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Art, Hubble Images, Μικρές Χαρές, Music, Photography

Jupiter Bubbling. No toil. No troubling.

Jupiter bubbling, neither toiling nor troubling.

Bogrács (stew-pot) by Kristina Kriják

Might seem strange to place a Witches’ Brew right smack in the middle of ThursDao.

First there’s the whole ‘witch’ thing, which wigs out some folks. Doesn’t bother me. We decide the meanings of words, and for this one there are so many meanings.

So I went back to the source to learn that the word originated from the Swedish ‘vika’ meaning ‘to move to and fro.’ Which is exactly what we do to the stuff in the stew-pot.

La lettre d’amour, c. 1770
Jean-Honoré Fragonard

Sometimes ‘witch’ is simply used as a pejorative, to dismiss mean women, or less attractive women, or women who are older. Sometimes the three concepts are blended into one, so that any woman who is older is also de facto ugly and mean.

Well that’s one brew that’s hard to swallow.

I’m neither ugly nor mean, but I am older than I was. (Aren’t you?) So there’s another reason to include the Brew. To put the pejorative in its proper place, transform it into its proper face.

Finally, ‘to bewitch’ can simply mean ‘to charm or enchant.’ Certainly nothing wrong with such pleasantness.

Der Zitherspieler, 1890, by Emil Rau

I was prompted to look up the song Witches’ Brew after coming across it in a story my daughter wrote when she was eight years old. So I leapt across the spacetime continuum – like a gazelle, I was – and rang it up on the internet and there it was: A happy little tune bearing some real truths about what we each must do with all the big and little bits of life that come our way.