Transcript: DORI MIDNIGHT on Spinning Webs of Support /310
Ayana Young Hello and welcome to For The Wild Podcast, I'm Ayana Young. Today I'm speaking with Dori Midnight.
Dori Midnight You know, systems of domination rely on severing these connections, and the threat of violence and obliteration and loss of connection, leaves people feeling really vulnerable and afraid and that, in turn, really, I think, becomes fertile ground for adopting toxic mimics of protection.
Ayana Young Dori Midnight practices intuitive healing, weaves collaborative, liberatory ritual spaces, makes potions, and writes liturgy, spells, prayers, and poems. For over 20 years, Dori has been practicing and teaching on ritual and remedies for unraveling times, reconnecting with traditions of Jewish ancestral wisdom, community care work, and queer magic and healing. Dori’s work is supported and inspired by a web of teachers, dreamers, and co-conspirators in Disability and Healing Justice work, queer liberation, and earth based, multi-rooted/diasporic Judaism and is in service to more love, more healing, and more freedom for every body. Raised on Tongva land (Los Angeles), Dori currently lives on unceded Pocumtuc/Nimpuc land (Western Massachusetts).
Dori, I am so gleeful and grateful to be sharing this time with you today. Thanks so much for being on the show.
Dori Midnight No, thank you, Ayana. It's such a gift to get to be with you.
Ayana Young Well, I want to start off by just saying how inspired I am by all the ways your work weaves together magical and liberatory practices. I think it'd be great to begin by locating us within your lineages, as well as if you could speak a bit about your healing offerings and your origins in Healing Justice work.
Dori Midnight So I love this question because my great grandmother, whenever she would meet someone, the first thing she would ask was, “Who are your people?” And I think it's a really beautiful way to get to know somebody and, like, feel the way that we are more than just our little selves in this lifetime. So I can speak a little bit about some of my lineages, and starting with my ancestors of blood, my dad's side, are Jews from the Pale of Settlement, so the region between the Baltic and the Black Sea, where Jews were exiled by the Russian Empire. So they are from Romania, Latvia and Ukraine, that is what that land is called now, and they came to the US in the late 1800s, like around 1890 or something through New York City. And they lived on the Lower East Side, and in Brooklyn for a couple generations before going to the Midwest. And that said, my family were very religious, they're Orthodox and also Hasidic Jews. And, you know, that journey is, is like, of when they came to the US and how that things shifted for them religiously, spiritually, culturally.
Like there's this amazing story about my great grandmother. Like when she got to the US, she loved bacon, and she would like to cook bacon, and then smoke a whole pack of cigarettes to cover up the smell of bacon. I feel like it is a perfect little story about assimilation and her story of assimilation. And on my mom's side is a little bit more mysterious and unknown and complicated. My mom's mom was an orphan. Her mom died when she was an infant, and she was in and out of orphanages and foster homes for her whole childhood. So I don't know much about her story, her family, and my mom’s dad was Jewish, and came from his family, his parents emigrated when his mom was pregnant with him, and he was born in the US, and they came from the Ukraine, but from what I understand, they were Sephardic. So they're kind of like longer roots, their deeper roots were from the Balkans and Iberian Peninsula, and you know, that Mediterranean region, and that side of my family, my Jewish family, were more secular. And in fact, like that side of like, a bunch of his cousins and relatives were kind of like secular lefty socialists who moved out of the Midwest and moved out to LA in the 20s and were involved in you know, all kinds of Jewish lefty shenanigans. And so those are my blood people. And in terms of my my lineage of practice, and my chosen people, I really, you know, connect my healing practice, it feels like it's sort of in the flow of rivers of Jewish healing traditions, and some of those people call themselves sanadores [sp?], precantadores [sp?], those are Ladino names, buenas madres, and also Ashkenazi healers, people who carried ancestral wisdom and listen deeply and tended to their communities with love and care and some of whom just you know, didn't have titles who just did that kind of listening and tending out of kitchens and homes.
And, you know, I came of age, like in terms of sort of how I came into my own healing practice, it’s something that I was always oriented to as a young person. My great grandmother, the one I talked about, the bacon eating cigarette smoking one, Francis, I grew up at her feet. And when I was like six or seven, I always loved to tie her shoes. And when I was like six or seven, she joined the trend of getting velcro shoes and she had these like hot pink sneakers that were shiny. And I was sitting at her feet, like with our little tradition of me tying her shoes, and it was sort of like neither one of us could give up that practice, even though she no longer had shoe laces. And she took my face in her hand, and she looked at me and she was like, “You have an old soul, you are a storyteller, you are going to keep the stories alive, you and those little blue eyes of yours.” You know, I was like this anomaly in my family who have like these beautiful, chocolatey brown eyes, and I came out with these blue eyes and nobody knew where it came from. And she was like, you are going to remember the stories and you are going to bring these stories through. And I think, you know, I just soaked up everything she said to me, you know, she liked, gave her plants little, when they looked wilty and unhappy, she would give them a sprinkle of vodka. And you know, she gave me these bobby pins. When I was a kid, she chopped her-she had these long braids that she wrapped in like cinnamon rolls around her ears, and when she cut her hair, she gave me her little tin of bobby pins. And she was like, bobby pins, these metals keep the demons away. So it was like always, like she was dropping little bits of wisdom. And so I feel like she's sort of one of my main and first teachers and also like, gave me a lot of direction and guidance and purpose and still does, you know, even though she's in spirit now.
I was very connected to the spirit world, as a young person, and you know, and also was like, loved dancing. I grew up in the valley in LA and it was full of multitudes. And then in my teens and 20s I came of age in like a community of really politicized queer witches in the Bay Area in the 90s and 2000s. And just was like, you know, hanging with radical fairies and leather dykes and organizers and sex workers. And I was also at the time also like really immersing myself in rivers of radical diasporic, just Jewish lesbian feminists and unlearning Zionism. And at that same time, I was diagnosed with cancer in my early 20s. And so that really initiated me into you know, kind of like being scooped up into the loving arms of other sick and disabled people. And you know, what now is called by, you know, Kara Paige and Susan Raffo and Leah Lakshmi and you know, other Beloved's like Disability Justice, Healing Justice work, and at the time was just, just like, sick and disabled friends caring for each other and being with each other in these ways. So like, that was sort of the culture in that I was in in my young adult time that yeah, initiated me into my own my own healing my own personal healing and in the cauldron of like queerness and queer liberation and kind of radical magical worlds. And also was at the same time like I was apprenticing the person who was seen for healing work this this amazing, now, crone cube LA and in learning about intuitive healing, and stones and plants, and so it was really like my own my own healing process, my own, you know, ongoing, forever lifetime healing that I'm still doing, but at the time, like in a very explicit way around sexual violence and trauma and chronic illness. And at the same time experiencing all this like joy and abundance and expansiveness in with all these like magical sparkly weirdos and freaks and in the bay, and so those are definitely also my people that are like, you know, thicker than blood, community people and loved one and chosen ones.
Ayana Young Wow, what a beautiful and really personal introduction you shared with us. I really appreciate your willingness to share so much of yourself. I really was with you, as you were sharing these stories like seeing you with your grandma in the Bay Area, and just the wardrobes of the times, and like I really saw it in my mind. And there's so much I could ask from this point. But I guess one thing that I have really been thinking about is this article you wrote titled Jewish Plant Magic: Rooting In and in it, you ask your ancestors quote, how do we know what we know if they didn't write books, and so much was lost through assimilation, sexism, racism, anti and semitism? And I want to pose this question to you now, how do we know what, what we know? And I think this is a question of intuition, and trusting intuition. And I think it's really challenging for so many of us to trust those inner voices. Now more than ever, because there is so much noise. There is noise with the media, with social media with people's opinions. I think that the dominant culture has done a really good job designing ways for us to not trust our intuition, and trust this inner knowing of our past. And so I want to pose some of those thoughts to you. And if you see that as well, what are ways that you inform others of how to start to reconnect to that intuition again, and combat so much of the distraction and energy that tries to tell us that? That's not true, correct. valuable? And so on and so forth?
Dori Midnight Thank you for that question and, and thanks for all your questions. Most of the time of my days I spend asking other people questions and doing a lot of deep listening. And so it's fun, and then an adjustment to be talking and being the one asked. I guess, I think about the story that this like, very classic Jewish story that my mom told me when I was a kid, which is the story that before you were born, when you were just like a little soul, maybe you were just a little sparkle, or maybe it was like when you were, you know, kind of like cooking away inside somebody's uterus, you knew everything, you knew all the wisdom of the universe, you knew languages, and you knew, you know, maybe you knew physics or you had all these skills and knowledge. And the story goes that, then you're born and as soon as you were born, an angel came. And not only did this angel bless you, but this angel tapped you on that little spot above your lip, that little indentation under your nose, you can just place your fingertip there and see how it fits in so perfectly. And when the angel tapped you there, everything, you forgot everything-it’s gone. And like every Jewish story, this can you know, this can be interpreted in so many ways snd something that I love about this story, or what's really powerful about it to me is that then it becomes that, like learning is a remembering. And it's like remembering what we knew. And something that we already knew that we knew in our souls or we knew in our bodies are whatever the differences between those things are and that we can we have access we can remember what our ancestors did.
I think this remembering, especially in the context of empire and modernity and white supremacy and trauma, the remembering is an act of resistance and the remembering is an act of healing. And so yeah, I guess I feel like the learning about these things is like, an unveiling or a recovering or revealing of these wisdoms, and you know, every time I talk about these things with other people, or teach about these things or, you know, do healing work with people, it's like, this moment of familiarity or recognition, or like, do I really, do I really get to have this inheritance and also, like, this feels so familiar, or somehow I feel like I already knew this. And so I think that can be a really powerful experience in terms of like, what that affirmation of our intuition feels like, I think we need that affirmation and I think we really need each other to do this remembering like, I think one of the things like you were talking about this, like, the noise and the culture that is such a, you know, an attack, so undermining, to being able to hear ourselves to be able to hear our intuition and trust our intuition, but it also like, makes it hard to hear and trust each other. And I do feel like this kind of remembering is a collective practice. And we need each other in this practice to help reflect these things, and to help each other remember.
You know, we do carry these, we carry these traditions in our bodies, in our dreams, in folktales, and songs in the memories of our grandparents and great grandparents, they're hidden in our rituals, and prayers, and many of these practices are still alive and well. And I think that's important to remember, too, that not all is lost, and like the scale and quality of the loss of these traditions really varies between different dice workers. And so it's also really important to honor and celebrate the richness of these practices that have remained vibrant, and also the resilience of those who have kept them alive. And, you know, I mean, and in the face of centuries of empire, and colonialism and Orientalism and state violence and exile and patriarchy, and, you know, the list goes on. So many of these healing practices have been lost and hidden and suppressed, or obscured and subsumed, and sort of, like recast into religion, that kind of, like lost their, you know, for lack of a better word, their magic. And with that remembering, it's also essential to say, you know, like, this is not a practice of romanticizing, or fetishizing, resisting nostalgia about it, but also like, bringing forth this wisdom.
I feel like part of my work and the work that so many of us are engaged in is like, living it, adapting it, and pointing these legacies towards liberation, which I think is for me, like what I really understand Judaism to be a practice of is like, this is a living tradition. This is a tradition that has always adapted to the context that we are living in it has always responded and remains connected to something ancient and as reverence but also like wrestling and tumbling and getting down and dirty with text and, and so like, yeah, like, I think that all you need is like a scrap or a seed or a fragment or a story. You know, so much of Jewish study and Jewish practices, like you can unfold a single letter and derive so much meaning like there are mystical practices in Judaism, of meditating on breath, or on one single letter, let alone a word or a phrase, let alone like an entire Psalm or prayer or a practice of just like, throwing some salt, braiding bread, lighting a candle. And so, I guess one thing I want to say is, it's like, it doesn't take much like there's there's a lot in the way of accessing these things, including a feeling of like, not being Jewish enough or not being the right kind of Jewish or, you know, different ways that people's families assimilated for survival for safety. And so, giving ourselves permission and giving each other permission to access these things, and encouraging each other to get messy and make mistakes and being willing to like fumble, and being really forgiving and loving with each other while at the same time, like, being rigorous and being in integrity, and, you know, doing our studies and our research together in a way of like being in practice, like before we go out and teach something. So it's like a lot of listening, and moving slowly and with intention. And also, you know, I think your question of how do we do this? How do we reconnect? I think, for me, I feel like I've learned a lot about this through my queer ancestors, and, like, through queer liberation of just like, following desire and following longing. And those being a form of wisdom, those being a practice in itself. And so like, letting the desire and longing arise, like making a lot of space for desire and longing, like, I really fucking want to know what my ancestors ate, or prayed, or what plants they played with, or what songs they sang. And before we kind of foreclosed upon that with grief, and, like a sense of loss, and the impossibility of knowing those things, like, the same way that we do as like, queer and trans people is like, you know, protect that desire as as holy and sacred and full of life and, and then letting that desire and longing lead you like a fucking headlight, you know? Like, where does that desire want you to go, deep into some cavern, up into the stars, into a synagogue out into the fields, into text, you know, studying with all the amazing people who are sharing a lot of wisdom right now, letting it be a guide. And also, you know, of course, at the same time making space for the grief that comes up around like, how, and when, and why there's been loss and disconnection, but I think like untwining them like unbreaking those things so that the feeling of longing and desire and interest doesn't have the flavor of grief and loss and kind of like resignation about it, you know?
The Jewish tradition has this tradition of study with friends. It's called Chavrusa, which shares the root with the word friend, it's like a study friend. And I think there's so much wisdom in that ancestral practice. I think there's a lot of beauty in doing things on our own and in solitude and in quiet and, you know, I'm also sort of an extroverted hermit, and so I value a lot of study on my own, too-and I think that there is a way that brings people in with you. And, you know, I think as a person who was raised in a very vibrant Jewish community, I really see the way that community helps us practice like that. Rituals, moving through time doing these things that have to do with life and death and meaning. Like, it's helpful to do them, with others holding that space with you and holding those intentions with you. So I also think, like, doing it with friends, doing it in community and and then I think, you know, letting it live in your body, giving yourself space and time, learning about doing research. Like I'm an I'm a nerd, and like for me, that's for sure been one of my most treasured spiritual practices, like, what are the recipes? And can I cook them? What did they grow? And can I grow it? What are the songs they sang? I'm going to learn them. Just like this immersion, following the calendar, like being in like, full negation of capitalist time and being like, I'm gonna follow the moon the way that my ancestors have for 2000 years. And then, like, for me, it feels like really essential just to ground it, and also let it infuse my politics so that these practices this practice of reconnecting to this wisdom is part of divesting from white supremacy and patriarchy and and also like continuing to let these practices support us in showing up for, you know, pointing these legacies towards liberation, divesting from cultural appropriation And, you know, for me, the plants have been the plants have really been a way for me personally to do this. And I feel like it really resonates for a lot of people because they are living beings, they are part of our ancestry. These memories travel on their scent and their tastes. And so that, for me, has been a really embodied way to reconnect and re-enlive and re-enchant these wisdoms and memories.
Ayana Young Before you started speaking about plants, I was going to ask you a very different question, but now that you brought plants up, I perked up and I'm thinking about herbalism and our connection to plant allies and how we work with plants, whether that's through food, or medicine, making, or growing, or harvesting, tending, or just being with, praying to, building a relationship with and so on and so forth. And I think that being with plants, in one way, is so natural and simple and it just is this relationship beyond time. But, on another end of the spectrum, it's also complex and deep and complicated as we have grown into these modern humans. And so I would love to just open a question up to you about your relationship with plants, and how you build your relationship with them in terms of using them as medicine or as food or just being with them.
I remember for me, when I started to become interested in getting closer to plants, it was this big question of what does that mean? And how do you do it? And, you know, it's one thing to just buy a tincture at the store, which is great. And I really support people in doing that. But I think that there's a lot of questions that could come up of am I doing it right? Or what is respectful? How do we deepen those relationships? How much time does it take? And even questions around honorable harvest? I know I'm throwing out a lot right now. But I'm just doing that kind of buffet for you with questions around plants to see what feels alive for you in this moment, and what you could share with us about your relationship.
Dori Midnight I love that the plants just like took over the interview. You were like I was gonna ask you these other things, but then you said there were plants and now we have to talk about this. Yeah, it's like that. Well, okay, there's so many things that you said that I'm like, where should we go first? Well, you know, I think that first I guess I want to respond to the question that you brought up, or the feeling that you brought up like, I want to be respectful and then there's also like, the kind of shadow side of that of questioning oneself. Am I doing it right? And you know, like, is it okay and, and I think it's like, to me, it reminds me of this Jewish teaching where this Rabbi…you're supposed to keep these two scraps of paper in your pockets, one on one side and one on the other. On one side, the scrap of paper says like, there's no one like you, you're the only one that is you. This sort of message is like your innate divinity and the exceptional miracle that is you. And then in the other pocket, there's a little note that says, you’re dust, you're dirt, you're just like, like everybody else. Like both there's like a humility to it and also, like, you're special, everyone's special. You know, we're all made of the same stuff. And I think that, being willing to be in the wrestling and to hold these contradictions that aren't really, you know, contradictory of like, give yourself permission, be willing to make mistakes, play, really invite in a spirit of play, and not having to be right and purist about it, and I think giving each other permission and giving each other like, just a lot of love and forgiveness and space to not know and to be like, I'm just gonna try this thing. Gosh, there's just so much pressure, I think, especially in a culture where like, also everybody's so public about everything on social media to like, just be right, get it right, be really good. And I just like, I really want us to dissolve that and be able to, like, be creative. The process is so messy, getting to know who you are is so messy. And so like, how can we give each other a lot of space to play. And at the same time, like being in integrity, and being respectful and bringing in this kind of reverence for the plants, and the ancestors is imperative. And so I think, like, yeah, both right, like, we need to bring both into our practices. And, and my sense is that it's sort of like, for a lot of us, we lean one way or the other harder, right? So some of us may be really hard on ourselves and feel like we, you know, can't give ourselves permission to be messy, or to not know, or to try something new. And because of that, we tend to be harder on ourselves and probably are more interested in doing the things that are about like, rigor and integrity and a lot of questioning, right, and the people who, you know, are a little bit more, you know, whatever careless, I guess not in a way that's like, because they want to hurt people, or maybe they feel more entitled, or maybe they've experienced a lot of entitlement. And so they, it may not come as naturally to them to be as thoughtful about things like, the impact that they have, or their own power, or whatever. And so, because of that, they're not going to tend to bring a lot of rigor or precision to learning, and practicing.
This is why it's really good to do these practices and learn together, it's because we can learn from each other and be like, “Okay, if you're a person who feels like “Whatever it’s fine, you don’t have this? Use this.” Learn from those who bring a little bit more precision and if you're a person who tends to be really hard on yourself, like, getting to be with a kind of more wild and free people and just be like, I'm just gonna try this, and I don't know what it's gonna be like, and it might be a mistake, but it'll be a learning, you know. So I think there's that piece to the question of how we practice these things. That's one thing. And then. Okay, so I think you asked, there's so many different pieces in question. And I'm trying to remember what they all were. It was like plants in general.
Ayana Young It was, truly, a buffet of all different flavors. But yeah, I think I just want you to flow where the plants are taking you today. And I love hearing your stories. So if you wanted to tell more stories of your past of specific plants, or when they came into your life and how or how you're working with plants today, or even how you're seeing people and plants in your practice. Yeah, I'm open to any and all-the plants are really just kind of singing to me right now being like, tell me a story. All stories. I just want to be in this conversation.
Dori Midnight Yes, yes, let's bring them in. One of my favorite quotes about plants is from the Apocrypha, which is like a non-canonical Jewish text, which of course makes me love it even more. It's from the Book of Enoch, which is a book that is a lot about angels. It's so weird. It is totally freaky and there's a lot of really weird shit in it. But, you know, one thing I love about Jewish practice and studying texts is like really, you get to like take something from the text and be like, here's what I think it meant, like that's midrashic tradition. That is the tradition of, you know, finding these gems in the texts, this is what speaks to me, this is and this is what my ancestors have always done with text is wrestle with text. So there's this line in the Apocrypha that goes, the angels taught the daughters of men, incantations, exorcisms, and the cutting of roots and revealed to them the healing plants. And it's in the context this this line is in the context of basically talking about, like, condemning women as witches, basically in the Apocrypha and being like, these these femmes, these trans people, these non binary, these people without access to institutional power, who like aren't supposed to be reading and aren't supposed to be teaching and, you know, shouldn't be doing these things, or cavorting with angels, you know, and we can talk about what that means-what we mean by angels are, I mean, that's a really fun conversation. And here's what they're learning. They're learning about healing plants, they're learning about how to release, remove, clear, create boundaries around harmful energies and entities, otherwise known as demons, the name is Shedim in Hebrew. You know, 2000 years ago, our ancestors were very concerned about demons, the cutting of roots, you know, harvesting roots, harvesting plants, and incantations. You know, one might ask, what is the difference between a prayer and an incantation? What is the difference between a song and a spell? You know, what does it matter, like what the words are doesn't matter, who's saying it doesn't matter, what the intention is, and why they're saying these things like an incantation is like a sacred speaking and singing, have words for an intention, in this case, you know, for healing. And so this line, to me is like a guide for how our ancestors worked with plants, and that they learned from angels, and that the angels taught them which means this knowledge is available, this knowledge is in the ethers, this knowledge is in the plants themselves, the angels of the plant, the angels of our intuition, the angels of our ancestors whispering to us and through us.
I carry that frame into my learning and apprenticing with the plants and into my relationship with what I think of as the angels, the angels with plants and the angels of healing and the ancestors and a real connection to this lineage of people who were learning in non traditional ways, who were learning outside of institutions, who are teaching each other who were like, carrying, and doing transmission of wisdom and knowledge in the fields, in the wilds, by the waters, in their homes, you know, outside of synagogues. And that's the lineage, that's the lineage that I want to be and that's the lineage that I want to carry forward and uplift and reveal. And so it is very much like a body practice. It's not I mean, I love texts. I'm a text nerd. And I'm also you know, I'm a body and I love learning through my body and through play and experiments and being with the plants themselves. So for me, like there's a few plants that are central to that, one of them is garlic. I think of garlic as this heart of Jewish plant magic. Garlic is in the Torah, it talks about it as like this, you know, sort of like as the Jews are reminiscing about being in Egypt, where they were enslaved, they're like, remember when we see garlic and onions and how it made us really strong to build the pyramids when we were slaves. You have to remember they're like saying that when they're in the wilderness and they don't really have food, they're like subsisting on like, you know, heavenly food, but also dry crackers and and then the garlic. Garlic is talked about in the Talmud, as a healing remedy, as a plant that is specifically a delight to eat on Shabbat, like, it's connected to joy and this imperative that on Shabbat, we experience joy. And one of the ways that we can experience joy is by eating garlic. And reflexively one of the other delights of Shabbat is sex and garlic also, like, makes us frisky and want to have sex and it it talks about how garlic dissolves jealousy, and warms our heart and soul, it warms our digestion, all these things that it's like, you know, science and plant, like botanists now are like, here are the constituents and the properties of garlic, you know, and meanwhile, 2000 years ago, our ancestors, these rabbis who were writing it down in the Talmud, who were 100% learning these things from their mothers and sisters and daughters and aunties, you know, then wrote it down. These are the wisdoms that we know about garlic and garlic is like, you know, it's a community healing plant, it's like itself a community, it's like a tight little ball of individuals that all are connected and kind of stick together and rub up against each other and help us stay well as a community, right, like when we eat garlic, our immune systems are robust. So it can mean that we can be in intimacy, we can be in community together, and then, you know, you pull these little individuals apart, you stick them in the ground, and they grow more. They contain their own community, they make their communities.
So it's also a plant that is, you know, a beautiful plant for a diasporic people/a people who are exiled from place, to carry in one's pocket and to carry in one's bag from place to place and plant where you live. And then there's this sort of like this really intense story that garlic carries, which is that, you know, Jews were called garlic eaters just named ourselves garlic eaters, we call ourselves garlic eaters in the Talmud, and then like in the Roman Empire, and throughout Europe through the Middle Ages, into the Renaissance, and even into the, you know, big wave of immigration to the US at the turn of the century, Jews were called garlic eaters, and a trope of anti semitism was this idea that Jews stunk and smelled like garlic. And, you know, meanwhile, like in the Roman Empire in Europe, in the Middle Ages, Jews were sought out for their magical powers for their, you know, capacities for amulet making, but also persecuted for being hyper magical spell workers and smelling of garlic. Meanwhile, garlic was also this protection plant that people hold on their windows and doors and carry in their pockets and worn little amulet bags for protection. So it has this power as both something that we identify as and are identified by that protects us but also marks us and like, was a site of being targeted. You know, like in the Inquisition, the Inquisitors would walk around the streets. Kind of like tracking the scent of cooking garlic and going to the house where the garlic was cooking. And you could be persecuted for cooking garlic, because that was the mark that was like one of the marks of being a Jew. And so garlic is a plant that I work with a lot in terms of like, as an ally for protection like this zesty, pungent-you know, I think for a lot of people, not just Jews, but like a lot of people who come from like cultures, who are children of immigrants, who experienced like a sense of shame of smelling like this kind of like assimilation that happens because of white supremacy and racism of like not wanting to smell different. And then losing connection with an ancestral practice, losing connection to something that has been a resource for your people for 1000s of years. And so reclaiming a connection with garlic whether or not you eat it if you just place it on your altar, but you know, you can eat it, you can cook with it, you can pray with it. There's a tradition of bringing garlic and placing a clove of garlic on the gravestones, like people do stones but people also place garlic on the gravestones, as you know as protection as an act of reverence and love and care, because that's how we relate to garlic.
So I think garlic is a beautiful plant to begin with. So I grow garlic, I love to give it to people. I love to encourage people to work with it in, you know, in the daily ways that are the magical ways, you know, like both the daily ways that can be magic. I was recently talking to my uncle about this, and he told me a story that his dad, my grandfather, my grandpa used to eat garlic before he went to bed. He would have garlic before bed, which I love. He was very like, robust, hearty, he loved to sing, he was so handsome. And I can just like when I think about him, like going to bed with garlic breath. And, you know, he had a real lust for life. But he would say, you know, well, I eat garlic before I go to bed. So if the angel of death comes, I'll just open my mouth and say, “Who are you” just right in the face of the angel of death. So my grandpa, the story is basically like, fighting off the Angel of Death by breathing garlic breath in the Angel of Death's face. And, you know, my grandma, my great grandma carried it in her pocketbook, and tucked it in her bra, and, you know, had little bits of garlic around the house, and my mom would put it in my ear and have me eat it when I was sick. And so it's like, even though I wasn't taught all of this, like, wild mythology of the magic of garlic, these little cloves were tucked away for me to find. And then they opened up this whole world for me. And I think that plants can do that, so much of it is about scent, our memory, the way that our brains work is connected to our olfactory, more than sight, more than hearing, these smells can evoke so much beyond us, beyond our personal memories. So, I think garlics like, pungent newness and, and protection, like ancestral protection is a good one. And, you know, I work with rosemary a lot, too, which is like another plant that I think is really beautiful for evoking and strengthening memories that we might not feel like we have access to. And that's where it sort of comes into being like, memory dream, the stories that can unfold with our imagination, and letting ourselves imagine letting ourselves imagine as an act of resistance, letting ourselves imagine, as an act of like a gift to ourselves. And I can talk like, you know, I'm happy to go into more plants, talk more about rosemary or cedar, as much as you want. I can talk about plants all the time.
Ayana Young It's so hard to turn down the offer to talk about plants more or hear your stories. So I'm really feeling like we just need a part two at this point, and that one interview will not be enough. And there are other questions that I want to ask, but when you say words like rosemary and cedar, I don't know how to say no to that. Maybe if you could just pick whichever one of those two or both. But I really don't think I can pass that up. Because I love both of those plants so much. And I can smell them as you say them and feel them and taste them on my tongue. So anyways, I'd love to hear about both or either before we move on.
Dori Midnight Sure. Yeah, it's really like that, right? Like they enchant you and are begging you to fall in love with them and then you're like, how can we not talk about you? We love you so much. Well, I'll talk a little bit about cedar. So cedar is known as אֶרֶז in Hebrew. And you know, people get really this is like, where that kind of like a perfectionist purist thing, like, you know, ethnobotanist biblical people who really who study like the plants in the Bible and get really into like, well, did they mean this kind of cedar or that kind of cedar? And what about the city where we live? And so I think that's always that's always a question that comes up for people where it's like, well, I live in the Pacific Northwest, and this is the kind of cedar that I have, or, you know, my family is from Syria or Iraq or Iran, and like, this is the cedar that my family was really connected to. And I think when those questions arise, I was taught, I grew up, I went to Hebrew school three days a week. I mean, I ditched a lot and went to the parking lot, but I did attend some Hebrew school, one of the thing that I actually learned, other than some things that I had to unlearn was about the value of questions and how questions are like actually a sacred practice and that it's not the answering of questions. So just even people who are listening to this, as questions are rising, I just want to lay them upon the altar. Be with the questions, just love the questions. And so like this question of which cedar are we talking about? Can I use blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. This is one of those places where I'd be like, learn about it, learn about what it is, learn about where it comes from, learn about, you know, always in integrity and reverence and respect, especially as people who for those of us who are settlers, and also give yourself permission to be like, as diasporic people, Jews were always connecting with the plants, you know, they bring some plants with them, and then they were connecting with the plants that grew around them and and that their neighbors were using, you know, there was a lot of cultural syncretism, there was a lot of sharing, you know, Jews were always living amongst the dominant culture and they were learning the recipes and remedies and languages and traditions of the people that you know, were also maybe like the you know, the people who were their neighbors so, cedar is a plant that's really you know, tree that's really sacred in in Jewish you know, I never know I get really hung up on like, do I call it a tradition do I call it you know, Jewish culture and spiritual practice, whatever, you know, it's a Jewish sacred thing. And cedar was used as the beams of Solomon's temple and cedar was what used in the Ark, in the holiest of holies, like it has this role as being known as used in shipbuilding. It's aromatic and those kinds of constituents resist rot and pests, it's very strong. And kind of like, in a way, like creates a boundary with its scent with its aroma. But that's specifically used in the architecture of spirit that's used to house holiness, that's used to contain holiness. And so I think of cedar as a tree that helps us create space for holiness. And, you know, it said that there, you know, even though this is not something I was taught in Hebrew school, that there were priestesses outside of the temple of the ancient temple, who burns cedar is a purifying and cleansing smoke before the priests would enter into the holiest of holies. And so, for me, that is, I take that to mean that like this, you know, that's a plant that we have burned that we've used as a smoke to cleanse and to get ourselves ready to enter into altered space, or into sacred space, which, you know, really gets everywhere, not just in temples.
There's a lot more lore and legend and myth and magic with cedar, but I use it, you know, I like to dip it in water, like fresh branches and do you know, kind of like rain down cedar droplets all over my body or for other people for cleansing, I like to burn it. And I also really like to just like, you know, when people send me cedar from wherever they live, and just put it on my altar as a way of connecting. I think this is part of diasporic tradition too, of like, making holy, you know, the whole story of Judaism, about like, really centering on this temple that doesn't exist anymore, that was destroyed and that being one narrative, but just being like, everywhere is holy, everywhere is sacred. Everywhere is a place where we can access the divine and everyone can you know, not just not just priests and I think like, being friends with cedar is like a way that I experienced that.
Ayana Young Cedar or at least red cedar who I was conjuring as you're speaking isn't around me but Yellow Cedar is and I'm thinking about practicing the droplets, spreading the droplets over my body that sounds really beautiful and really special. And I really appreciate your stories and all these really magical and simple things and I don't know why the word pure is coming to me. But these ways of being with plants don't need to be so complicated or thought out or that there's no expert culture needed here. And I really appreciate that. I think it's really welcoming. And although I could continue asking you questions about plants, and we've figured that out already, I do want to get into a topic that is, I'd say tough for a lot of us. And I want to ask you about reclaiming Judaism from Zionism, and solidarity with a free and sovereign Palestine. So I'm wondering if you could speak to the shared interests between Palestinian Liberation from Israeli settler colonialism, and apartheid and Jewish divestment from Zionism?
Dori Midnight Thanks for this question, Ayana. Speaking from my perspective, my experience as a white Jewish person in the US. And, you know, I just want to say, like, I’ve been involved in organizing around Palestinian Liberation in the Jewish community for a really long time and I think for me, like the shared interest is just that I truly believe that our liberation's are entwined, you know, and that all liberation and struggles for liberation is tied up together. And that, I think, coming from a place of just believing that all people deserve to live in dignity, that all people deserve to be free from harm. And then for me explicitly as a Jewish person in the US, it's like, I feel like it's part of my, it's part of my my work to undo and resist Zionism, because, like, as a project of settler colonialism for one, like, I believe in dismantling settler colonialism, and all of its forms and undoing Empire everywhere for everyone's liberation. And then as a Jew, you know, in the US, and also in occupied Palestine, is that it’s a project that's being done that purports to create Jewish safety, and, or to solve Jewish safety. And, you know, Judaism is 1000s of years old. And the State of Israel is not even 100 years old, you know. And so, I guess I feel like, it's really important to remember that because I think those of us who get involved in this, like it can just like, the coming up against Empire can feel so impossible. And that I always find that to be like, when I think about time, you know, it's a way that I work, even when I'm feeling disheartened about the destruction of our planet, or you know, anything that sort of like, where I begin to really feel into feeling disheartened or hopeless, or small or insignificant. Like to remember time, like a big time, often is a really helpful practice for me.
So when I think about how young Zionism is, and also like, really understand its roots, like I also am like, this is like, it's not actually complicated. I think that's one myth. And it's really young. And it really is, like you said, it's a settler colonial project. And I feel like, for me, that is antithetical to, for lack of a better word, like Jewish theology, Jewish spirituality, Jewish values, and I'm not alone in this. This is not like my original thinking, that this is like empire kind of co-opting and militarizing a tradition. And so I think like, you know, as part of my practice as doing all of this beautiful reconnecting with and teaching about and practicing these Jewish traditions like, I am also attuning to the legacies of resistance and healing, and like pulling from these threads of these practices in rebellious history as a counter spell to ethnonationalism, as a counter spell to militarization and carceral systems. And I'm really interested in connecting with these ancestral practices, because I think they offer us resources, alternative support, and counterspells to creating safety through the state, which we know doesn't create safety, which we know just creates more insecurity and does harm and destruction for everyone, and especially for Palestinians. And so, you know, I think what a lot of like, Jews in the US are reckoning with is like, what does it mean, when one's sense or illusion of safety is like, actually directly harmful and impacting the safety of other people? Yeah, I think it is, these are hard questions. But I think like that, for me it is. It is part of the practice of like, we don't just get to connect with these beautiful lineages of plant magic without reckoning pointed and being with the harms that are being done in occupied Palestine. And for me, they're very connected, you know, a lot, there's lots of different ways to dismantle empire, to resist empire. And for me, this is like part of my practice, work, and longer work than me and all of us-of resistance.
I have a hope and a prayer that, you know, that my work can be part of, well, I guess like to connect it with like, so I don't think it's separate from what we were talking about before, it doesn't feel like a diverging from talking about garlic and cedar. Because, you know, in my work, like, what I'm really interested in is that, like, for 1000s of years, Jews have had these practices of carrying garlic and wearing amulets, and participating in a multitude of expressions of like, of collective care, to cultivate safety, to cultivate protection for ourselves in our communities. And like, these practices, leave and are woven from connection and presence, connection to ourselves to each other, to place, to elements, to earth, to ancestors and ancestral tradition to life itself, you know, or whatever word you want to use for divinity and mystery. And I do think inherently, these practices are actually like, full of liberatory potential and impulses, that they are embodied, that they're relational, that they're reciprocal, that they're not an extractive, and that they are life affirming and, and built in kinship, you know. And I, so I think, like, I can flow right from talking about cedar and garlic to talking about how this work is very much a part of resisting, undoing empire, and specifically Zionism. And I can say more on that specifically, or I don't know if there's, like questions arising that you have that are specific about that.
Ayana Young I really appreciate what you've shared so far and if there is more that you're thinking of at this moment, I'm happy to continue listening. I think it's really important for us to hear.
Dori Midnight Well, I guess I think about how you know you know, we know that a well worn tool of oppression is to try to separate people from our life sustaining traditions from our practices. From the ways in which we feel connected to each other, in a way we're connected to land. And, you know this like attempt to sever these invisible webs of support and lineage and a sense of belonging to each other. And I think that you know, systems of domination rely on severing these connections, and the threat of violence and obliteration and loss of connection, leaves people feeling really vulnerable and afraid. And that, in turn, really, I think, becomes fertile ground for adopting toxic mimics of protection, like seeking safety and assimilation or hiding, kind of like a contract. It's an end to exclusive hypervigilance, wealth accumulation or hoarding, land acquisition, land theft, and also relying on false promises of the state for safety. And so I feel like reconnecting with these practices but in like, in the spirit of divestment is a form of resistance, you know, and the way that empire I think, really reduces our capacity and reduces our participation, and is invested in disconnection both from each other and from land and from these traditions. And it's like, you know, when we reconnect with these, like beauty filled practices in service to dismantling empire, I think that this work can be an invitation to divest from Zionism. And these, you know, the ideas that Zionism, like the imperatives of Zionism, like spiritual hierarchy, and Messianism and birthright and Homeland and stuff, and like the way that Zionism positions itself as the ultimate arbiter of Jewish theology and spirituality and the ultimate source of Jewish safety, right. And so, this is one idea and sort of like in, I feel really inspired by like, you know, Ruth Wilson Gilmore and Angela Davis and Mariame Kaba and Black feminist abolitionists who talk about that, abolition is not just about dismantling, but abolition is about world building, and building the world to come.
Which part, you know, as a Jew, like that part, I feel really connected to. Its Jewish concept of Olam haBa, of building towards the world we dream of, of the world that could be, that we get a taste of on Shabbat, and that in order to build towards the world that we want to live in, and for me, and for a lot of people, that means a Judaism beyond Zionism, we need to be practicing what a Judaism beyond Zionism can look like we need to be living, and practicing, and doing things that build the world that we want to live in a world beyond that, like without creating safety through militarism, and policing and carceral systems. And so, you know, I think like, when we reconnect with these practices, but also like, breathe life into their liberatory potential, it can not just like, offer theoretical possibilities and counterspells. But also, like, I'm interested in the ideas of how it can help us redefine what safety means or what protection means. And that it's not just about magic, it's not just about like, oh, like, garlic is gonna keep me safe. So we don't need cops. You know, it's not honestly that simple. But I think a lot of these, what these practices do, is that they're expressions of interdependence, they're expressions of life, and of loving life. And as presence, there are practices of mutual aid, they are non extractive. And so I think that they can be part of this world building, they can be part of this dismantling. And I think like, because of the history of these practices, which have to do very much to do with where white supremacy, Christian hegemony, where patriarchy have impacted Jewish practices, and kind of like, the sights of assimilation.
So it's not just like divesting from Zionism, but it's also like doing this kind of healing work from all these ways that we lost these practices in the model of assimilation, which, you know, was one way that many people survived. And so, yeah, so I think like, when I talk about these practices, it's not like, not, like simple or romantic or nostalgic, but like, really remembering the way that these practices have bound us to each other and bound us, like tethered us to life itself. And like that these practices were always held communally. And with a prayer like to imagine, beyond the current structures and systems, and kind of like weave ourselves into and be wrapped inside of the invisible cloak, that's interdependence, that's mutual aid, that is, like, helps us supports us to reach towards each other and reach towards a vision of mutually flourishing life, of generosity of true belonging, that's not about belonging to a state, right? That's not about belonging, like in this false way, that that's the only way we can belong is through nationalism. But that's really about, like, a safety that is truly, you know, like with that holds complexity, that safety can be guaranteed that safety is totally, like, relational, that we create safety with each other. And I guess it's like my prayer that, like, for me, like this work is very much an integration personally, of my politics and ways in which I've been in organizing spaces for a long time. And also, you know, my healing practice and that, for me, those things are not separate. And I'm really excited to be in conversations with you, and with so many of the people who, you know, listen to your podcast, where these things are being woven together in really beautiful, complicated, supportive ways. And I just feel grateful to get to be a part of that web.
Ayana Young Oh, Dori, I am so grateful that you are a part of the web. It's been such an incredible time. with you today. I really feel a deep yearning to have a part two because I feel that as deep as this conversation went. I think we just began to scratch the surface of so many topics. And yeah, I really appreciate your energy and your devotion and the way that you see the world and spirituality. And I think at this time, what really is our largest trouble is, is a type of spiritual bankruptcy, which has led us to this place of immense disconnection from the Earth. And so hearing your words was like honey on the heart, and it felt really soothing. And I really appreciate your storytelling. I think we're missing that, so much, getting so reductionist in the way we understand things and the way we feel like we have to explain things to have validity. And I really loved hearing your stories and the weavings were so captivating. I really was at the edge of my chair, wanting to hear more about garlic and everything else. So yeah, just want to say I appreciate you and I really look forward to a conversation in the near future.
Francesca Glaspell Thank you for listening to For The Wild Podcast. The music you heard today was by 40 Million Feet, Katie Gray, and Aviva Le Fey. For The Wild is created by Ayana Young, Erica Ekrem, Francesca Glaspell, and Julia Jackson.