My Grimoire

 

Leaves from the Tree of Knowledge 

My Grimoire is a project a began in March of 2020. Due to the Covid 19 pandemic, I was sent home from my office job for what would be two months. At that time, we didn't know a lot about the virus and there was a great deal of misinformation being spread. For this reason, I barley left the house during those two months. 

Luckily a month earlier, I received my tax refund and so I stocked up on a lot of frozen foods, vegetables, and meats which I stored in my deep freezer ---- as I do every year when I receive my tax refund. I also stocked up on canned goods, cleaning supplies, and toilet paper (which came in handy when there was a shortage of the later). For fresh fruits, vegetables, and other perishables I used instacart. 

I settled into a daily routine of watching tv, reading, writing, and taking naps. It was during this time that I began re-watching Charmed on TNT. Inspired by the Charmed Ones Book of Shadows, I decided to create my own Grimoire with the idea that I was a witch living in the Charmed universe, but with absolutely no connection them. 

I started with a blank journal. I aged the journal by dunking it in a sink full of water and then placing it in front of my heater vent for a few days to dry out. Once dry, I personalized the journal by painting the spine and corners black. Finally, I wanted to put a symbol on the front of the journal... my own version of the Charmed One's Triquetra. I didn't want to use the pentagram because it was too common. I wanted something unique. A few nights later, I dreamed of the symbol you see in the above photograph. Later, I discovered that this symbol appeared in the works of Scott Cunningham and represents witches as it was a sigil of the roman numeral 13. 

Once the Grimoire was finished, I wrote a book blessing on the first page. It reads, 

Written here be 

a spell such,

that no evil hand 

may touch;

nor any evil eye 

may look,

upon the pages 

of this book!

Afterward, I began using the mythology of Charmed to write fictionalized accounts of people and experiences I have had throughout my life. Take the Tattooed Warlock for example:

The Tattooed Warlock was actually about one of my early boyfriends who was the archetypical bad boy. In the story of my life, he broke my heart, however, in the fictionalized version I wrote in my Grimoire I was able to vanquish him! 

If there were Warlocks, I also had to include Demons. Some of the Demons come from actual folklore such as the Plate-Eye. 

While I simply made-up others based on my own experiences. For example, the Infiltrator Demon was based on a situation in which a new person was introduced into my life and who subsequently had a negative impact on my circle of friends due to their difficult personality.  

 And there are plenty of spells and potions as well...

Many of these spells and rituals were inspired by things that occurred to me in my own life. For example, the Mood Enhancer spell was written after I allowed a negative experience at work to give me a bad attitude and the Cord Cutting Ritual was written to help me move past an old relationship that I was having trouble getting over. 

Although I often referred to this as my fake Grimoire online, the spells are actually sound, and you can certainly cast them. However, I found that the act of writing the spells and creating pages for them in my Grimoire was actually very therapeutic for me. 

In some cases, I wanted to create pages to commemorate real people such as Mary Ingleman, the first witch of South Carolina. 

...and events such as the Great Conjunction of December 2020 

and the invasion of the Ukraine by Russia 

In addition to all of the entries in my Grimoire, I have various business cards, newspaper articles, and index cards with hastily written notes on them stuffed between the pages. The business cards are from various metaphysical businesses I have purchased magical items from, the newspaper articles are about pagan festivals, a healer in India and an interview with an herbalist in the New York Times which I feel brings an added dimension to the Grimoire. 

As of this writing, I have about 36 blank pages left in my Grimoire, and I am in no hurry to fill them. I want to build up the pages organically so that it will become a treasured tome of memories and experiences when it is finished. 

- Carolina Dean