Ants In My Office & Other Chthonic Invasions
on spiritual spring cleanings
It started with a single little beastie crawling on my painting supplies.
My office, lovingly coined the Fortress of Solitude, used to be the front porch of our house. So, an occasional spider or black ant visitation is expected. I did, in fact, invade their space by filling it with my artifacts, books, watercolours, and endless chattering about storytelling.
I watched it wander back toward the windowsill. This stray would soon return to the nest outside in one of dark, earthy space under the porch. So much for paying attention to patterns and signs in my life.
A day earlier, I had received a surprise delivery from a friend: a gorgeous sketch of an owl with an otherworldly story of how it arrived at my doorstep. Mora, I named her, Mother of Souls. I framed her and hung her near the spot where I later found the first ant. The chthonic deities had started appearing even then. I should have realized, more would come.
That first ant did come and go without me caring. That night, I dreamed of a misty forest. The owl people, Hekate, and others appeared to me. I stepped into a cave and started seeing flashes of people; a great waterfall; me submerged underneath it. More patterns and signs? Probably, but I remained firm in my ignorance. But, the ants did make progress in cracking my thick skull as the next night was the full moon. I wrote about coming face-to-face with the Damp Earth Mother and letting her Lampades torchbearers light the way HERE.
Soon, I am face-to-face with Hekate, realizing it’s her cave I have entered. Of course, that also means I am in for a wild ride. She, like Marzanna, is no charmer. She sets you off on generally painful quests to figure your sh@t out.
I awoke to find more ants, and they didn’t go. I got mad, irritated, even started smushing them. Yet, by noon the day after, I had big black ants traipsing up and down the walls, curtains, and edges of my office.
Here’s a little mood music for the invasion:
It was strange. While some had definitely made it the full length of the house to the kitchen, a majority of the beasties congregated in my space very near the new owl and other painting I had done lately. My practical side reacted with “ew.” My intuitive side said, “This is not just a case of the weather warming up and the ants going on a painting retreat together at your place.”
So, I started cleaning. First a wipe down of my desk, an emptying of anything I thought might hold a spare wedge of chocolate (because, well, it’s me). I water and trimmed the plants, vacuumed spaces I pretend don’t have a year of dust balls in them.
And, with every corner cleaned an polished, I realized that I had neglected some very critical spaces. As you can imagine, these had NOTHING to do with my office.
Eating The Filth
At one point, I rushed out onto the front porch. There, I keep massive pots of lavender and mint, rosemary, and other spiritually protective plants. To me, the entryway of my home is the most sacred and the place I have always set the protection the strongest.
Yet, as I stepped out, I realized that both the mint and the lavender—protected from the rain and snow this winter—had not been protected at all. In fact, they had starved and died off without the nourishing rain from endless showers and melting ice that breaks open new seeds with its force. Piles and piles of death and decay covered them.
I started to dig and clean out. Deep beneath the dying mint, I discovered an incredible trove of gems, sea shells, and more. Pulling them out felt like metaphorically recovering pieces of myself. The layers of filth and rot on top of them proved intense and the ants suddenly burst up out of one of the layers and ran off down the side of the house. I realized they were eating it.
The lavender planter required even more care. I had to cut her back so much, and I am not even sure she survived the winter. I found this at her base.
I should point out that these things didn’t randomly end up there. I’m sure I placed each item in the planters at some point. However, the deep dive into the cave that I have talked about recently meant I also had begun to ignore many of the critical pieces of everyday life that needed tending to in order to keep my home and family healthy and safe.
Over at the The Artemisian (a wonderful Substack on all things archetypal, dream world, and other), author Alyssa Polizzi wrote today about the importance of casting magical circles while working with archetypal forces. It struck me, as I read it, how the ants foray into my office made it clear that I was not keeping up the spiritual hygiene that I have always worked hard to maintain.
The ants, I now believe, were a bit of a chthonic deliverance from Borborophorba—an epithet of Hekate that means Eater of Filth.
They entered my space to shout, “Hey, lady, you need to do some spiritual spring cleaning. Set the wards. Protect your sacred space. We know you are working on that novel and you need to figure out this Sibylline thing, and Hekate keeps showing up, but if you don’t do the work, we are coming for you.”
Alright, that sounds creepy, but let’s get real for a moment. Life will most definitely deal you the lessons you need to learn until you get up off your rear end and do the work. For me, because I am a bit of an edge dweller, those lessons most often come in the form of archetypes and metaphorical “invasions” as it may be.
Communing with The Dark
Part of the process of going into the cave to figure oneself out is to come into communion with the things that live in total darkness. We’ve been programmed to fear that relationship. That somehow those chthonic entities have nothing but evil to show us. Yet, to be human is to sit with the ants in your office and listen to what they have to say to you. The light is never where the learning takes place. It is with the creatures of the dark.
They are gone now. My husband joked that he felt like he was casting a spell as he laid down the cinnamon and lemon mixture across our doors and wall joints that is now keeping my eater-of-filth buddies in the realm of the flower beds and magnolia trees.
My pots of mint and lavender are cleared out. There is even a new sprout in the mint pot this morning. I have set the wards around the house, made sure that I am setting firm boundaries as I do my edge dweller explorations, and am even casting a bit of a sacred circle when I sit down to write.
The ants forced a spiritual spring cleaning that brought a light freshness to my everyday. And, I am reminded that clearing out the filth and casting those magical circles that Polizzi speaks about is more than housework or spiritual hygiene.
Creating and caring for your sacred space, in whatever way you believe and by whatever means works for you, is a critical part of not getting mired down in the muck. You can become your very own Borborophorba, eater of filth, and transform it into a fresh, new form.