My family is typical, very American in that we are diverse and representing of every demographic that makes this country the culture it is. My ancestors migrated from region to region all over this place, collecting the folk magic and superstitions of the cultures we encountered, adopted or descended from. We are a blend of the typical American bloodlines; various kinds of European, Native American, African and Latin American. My generation, my siblings and I, are the culmination of hundreds of years of immigration, adoption, homesteading and assimilating on this land. From my family and my own experience moving along the West Coast; being raised by Southerners in the Southwest and later the Pacific Northwest, I have developed a kind of strange and intimate relationship with regional forms of folk-magic in America– things I never really thought about as being cross-cultural syncretic religious practices turned out to have heavy and deep roots, and I’ve dedicated most of my life to researching the roots of magic and witchcraft through my family.