My Happy Darkplace
Hey guys. Steff here. How are you enjoying pumpkin spice season? Made any fun Trader Joe’s discoveries? Is your pantry overcrowded with boxes of bright orange Oreos? Or hey, don’t forget about apple cider. Ooh, yeah. Gotta love it in all of its glorious forms. Sparkling apple cider. Warm apple cider. Apple cider scented candles. Oh wow, scented candles! “Fall Harvest” and “New England Apple Orchard” and “Cranberry Fantasy” and “Nutmeg Wet Dream.” Collect ‘em all and light ‘em at night and tell yourself it’s normal for the whole state of California to burn down every October. It’s fall, dammit.
Yeah, fine, I can be a bit of a hater when it comes to Fall Madness. I don’t hate fall, ok? I hate Fall Madness. My state is on fire and everyone’s telling me to be cozy. It’s annoying.
Look man, I own scarves. I own sweaters. I look fantastic in long coats and I love love love a knee-high boot. I lived in Santa Cruz from 2005 to 2010 and lemme tell you, when October rolled around and the nights started to get chilly, I was the first one in the house to load up on cinnamon and bake autumnal favorites all day. Now, nine years later, as I look around and see nothing but oppressive sunshine (and fire engines), the last thing I want is a slab of pumpkin pie.
Here’s the other thing: I don’t care for Halloween. I don’t. I’m 32 years old and I don’t have children, which means I can’t participate in Trick-or-Treating, aka: the greatest Halloween tradition. I mean, what am I gonna do — carve a pumpkin by myself on my kitchen floor? Total waste. Total mess. Not gonna do it.
Oh hey — another confession. The last time I dressed up for Halloween was 2015. Guess who I went as.
That’s right. I dressed up as an aspiring dictator. A bigot. A misogynist. A rapist. A transphobe. A completely crooked, incompetent man-child who binges Filet-o-Fish sandwiches and does not just freaking die already. I dressed up as the man who falls asleep to Fox News while children at the border sleep in cages. I dressed up as the man who believes the Continental Army “took over the airports” during the Revolutionary War. I dressed up as the future President of the United States of America, because dear God, in 2015 that just seemed like such a complete and total impossibility.
But look. Here’s one reason I’m still ok with Spooky Season despite the commercial shenanigans: I’m 100% down to fuck with the dark arts.
Two weekends ago, a darling friend of mine invited me over to watch The Craft and “be witchy.” I emphatically accepted the invitation and stopped to buy champagne on my way over. I felt like celebrating my womanhood, ya know? For serious, do men invite each other over to watch The Craft and be witchy? Probs not. Man, the patriarchy just ruins everything for everyone.
There’s something to be said about witchcraft and female empowerment though, eh? No, we cannot physically overpower men and yes, men have more money and considerably more influence, but watch out all you bad dudes — somewhere a group of women just might be summoning the devil to drag your ass to Hell. Makes perfect sense to me.
We were on our second round of bubbly when we started talking about spells. I told her about the fortune telling book I got at Hot Topic when I was 12 or 13, and she told me about how badly she wanted to be Wiccan when she was a teenager.
“What kind of spell should we do?” she asked.
I sipped. I thought. I sipped again.
“Can we like, hex Trump?”
We did some light googling and learned that we’d most likely need a black candle and some scented oil.
“I have sage here already,” said my friend. “I picked it myself.”
We finished our champagne and walked to a nearby occult shop. (Ok wow, how much do we love that sentence. I love it so much I’m gonna write it again.)
We finished our champagne and walked to a nearby occult shop. The sun was angry that day, man. I had my shades on but I also had my hand in front of me the whole time in an effort to block that pissed off star from roasting my face.
“Ya think climate change will fuck up the seasons first?” I asked my friend.
“Like it’ll be summer in October?” she said. “Maybe.”
“It really wasn’t that hot this summer,” I said.
“No,” she agreed. “Not at all.”
We made it to the store. The air conditioning felt incredible. A gorgeous woman with Swarovski crystals placed underneath each eye walked up to us and asked if we needed help.
“We’re trying to…stop someone…from…causing…evil?” I said. I wanted to tell her we were there fuck shit up and save the world, but I figured I’d feel out her vibe first.
She guided us to a wall of $18 candles and explained how each one came with its own intention. Some warded off “bad energy.” Some cleansed you of “bad energy.” Too late for that.
“What would you recommend we do to actually, uh…to stop someone, though? From causing evil?”
“It’s hard for me to say because I don’t know your situation.”
I lowered my voice. “We don’t like Trump,” I said.
She nodded. “Got it.”
I imagined her leading us down a dark corridor to a groovy, hidden room where they kept the serious shit. Instead, she pointed at a different $18 candle.
“This one’s for peace,” she said. “You have to be careful with what you put out in the world because it comes back on you three times harder.”
My friend and I said nothing for a good few seconds because we were both thinking the same thing: “We’ll risk it.” Instead of vocalizing this, we thanked the woman for her help and walked to a different side of the store. My friend found a small black candle for 75-cents, and a roll-on body oil that she could use as a perfume after the spell was complete. Done. From there we wandered to a restaurant and ordered a plate of nachos to-go and I stole a cute little salt shaker that was just begging, “Take me with you.”
Back at the apartment, my friend set up a tray with the candle and the oil while I googled, “Spells to stop evil people.” The first video that came up was by a cute young witch with long black hair and a serious crop top. We hit “play” and followed along as she instructed us to sprinkle salt around the room to create a protective barrier. I just happened to have a stolen salt shaker in my pocket. Perfect.
“Am I actually gonna shake this around your apartment? Or…?”
“Just make the barrier around the candle,” said my friend. “I’m sure we’re fine.”
The next step was to carve the evil-doer’s name into the candle (we could only fit “TRMP”), and then anoint the candle with oil. From there, the chanting began. I don’t remember a word of it, but here — I found the video.
Once the chanting was finished, all we had to do was let the candle burn completely. We stuck it in a cute Halloween holder and, true to our original plan, put on The Craft.
Look. I’m not saying it absolutely worked. All I know is that it felt real good to wake up this morning and listen to CNN report that the House had voted in favor of proceeding with next phase of the Trump impeachment inquiry. I felt like I had regained the smallest sense of control. I felt like things were maybe moving in a direction that made sense. I felt like yeah, okay, all I did was chant some words and steal some salt, but dammit, at least I did something.
I stood over my bathroom sink and brushed my teeth with newfound gusto while a reporter read Trump’s most recent tweet: “The Greatest Witch Hunt In American History.”
“No it is NOT,” I thought, as I silently honored the hundreds of Americans who were accused of witchcraft all those centuries ago. I thought about that 75-cent candle and smiled. They didn’t get all of us.