/Forage
Lately, when Finn and I are out and about on a walk to the library or to the grocery store, I find myself peering down at the sidewalk and finding the occasional “nice stick.” That’s what I tell Dan when we get home. “I found another nice stick!” My current collection is intended for a pentagram craft, but in general they’re nice to have around as a way to bring the outdoors inside without being terribly overwhelming or in the way. The plan is to take a walk with Finn—weather permitting—to collect any stones, sticks, flowers, or feathers that I might come across and feel a connection to. They’ll go on my shelf of other witchcraft items and be saved for crafts or spells later on.

I also intend to do a little baking—hot cross buns, maybe, or a small lemon-honey cake—but for the most part, the above are my main plans for the day. I especially think they’ll be fun with Finn, because he may not be able to appreciate planting seeds, exactly, or the greater experience of spring cleaning, but he’ll get to be outside (weather permitting), which is always nice, and I think the energy flow between him, the plants, the house, and myself will be a huge positive for the both of us. I see us falling into bed with a good day behind us and a bright spring ahead.

the seven of bows.

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When I flipped the card for day two of the Goddess Tarot Challenge I’m participating in for March, I was genuinely curious what it would tell me. The prompt for the day asked what I needed to focus on to support my inner goddess, and to be honest, I had no real guesses what would come up. When I turned over the Seven of Bows in the Wildwood deck that I’m using, I looked at the image but still had to check the deck book for the meaning.

“Allow the passing of the old”
“Accept change”
“Focus on what you really need in life and what to dispose of”

My first thoughts, as they always tend to be, were about writing, but after a few moments thought, that reaction didn’t seem thorough enough. It’s not a suggestion that I let go of writing, but rather that I let go of how I think about writing.

I spent a bit of that night journaling about the card and my relationship with writing over the years, and it’s amazing how on only the second day of this challenge such a strong message has come across.

I’ve been writing since I learned to hold a crayon and put it to paper. I remember half-begun short stories written in elementary school about ghosts and adolescent horror. I remember my first writing competition submission. I remember my first LiveJournal account (and second, and third…). Quitting writing itself is entirely out of the question; it’s too great a part of me to even think it’s possible no to do it anymore. Reframing my mindset, however, is the message I got from that card, and since then I’ve been meditating on my relationship with writing.

I’ve kept journals since middle school, and even if I go months without writing in them, I always come back, usually when my emotions are in the midst of some upheaval. In middle school, my entries were full of angst and heartbreak, the crushing weight of rejection and the confusing presence of affection. There were angry tirades against everyone around me. There were lengthy love letters to the peers who caught my eye. I held nothing back. As I got older, though, and some things were chronicled online instead of in my journals, I felt the walls starting to come down on my words. I became more careful about what I wrote because I started to care about the work being palatable. I started to care about others reading it rather than about just writing. It’s been over ten years since that happened, and I’m only now beginning to realize the consequences.

In that time, the closest I’ve come to being as open as I was in those first LiveJournal posts was in my personal zines. I’m not sure what it was about the medium that opened me up, and even as I wrote those I was still guarded about what I shared. It’s not that being selective is a bad thing, but it feels like this approach has left me falling just short of my potential. Instead of just writing, I’m always analyzing what I’m going to say before I even put it down.

My first step is determining my ideal reader, and to be honest, I think I’ve already done that: I want to write things that Finn would want to read. I never realized it before, but I want to write things that my child could read and be interested in, be entertained by, and be proud of—even if they’re hard to write and read sometimes. I want my writing to be honest with Finn, whether it’s hard truths or silly musings.

My next step is just to get writing.

trust in a witch.

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Was it in middle school, when a girl on my bus let me borrow–and ultimately keep–a copy of A Witch’s Guide to Faery Folk? Or maybe it was before that, when I was reading the Circle of Three series in elementary school. I never even finished it until a deep dive on Amazon in college earned me used copies of every book in the series that I’d been missing. Or maybe it was when I was a little girl, playing in my backyard with a teddy bear surrounded by twigs and plants as I tried to bring it to life.

I think we all start out with some kind of magical inclination in us, that imagination and openness to all the possibilities the world has to offer. I might have lost that at some point, but to be honest, it wasn’t a true loss and it wasn’t for very long; at most, it was just a temporary loss of interest. For more than twenty years, my imagination has run away with me, and it still does and it’s still fun. It’s part of why I write. I might not be trying to make my teddy bears sentient anymore, but my magic has shifted and emerged in new ways.

There’s not much I don’t believe in–or at least, not much that I disbelieve–as far as the strange and unusual are concerned. I have watched every episode of Ghost Adventures and Ancient Aliens numerous times, and I’m always adding new paranormal books to my Goodreads list. And along with ghosts, aliens and other oddities and outsiders, witches and witchcraft have always held a special place in my heart. It’s only in the past few years that I’ve embraced the “witch” label myself, but that nature has always been inside me, and as of late it’s really been manifesting itself in my everyday.

It started with faeries and Harry Potter, The Craft and Sabrina, the Teenage witch, and now it centers on the hearth and home. If asked, I’d proudly proclaim myself to be a cottage witch; it fits my motherly, nurturing personality perfectly. I’ve always loved cooking and baking for others, and it only makes sense to me that the love I’ve been putting into every roast chicken or chocolate chip cookie or loaf of bread that I’ve made over the years has been more than what it seems. I’m not just speaking my love language when I do these things, although that is also a huge part of it; I’m doing a spell to make someone’s day a little brighter. I’m creating with the intention of changing the energy in a space with the simple act of a home-cooked good.

And now, as I expand to creating and combining more thoughtfully with my cooking and working to cultivate my own herbs garden, I’m also diving headfirst into all things witchcraft. I’ve been requesting books from the library and making particular selections as far as books to purchase for my collection. I’ve watching countless hours of YouTube videos. I’m writing down anything and everything and pursuing a more in-depth focus on the topic. I’m spending so much cherished time bouncing back and forth between playing with Finn and taking notes in a witchy bullet journal. Those are probably the two activities taking up the majority of my days right now, and I’m loving it.

Maybe it’s a little silly, and I definitely spend time wondering what people close to me must think; for the most part, I expect laughter at my expense, but I don’t much care. This is what’s calling to my soul right now. Every hour that I spend reading, taking notes, and artfully transferring information into my witchcraft notebook makes me feel so damn good. Why give that up just because someone else doesn’t get it? Do I think Brigid and Cerridwen are or were real people? No, not really. But do I find the thought of them inspiring and motivational in regards to their corresponding attributes? Absolutely. They’re worth some pages in my book if their presence is going to help me take my nurturing personality to another level. And if I want to toss some herbs and a crystal into a little pouch and call it a charm bag, it’s not going to hurt anyone. (Probably not even if I throw it at them.) So it’s worth giving it a go if I think it will help me sleep or have a little more control over my wallet.