BADGERS AND WITCHES

     It’s very quiet here… only the sounds of the birds, the lambs, sometimes the military helicopters from the Royal Navy Base in Yeovilton  buzzing  over the endless green landscape letting you know that there is a need for military helicopters somewhere.  But don’t be mistaken, just because we’re in the country it doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot to do.  Mornings are for writing.  Then it’s pulling prickly nettles out of the ground, chopping down brambles; those relentless attack vines with spikes, feeding Penny the peahen and stressing over why she’s gone off her fruity nibbles and is favoring sunflower seeds, doing battle with the dandelions, and traipsing over the moors. 

Fruity nibbles.... again!  

     You can buy wands, broomsticks, every manner of cape, herb, powder, candle, or other spell paraphernalia.  A Witchcraft-themed bed and breakfast welcomes followers to town.  

There are things I’ve wanted to accomplish in life that have so far eluded me.  And some people I could do without.  Maybe conventional channels are not the answer.  Maybe Witchcraft is.  It seems like witches would be open-minded people.  They’d certainly be interesting.  I’ve found an online course based in Glastonbury where I could learn to be a witch in a few short weeks, but I still wouldn't meet other people.  

I think I have to go to town and  join a group.  I’m not sure how that would work exactly; maybe I’d buy a how-to book and look meaningfully into the clerk’s eyes.

     It dawned on me that that maybe I should not be so isolationist here in The Pink Cottage; maybe I should get out more, become involved in a local activity, something where I could meet local people and be a part of a community. 

    First activity that comes to mind is Lamping.  It’s kind of a sport I guess, the first community gathering I witnessed.  Very local, I’ve seen it out the window at night, beams flickering across the fields.   Lamping is the practice of attaching giant lights to jeeps, shining those lights across the nighttime dark fields until you spot a hare.  The hare is mesmerized by the light.  That’s when you shoot it.  I reassess.  I have no gun, no jeep, no lamp, and I like my hares alive and bouncing white-tailed across the moor.

     Then I think, I do love animals, how about joining the Badger Protection League?  Badgers are big news in England, and people like naturalist Sir David Attenborough and Ab Fab Joanna Lumley are amongst the League’s members. There are a ton of pro-Badger organizations all over the country.  
     Badgers can carry tuberculosis and infect cattle.  Lots of people want the badger population culled.  Others want the badgers inoculated.  Still others don’t even believe the badgers are the real reason bovine TB is spreading.  The government has sanctioned a cull in Somerset this June.  It’s a very divisive subject.  Now, I’ve never seen a badger, but there’s a bunch of them in the wood next door.  They’re nocturnal and elusive.  You know they’re there because you twist your ankle in the burrows they dig.  

Badgers live here.

     Badgers are a protected animal in England, even though they are a member of the weasel family, but lots of farmers are not fond of them because of herd infection.  A very complicated issue.   Brian May from the band Queen is the VP of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.  He’s also an astrophysicist and a leading member of the Badger Protection League.  If I joined the League there would be lots of protests to attend where I could meet like-minded badger lovers.  Maybe I’d get to meet Brian May.  I always liked Queen.  The problem is I don’t think belonging to the Badger Protection League would endear me to the farmers in my neighbourhood (yes, with a u).  I wouldn’t be able to voice my pro-Badger sentiments.  I wouldn’t even be able to attend the Badger Night Walk protests across Somerset without alienating those around me.  I’d just be a silent Badger lover in the confines of my own home, not meeting other Badger lovers.  That’s kind of what I am already.  Maybe I'll just donate to the cause.  You can too.

     That pretty much leaves Witchcraft.   We’re five miles from Glastonbury, arguably one of the Witchcraft centers of England, if not the world.   It’s home to the Arthurian legend, it claims to be Avalon (but then so do a lot of other places), and it’s a New Age center. 

     It’s also crammed with stores selling every witch accessory a beginner could want. A friend told me the place is lousy with witches and that there is some interesting business going on behind those closed doors.  There are at least four bookstores on one small stretch of street that offer anything and everything to do with the occult, including how-to books on Witchcraft.

      I'm thinking Witchcraft is the ticket.  Then my husband reminds me that sometimes I already am a witch. At least I think that's what he said.  He's just given me one more reason to take up the craft.