Did you feel the shift in energy?

yes, we can have nice things // 06

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Photo by Nastaran Taghipour

Hi lovelies,

Today is Persian New Year! It’s also the start of Aries season, or the astrological new year, and the Wiccan/pagan holiday Ostara—one of the eight Sabbats, like its autumnal sibling Samhain.¹ Combined with and amplified by today’s vernal equinox, we are promised a much-needed change in energy, and I’m more than ready for a series of gorgeous new beginnings that are dictated by the natural world, not the Gregorian calendar (which I may or may not have strong feelings about. If you know, you know).

Tomorrow is the first of a rare couplet of Aries new moons this season, with the second taking place on April 20, a solar eclipse. This means we’ll get a double dose of the dynamic ram, and a second chance to clear out what doesn’t leave—or get summarily removed—now. (May as well get a head start. :))

And yeaaah, your Aries friends are pretty fucking excited. If there’s one thing they’re well-versed in, it’s the fact that there’s something so beautiful about initiating. Taking action comes naturally, breathes easily, sits prettily. Feels a hell of a lot better than waffling, sitting around wondering, and doubting ourselves, our path forward, and the magic of the intuition, especially when it comes to making important decisions.

I’ve had to learn to make my peace with just that—sitting in spaces of uncertainty, feeling into the collective spinning of wheels, understanding what patience means for the first time in my life—for the past few years, even and especially recently. We all have. And that can be a beautiful necessity. But when it’s all systems go and an Aries gets to put their horns down and charge forth, there’s really nothing quite like it.

I’m heading on a cute little roadtrip to the Pacific Northwest next week, and have a few cool writing projects coming up, so I’ll be taking a break from nice things next week, but I’ll be checking in. Happy all the things. xx

1. A few fun little facts about Persian New Year: In Farsi, we call it Eid or Nowruz, which means “new day.” It always falls on the first day of spring, and involves assembling a spread, or sofreh haft-sin, after the old Zoroastrian traditions; the sofreh consists of seven items, all meant to symbolize different things—and energies—to bring into the new year. I don’t have a sofreh of my own this year, but I’m currently in LA visiting my sister with our family, and hers has come together really nicely.

Items on the spread all start with the letter S, and include things like:

• Seeb, or apple

• Sabzeh, wheatgrass or lentil sprouts grown in a dish

• Sumac, a fragrant crushed spice often sprinkled on rice

• Samanu, a sweet kind of pudding

• Senjed, or dried oleaster (the fruit of a lotus tree)

• Seer, or garlic

• Serkeh, or vinegar

Other items, like a mirror; flowers (sonbol, or hyacinths); decorative eggs, like Easter eggs; a book of poetry; and goldfish are staples, too.

This year my aunt’s haft-sin features birds in flight; they are painted in the colors of the Iranian flag to symbolize freedom for the people of Iran. Zan, zendegi, azadi ♥️

2. Note to my Self and to you, a fitting one to start this week—and season—out on: If something is no longer serving you, it is more than okay to change your mind. To change your patterns, your perspective, your life. To go right off and do something different, even if that “something else” is utterly foreign. Maybe it even feels unspeakably terrifying at first. You don’t need permission; nor do you owe anyone an explanation, either. (I know, I know, spoken like a true Aries, but it’s appropriate for this time of year and, frankly, always.)

3. Love, love, loved this Vulture profile on Kelly Link. If you missed her novelette/short story, The Faery Handbag, that I shared in nice things last week, it starts with, you guessed it, a handbag. Owned by the narrator’s grandmother, this is no ordinary bag, however; it’s a huge and hairy, Mary Poppins-esque accoutrement which just so happens to house a fantastical fairy realm. (Here it is on Link’s website.) And I, too, would like to be a fabulist in the woods, much like the author, thank you very much!

4. The below post is such a wonderful repository of book recommendations, I have enough new additions to my TBR list from it alone to last well into next year! Anyone else wish they had an extra brain solely geared for novels, the way certain animals have multiple stomachs? Just me?

This newsletter is a cry for help

5. Did I try acupuncture for the first time last week? Yes. Am I now recommending it to everyone I know? Also yes. And I’m aware it’s not solely a modern practice, of course—fully aware of its status as ancient Chinese treatment—but it’s new to me, and I came away from those tiny needles a whole new woman.

6. Speaking of incredible Chinese things, The Many Daughters of Afong Moy, a generation-spanning, time-jumping novel by Jamie Ford, has me spellbound.

7. Trader Joe’s Truffle Hot Sauce. That is all.

8. There are so many words for the phenomena of “glitter” in the English language. Shimmering, sparkling, shining, coruscating, glimmering, gleaming. Simple pleasures; if you ask me, there can never be enough sparkles! Nor can there ever be too many ways to describe them happening in the world, or on one’s person. I will not be getting off this hill, I will happily die on it. Actually, maybe I’ll crawl under the hill inside the faery handbag and bring all my glitter with me.

9. Artists finally have a tool to fight back against AI stealing their artwork.

10. How can we think differently about climate change? Award-winning author, historian, and activist Rebecca Solnit has an idea.

11. This letter from writer Jenna Wortham, who writes

• channeling •

, reminded me of just how much I love Ada Limón’s poem, “Instructions on Not Giving Up.” Brilliant.

12. More poetry! This one’s a stunning and evocative banger from poet and essayist Hannah Bonner.

via @poetryisnotaluxury on Instagram

“Every day a wilderness / my body can’t contain”… that line just does things to me.

And lastly, your witch tip of the week:

13. Last week I wrote about cleansing your front door or the entryway in your home, as well as doing a smoke cleanse to energetically clear the space.

In Persian culture, we use a special herb for cleansing—one called esfand. I’ve always thought of it as the “Persian version” of sage, that particularly prominent of witchy herbs (though it’s important to be sure we’re purchasing ethically sourced sage, whether shopping online or in person, and to acknowledge that some consider burning it all to be cultural appropriation).

Esfand can be used in a similar fashion; it’s a kind of wild rue, the aromatic seeds of which are burned to ward off negativity or negative intentions, bad luck, or cheshm—also known as the evil eye. Burning it, like many other facets of Persian culture, including the sofreh haft-sin, is a practice that comes from Zoroastrian traditions. When it comes to supernatural protection, if it was good enough for the ancient Persians, it’s certainly good enough for me.

xx Kimia

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1. Plenty of key upcoming astrology transits in my end of Pisces season breakdown, if you want to know more about this.