Middle
Earth,
USA
Four of the fifty United States have the word “new” in their names, the epithet designating the territory to be an extension of another place and so permanently connecting the two. Embedded in Hampshire is “shire,” a Britishism denoting the countryside, particularly the rural farming type. When J. R. R. Tolkien named the Shire in The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings trilogy, he preserved for posterity the beauty of a life connected with nature, and in the process he also created a mythology for the Britain he loved.
“New” (Hamp)shire has all the trappings of a New World Middle Earth: wild forests, distant mountains, deep lakes, and, of course, acres of rolling farmland, all of which have stories to tell. America is writing its own mythology; what will you discover in this “new” Shire?
Many states share rock, gem, mineral, floral, and tree symbols, especially if they share them as resources. Vermont is home to the famous Barre Quarry, but it’s New Hampshire that’s nicknamed “the Granite State.” The state symbol, the Old Man of the Mountain, was a natural granite rock formation that looked like the profile of a man. Conquered by erosion, he is no more, but you can still see his ghost through an ingenious artistic installation created by Ron Magers and Shelly Bradbury in Franconia Notch State Park.
New Hampshire’s official gem, smoky quartz, is all its own. Sometimes called Cairngorm for the Cairngorm Mountains of Scotland, where similar stones are found, New Hampshire smoky quartz is clear, but with a brown sfumato tint. Carry one for clarity—all quartz crystal is good for that—but smoky quartz can also aid in banishing anxiety. It’s the original worry stone.
Old Man of the Mountain “Profilers”
Photo © Shelly Bradbury; “Profilers” by Ron Magers and Shelly Bradbury
Purple lilacs are hearty, long-lived plants; the lilacs at the Governor Wentworth Estate are believed to be the oldest in the United States. Their flowering time is short; the cone-shaped bunches of tiny purple blooms only last from May to June, after which the shrubs become a mass of dense, dark green foliage. The lilac was made the official state flower in 1919 and was chosen because it symbolized the “hardy character of the men and women of New Hampshire.”
Lilacs are sacred to the virgin goddess Syringa of Greek mythology. The god Pan fell in love with her and chased her through the forest, but she escaped by turning herself into a lilac tree. Her name is very similar to the ancient word syrinx, which means “pipe.” The wood of the lilac was used to make pipes (Pan pipes!), and the individual flowers of a lilac cone are pipe-shaped. Lilacs can be used in love magic, the purple variety evocative of the first blush of love. Their sweet perfume evokes passion and love while the plant’s longevity promotes staying power, a blessing for long-term relationships.
She loves the sloping ground that borders the streams and rivers. Her lovely papery whiteness is a stark foil to her sisters and the fiery colors of autumn. She is the white birch, and her petite stature (for a tree—white birches grow to be about eighty feet tall) and graceful build have earned her the title of Queen of the Woods. But she is practical as well as regal: people of several Native American nations have used birch bark to make scrolls for sacred writing as well as lightweight canoes. Magically, birch is one of the nine woods used to make a sacred ritual fire; for the record, they are birch, hawthorn, alder, rowan, oak, holly, ash, willow, and hazel. Along with the oak and the yew, birch is one of the pillars of wisdom. Birch is often the tree of choice for Maypoles, as it is good for renewal: it’s highly adaptable and grows quickly when planted. Found throughout the state, the white birch is a New Hampshire native and was made the official tree in 1947.
Aleister Crowley spent the summer of 1916 in New Hampshire at a cottage owned by his friend Evangeline Adams for what he called a “greater magical retirement.” The Jonathan K. Pike House (now a private residence) is one of several cozy nineteenth-century homes on Hebron’s Newfound Lake, which Crowley called Pasaquaney Lake. (He did like to keep folks guessing about his goings-on and his whereabouts.) Crowley might have called his time at the cottage a “retirement,” but while at the cottage he worked on Astrology, Your Place Among the Stars and Astrology, Your Place in the Sun with Evangeline as well as several of his own writings, took potions, and had visions and a near miss with a lightning ball—a summer vacation to write home about (which he did, at least about being chased by lightning, to the New York Times)!
New Hampshire had two official witchcraft trials, one in 1656, the other in 1673—both for the same woman, Goodwife Eunice Cole. The Witch of Hampton’s first conviction got her sent to Boston, where she was imprisoned and whipped, after which she spent nearly twenty years in and out of courts, accused of (among other things) bewitching people and animals, causing illness, ruining bread, keeping invisible familiars, trying to get a young girl to live with her (the topic of the 1673 trial, of which nothing came of the charges) and, of course, consorting with the devil. It probably didn’t help that she was outspoken; there are registered complaints about her insulting her neighbors.
She died a destitute widow, her citizenship revoked, likely without a proper burial. There are tales of her body being thrown in a ditch and a river, and, most horribly, of having a stake driven through her heart—a means of keeping a witch’s spirit down after death. Even after this, Goody Cole was allowed no peace. Ballads were sung of her exploits. John Greenleaf Whittier’s “The Wreck of Rivermouth” wove her legend together with a real shipwreck, where she confesses to cursing the boat.
A Goody Cole coalition was formed 300 years after her death: the Society in Hampton Beach for the Apprehension of Those Falsely Accusing Eunice (Goody) Cole of Having Familiarity with the Devil. On August 28, 1938, in the name of banishing superstition, Dr. Ralph Walker led a ceremony wherein official copies of all Goody Cole’s court documents were burned, thus restoring her citizenship. The ashes, along with soil from what was believed to be the site of her home and the site of her burial, were sealed in an urn.
The people of Hampton promised to give the ashes—and thus Goody Cole—peace, but this never came to be. A burial-mound-like boulder does sit on the grounds of the Tuck Museum (the guessed site of the Cole’s homestead) with a plaque to her memory, but the urn remains on display and her story continues to be reenacted; she is, after all, Hampton’s most famous citizen. But perhaps she is not at peace: many have caught sight of her in the guise of an old woman wandering the streets.
Blame it on the Viking craze: It’s intriguing. It’s romantic. It brings tourists. It started when a man named Charles Lamprey saw the boulder and the scores upon it and decided that the humble stone must be a Viking relic—and not just any relic, but the last resting place of Thorwald Ericcson, brother of the infamous Leif. Do you believe?
“Words of praise will never perish, nor a noble name,” says the Hávamál, the most famous of the poetic Eddas. Thorwald’s Rock, also on the grounds of the Tuck Museum, surrounded by a round stone wall with iron bars over the top, may be Viking—or not—but the notion does fire the imagination.
The alien landing at Grover’s Mill, New Jersey, may have been a hoax, but Betty and Barney Hill insisted to the end of their days that their experience with extra-terrestrial life (which took place, ironically, only forty miles from Aleister Crowley’s lakeside vacation cottage) was quite real.
It was almost the equinox—September 19, 1961—when the Hills, driving home through the White Mountains, saw what they thought was an airplane. Then, according to their testimony, the plane, which was not a plane, hovered over their car, and Barney saw (through binoculars) small, gray humanlike creatures. The next thing either of the Hills remembered was driving again—two hours later and thirty-five miles from where they’d stopped. A plaque marks the spot where the encounter (or the Hills’s last memory of it)—the first widely reported and investigated alien abduction, and officially recognized by the state of New Hampshire—took place.
The headstone and memorial plaques of Betty and Barney Hill give only a slight hint of their otherworldly adventures, their “uninterrupted journey.” They rest a little over 100 miles from their close encounter.
Chaos Theory (sometimes called the Butterfly Effect) was coined by Harvard professor Edward Norton Lorenz. Anything and everything we do today has effects that ripple through time. Honor the notion and the man by tracing the eternity ripple etched into his headstone in Waterville Valley Cemetery.
Whatever his private spiritual leanings, poet Ogden Nash expressed the passionate humor of Paganism in his poem “The Passionate Pagan and the Dispassionate Public.” Nash grew up in New York and made his home in Baltimore, but he loved New Hampshire’s tiny coast and came home to rest here; the cemetery is practically next door to his summer retreat.
Androgynous figures, fantastical and Pagan imagery, and light that gilds or shines from within mark the works of Maxfield Parrish. The oak tree in front of his former home (the Oaks, a private residence that burned down but was rebuilt on its foundations) is the site of his true resting place; his daughter scattered his ashes there in 1966. You can visit his simple memorial in Plainfield Cemetery.
Mystery Hill
In the woods of Salem, New Hampshire, is the most well-known calendrical site in the Northeast. It’s been dubbed America’s Stonehenge, but it hardly resembles the assemblage on Salisbury Plain in the United Kingdom. It’s a bit more complicated—literally.
There are standing stones, but there are also chambers—fourteen of them—with walls, basins, and drains that suggest something like Mayan processional walkways. Some folks say it’s 200 years old; others say 7,000. Is it a single complex built for one purpose—or is what you see layers of structures, built or perhaps repurposed for multiple uses?
Is it Celtic?
Colonial?
Native American?
No two people will give you the same answer, which is why the place has a second name: Mystery Hill.
The “table” may have been used for sacrifices—the grooves incised into the surface for channeling blood—or for more practical purposes like lye leaching (the removal of lye from wood ash to make soap) or draining the juice from crushed apples. The paved pathways in another part of the complex may have been used for this latter purpose as well—on a grand scale. The Pattee family, who owned the property in the first half of the nineteenth century, may have run a cider mill on the site. The “oracle chamber” is not a single room but a suite of passages and alcoves decorated with U-shaped petroglyphs and writing that has been called Phoenician as well as Ogham.
Whatever its age, and whatever its intended purpose(s), the site does have some confirmed astronomical alignments. The sunrises and sunsets of the solstices and equinoxes, marked at the site since 1994, are pinpointed by notches in various rocks, stones, and structures.
Was America’s Stonehenge intended as a ritual space? Spend a sabbat at the hill. Ritual celebrations to mark these passages are held year-round.
• http://stonehengeusa.com/events.html
There are over twenty “Stonehenge” sites in the United States, old and new, contemplative and quirky. Find them with the help of Roadside America’s themed map.
• www.roadsideamerica.com/map/theme/85
The White Mountains
The White Mountains are magical—and massive. They occupy a quarter of New Hampshire’s land as well as a bit of Maine. Forty-eight of the peaks are over 4,000 feet tall, including Mount Washington, but wonder is to be found on the ground as well as in the sky. Several roads run through the range; walls of stone loom up tall on either side, turning from bare rock to pine woods to snowcapped peaks. The air is cool and fresh and scented with pine. Far above you, hawks fly. Crystals, caverns, and rainbows that dance off waterfalls wait in the trails.
Mineral Collecting Areas
Have you ever felt the vibrations of a crystal when you’ve held it? Stones are living beings with their own pulse: energy to which you can connect and direct. Think of how much stronger that connection can be when you birth a crystal from the earth with your own hands. The Moat Mountain Smoky Quartz Collecting Area and the Deer Trail Collecting Area, both in the White Mountain National Forest, are sites where visitors can mine smoky quartz—New Hampshire’s state stone—as well as other crystals, including amethyst, which is good for focusing, peace, and psychic awareness.
Polar Caves Park
Arctic air comes out of the caves like a cold vapor, and thanks to the shape of the stone and the granite walls, snow can survive well into the summer months—the reason these passages are called the Polar Caves. The granite is millions of years old, and the caves thousands, shaped by magical hands in the form of glaciers. Once underground you won’t see fantastical formations, no stalactites nor stalagmites, only narrow passages and soaring walls of solid rock, granite with veins of quartz running through it.
More of nature’s persistent and magical activity can be seen in the Sculpted Rocks Natural Area about eleven miles from Polar Caves, a canyon carved by sand deposits flowing in the Cockermouth River.
There are caves to explore throughout the United States. Visit the National Cave Association at www.cavern.com and Adventure Caves at www.adventure-caves.com to discover underground kingdoms that await your descent.
Arethusa Falls
Multi-tiered and wide, water flow can range from a soft trickle as hundreds of rivulets drip during dry spells to a roar and rush as white water flies to join the river bed below. Can you see Arethusa through the net of water? The nymph of myth who transforms herself to join with an amorous god, she was immortalized in poetry by Percy Bysshe Shelley. The White Mountains are home to many waterfalls, but Arethusa, with her veil-like cascade of water, conjures up visions of faerie forests where spirits reside. Here the elements of earth and water combine to create power that is active every single second.
Magical transformation of body and spirit—the same that happens in magic—is captured in Shelley’s poem. Find a place of calm and shallow water near the falls where you can read the poem aloud; you can access the text at Poem Hunter, http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/arethusa-2/. Each stanza (there are five) can represent the point of a pentacle.
Think of something in your life you would like to transform. As you finish each stanza, place a stone to mark each pentacle point until the poem and pentacle are complete. Place a stone in the center of the pentacle and state your intention aloud. Leave the stones where they are and let the water do its work to aid in your transformation.
Small or large, waterfalls have transformative power, literally and physically. They exist under the ground, in hidden nooks of the earth, and in the sky, and they can be found practically everywhere. Find one near you at World of Waterfalls at www.world-of-waterfalls.com and Go Waterfalling at www.gowaterfalling.com.
Mount Washington
Mount Washington is notorious for its fickle and often dangerous weather, and it lives up to its reputation: alpine and tundra climates with snow all year-round, lots of precipitation and unusual and strong winds for a third of the year. Yet the intrepid dare to ascend and get a sticker for their pains: This Car Climbed Mount Washington! It’s no wonder that the mountain is called Agiocochook, “home of the Great Spirit,” by the Abenaki.
Part of the White Mountains National Forest, the summit is its own park; in Victorian times the Tip Top House, the granite hotel at the summit, was an exclusive destination. To climb to the top of Mount Washington is to walk among the clouds and spirits of air. Clouds and mist are elemental workings, the result of water and air, heat (from earth and sun) working together to manifest form on or above the earth. They are a conduit to speak to god and goddess, the universe, or whatever name you give divine power. At the summit of Mount Washington the clouds can seem close enough to touch. Tap into the elements as they manifest, reach out to them (being safe, of course), and thank them for their presence.
Sometimes size does matter. Mount Washington is the tallest mountain in New Hampshire and in the Northeast. Every state has a high point that begs to be climbed or looked upon. To ascend is not easy, but for those who dare, the view of the world and to walk among the clouds is its own reward.
Visit www.highpointers.org/us-highpoint-guide to find the high point of your home state—and then go to the mountain. Even if you don’t climb, the foot is as important as the crown.
The Sunken Forest
New Hampshire only has eighteen miles of beach, but every last inch counts. As the least-developed area of New Hampshire’s tiny coastline, Ordiorne Point State Park hosts a variety of habitats despite its small size: sandy shore as well as rocky tide pools, salt marshes, sand dunes, and an area called “the Sunken Forest,” a place where there is beauty in something that has died.
About twenty-five thousand years ago, during the last Ice Age when the Wisconsin Glacier made its way south, coniferous trees clustered along the coast of the area that would eventually be known as New Hampshire. The passing glacier inundated the hemlocks, pines, and cedars, in effect, drowning them. The passage of years wore away what was left—but not all. There are stumps that still stand, the ghosts of a forest temple now hidden in the sea. They’re like cauldrons, low and hollow, where stones, seawater, and shells have collected, ready to make magic. Roots bubble up all around, shiny and wet, only to vanish from sight when the tide comes in.
The stumps of the Sunken Forest can still be seen, depending on the shallowness of the water at low tide just off of Jenness Beach, but it’s never certain. To increase your chances of catching a glimpse, keep track of the tide at www.surf-forecast.com when planning your visit. If they are visible and if it is safe to do so, at low tide make an offering of a found object atop one of the stumps—a stone, a shell, or a flower to affirm your worth and your place in the spiral dance that is life.
Rhododendron State Park
A tree by any other name would smell as sweet, but the “rose tree,” the rhododendron, is more showy than fragrant. An evergreen that can grow to be upward of twenty-five feet tall, it explodes with blossoms in hues ranging from creamy white to bright yellow to various shades of purple and pink. This midsummer display is the centerpiece of Fitzwilliam’s Rhododendron Natural Area, a sixteen-acre grove of rhododendron trees in Rhododendron State Park. For a pamphlet and trail map, see http://www.nhdfl.org/library/pdf/rhody.pdf.
Magically, the rhododendron is a cautionary flower, warning of danger; some species are toxic. And yet it’s also a healing evergreen, as it promotes balance and the embracing of personal power. Keep this in mind as you walk the half-mile trail that circles through the woods and into the rhododendron grove. The fragrance of wildflowers and the sweet notes of birdsong make this brief journey a magical one: gaze into the hearts of the flowers as you listen to the birds hidden in the woods. As you make your way around—clockwise to empower, counterclockwise to banish fear and doubt—breathe deeply and repeat a mantra such as “Empower me” or “I leave (fill in your intention) behind.”
Lake Winnipesaukee
The spring-fed waters brim like a full cup, sparkling under the rim of the mountains. New Hampshire’s largest lake (www.winnipesaukee.com) gets its name from the Abenaki word wiwininebesaki, meaning “lake region.” A more romantic translation of the name is “the smile of the Great Spirit,” commemorating the brightening sky over the lake when enemy tribes made peace via a Native American Romeo and Juliet love story (minus the tragic ending).
Crowned by the dormant, volcanic Ossippee Mountains in the north, the lake and its environs are a magical place. All the elements are present in the landscape: earth, air, fire, water, and, of course, the Great Spirit.
Mystery Stone
What kind of smile was the Great Spirit wearing in 1872 when construction workers dug up what is now known as the “Mystery Stone”? The black quartzite egg-shaped cabochon is precisely incised with a circle, a manlike symbol, a runelike symbol, a face, a teepee, corn, a spiral, and an eight-pointed star—a curious collection of symbols on one artifact. That and the fact that the carvings are so clean have caused many folks to dismiss it as a fake, insisting that nineteenth- or twentieth-century tools had to be used to create it. Either way, it doesn’t answer the question of who made it and when—and for what purpose?
Photos courtesy of the New Hampshire Historical Society
You can see the stone at the New Hampshire Historical Society Museum in Concord. To this day, no one knows from whence it came, who made it, or anything else—only that it was found along “the smile of the Great Spirit.” What in or under or about the lake inspired its creation? Is it otherworldly, a talisman for prosperity and plenty, or a unique souvenir of a summer long past? The mystery remains unsolved.
Temple of Witchcraft, Grandview
“My mistress’s eyes are nothing like the sun,” wrote Shakespeare of the love interest who was the antithesis of expected beauty—shadowy, not light; dark instead of pale and gold. So, too, was the Faery Queen who led the Temple of Witchcraft to Salem, New Hampshire.
Founded in 1998 by Christopher Penczak, the Temple of Witchcraft is a magical order, mystery school, and community resource. The temple provides structured study for those pursuing an eclectic Pagan path, with courses that are offered both online and in person. Students progress through the various levels of the inner temple, acquiring skills along the way. When the call is felt to put those skills into practice for the greater good, students become teachers and ministers, and the tradition grows.
Pagan traditions are, Christopher points out, “of the land.” One of the temple’s initial goals was for the order to have its own physical place to use as well as share. For many years teaching took place in rented and hosted space, and while community building was effective, something was missing. Enter Aroxana, dark and fae.
Temple of Witchcraft, Grandview
She appeared to Christopher in meditation. “Unlike the usual depictions of bright, white, and fair faery ladies, she manifested dark-skinned, dark- eyed, and a strange tribal mix of European faery with stronger overtones of Native American, African, or even Aboriginal styles. She was somewhat feral looking at times, but still regal and powerful.” She asked that the temple be an intermediary between the Northeast and the faery folk. In exchange, she would help find them a place of their own, a place “of the land.” An agreement was made, and afterwards visions and opportunities started cropping up, including a site off the highway where business parks give way to residential neighborhoods—and Grandview.
She is a grande dame of Victorian architecture: white, with a red-roofed turret, a barn, and, beyond the house, woods that screen out the interstate and industrial buildings. Step over her threshold and you’re transported, literally and figuratively. This is a place of magical working as well as a place with a past, both which can be felt and seen. Mandrakes in over-sized pots sun themselves in front of long-paned windows, crystals and books line shelves. Magical tools grace the walls of the ritual space, both crackling with potent protective and loving energy even when not in play. More than just a house or a space to hold classes and circles, Grandview is home—living place and home base, comforting to the spirit, and always evolving, inside and out.
The process of knitting or crocheting is ritual; the repetition of stitches in pattern, infused with intent, makes powerful magic. Part of the Temple of Witchcraft’s work is to offer healing to the community at large. Some of the best magic we can work is the positive intent we can give to others in need.
Consider making a healing prayer shawl for the Temple’s Stitch ‘n’ Witch program. The Temple accepts donations of shawls throughout the year. Visit www.templeofwitchcraft.org/cancer/shawl-ministry/ for details on how to participate or to request a shawl.
Celebrate the first harvest at the temple’s largest annual event, TempleFest. Held in nearby Southhampton, guests experience three days of workshops, vendors, and rituals, including a grand Lammas circle.
Mount Monadnock
Dark Flower of Cheshire garden
Red Evening duly dyes
Thy somber head with rosy hues
To fix fargazing eyes.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson on Mount Monadnock
The northeast has its fair share of climbable peaks, but hikers agree: Mount Monadnock is a siren song of solid stone, the paths that wind up and around its rock summit calling be traversed again and again…but why? Is it a cache of precious ore waiting to be discovered at the heart of the mountain or the convergence of seven ley lines at its peak creating the drawing power of a magnet? Legend or underlying energetic current, people flock to worship at the mountain’s foot and crown: Mount Monadnock is second only to Mount Fuji in Japan as the most hiked mountain in the world. Many walkers time their ascent (about 1½–2 hours to get to the summit) to coincide with the rising or setting sun.
In the Abenaki language, Monadnock means “the mountain that stands alone.” Solitary and high at 3,165 feet, it’s a good thousand feet higher than any of its surrounding brothers. There are five main trails to the summit, along with many other more circuitous routes. Every path has secret aspects that make it special: the sheer cliff walls of Billways Ford, the delicate splash of water that creates the veil of Chamberlain Falls. Lookout points and perches, woodland paths, hidden dells and springs wait patiently to be stumbled upon, each offering an opportunity to capture a bit of the solace and solitude that can only be found in nature. What draws people to the mountain that stands alone? What makes it a sacred space? Thoreau said the mountain made him “feel the presence of some vast, titanic power”—an earthly elemental, perhaps.
Let the mountain draw you into its presence. Pick a trail according to your ability and ascend if you are able. Warmer months and longer days invite evening walks up the mountain. On clear nights the full and rising moon can be bright enough to light some of the trails; the summit of Monadnock is a unique place to commune with Luna.
Note: Check the park website and meetup groups for organized and guided full moon walks. Night hikes are for experienced hikers; if you cannot ascend at the full moon, it is an equally powerful experience at the mountain’s foot.
About thirty-five miles east of Monadnock is Ponemah—not the fabled Land of Hereafter of Longfellow’s “Song of Hiawatha” but a quaking bog. Kettle holes formed by glaciers were slowly filled by peat and water, creating a strange and unearthly spot: a floating magic carpet of life. Layer upon layer of natural history has been and continues to be recorded in peat, pollen, plants, and rainwater.
All is in a state of flux and change depending on when you see it: the scent of pines in winter, the blaze of pink-purple rhodora flowers in May. In the summer, stoop low to the ground to peer into the jaws of carnivorous plants as you listen to the sounds of the birds and the life churning around you.
Trails to the bog start in the woods, but the nearly mile-long path that winds through the bog itself is boardwalk to protect the delicate chemistry that must be maintained for the record to continue.
with christopher penczak
Christopher Penczak is a metaphysical teacher and award-winning author of numerous books, including the critically acclaimed six-book Temple of Witchcraft series. He is a witch fulfilling the timeless role of the cunning man as a healing facilitator through the use of tarot, energy work, pastoral care, and spellcraft. Along with his two partners, Christopher is co-founder of both Copper Cauldron Publishing and the Temple of Witchcraft tradition/nonprofit organization, training witches and building community throughout the world.
Granite Strength Spell
New Hampshire is known as the Granite State, due to its large amount of granite formations and quarries. While in a similar size and shape to Vermont, the high granite content of the White Mountains has a very different feel from the more verdant Green Mountains of Vermont, giving some local practitioners esoteric lore of the white and green dragons of the lands, not unlike the British red and white dragons.
Granite is a mix of feldspar, mica, quartz, and horneblende (amphibole minerals). Metaphysically, it is associated with protection, prosperity, and balance. Physically, it is used for the dense structures of the body, including bones, teeth, and muscles. The energy of granite tends to attract people who are a bit harder, who value strength and self-reliance and can be a bit skeptical in their down-to-earth approach. It’s one of the reasons we like to think we’re a perfect choice for being among the first to check out presidential candidates.
Until recently the state patron took form as the Old Man in the Mountain in Franconia Notch. He appeared as the distinct profile of an old man in the mountainside. Sadly, the Old Man fell over in 2003, breaking the heart of many Granite Staters and yearly visitors to his reassuring face. Even without his image, you can still tap into the magick of granite, no matter where you are. You just need to get a small piece of granite to make this spell work.
Gather the following:
- • Granite
- • Bowl
- • Spring water
- • Large dark glass bottle
- • Smaller dark glass dropper bottle
- • Alcohol (80 proof or higher potable alcohol such as vodka or brandy)
Essentially this bit of magick is making a gem (or stone) elixir similar to the vibrational essences used in flower essence therapy and some forms of homeopathy. While often appearing very clinical, the use of vibrational essences is very magickal. It creates a potion that confers the vibration of a substance to your aura, like safely ingesting the spirit of the stone or plant. It changes and heals you over time. This granite essence is to confer the strength and steadiness of granite to your consciousness.
Start on a sunny day. Cleanse the granite like you would other stones and talismans, perhaps with a little sage or other incense, or run it under cool water to clear unwanted energies. Then bless the stone between your hands, asking the consciousness of the granite to awaken and radiate its beneficial properties. Fill the bowl with water someplace in the line of direct sunlight. Place the stone lovingly into the water and bless the water, holding your hands over it and radiating the intention of healing and power. Let the stone soak in the water for at least three hours. Fill your larger dark glass bottle with one-third of your alcohol by volume of the bottle.
When the three hours have passed, take the stone out and pour the water from the bowl into the larger dark glass bottle, which already has the alcohol in it, until the bottle is full. Shake well. This is what vibrational healers call the Mother Essence. In this case, it’s the Mother Essence of Granite. Label and date the bottle, knowing it can last for up to ten years if kept in a cool, dark place.
Take your smaller dark glass dropper bottle. Fill it with one-third alcohol and two-thirds fresh clear spring water. Then add ten drops of the Mother Essence to the dropper bottle solution. You have now created a Stock Essence. Take a few drops of this potion when you need to be solid and firm, set good boundaries, and endure difficult situations. If these are longstanding issues for you, take three drops three times a day until the bottle is done. You can always make more from the Mother Essence. Journal and you will notice a tremendous shift in your awareness and inner personal strength. Granite essence can give you the blessings of the Old Man in the Mountain, particularly if you use New Hampshire granite.
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