Witch Way Now

I've decided to carry over and re-blog some posts from my former blog. Some will be updated and others, like this one, will be left as is. This was originally posted in September 2013 during this blog's previous incarnation. ~BB~

I spoke to my mother today and we had the usual mother-daughter conversation: "How are you?" "What are you doing?" "Are you still coming for dinner on Friday?" The conversation was quick and about to end when she told me about her dinner plans for this evening. My mother is a teacher and not just any teacher; she teaches special education and has been doing this work for over twenty years. The kids that come in and out of her classroom are autistic, dyslexic and have a host of other learning disabilities. I could list the struggles and stresses of being a teacher (not enough books/supplies, not enough support from student's families, etc.). But if I did that, we'd be here all day and the point of this post could be lost. Being a teacher is hard, period.

Tonight one of her former students (we'll call her Amy) is taking her to dinner. I remember hearing about Amy years ago. She was in my mother's class and has a learning disability. Her family told her finishing high school and going to college was out of the question and didn't believe her life would amount to much. Amy disagreed with her family and so did my mother. So they worked together to prove them wrong. When Amy decided she wanted to take on a job in a restaurant my mother came up with a plan. She arranged the classroom like the restaurant, numbered the tables and acted like a patron having her order taken. She helped Amy learn the menu and she became one of the best servers on staff. My mom has this ability to tune into her kids and figure out the best approach to open them up and get them learning. Over the years, Amy and my mother stayed in contact with each other (her kids know that her help doesn't end when they graduate from high school.) Amy not only finished high school, she went on to attend AND graduate from college. Tonight, she is taking my mother to dinner to celebrate her new job. Tomorrow is Amy's first day as a third grade teacher!!!

This is just one of many students that my mother has helped grow and push through the low expectations people have for them. The short conversation I had with my mom today got me thinking about magick. Everyone has magick inside of them and everyone uses it differently. Some people are talented with herbs and roots and connect with trees and folklore. Some people make magick with candles and crystals. Others make mojo bags and work with poppets. Some people (myself included) live an eclectic magickal life and draw from many types of magick. Then there are people like my mother. She's not a witch and doesn't practice any of the magicks listed above, but there is still magick in her life.

Magick is everywhere waiting for us to mold it and put it to work. My mother's magick is in her patience to deal with the stresses of teaching. It's in her intuition and ability to connect with children that people have deemed unreachable. Her magick is in the power she uses to draw a child out of their shell and foster belief in themselves. And there is magick in the little things teachers do that usually go unnoticed. Like seeing your student, at his first dance, struggling to find his table assignment in a dimly lit room. This student has aspergers syndrome and is legally blind. My mom noticed him struggling to find his table card, walked up to him and in casual conversation pointed the card out to him. She told him it was the best seat in the house and walked away, leaving him smiling and ready to enjoy his first school dance.

The point? Whether you call it magick, universal energy, life-force, etc., it's around us and in us

all the time. It's in that gut feeling you get about avoiding a certain person. It's in the herbs and oils you combine to make a healing mixture. It's in the crystals you wear and meditate with. It's in that synchronistic moment of being in the right place at the right time or meeting a stranger that becomes your best friend. It's in the nurse who's healing hands comfort you during a scary time. Magick is in the teacher that helps students reach goals no one thought possible and it's in the students that find the strength to achieve, despite the odds stacked high against them. There's magick in the cycles of life and living. My mother has plans to retire at the end of this year. How fitting in the same year she'll retire, one of her students begins her journey as a teacher. My point: every little thing we do is magick. My other point is I'm wicked proud of my mother. She went from night school (I went to college with her when I was little and drew pictures on the back of her exams) to substitute teaching, to teaching full time and becoming the president of her teachers' union. She makes magick in her classroom and I'm glad that, when she retires, a mind molded in her magickal classroom will continue the work.