Int'l Pagan Coming Out Day Part 2: A Price above Rubies

     I intended for this to go live last night.  Instead, I spent my evening counseling a student with a crisis, and then meeting a friend for dinner.  We were meeting discussing her non-profit women’s group she’s launching and wants help with. During part of my evening my Superego was screaming, “International Pagan Coming Out Day is rapidly coming to an end! Cut this short and go WRITE!” and sometime during my evening the Ego said, “Look. This is Important. Your history took almost 22 years to write. Don’t limit your experience to one day.” So here we are, part two.

     With my friends, I’ve been out of the broom closet since I talked to my parents in 1995. At one point, I’m sure people in space knew. Not because I introduced myself, “Hi, my name is Amy and I’m a WITCH!” As silly as it sounds, I’ve met those people too. It’s called immersion. You have a spiritual or identity change and you feel the need to spend more time with those people that identify similarly, because they understand. Most people deal with it for a little while and then happily, move on to a more subdued attitude.

      However, I was attending school in a county where a particularly violent hate group preached in broad daylight on the street corners on Sunday. Being out of the broom closet (OOTBC) was something that was a scary option at first. So, at school, other than some close friends, I was ITBC.

     Back in those days I wore a simple, beautiful crescent moon pendant with a tiny star (not pentacle) on the tip of the moon. One day a girl I believed was a buddy (not friend exactly) of mine asked whether my moon made me Muslim. I gave her a simple explanation about nature, staying away from buzz words like Witchcraft, Wicca, Witches or magic. It turns out this ‘friend’ was holding a grudge that her ex-boyfriend left her, and a month later asked me out and she spread my note (Yes, back in the stone ages before texting.) like wild fire. It came back to me scribbled with horrible things written in the handwriting of most of my grade. One of the ‘popular’ boys went so far as to corner me and threatened to kill me. The Witches Voice had recently featured a sad tale of a 14 year old girl who was beaten to death by members of her high school football team because her school mates found out she was a Witch.

      I brought it home that day, and went next door to my best friend’s house to cry. My 16 year old self was convinced that life was over. He came up with a most inventive and highly cathartic way of destroying the letter and the feelings that I had about those people. It was beautiful and empowering. (Just one of the many reasons my then best friend, is now my husband of 8 years as of May 1.) Even with dealing with feelings of betrayal, loss, and more, someone important in my life helped me see that, though it was an awful day, there can be beauty in all of life’s shitty days.

      It’s important to me to remember the hard days of being Pagan, because honestly, if it were easy, anyone would do it. I’ve had millions of moments of beauty that being Pagan and out of the Broom Closet has brought me. The cruddy moments I can count on one hand and still have fingers left over.

      During Blessed Be and Meet Me in DC in 2001, a particularly moving ritual by Elspeth and Nybor was interrupted by Rugby players from the next field over. The park police that we had informed of our event showed up and the 2 players and 1 coach were escorted from our Space and no harm came to our people. It gave the participants the organizers hope that we could be treated just like anyone else by authority figures.

     In late 2004 I created the Newark (DE) Pagan Meetup (which is still going strong, though I stepped down years ago, and is still being held by original members) and its ranks swelled to 200+. We had a setting on the website to prevent anyone under 18 from joining for liability reasons. If any of the moderators got emails from persons under 18, they were encouraged to discuss it with their parents and their parents could join, and attend meetings with their children for propriety and safety of the minor. A few years after the meetup was established one such request came through. The pre-arranged response was given. The next thing I know, my meetup linked email is filled with email. Screaming, hate filled threats dripped from my inbox. Threats to picket the business where the meetup was held were popular, but also included threats to burn down my house, kill my pets and my family.

     While the hullabaloo lasted a week or less, and never amounted to any actual harm, it was a stressful week. It never made me regret being a public face and doing public outreach for other Pagans. I was glad that I always used my Magickal last name, but it didn’t dissuade me, or make me crawl back into the broom closet or to stop meeting with those of a like mind.

      Just like anything else we do of import, it’s not always easy. It should be. It really should be. It should be easy to just be who you are, no matter your faith. To me, that feeling that my faith is something that has stayed with me almost 22 years, though ridicule, threats, and a near death experience is worth its emotional weight in rubies.