… just curiosity and willingness to follow what feels alive.

So says my Spring Equinox tarot card reading – especially my jumper card, the Page of Wands.

My Equinox oracle card – the reversed Possum and the Peony, representing bashfulness – tells me that, while I’ve recently been shaken (perhaps by turmoil or a disorienting change), I am now ready to stand on my own two feet. My period of retreat and solitude, though healthful for a time, should probably wrap up while I work to ensure that my anxiety doesn’t control me.

Anyway. Hi. I’m back!

I never know how to break back into writing here after a lengthy hiatus, so why not kick it off this time with some witchy shit? The world is so different now than it was when I last wrote in spring 2022, and not to mention completely bonkers. I am so different, too – and also maybe a little bit bonkers.

Yet, some things remain the same. I am still vegan. I still love flowers. And cats. And travel and cooking, even though I don’t do much of the former anymore, while the latter has generally become more practical.

But, I’m a (human) mom now. I live in the Midwest. I still work the same sort of job, but it’s gone through several iterations and I care less these days about the consistency of it all – and even less about any sort of ambition, lofty fulfillment, or prestige.

It’s more about enabling the blessings and quality of life I’ve come to enjoy and that I want to continue giving to myself and my family.

Not unlike the job, there have been several iterations of Me these past four years, too. Various different circumstances, stressors, changes, and discoveries have peppered my timeline. No need to recap them right here, right now, but I’m feeling more ready than ever to assert more control over my present and my future, ultimately by insisting on less control, if that makes any sense?

Two specifics I will raise here are family and career (those aren’t really that specific at all, are they? )

In the latter half of 2025 and now into 2026, I’ve agonized over making decisions only to be thrown off by a fresh set of circumstances right as I came to peace with making one. I had decided to lean into trying for Baby #2 and enjoy a much more chill, part-time work experience… only to have an enticing and highly unexpected job offer fall into my lap.

On the advice of a friend, I assigned a symbol to each path – a ladybug for the baby-focused route, and a snake for the exciting job. Not that the two had to be mutually exclusive, but it was a question of how and where to really focus my energy. The new job would make a new baby much more stressful. Keep a lookout for one of those signs, my friend said.

The first ladybug I saw after that was a dead ladybug, I kid you not. But, it was a ladybug nonetheless, and there were other indicators that pressed me in the direction of Baby.

We got pregnant basically on our first try and I felt so much more prepared and less anxious than I was the first time. Encouraged, I mentally geared up for a 2026 of Motherhood 2.0, pleased that I could give my sweet boy a little brother at the ripe maternal age of 41.

On Christmas Eve and mere days after my birthday, I miscarried. The way it happened caught me off guard, even though I thought I had the practical outlook that’s necessary in the first trimester. It was devastating. Dead ladybug, indeed.

Of course, I recovered. My New Year tarot reading gave me uplifting perspective about an open mind and a fresh start – permission to not be so rigid in my expectations of what a fulfilled and harmonious future could look like.

Now, my body is recalibrating and yet another solid job opportunity has fallen into my lap. I’m not sweating the outcomes of either trying once more for Baby #2 or accepting this new role. I’m merely trying. Merely accepting. With curiosity and willingness to follow what feels alive, just in time for Spring.