In my previous blog I confessed to knowing that I am not a witch. But how do I know that? Why am I confident that I don’t have any witchery in me?
How I Know I’m Not a Witch
For one, I am not interested in the occult or sorcery. I place this knowledge in the same category as knowing that I am not a golfer (unlike everyone else in my family) or a dog lover (like my husband).
In addition, I cannot cast harmful spells or curses or make potions that cause people to grow sick or die. Indeed, the Wikipedia definition of witch indicates that the word was originally associated with “bad” magic, meaning the use of spells and potions to cause people harm or to bring misfortune to them. Based on that definition, I must resemble Glinda the Good Witch in the children’s classic novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, for I would never cast harmful spells or curses or make deadly potions!
I Once Met a Witch
I once met a woman who confessed to being a witch. She told me she had known since she was a teenager that she was different from her friends. She wasn’t interested in dating and dancing and wearing cute clothes. Instead, she learned how to grow and propagate plants, studied horticulture at university, and planned to own a plant nursery one day. In learning about the healing properties of plants, she became interested in witchcraft and the use of potions for healing the body and soul.
Unfortunately, I only met her the one time, but I remember her very well. She struck me as a thoughtful person who became interested in magic and believed that there was much about the world that we did not–and perhaps never could–understand. How I wish I could talk to her now about her journey into witchery and what she learned!
There Are More Than a Million Witches in the US
Apparently, there are roughly 1.5 million witches practicing witchcraft in the US, many of whom embrace the modern pagan religion known as Wicca, although not all witches do so. (Read about Wicca here and here.) If you plan to travel to England, consider visiting the Museum of Witchcraft and Magic located in the village of Boscastle on Cornwall’s coast. Online searches return hundreds, maybe thousands, of articles about magic! I suspect that witchcraft is as popular today as it was in Jane Austen’s lifetime.