At the end of December, as the longest night of the year slowly seeps into the room, I light candles and make a Didukh. I weave this keeper of ancestral stories out of dry wheat stalks and distant memories of a sheaf that my grandfather brought into the house on Christmas Eve. “Didukh in the house, trouble out of the house,” he would say as he placed it under the icons framed by rushnyks, embroidered towels that decorated the walls of every room at my grandparents’ place.
Every planting season starts with pots, soil and seeds scattered on my living room floor like stars strewn across the night sky. A cosmic chaos of new beginnings, an assortment of legume galaxies, constellations of leafy greens, flowery nebulas and herb clusters. Speckled beans flexing their curvy backs. Translucent gems of corn glistening in the … Continue reading Sowing Magic
I lower my paddle in the water and push the canoe into pre-dawn stillness. The boat glides effortlessly across the lake, cutting a sharp triangle in its mirror-like surface. Each paddle stroke sends circles through the water – ever-expanding, widening – until they reach the forest along the shore and Killarney’s white cliffs towering above. … Continue reading Stories of Entangled Life
Stories of Entangled Life 