To the Man Walking the Dog

If you follow the moon and astrology and tell people who don’t “believe in that stuff” that it’s probably because they’re a Virgo (or maybe a Capricorn), then you know this week marked the first of two supermoons this month. You also know that at the end of the month we’ll have a blue moon, which is what it means on the rare occurrence when there are two full moons in one month (hence the phrase “once in a blue moon.”). Two supermoons in one month won’t happen again until 2037, so if you missed the Sturgeon Moon this week, you should try to catch the blue supermoon at the end of the month, when the moon is the brightest and closest to the earth in 2023.

The other night for the first supermoon of the month, I was preparing for my minor league witchly incantations. I follow a sufficient number of woo-woo crystal persuasion accounts on social media, I’m a candlemaker and a reiki master, so I’m relatively prepared to have my Mojo Dojo Palo Santo house in order on this little island. The crystal grid was laid out, the crystal wand pen ready to be dipped in black ink for writing things I wanted released from my energy field and what I wanted to manifest. Sage and palo santo were ready to be burned beside white candles and I had reiki tarot cards ready for a pull.

The moon rises on the other side of the island, so after the sun set over the Chesapeake, I packed up my moon offering of fresh flowers from my garden, freshly-inked papyrus intentions and a few crystals, and I headed out, Tony Bennett singing “Fly Me to the Moon” in my car. I was already crying.

I’m emotional. In addition to having a personality disorder related to emotional regulation (dealt with regularly through much therapy, reading and spiritual work in progress), I’m also a Gemini (Cancer moon and rising), so more or less I can be a dumpster fire inside a train wreck emotionally at times. I’ve had a rough year, and with this moon I letting go of some heavy shit and picking up some better vibes in my life. On my next birthday I’ll be 55, and I feel a need to get my shit together—if not now, when for fuck’s sake.

So anyway I’m crying and driving, and there’s this old guy and his dog in the middle of the very dark road, and I saw them in plenty of time, but jeez, I thought, he really should’ve been off to the side more. I get to the shoreline area where I wanted to watch the moonrise, but there are too many clouds. This is about to make me cry more, then I remember my former girlfriend once telling me “the moon is always there even when you can’t see her” which of course immediately makes me start bawling. This is why they call it a “full moon release” I guess, so, just like I sage-burned the negative bullshit out of my life, I let the tears flow; better out than in, I always say.

I’m crying to the point of sobbing, hurling random witchly objects into a body of water. There are no-see-ums biting me, so I’m dancing all over the place spinning and slapping at them and cursing, and decide I need to ground myself so I do some reiki, meditate for a few minutes, calm myself down, do some deep breathing. I’m stretching up to the moon, down to the ground.

Just as I walk towards my car, I see the dog-walking man standing there staring at me like he’s the only ticketholder to the wailing, moon-worshipping shitshow that even the moon didn’t show up for; its lazy ass is still hiding behind the clouds.

I look at him, he looks at me, his dog starts walking toward their home as though it knows things have gotten awkward and it is time to head in that direction before anyone feels the need to speak. The man was older, maybe 75, and seemed kindly and concerned versus creepy or even curious. I paused briefly, realizing that I hadn’t had the end-of-the-road coastline lawn all to myself, that this was a neighborhood where people (and dogs) live, and that maybe in future unhinged sativa-and-Stevie Nicks-inspired moments, I should find a more private area to see how high I can fly with the moon in my eyes.

I get in my car, drive past the man again as though there was never anything to see here, I didn’t lower the window and yell an explanation about how I’d simply been POURING MY DEAD GRANDMOTHER’S ASHES INTO THE RIVER BECAUSE IT WAS HER FINAL WISH, MAYBE KINDLY OFFER SOME PRIVACY NEXT TIME. I looked the other way, a more cheerful remix of “Dancing in the Moonlight” bopping on the moon playlist now.

I owe the man and his dog an apology for the drama, but hey, walk your dog during the full moon and you don’t know what amateur witch you’re gonna run into on a little island. Probably an hour or two later, when I turned out the bedroom light, my window perfectly framed the giant, gorgeous orange supermoon—she’d finally shown up for her own party, that “face on the moon” clearly evident and, it seemed to me (probably because pot gummy) maybe laughing a little.