About Black Cat Curios

THE MISSION + THE MOJO

Whatever your spiritual or mundane goal, we are here to be your Conjure Conspirators™. That is why it is of supreme importance to us that what we are making and selling is both authentic and effective. All of our baths, washes, conjure oils, incenses, and dusting powders are handmade, in-house from recipes that have been developed and tested over lifetimes. We do not use synthetics, so our stuff may not smell as pretty as those offered by other sellers, but on the other hand, you can always count on our ingredients being natural and condition-correct.

We always want you to feel as though you got from us what you paid for – an exceptional product or service. It's just the way we do what we do. Drawing on the knowledge and gifts of those before us, we reach back to move forward, from the Ancestors to you.™

THE PRACTITIONER, MADAME JA

Family legend says that my great-grandmother had the "shine" and that she would help out people in the neighborhood with a tincture here and a tea reading there – things that she had learned from the "Black Gypsies" when she was coming up in North Carolina. It is also said that her daughter, my grandmother, frequently exhibited an uncanny ability to know the future, could take the measure of a person in moments, and would converse at length with the many animals that hung around the family's Indiana homestead.

Oddly enough, my mother always referred to their doings as "their funny ways" and "superstitious hogwash." Yet, I also know that it was not beyond my mother to put a little menstrual blood in her man's food to keep him faithful. It would seem that the familiar propensity to do what I do was there the whole time. There just wasn't a name for it, it was just the way one did.

Growing up in Denton, Texas, I was unaware of hoodoo as a body of knowledge until, at the age of eleven, our family babysitter disclosed to me that watching other people's kids was not what she considered her actual occupation. Turns out, she was a self-identified "hoodoo" and my first real teacher of things spiritual and conjure-related. Among other things, she taught me not to fear the spirits that would pass in front of us while we were watching TV, how to train hunting money, and that even if one does not believe in a curse, a curse doesn't care.

Yes, Ms. Brown's kind tutelage opened up a whole new world to me. I then saw the hoodoo everywhere; a neighbor standing a broom up in a corner, or a friend's mom stealing a cabbage leaf at the store, the man at the barber shop spitting at another's feet as he walked away, and tons of wild goins on that you just would not believe if I told ya'.

Decades later, I'm still at it! While I have explored plenty of other paths and have enjoyed the benefit of other very talented teachers, hoodoo/rootwork/conjure just resonates best with who I am as a person and a practitioner – natural, practical, and no bullshit.

Lastly, should you want to read more about "the work" and get my perspective on the various aspects of it, head on over to my personal blog – Love+Peace+ChickenFeet. You may find it entertaining and, who knows, you might even learn something new.

Go Forth and Conjure!™

Laura Hair (aka Madame Ja)
Proprietor / Practitioner Extraordinaire

Madame Ja