Beltane — the pagan holiday marking the midpoint between the spring equinox and summer solstice — landed this week, and SF's witchy community answered the call. Local practitioners put the word out looking for fellow celebrants to join them at the beach for what was promised to be a "powerful" night.

As one local put it: "We need to be outside tonight and I need my fellows."

Honestly? Fair enough.

Here at The Dissent, we're not exactly in the business of evaluating the metaphysical potency of any given evening. But we are firmly in the business of defending people's right to peacefully assemble and practice whatever tradition speaks to them — no permit fees, no government intermediary, no bureaucratic nonsense required.

This is what community actually looks like when it's organic. No city supervisor took credit for it. No nonprofit applied for a grant to facilitate it. No task force spent six months and $200,000 on a feasibility study. People just... showed up at the beach.

San Francisco has a long, proud history of spiritual counterculture, from the beats to the hippies to whatever you'd call the guy doing tai chi in Dolores Park at 7 AM on a Tuesday. The city's pagan and witchcraft communities are part of that fabric, and gatherings like these — free, voluntary, open to all — represent the kind of grassroots civic life that no amount of municipal programming can replicate.

Whether you're casting circles or just casting a fishing line, Ocean Beach belongs to all of us. No bureaucrat needed.

Blessed be, or whatever works for you.