Limen: Thoughts from a threshold

Around a month ago, I started noticing increased eyestrain headaches, and got my act together to go and get my eyes examined.

Now, I’ve had glasses in the past - both times briefly, as my eyes got better, and there were some practical issues (computer-only glasses are a really poor choice for a librarian: I’m often up and down talking to people, looking at a shelf, getting a laptop for checkout, and all the other parts of it.) The end result? I have a mild astigmatism in both eyes, enough that everything’s readable, but not crisp. Hence, eyestrain.

The nice optometrist I talked to about this agreed that for library work, computer-only glasses would not work very well (they’d be constantly on and off, with all the wear and tear that brings), and so wrote my prescription for all the time wear. This is fine by me: as I pointed out, it was the only appearance thing I was missing on the librarian stereotype list (I have long hair, often in a bun, and I generally wear skirts and sensible shoes…) And I hang out in geeky-type crowds, anyway, so there are more people around with glasses than not, most of the time.

I picked up the glasses on Sunday. Being me, I also started thinking about the ritual and magical implications. And, since I’m finding less out there about how other people handle this than I thought I might, I figure a post about it is a possibly useful thing.

I do have some options, since I do not actually need them to read and can function just fine with them off (except for the eyestrain aspect if they’re off too much). In fact, I’ve been taking them off when I go to bed, even though I generally read for at least 15-30 minutes before sleep, because I both read and fall asleep on my side.

Ritual
There are, I am told, some groups out there that heavily limit items like glasses in ritual. (I’ve seen different arguments for this, some of which I’ll address below.) We are not one of those groups: my covenmate wears hers pretty much all the time.

Our ritual work (as you might have guessed from my general description of approach) is something we take seriously, but it is not necessarily very formal. Our current ritual clothing is generally ‘whatever suits the ritual’. But since before I can remember, I’ve also been a big believer in the interaction of ritual and theatre, and very aware of how people pick up mode, mood, and focus cues from choices in dress, word choice, body language, and so on. (This makes even more sense when you know my father was a specialist in ancient Greek theatre, and a theatre historian in general.)

Taken this way, glasses are interesting for two reasons. First, they are a physical, obvious difference: they’re on my face, after all. But second, I’ve already noticed some changes in body language (not just from the lack of tension in my jaw and neck, but also in how I hold my head, move, adjust them, etc.)

Does it matter if they’re on my face? Good question.

For most rituals I’m likely to be taking part in, I don’t think it matters: they aren’t going to affect my ability to priestess or otherwise lead or participate in ritual.

There are times, though, when I think taking them off may be a good idea.

1) One obvious time is if we’re doing something either messy or potentially messy. For example, we’ve talked about a ritual using either body paint or henna: I’d rather take the glasses off rather than risk splatters (and also because it gives more choices for face art.)

2) When they’d be distracting to me. I haven’t yet figured out what I want to do about meditation work, for example. I normally work with my eyes closed, and either sitting up or lying down on my back. I don’t know if I’ll find the weight of the glasses (or something like them shifting slightly) distracting.

3) When they break mood. For example, I’m likely to remove them for ritual theatre, or for Drawing Down, because in both cases, they may be one more thing for people to edit in their heads about presentation. As in good theatre, paying attention to the little details often helps. (Also, from a purely personal point of view, taking them off may be a good indicator to my brain that stuff outside my norm is happening.)

I don’t know which of these will end up happening, but they’re the things I can see as potential options right now.

Daily Wear
But aside from ritual, there’s another aspect that intrigues me.

See, I name stuff. Especially stuff that’s core to my daily function. I have named my computer, my harp, my car. My iPod. My cell phone (ok, so that one I don’t actually use very often.) This is not actually all that weird: many people name their cars, technology, or major musical instruments (or have some sort of consistent pet name.)

I often have small personal ritual moments - I’m not talking big weird things, but I do talk to my car (and my computer, and my harp, and…) and I have *far* fewer technical glitches than you’d think the law of averages would suggest. Treating the glasses in the same sort of ritual sense I treat those things is probably not a bad move. (And even if it’s weird, at least it’s an internally consistent weird.)

I’m not sure yet how I want to handle this with my glasses. Some obvious possibilities include having a specific place they’re kept at home, cleaning them as part of my morning devotional work (in part because there’s such a clear link to some of my primary vocational stuff), or naming them. I’ve been thinking about this since I got them, but I’m still trying to decide which things are meaningful and useful to me, and which things aren’t.

One of the easier bits of shared-practice discussion I’ve had in the founding of the Shiny New Group has been about figuring out how to handle ritual texts.

The options:

There’s a spectrum.

• Some groups memorise everything (i.e. there’s a prewritten script, but everyone works in ritual from memory.)
• Some groups work from a written script, with notes used during ritual.
• Some groups write things out in advance for planning, but then memorise or improvise in the ritual as makes sense.
• Some groups figure out the goal of the ritual, but then collaboratively create (often referred to as co-creating) the ritual together. (In this last one, ritual roles or methods may not be assigned: people step forward to take on the roles they want to do, and do them as they see fit.)
• Some groups combine one or more of these.

My past experience:

The group I’ve hived from is closest to #2:

• Ritual roles are determined in advance (though people may find out about smaller ones that don’t require advance preparation when they arrive for ritual.)
• The ritual is pre-planned, and the working, explanations, ritual texts, and such are pre-written, and used basically intact. There’s some discussion of how to read from cards/script without burying your nose in it, and keeping the energy going.
• Everyone with a significant ritual role (HPS, HP, handmaiden, summoner, sometimes other roles) gets a copy of the ritual, and works from that.
• That while things are pre-written, there’s still a fair bit of room for seeing how things go - a lot of working notes would say “X, Y, or Z may happen now” and we’d run with whatever made sense.
• Deity and ancestor invitations are generally not pre-written (though someone who is new to doing them may write something up for reference in case they blank while doing it.)
• Some parts of the ritual (blessing text, circle cast, songs, quarter calls) are memorised over time. (Most people can do them fairly comfortably by memory by the time of their initiation or not long thereafter.)

There’s a lot of benefits to this - especially in a teaching group, and where sometimes people can’t be at a given ritual, or you may have guests with varying levels of experience.

What benefits?

• You can preplan more, and discuss anything that might be an issue for specific students or guests (or things to do to avoid confusion or problems.)
• People can take on roles they do not yet have fully memorised (which requires a high level of comfort)
• Those learning larger roles within the ritual (such as someone beginning as handmaiden) could see clearly what was expected of them in advance during the ritual, and plan ahead better.
• It allows for a lot of conversation about ritual design (since we’d have a script to go over before ritual.)

There’s also some less useful parts. Working from a script or cards requires a lot of work to *prepare* them (my HPS usually did 2-4 sets of cards, with different parts highlighted, plus often a separate sheet for people with smaller roles that was generic. (And then there’s the cutting them apart, keeping track of them, keeping them in order, etc.) There are times this is very useful (something like an initiation, where it’s a ritual that isn’t done often, and there are a lot of specific sequence details and wording to keep track of), but it can be a lot of work to do for every ritual.

And, of course, some people will get ‘caught’ by reading off a sheet. We actually rarely had this problem, but it does take some training and practice to read with feeling and attention to the group energy while you’re looking at a card. It’s not an common skill without practice.

Our choices:

Our choice so far has been to work far more organically. (Of course, this is a lot easier when there’s only two of you, and you’ve been working together for over 6 years in various forms…)

• We set our general focus for the ritual well in advance (i.e. we can say “Next moon’s ritual will be focusing on X and probably involving Y”) We like this: it gives us a chance to mentally prepare and roll around different ideas without time pressure.
• A few weeks before the ritual, we figure out precisely what we want to do for the working, and how we want to approach it.
• We keep notes, but we have not (so far) written up formal scripts. I do send out an outline of what we need to remember to bring/have ready, but that’s about it.
• We have some standard texts (circle cast, a few songs, etc.) but in most other cases, we’re improvising.
• We’re also (so far) not pre-writing the welcome comments, or even specific meditations (because, by default, if one of us is reading the medication, we can’t both be doing it equally: we’ve done shared-meditations where we both share what we’re seeing, though, or where one of us has talked through a set-up, and then we both have time to explore.)

We’ll obviously continue to adapt (especially when we we add more people) but I like the combination of advance preparation (everyone, going in, knows what the focus and intention will be well in advance) and openness to trying out different ways to get there when it’s appropriate. (It also means that if we get a brilliant idea in the last week before ritual, we don’t have to scramble to get scripts together: we just note what we want to do and run with it.)

Since this also just turned up in my search engine results, I thought it might be handy to mention. One of our coven desires is good food and drink: we’re both big believers in food being a pleasure as well as a necessity, and we want our ritual work and celebrations to reflect that.

What does that actually mean?

Food in ritual
As is true with many Wiccan influenced groups, we have a ‘cakes and ale’ portion in our rituals. Most commonly for us, this is bread and wine, mead, or sometimes beer (depending on the season and ritual focus.)

I started baking bread maybe four years ago, and I’ve discovered that I really like baking bread for ritual use. It’s also remarkably easy - my basic bread recipe (which I’m not going to post today, as it’s long, and I want to talk about other things, too) takes about 3 hours start to finish, and only about 15-20 minutes of actual work.

Why bake for ritual? Why not buy something from any one of the excellent bakeries within easy driving distance?

• I know exactly what’s in there.
• I know where those ingredients came from (for example, I use locally produced honey rather than sugar in most of my bread.)
• I can adapt the bread precisely for ritual use: I did spice-based breads over much of the winter, but now that we’re in spring, I’m doing herb breads. Both are fabulous, but they evoke different feelings.
• I can shape the bread in ritually beautiful ways that help reinforce the focus of the ritual.
• There is something powerfully transformative in making bread: I begin thinking about the transformation and change the ritual will bring even before I get there.
• It requires that I spend about 3 hours at home, which turns out to be a nice and happy scheduling thing for me: it means I am far less likely to make too many plans the week before group ritual (and thus am less tired, have gotten stuff done at home, etc.) Definite bonus.

My recipe for Beltane is actually going to be a new one for me - one of the friends who is coming as a guest has an oatmeal bread recipe she thinks would be fantastic for ritual, so I’m going to try that.

Likewise, what we pick for a liquid varies. We’re happy to do an alternative for people who don’t drink alcohol (currently not an issue, as everyone attending also drinks socially) but I do find that alcohol holds energy better than other liquids, and that that is sometimes very useful. My non-alcohol of choice is either sparkling juice, or some kind of interestingly flavored not-too-sweet juice. (The ready availability of pomegranate juice, for example, is handy.)

Food for Beltane

There are a few traditional foods - white wine with woodruff and strawberries, for example, or rose petal scones or other baked goods. However, we’re in Minnesota - neither of these things are actually seasonal for us, unless we have an unusually early spring. (And even then, that’s only roses, not strawberries. And one of our guests has rose allergies to many common varieties.)

Our plans, therefore, are for *good* food - homemade foods that feel right to us right now. I’m contemplating a chicken salad (to go with the ritual bread) but I’m still figuring out exactly what I want to put in it.

We’ve been talking, in terms of group work, about how to handle things like food allergies.

Why relevant?
Food allergies are relevant in a couple of ways.

1. We share some kind of food and drink in ritual.Generally, this is bread and wine (or mead, or maybe beer or ale), but generally alcohol. I generally make the bread, which uses white flour (wheat based). I’ve done cornbread, but I haven’t experimented with gluten-free baking (and because of the relative expense of the necessary ingredients and storage issues in a tiny kitchen, don’t anticipate doing so, honestly, on any kind of regular basis.)
2. We make a point of shared food after ritual.Good food and drink is actually an explicit value of the group, and we like paying attention to where our food comes from, seasonality, and other details like that. Currently, we’re just planning a shared meal (as it’s a little weird to do potluck with 2 people) - you’ve seen the photos of our Ostara meal. Our new moon meal last weekend involved cold roast chicken (roasted that afternoon), herb bread, baked mushrooms, salad, and oatmeal cookies, along with wine.

The trick is, people have food allergies. In our previous group work, we’ve seen everything from people who can eat anything, but who show up with a bag of chips, to people who can only eat 2 or 3 very specific foods - and the people who (despite being prompted twice beforehand) don’t mention they have food allergies until 2 minutes before ritual.

Clearly, we want a way to handle all of these competing issues in a way that is sane for us, and sufficiently healthy for others. Equally obviously “Do you have any food or other allergies” is a necessary part of our pre-ritual questions for guests.

Ritual food:
I have two major goals for ritual food.

1. That we do our best to come up with an in-ritual food alternative that they can have at the same time.For example, we might have alternate chalice with juice or water for those who don’t drink alcohol, or a small bowl of apple slices for someone who is gluten intolerant.
2. That the alternate be appropriate to the season and ritual.My preference for this is to talk to them in advance, figure out an alternative they can eat (by running through some options) and provide it in the same way we provide the bread. (Either I provide it, or whoever does has it ready to go when they arrive.) This reduces pre-ritual fussing. If that’s not possible (their diet is so restricted they need really specific foods), then I’d ask them to bring what made the most sense.

Advance warning:
Obviously, this means they have to let me know in advance - so “Do you have any food allergies or other medical needs” is high on the list of things to ask when inviting a guest.

That said, I’ve seen more than one situation where people have been told clearly they need to let people know about allergies - and not mentioned it until they show up in ritual. This leads to my own personal policy:

If you don’t tell me at least 24 hours in advance of ritual (barring truly last minute changes) of an issue, I’m not going to run around trying to accommodate it by running out to the store, trying to find an alternative in the cupboard, an appropriate size bowl to put it in, etc. It’s important to me that the immediately pre-ritual time be as calm as possible.

If someone doesn’t tell me, they still have options - the most obvious being to simply bow their head over the food and drink to acknowledge the blessing. Again, I’m not expecting them to know they need to mention it: I’m just expecting they’ll tell me when asked, or cope with the consequences of not doing so.

Post-ritual feasting:
My current favorite phrase for this is ‘additive, not restrictive’.

In other words, if you can’t eat something, but it will not cause you physical harm to be in the same room with it, then other people may bring it. And, of course, if it will be unhealthy for you to be in the same room, we want to avoid it.

On the other hand, if it’s just something you can’t eat (but can be around) or just don’t like, we will do our best to make sure there are at least 2-3 foods that any given person can eat. And if we have people with restricted food choices even from what’s there, perhaps that they get first dibs at the food in the very sensible tradition of alt.polycon’s Decadent Brunch.

L and I do not have food allergy issues, but all three of the guests for our Beltane have foods they can’t eat or shouldn’t have. I just sent out the email for that, which is somewhat complex (because it includes both “Don’t bring at all” lists and “Here’s specifics for stuff that must be carefully labelled/someone can’t have” but at the same time, means people can see for themselves whether something will work (and know who to contact in case of questions. I believe this will work - update when we get past May 3rd.

General theory of ritual food:
As it says in one of my info-documents-in-draft: “If you bring a bag of chips, you may be teased.”

There is encouragement to bring ‘real’ food (few preservatives, perhaps from the local area/your garden/the farmer’s market/other sustainable sources.) I can’t always afford to do what I did for the New Moon, and spring for a free-range no-hormone chicken to roast (or the equivalent) for all my food needs, but I do try hard to do so for ritual and post-ritual foods. There are a surprising number of inexpensive but filling post-ritual options (must do a post about those, too.)

That said, people have different resources - money, time to cook, ability to get to local markets. I would be quite happy with almost anything *except* “I stopped by the gas station on the way here and got a bag of chips” (which shows lack of forethought). Even a deli salad or fresh fruit (assuming it’s seasonally appropriate) makes a lot more sense.

My real concern is that people are thinking about it somewhat in advance, and trying to find something that will be lovely and suitable for the day. (i.e. bring a food you yourself will enjoy, and that is not served miserably out of season. Supermarket tomatoes in winter are an okay ingredient, but they shouldn’t be served like you’d serve a heirloom tomato warm from somone’s garden in the summer - which, okay, needs very little help or additional preparation, in my book. Maybe a little basil and olive oil. Mmm.)

You get the idea, I hope - it’s mostly about attention to what you bring, and how you wrap that into the total ritual experience, for me. There are many paths to that goal.

I actually really like the equinoxes though I know many people who struggle with them. I like the fall because, well, it’s my birthday (specifically, the 22nd), and I can’t think of a better way to spend it than ritual and feasting afterwards.

The spring, I enjoy because I love that moment of balance and quiet before the spring starts bouncing out in all due force. Minnesota is weird: some months, spring comes quickly, and if we’re lucky, it falls on a weekend. Some years, winter drags its feet about leaving (like this one, apparently: it was 35 and clear and melted snow on Thursday. Friday? 3+ inches of snow.)

Anyway, Thursday, before a busy SF con filled weekend, we did our first Sabbat ritual. Have a photo of the altar after we dyed eggs. You can see the altar here - it’s had a little photo editing done, as I am apparently incapable of pouring red wine into a cup on a white cloth without spilling some.

You can see the eggs on the left: we each wrote words or designs in wax pencil on the egg, and then dyed them whatever color seemed appropriate (using a ‘dowsing’ sort of method: hold the egg over the dye cups briefly and see which way they feel pulled.) We then used them as a divinatory/oracular source; what did the color + design suggest to us?

Some of them were fascinating: the red one, for example, says “Remember this color”, and it’s a gorgeous bright red. (Or was.)

This is the picture of our feast afterwards. One of our group goals/desires is good food and drink. This is what happens when you clear off the altar desk and use it for a dinner table. You see here, left to right:

• green beans, tomatoes (from my covenmate’s garden last summer) and garlic
• challah bread (same loaf as on the altar, obviously. It did try to take over the world, but was delicious. Recipe in Reichart’s Breadbaker’s Apprentice)
• The glass bowl has chicken salad - it had parsley and other green herbs in it, and tasted absolutely like spring. (We made sandwiches using the challah bread.)
• devilled eggs (in this case, made with mayo, mustard, and dill, with more dill as a garnish. I like dill. So does L.) Made, of course, using the eggs from ritual.

And liquid - wine from the same bottle as for ritual for L, who wasn’t driving shortly, and water (in the horse mug on the side of the table) for me.

We are currently alternating hosting rituals: this is my tiny little house: the curtains behind the altar lead into my bedroom alcove (big enough for my bed, a bookcase, a freestanding closet, and the desk when it’s not being an altar. Which altar tools we use depend a bit who’s hosting; whoever hosts mostly provides things like the water/salt/incense holders from our own tools right now.

Probably the most common issue asthmatic witches (and various other Pagans) raise is about incense.

Different kinds of problems:

One thing people don’t always realise initially is that there are different kinds of things you can react to with incense.

Type: You might react to stick incense, but not to cone or loose incense. You might react to synthetic fragrance notes, but not natural oils. You might react to commercial binders and preparations, but not to homemade incense or even handcrafted commercial incenses.

Scents/ingredients: You may only react to some specific scents, but not to all. I’ve got a good friend who’s very reactive to lavender and rose and patchouli, but who adores other scents.

Space or amount: You might have trouble with lots of incense in a small or tightly shut room - but be fine with a smaller amount, a larger room, or better ventilation.

My current home is 400 square feet (no doors except the bathroom) and well-ventilated (another term might be ‘drafty’ except when the winter plastic is up). I have days where I burn a third or half of a stick of incense. I also have days when two or three sticks over the course of the day is just fine. I can tell in advance which is which.

Before writing incense off entirely, it may be worth doing some cautious experimentation (assuming that your asthma is generally under control, and you do this in a space you can leave and not come back to until it’s aired out.) Get someone to help you, too: they may spot you having trouble before you consciously notice it.

Consider the times you’ve had trouble before - not just with incense, but with perfumes, bath products, smoke, or other related allergens. Keep a journal for a month if you have to, of the times you find it easier and harder to breathe. Are there any patterns? Keep track of any new patterns you spot as you look at incense options. It may be that you can find options that do work for you.

Options:

Are you reacting to something specific? Consider, as above, what you actually react to. Maybe you need to avoid floral incenses, but other ones are fine. Some people find the sticks in the stick incense to set them off: some of the Japanese stick incenses (shaped like a stick, but with no wood in the middle) sometimes work better for those people. (Also, they’re shorter, so they contain less actual incense.) Some people find the charcoal used for loose incense gives them trouble, but a cone (which has finely powdered wood in it to help it burn) works fine.

Consider other scent options: Depending on what you want the incense for, you may find other options work well. Perfume and essential oils are some common ones.

If you do want to use scent, consider applying perfume or using an oil burner may work just as well. (However, there are uses of incense that don’t work as well with this.) While some people with allergies or asthma react to all perfumes, many actually react to other substances in commercial perfumes besides the perfume oil - things like the alcohol or other carrier or base.

There’s a sizeable number of natural perfumers out there, using different approaches. I’m quite fond of the Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab oils (and I’m really fond of their ritual oils, which are at Twilight Alchemy Lab) I’ve also been really impressed by Magickal Realism’s work. (Bias note on this one: I know Di from my local Pagan community.) They have different approaches, but the smells are great!

One benefit of the oil burner or applying a perfume oil to yourself is that if you do have problems, it’s usually easier to get it out of your environment fast. (Wash it off your skin or blow out the oil burner). They’re also usually far less all-involving than incense smoke can be. Remember that essential oils should be diluted before use, and that some oils aren’t suitable if you’re pregnant, or if you’re dealing with some types of medical issues (and you may want to pay attention to those ingredients in perfume 0ils, too.)

If you want to represent the element of air (but don’t necessarily need scent) you can use a feather, a fan, or ribbon.

Don’t use it:

The last logical option is simply not to use it at all. The benefit, of course, is that you can’t react to what isn’t there.

The problem is that many traditions use it for specific reasons: some of those reasons are more adaptable with alternatives than others. In addition, scent is a very powerful trigger for some people: using it deliberately can be a very moving ritual act. Removing that opportunity for a group should be considered very carefully, because it will affect everyone else in the group’s experience (and if the group trains students who will go off and found groups of their own, can also affect practices of those groups down the line).

A group may decide to take this step (and public ritualists should consider incense use very carefully), but they may decide not to change everything for one person. (at least not without first exploring alternatives.) It is good, though, to ask questions about allergies, to let people know that incense will be used (if it will be), and what kind it’s likely to be, if anyone has concerns.

This is an introduction to a series of posts I’ve been contemplating for a long time. I was diagnosed with asthma in my college years, and still struggle with it regularly. It’s something that I have to keep in mind when looking at some kinds of ritual design, some practices and techniques - and just generally, in terms of being self-aware.

Asthma is sometimes called ‘the magician’s disease’ for various reasons: a number of well-known figures in esoteric circles have suffered from it. However, there isn’t always a lot of realistic discussion about what to do about it.

This series (which you can find under the tag ‘asthmatic witch‘) is going to focus on what’s worked for me (and that might also work for you or asthmatics you know), and what some of the many and varied options are.

Obviously, though, you are responsible for your own health. Don’t assume that what works for me works for you (and that what isn’t an option for me isn’t for you.) Check with your doctor and other medical advice.

A little background:

Asthma varies by person, though there are some common issues. So you know where I’m coming from, here’s what the issues are for me.

Triggers: Mostly allergy related, though I tolerate some kinds of exercise just fine and others not at all. (Running and climbing stairs are almost always hard for me, where walking, horseback riding, and swimming aren’t, even when I’m exerting myself.) I’m very allergic to feathers, quite allergic to dogs, mold, and fall pollens, and varying degrees of allergic to dust, cats, spring and summer pollens, and various other things.

I react to some kinds of incense, etc. but not all: almost anything is fine if it’s in a decently sized, well-ventilated room.

Lung issues: Along with the asthma, I have some lung scarring from bacterial pneumonia when I was 11. (I think that the scarring has something to do with my exercise issues: there are some body positions - like leaning forward when running or on stairs) that seem to decrease my lung capacity significantly, and if I’m already having trouble, it’s just too much.)

Between the two, I’m usually running on 80-90% of the ‘normal’ lung capacity for my age and height. If it drops much below 80%, I start seeing a drastic decrease in my ability to function - not just physically, but mentally. Online stuff that normally takes me 45 minutes will take me 3 hours to get through, along with the more obvious things like having trouble climbing stairs, walking long distances, or dealing with other allergens.

Medication: I take an albuterol inhaler as needed for immediate relief, but I’ve had extremely bad luck with side effects to the inhaled steroids I’ve tried (they send me into fast-cycling mood swings. This is not a way I want to live. Everyone agrees with me once they’ve seen it in action.)

In late 2006, I started seeing an herbalist, partly for help with asthma related issues, and that’s been really succesful. I still have problems, particularly in the fall (when I hit the combination of fall pollens plus mold) until the first few solid frosts - but I’ve been way better otherwise, and can moderate what I’m taking based on how I feel day to day (within the guidelines my herbalist gives me) without noticeable side effects.

Triggers I’m around: I live in Minnesota, so there are pollens around. I live with one cat (who I tolerate really well: I wash my bedding regularly, feed her food that helps reduce her dander and her own food intolerances, and run an air filter all the time in the bedroom.) The covenstead of the group I’ve trained with (I’m getting ready to hive, so this issue is diminishing) has two dogs, five cats, and I do have allergic reactions regularly, even though they work hard on cleaning before events.

Minnesota is generally fairly good about mold (we get a fair amount of moisture most years, but it generally dries out fully in between), except in the fall, until the frosts kill any mold from fallen leaves. Fall is definitely my worst time: early September through late November eats my brain, my energy, and my focus.