Rancho Tarzanadu: "Strawberry Moon"

     It was the “Strawberry Moon”…all the Witches were discussing it on Facebook and Instagram. There was a “Witches’ Call to Action” meme that Miss Linda was widely circulating in her various online groups: “Global action will be taken on the Supermoon of June 5^th by Witches, Shamans, Brujas, Rootworkers, Spiritualists, and every other practitioner and/or Occultist. On the Supermoon of June 5^th we call everybody to focus your intent, do spellwork, light a candle, do what you find necessary to send protection, do healing and bring justice to injustice everywhere. Let’s help end this sh*t! From the inexperienced to the experienced, let’s gather together. #june5thglobalspiritualprotest.” ~ Anonymous.

     One of the Massage Therapists in one of Miss Linda’s online Massage Therapy forums said that: “All the healers of the world are really *pissed off* right now.” And she was right. They were all f*cking pissed. And they were banding together with focused intention via the internet, which Overlord L’Orange wanted to shut down. Miss Linda could see why. The internet was a handy tool for uprisings! Similar in function to a magic wand.

     Attorney General Willian Barr had deemed the peaceful protests all across the county for the murder of George Floyd a “Witches Brew”…he really had no idea how accurate he was! But Miss Linda had absolutely no respect for anything that came out of his flabby, officious, jowl-y face; his father had hired Jeffrey Epstein to teach at The Dalton School in New York without even possessing a freaking Bachelor’s degree (this especially outraged her because she had literally just received her BA in Creative Writing, and she knew what a tremendous amount of work went into actually getting it). Miss Linda looked up the tuition costs for The Dalton School: $54,180 for one year (“including lunches” – she would hope so!). How the Hell did Jeffrey Epstein get hired at this school without a f*cking degree? Hmmm. Miss Linda thought it seemed awfully fishy. Stinky. Stank-y. She had just watched the Netflix movie about Jeffrey Epstein called Filthy Rich, to take her mind off the pandemic and the grass-roots uprisings while she ate dinner, but obviously it just made her more agitated!

     Corruption seemed to be the name of the freaking game as of late. Although, it had probably always been that way; it was all just coming to a head right now, all at once. One of the witches reminded her that they were entering into the actual Age of Aquarius (as opposed to the Dawn of the Age of Aquarius, which happened in the 1960’s, when Miss Linda was born by the way), so really everything that was happening right now made perfect sense, if you looked at it like that.

     In her “UFO and Bigfoot” Facebook group, someone posted an article about a mysterious crop circle in Wiltshire, England shaped exactly like Covid-19. It was getting hard to tell now who was a Conspiracy Theorist, a Right-Wing Conservative, or a New-Age Hippie; their belief systems appeared to be merging. It was all very confusing. Miss Linda found herself reaching for her CBD/THC organic avocado tincture oil far more frequently than when all this began…she was starting to build up a greater tolerance to it by the day.

     Miss Linda took long walks around the neighborhood (wearing her face mask of course) to relieve stress. It helped relieve the tension somewhat, for a little while. Except this week was different. Even the birds and the squirrels were worked up; she could literally feel the tension in the air in her suburban neighborhood. Miss Linda recalled on her walk that she had once mentioned to one of her many nieces (who happened to be three years older than she was – long story!) that she felt and absorbed other people’s “energy” and sometimes it was completely exhausting. This particular niece (who was once a Saxophonist in the Marine Corps Band) asked her: “Energy? What the Hell are you talking about?!” Miss Linda tried to explain it, but quickly realized it was futile, and changed the subject to what was on the menu for dinner that evening. It made her heave a huge sigh just thinking about it.

     Anyway, on this particular walk around the neighborhood while the protest were happening, people were racing through the back streets of Tarzana at a breakneck pace. Not just one car, but several. Almost every car. Racing. Flying over speed bumps. Anger was fueling them.

     As a refresher: Miss Linda’s father bought Rancho Tarzanadu in 1959 for $29,500, after going to college on the U.S. Army’s dime. Miss Linda was living in a very wealthy neighborhood, but purely by synchronicity. Just sheer dumb luck, really, on her part. She knew what it was like to live paycheck-to-paycheck, because she had been doing that her whole life. She knew what it felt like to juggle money and have to wait and really mull it over before she made a major purchase. She was living on the precipice of both worlds, appearing one way to some, and another way to others. She was a single, middle-aged woman with an artist’s heart. She was getting her Master’s degree in Humanities, for God’s sake, at a state school with full FAFSA support and Medi-Cal health insurance because her employer didn’t offer health insurance, even though she worked there over thirty hours a week while going to school full time. She had eaten her share of canned beans and boxed macaroni-and-cheese and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. She was on the side of the disenfranchised and overworked, taken-for-granted service employees, living in a house and a neighborhood way beyond her means. She intended to keep it that way (minus the sh*tty job, hopefully, from here on out). She was utilizing the space the pandemic provided (along with the unemployment insurance) to revamp her life.

     In her “Nextdoor Tarzana” Facebook group, some of her neighbors had been freaking out, worried that the protestors were going to storm their castles, and steal all their jewels. Miss Linda’s house was decorated with items and furniture from the Good Will, so she was not that concerned about losing her “stuff”. She had a feeling if anyone actually entered her home to steal anything, they would probably just end up being confused and leaving, if they made it past the pentagram windchimes on the front porch in the first place. Unless they were interested in home-made art or thrift-shop paintings of Elvis Presley. If that was the case, she would definitely have something to worry about.

     The point is: white people were anxious and terribly afraid. The tide was turning. It was palpable. And there was no going back. The Age of Aquarius was upon us. Jeffrey Epstein was dead. Long live George Floyd!

     Overlord L’Orange cleared the peaceful protestors away in Washington D.C. with tear gas and rubber bullets (which his press secretary denied through her bleached teeth and false eyelashes, even though there was video footage – but remember: don’t believe what you’re reading or seeing!), so he could slink across the street to pose for a photo op while holding the Bible in his hand at St. John’s Church (the Bible was upside-down by the way…Antichrist, anyone?). He vowed to call in the National Guard, to “protect” the citizens from themselves. Miss Linda wondered why the Conservative Far Right didn’t think this was an invasion of their “Liberty” when being instructed to wear a cloth face mask to stop the spread of a deadly virus was). Again, it was all very confusing, and maybe, just maybe, it was supposed to be. Miss Linda  (along with many others) was extremely surprised that the Overlord did not catch on fire just by holding that book upside-down in his tiny little hand.

     When a series of small earthquakes started rolling into Los Angeles, and there was a partial eclipse of the full Strawberry Moon, it was like a cherry dollop on top of a melting ice-cream sundae pool of inequality, corruption, and depravity. Miss Linda put her headphones on and listened to her Witchy podcasts while doing Yoga and deep-breathing exercises as she attempted to do her Brahmavihara Meditation, sending love and light out to the entire planet and enveloping it inside a pink-golden bubble of Universal light, love, and protection.

     When she was done, Miss Linda stepped onto her balcony, to infuse her jar of “Moon Water” with the healing energy of the Strawberry Supermoon, but it was so overcast that the moon wasn’t even visible.