Mary Brooding-Hawthorne
February 20, 2020 8:38 PM
Ethical and sustainable [Intermediates, III-V] by Mary Brooding-Hawthorne
Winter break had been . . . taxing. There were pros and cons, but it was clear that spending time in Greece with Darius and Evangeline, and their twins Louis and Calliope, had not helped Tabitha. Whatever it was that was bothering the Defense professor, it clearly wasn't just her workload, as Mary had suspected. It also wasn't just family, or just adventure, or anything else. Mary almost wondered if it was just being married. But she suspected that was not the case. Instead, she thought that it was probably a combination of things. That did little to help a conversation about it go any smoother and it was bittersweet that no such conversation had occurred anyway. Mary had kept busy, playing with the twins and trying not to look too happy about it when Tabitha was looking. It was exhausting, and that was one word she had never expected to use to describe her relationship with Tabitha.It had, however, inspired the first week of intermediate potions lessons of the new term. There was a concept that had been coming to mind that she couldn't quite remember where she'd heard it, but it struck a chord with her: work towards sustainable relationships. That meant non-toxic, healthy, loving, intimate relationships. As a potions professor, though, she couldn't help applying the idea to her own work.
"Today, we are going to be discussing ethical sourcing and waste-free potion-making," Mary told her class when they had taken their seats. "That means making sure we don't harvest ingredients in a way that is harmful to the environment or to the creature or plant the ingredient came from, and it can also mean making sure we don't use ingredients from unethical suppliers. Waste-free potion-making is important because it means getting the most out of whatever we're working with, and being aware of how other fields might use parts of the product that we don't. Perhaps you only need a lizard spleen, but there is a local, ethical shoe boutique who can also take advantage of the animal's skin." She was standing in front of her desk and leaned back so she was sitting part way on it, looking at her class with frank resignation on her face.
"Truth be told, there's not any ways that wizardkind has yet discovered to make potions without any animal products. Not that work the same way or are as safe or accessible. Some, sure. But many have not yet been done this way. That means that if we need these potions, we need to do our best to make sure the damage we're doing is minimal. Can anyone give me some ideas of what sort of damage might occur, or what we can do to minimize it?"
Mary accepted several raised hands, hoping that the buy-in from student participation now would pay off when she told them about the practical part of the lesson. Chalk danced across the board, jotting down the ideas as students said them and organizing them into two columns: the damages and the minimizations.
"Very good," she smiled. "For the practical portion of today's class, we are going to do an exercise related to waste-free potion making. For homework, you'll be doing research about ethical sourcing. I'll give you the prompt for that as you leave today. Expect to be assigned an ingredient; I expect you to research the region it comes from, the process for harvesting it for mass use, and ways it could be done more sustainably." Homework aside, Mary gestured towards the side of the room, where two crates were standing on their own pedestals.
"Each student - or pair of students, I don't mind whether you do one together or work on your own but discuss it - will select a product from one crate or the other. Your task will be to separate the pieces of it into as many usable ingredients as possible - think carapace, and eyes, and spleen, or stem, and stamen, and pollen, and petals - while preserving non-ingredient parts for other uses."
She looked around, taking a moment to answer any questions that came up right away. When the topic turned towards what the ingredients were, Mary nodded. She was careful to keep the gravitas out of her tone - solemnity had no place in this discussion when the inevitable was what she made her living on - whilst maintaining the seriousness of it.
"I want you to choose your ingredient carefully and thoughtfully, because whatever you think of the task itself, they are both very important. In the crate on the left, there are newts. In the crate on the right, there are mandrakes. If you need any help or any equipment, please let me know. Go ahead and begin! I'll come around to see if anyone has questions or needs help as well."
Subthreads: Don't let white people be in charge by Zara Jackson with Hilda Hexenmeister
We must respect the dead. by Evelyn Stones with Heinrich Hexenmeister
We have two whole sections of our website devoted to those ideals. by Jessica Hayles
It's a nice ideal by Ness McLeod with Felipe De Matteo
What is this ethical you speak of? by Topaz Brockert
22
Mary Brooding-Hawthorne
Ethical and sustainable [Intermediates, III-V]
1424
1
5
Evelyn Stones
February 26, 2020 10:19 AM
We must respect the dead. by Evelyn Stones
Today's lecture was the sort that made Evelyn think she wanted to do something with potions for a living someday. This stuff really mattered and it could be done better. That's all she could ask for in her lifelong legacy, was to do something that mattered and do it well. Unfortunately, she couldn't help thinking of all the ways it was not done well, particularly as someone with a reputation for makeup wearing. She wasn't sure what to make of the idea that she was probably wearing animal cruelty in Tuscany Rose on her lips, and Naval Kiss on her eyes. Each eyelash was coated with death, like so many beetle legs fluttering when she blinked. Awesome.Evelyn's first instinct was a great big 'no thank you' in terms of dissecting newts for class. She'd worked with them enough times in potions class to know she wasn't very squeamish, but she'd also seen enough of them in the forests near home that they were labeled as cute little things in her mind. However, with makeup and cruelty in mind, she couldn't help also sort of relating to the newts. Or at least understanding them in some way.
They were already dead. They were already going to be used. She thought that if she was dead and going to be used, donating her body to magic or science would be good. It would be nice to help people. Plus, Evelyn didn't know how the newts had died. Had they suffered? She doubted Professor Brooding would get murdered lizards for a class project but what was the difference, really?
With that in mind, Evelyn felt some amount of responsibility. She owed it to these tiny lost lives to be grateful and to be respectful. If she was going to do better, if magickind was going to do better, they had to start small.
So Evelyn made her way to the front of the class and frowned into the box of newts, selecting one of the smaller ones as she thought it was probably the more difficult to work with and most likely to be disrespected in death. She wanted to be a good thing in this little guy's death. As good as she could be.
Carrying the newt back to her desk, she looked at it for what felt like a long time. She wondered if it had a family or what its tiny life had been like. Did it have a favorite food? Maybe she'd find out when she cut it open. That was a horrifying thought.
Before she could proceed, an approaching student interrupted her and she looked up to see who it was.
22
Evelyn Stones
We must respect the dead.
1422
0
5
Heinrich Hexenmeister
February 27, 2020 9:45 AM
100 percent behind this lesson by Heinrich Hexenmeister
Heinrich, with the unthinking force of habit, took his seat next to Hilda, and began repeating everything he heard in English into German. Once he got his English a bit more refined, he had a good shot at a career as a translator, if he wanted to go that route. He was not sure he did, particularly since that would put him in the path of people who spoke German, who had a good shot of being Germans, who would definitely recognize his surname, but he didn’t have any better ideas so far, so he wouldn’t dismiss it out of hand until he did.The class began, and one part of him was listening, and one part was talking, and he wondered sometimes if being able to do that was entirely healthy. The good thing though was that it meant his brain was to busy trying to convert the English coming in to the German going out that he couldn’t think too hard about anything else. There had been some lessons early on where the German coming out was less what the professors were saying and more of his not-so-internal commentary on both the lesson and his personal worries. And there were an unusually large number of third year girls who seemed able to follow at least some of it. He fixed that problem by just not thinking any commentary. He couldn’t pay attention to both himself and the professor, so he just had to trust that if he was only thinking about the professors’ words, he was only saying the professors’ words. As best as he could tell, this was working.
So as Professor Brooding talked, Heinrich translated, stumbling only a little as he ran into English concepts he was only loosely familiar with. The word ‘sourcing’ was a new form of ‘source’ he hadn’t run across before, but context helped even out his uncertainty. He wasn’t completely sure he was repeating things correctly when he told Hilda about ethical lizard skin shoes, but he simply did not have the time or the brainpower right then to question it too hard.
He translated the open discussion question, not expecting Hilda to participate. He had offered a few times that if she wanted to answer in German, he’d translate the other way for her, too, but she was determined enough to Do This Stupid English Thing that she wouldn’t take him up on it.
He translated Zara’s long treatise, and when she was done, he finally had a moment to think while Professor Brooding looked for who to call on next.
Mostly he thought about Uncle Karl’s snake ranch. He was pretty sure Uncle Karl was an ethical source for snake bits. Well, in as much as being a purveyor of snake venoms can be an ethical business. But the snakes were well treated, sometimes too well treated, it seemed to him sometimes. Both Karl and now Hans, too, talked about the creatures like they were real people they regularly had conversations with instead of animals they were cultivating for parts. He was pretty certain both of them spent far too much of their time isolated out there in the desert.
When Karl had chaperoned the trip to visit the Zauberhexens in Germany and Heinrich had run the ranch more or less on his own (Karl had hired one fellow - a Spanish speaking guy, he admitted now that Zara had pointed it out, though Heinrich thought Karl paid a fair wage, and they seemed to be kind of friends, inasmuch as Karl seemed to have any friends at all - to help with some of the harder and more dangerous chores), but the books showed most of his business seemed to be in selling venom - and sometimes already brewed anti-venom - to various hospitals all over the world rather than the ingredients that would result in actual killing the snakes.
Still, there were orders for snake organs and eyes and such, and Heinrich didn’t think he was imagining it that Karl seemed much happier after Heinrich demanded a responsibility that did not involve interaction with live snakes and he ended up teaching Heinrich how to do that kind of harvesting. (“It’s not too much different from what what you do for that potions mistress at your school, boy. Here, look.”) Since then, that had been Heinrich’s job whenever he was in Utah. Professor Brooding would be pleased to know Karl was very fastidious in making sure there was almost no waste from each snake that was put down, and what little was left was carefully burned and the ashes scattered like a departed family pet. Heinrich was still kind of scandalized that every last one of Karl’s snakes had a name. Moreover, he wished Karl didn’t tell him the snakes’ names before he had to cut them up into their component parts.
He really wasn’t sure which way that went on the ethical scale. Was it a good wolf thing that the snakes were treated well as individuals who deserved respect and acknowledgement of their personal sacrifice, or was it bad wolf to chop up something with a name to sell its fangs to people who wanted to brew a potion to cure boils? But boil cures were medicine, so making that had to be good wolf, right? And the recipe called for snake fangs. Six of them. That’s three dead snakes for one boil cure.
Heinrich’s head hurt.
Hilda nudged him, and he realized another answer was being given and he translated that.
Okay. So what was the damage?
The damage was people getting attached to the animals they raise. The damage was people living out in the desert without contact with other humans and becoming a bit delusional.
The damage was that he was eleven years old before he even knew he had an uncle.
But that was maybe not entirely Karl’s fault and certainly outside the bounds of this class discussion.
He raised his hand. “One thing we can do to minimize the damage is to have an awareness of these damages. If you know your pimple cure kills three snakes in its making, maybe you will do a better job of using preventative soaps, or maybe choose a different treatment that maybe is not so effective but has a lower ethical cost.”
Uncle Karl had been right. What he asked Heinrich to do was exactly the same thing Professor Brooding was asking of them now.
Newts seemed more snake like than mandrakes, so he went to that crate. Besides which, newts were classified as beasts. Mandrakes were classified as sentient.
He brought a newt back to his seat, mildly baffled by the look Hilda had sent him, but he’d given up trying to understand every expression his sister made a long time ago. It probably wasn’t important. If it was important, she’d say something. Firstly, because Hilda was outspoken like that. Secondly, because she understood about and was sympathetic to his lack of fluency in Emotional Nonverbal Cues.
He sat down next to Evelyn and set the dead newt down in front of him. He cursed himself for wondering what the newt’s name was. It had not been raised by Karl. It probably didn’t have one.
What a sad existence that must be, never having a name.
He shook his head to shake off the thought and smiled at Evelyn. “I see you picked a newt, too,” he observed. “I have done this with snakes before. My uncle owns a snake ranch.” He thought he had probably mentioned that before, but the extreme relevance to the current assignment seemed to demand a revisit to the topic as chopping up snakes definitely had not come up before. “He sells snake ingredients for a living.”
Heinrich grimaced down at the nameless newt. “He names all of his snakes.” He poked at the newt with his potions knife, not enough to puncture the delicate skin but to adjust its position so he could get the knife under the spine and flip it over so it was belly side up. It looked nothing like a snake’s underside. He felt vaguely uncomfortable. “I used to think that was weird and terrible, but now it feels disrespectful, cutting into a newt without even knowing its name.” And it’s legs were a problem. He wasn’t sure how to skin something with legs.
At least there wouldn’t be blood. Blood would have been drained first. That was always the first job and it took a long enough time that there was no chance it was part of today’s assignment. Plus it smelled bad and people would vomit and contaminate their work. Snake blood was one of the more lucrative ingredients Karl sold, though. But Heinrich refused to do that part and Karl didn’t make him.
1
Heinrich Hexenmeister
100 percent behind this lesson
1414
0
5
Evelyn Stones
February 27, 2020 1:56 PM
That's because you're good wolf, through and through. by Evelyn Stones
Heinrich speaking up in class made Evelyn smile, and she had tucked her head to take notes and to keep from making a fool of herself or drawing undue attention to Heinrich. She was so proud of how far they'd both come since they had first met, and Heinrich speaking up in class was just one beautiful example of that. Also, he made a great point and Buddha knew acne was a topic a room full of teenagers could understand. Of course, it might also be something worth sacrificing lizards for, if anything was going to be.She was happy to see that he was the student sitting next to her and she returned his smile, feeling honored - as usual - to see him offering one. She gaped a little at his explanation of his uncle's business, pretty sure she knew some of it but not all of it already. "That's so cool!" she said. "I wonder if Professor Brooding ever gets ingredients from him, directly or indirectly?"
It amused her to think of Professor Brooding in all her pointy-hatted, tiny, sickly-sweet glory swooping into a snake ranch run by someone Evelyn could only assume was similar to Heinrich himself. Of course, Heinrich was one of her assistants, so she would be probably get on just fine with his uncle, too. She wondered what Heinrich's uncle would think if she got to meet him sometime. It was a very intimidating thought, but one that was less intimidating than she thought it ought to be. She knew enough about the Hexenmeisters to know that that she thought of Uncle Hexenmeister very much as a hero in his own right. Anyone who talk on three small children at the drop of a hat and was a halfway decent guardian to them was a hero. She knew as well as anyone that biological parents couldn't even say that much most of the time. She also knew that Hilda had largely grown up in Utah, and so there was something about Uncle Hexenmeister that encouraged, or at least allowed, the development of such wonderful people as Hilda and Heinrich.
Evelyn nodded understandingly about the nameless newts. She'd been wondering similar things before Heinrich had sat down, so it wasn't hard to relate. "What if we name them?" she suggested. She peered at her little tiny newt, sitting on the table like a smushy pile of lizard pieces rather than a lively newt like she had seen in Oregon. "This could be Melissa," she said with a decisive nod.
She looked up at Heinrich again with a smirk, her eyes shining, and decided to let him in on what she'd been thinking. "We've come a long way since we met. We were . . . what, thirteen?" She cocked her head, realizing she didn't actually know how old Heinrich was. She assumed he was older than she was because he was a Sonora year above her, but that actually meant very little considering her own age. The idea also brought the realization that Heinrich might not knew if she'd been held back. That was getting dangerously close to a topic she didn't want to discuss, but one she suspected he'd understand, even if not in so many words. "Actually... how old are you?"
22
Evelyn Stones
That's because you're good wolf, through and through.
1422
0
5
Heinrich Hexenmeister
March 21, 2020 8:33 AM
I hope so by Heinrich Hexenmeister
"Indirectly, maybe?" he guessed at Evelyn's suggestion that Professor Brooding got her snake parts from Uncle Karl. He'd remember if Professor Brooding's name or Sonora's showed up in the invoice log. But he did sell to general potion ingredient suppliers, so it wasn't impossible that some of Uncle Karl's snakes were in the potions cabinet right now. He didn't know how he felt about that.Fortunately, Evelyn changed the subject and he didn't need to think on it too hard. Snake bits were still snake bits, and it wasn't like Heinrich was the one who got attached the slithery serpents.
He bit his lip a little as he tried to remember exactly when it was he'd met Evelyn. "Twelve?" he ventured uncertainly, "If we start at the Strudel?" That had been the end of his second year, right? In some ways, it felt like he'd known Evelyn forever, but he also distinctly remembered not really having friends throughout his Beginner years. "But I was thirteen when I found you in MARS," he agreed, assuming she meant his age rather than hers, as they were in different years so their ages would be different, and he didn't know when her birthday was other than a very general 'summer' - and even that was assumed based on the fact that she had never mentioned it being her birthday during the school year last year.
Her last question was more straightforward. "I am still fifteen," he said, with only a little self-consciousness, knowing many fifth years had turned sixteen already, but Evelyn was a fourth year, so the admission came easier than it might have had he been asked by someone in his own year group. An August birthday made him the baby of his year group, and it was not a position he was entirely happy occupying. As the oldest of three siblings, he liked being the oldest. He wondered if that was why his only close friend was a fourth year. "I have a summer birthday," he explained, though his given ages for the Strudel and MARS encounters made that fairly easily deduced.
1
Heinrich Hexenmeister
I hope so
1414
0
5
Evelyn Stones
March 21, 2020 1:04 PM
I know so. by Evelyn Stones
It had been a long time since Evelyn had cared much about her age. Thanks to Professor Wright and Skies especially, her magic was getting ever better, and she was much less worried about her ability to use it these days. She still preferred classes like today's, even if the subject was a little macabre, because there would be less wandwork required, but she wasn't so embarrassed about the fact that she'd once feared herself to be a squib. Plus, she was happy to be in Ness' year, even if time of birth should have put her in Heinrich's. She was glad she and Heinrich had met,regardless, and she was honestly more upset about not being in Aladren than not being in her fifth year at Sonora. But this year had been harder, because she'd finally told someone - a couple of someones - why she had been held back. In fact, she'd told Kir the day after her fifteenth birthday. It wasn't something she wanted to explain to Heinrich, nor one she thought he probably wanted to hear about, but then, she also hadn't expected them to be within a few months of each other's ages.But Evelyn's birthday was one of the last days of the summer, so she wasn't too worried. She was probably still younger than Heinrich and at least now she knew about when to send him a birthday present. Still, she couldn't help worrying if it would bother him. Would he think she was dumb, and that's why she was held back? Or would he think she was not so . . . whatever . . . if she was his age. What if she was older than he was?
"I'm fifteen, too," she said a little softly, focusing on the newt in front of her. It felt rude not to look at Heinrich while she was talking though, especially since he was nice to look at. Uh, it was nice looking at people when talking to them. "We must be pretty close then; my birthday is August twenty-eighth. I started here late, when I was twelve." That definitely required explanation. But what sort of explanation? 'Family stuff' would probably suffice, but it would also risk opening a can of worms. At the same time, if Evelyn ever had to tell anyone else, she thought it might be Heinrich. "Some stuff happened at home and my dad decided I should wait one more year before starting." She shrugged as nonchalantly as she could, but she also had no doubt that Heinrich would at least be able to guess a in the ballpark of what was happening at home. People weren't being nice to her, and that much was clear from her tone.
22
Evelyn Stones
I know so.
1422
0
5
Heinrich Hexenmeister
March 21, 2020 3:04 PM
I am glad of your confidence in me by Heinrich Hexenmeister
When Evelyn turned her eyes toward her newt, he turned his toward his own unnamed-as-yet newt as well. He wasn't convinced giving it a name after it was already dead would solve the sadness of its nameless state, but it was probably better than not having a name at all ever, right? Before he could think of one though, Evelyn told him they were the same age, and in fact . . .He looked up, staring at her for a long moment in his shock.
Not because she'd been held back. That part he only distantly registered. That part he could understand. That part, he almost envied her. If he'd been allowed a year off after his life had turned upside down, it would have made his first year at Sonora so much easier. Yes, there would have been the angst over the conviction yet, the fear of a whole additional year of publicity in Europe with his surname attached to it, but the sheer shock of everything would have worn down a little, he'd have had time to get to know Uncle Karl a little before getting shipped off to Arizona, and he'd have had more than a few weeks to work on his English and get it to a point where he could understand the things going around him when he went to an English-speaking school instead of going from casual study to total immersion with almost no warning. He could only wish he'd been so lucky as to have been held back a year. He wondered why nobody had suggested it.
It was just that he'd been eleven. Eleven year olds were supposed to start magic school. So he had started magic school, whether he had been ready for it or not. And he hadn't been ready.
No, the part had him gape mouthed and staring at her came before that.
"August twenty-eighth?" he repeated after far too long of a pause. "That is my birthday, too."
1
Heinrich Hexenmeister
I am glad of your confidence in me
1414
0
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Evelyn Stones
March 21, 2020 6:56 PM
Now if I could find some for myself. by Evelyn Stones
A number of things went through Evelyn's mind very quickly. One of them was that Heinrich didn't seem to look upset or disappointed, just surprised, which was great. That being said, he looked very surprised. Between the extended pause and his big round eyes looking down at her - or up since they'd been previously looking at the desk, the whole thing was almost comical. And that was the second thought that went through Evelyn's mind: of course. A cosmic joke. Of course they had the same birthday. Of course they were exactly the same again. At first, she thought that there must have been some bad luck with August 28th fifteen years previously, but she thought that maybe that wasn't so true. She felt like she'd won the lottery with Ness and Heinrich.It was odd to think of her mother and Heinrich's mother - two women Evelyn supposed might have looked alike in some ways, given how many features she and Heinrich had in common - pregnant at the same time. Heinrich's mom was probably happier about it than Evelyn's was. Were the Hexenmeisters already... working? By that point? Did assassin-for-hire jobs have a good benefits package, with maternity leave and everything? Although wizard assassination was probably less strenuous than Muggle or manual assassination. It also meant that sixteen years ago at this time, both of their mothers were pregnant. That suddenly seemed like a very long time. For Evelyn, and apparently Heinrich, quite literally everything had happened since then.
Then, Evelyn thought of her previous birthday. She'd been with the McLeods of course, and she'd almost thought to write to Heinrich to tell him about her birthday then, but it seemed odd to do. Hi, it's my birthday, talk to me. Also, why don't you want me to visit? That would have been weird. Now, with the benefit of hindsight, she was glad she hadn't done that. But it also meant that Heinrich was sitting at home at the same time. If the entirety of his summer was as boring as he'd said, that was a bummer.
"Well, I won't forget your birthday then," Evelyn said, bursting out with a soft laugh. She hadn't really expected to laugh, but something about this moment happening at all, let alone several years into their friendship, was just too funny not to laugh at. One more thought did cross Evelyn's mind, and it was one that could be really good or really bad. Hoping to Eutykhia it was the former, she raised an eyebrow and let Heinrich in on it: "And hey, we'll have our sweet sixteens at the same time."
22
Evelyn Stones
Now if I could find some for myself.
1422
0
5