Carlo: The obvious question is: Who is Wacky Jac? Is that a serious way of referring to Jacqueline? Is she really a wacky girl, because I hear that the new president wants to outlaw Pagan wackiness.

Jac: Well, lots of answers. Wacky Jac is totally cool biz merging many of my wacky selves. It started out as a whimsical attempt to jump on the Hollywood witchcraft bandwagon except from the inside. Being subversive is definitely part of Wacky Jac. I had been sharing some of my artwork with the pagan community through local stores in the Bay Area and then Western Mass for some years already. I did it really for the thrill of it. In more recent years I had had more personal encouragement from the community. For fun I made a 'witches are sexy' card for Halloween and every witch I knew grabbed it and put it on the fridge. Then, Practical Magic came out and I just started thinking....'teenage witches on TV, the movie The Craft, now 2 big superstar actresses in Practical Magic, Buffy making strides in America's unconscious (even showing occult shops on TV).... Witches as appealing to young women. Enough of non-pagan/witch folk portraying us and getting rich. What about us real witches...the ones who have been aware all along.

Carlo: Well, of course there's Silver...

Jac: Yep. And besides I'd been kvetching for years about seeing the same old thing on pagan magazines and witch tees. I wanted to make something fresh, something that fit in with who I was...and where it felt like aesthetically the world was going with magic. So we did a 'witches are sexy' tee and mug and the response was do more...more. So we tried a bit more....a fold out brochure and maybe 15 products. Some more of our original (subversive) designs on tees and some local witchy coffee, a local hand made broom and some cheeky...can't help but laugh, very pagan undies. Again people loved it. And the undies were out of control!

Meanwhile, I got pregnant again, Mark stopped teaching and we kind of stepped back from active pagan life. And I have always been a step back. I'm into private power! Not to say a good public ritual isn't fun and feeding but I'm more of a backseat witch....observant, potent, but quiet. Wacky Jac was a major coming out for me and in a way the coming out that most suited me. So as WJ grew I became, outwardly, a pagan businesswoman. Then funny enough we began to naturally dialog with the Feminists, the Lesbians, the sex positive crowds outside the pagan community and of course the Goddess movement. The American Goddess tee is a fantastic seller. Anyway...the young feminist girls rising out of the 90s girl power movement, the ones who grew up with the internet and the new edge just love us. And it makes sense. I am a long time feminist, originally hopelessly urban though you'd never know it now out here in the woods! And a girl power girl before my time. They like our aesthetic, our pro sex, pro sacred message. And they are the wild girl goddesses of our future. I'm loving that dialog. Rocker girls, punk girls-goths-subversive types relate to the pagan, pro sex, pro woman message. My new tee "eat" targets that group directly trying to take a bite (ha ha) out of anorexia's glamour.

And last but not least my good friend Diane called me Wacky Jac way back in my 20s. We used to fantasize about opening up an alternative complex with art space, ritual space, alternative counseling and a cafe called Wacky Jac's Snack Shack. It was a young girl's California dream!

Carlo: Uh, like, yeah.

Mark: Wacky Jac is an egregore which either we created or which chose us, I'm not sure. It has a mission in the dense material plane. We do not know exactly what that mission is. But, so far it is working.

Carlo: It sounds like a story familiar to many of us - both in the Pagan community as well as the other groups that you're down with. And how fabulous that other Pagan-friendly groups have locked onto your message and encouraged you to expand and even given you great ideas. How did you two meet?

Mark: We met in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. She was an artist. When she smiled I fell into her eyes. I was teaching kids and pretending to be a fairy with horns. Although we might have passed each other on the Taconic when we were little kids.

Carlo: Yep, that fairy-with-horns thing always gets them! Whose idea was the business?

Mark: Jac's. Although, we have dreamed of doing some kind of creative collaboration for years. You know, follow your bliss the moolah will follow. Wacky Jac is as much about ideas and aesthetics as it is about shirts and undies. It is a spiritual and political and artistic work in progress. Besides, who else would hire the former editor of "The Wicked Word"?

Carlo: Wicked true. Now, you are an online retailer, or "e-tailer", is that correct?

Mark: Yep. We are also a wholesaler. e-tail is great because the shop never closes and you can go to work in your birthday suit.

Carlo: So you're typical Pagan businesspeople then! From whence did your online business come? Did you have a store at one point?

Mark: No store. We went right up the telephone pole.

Carlo: Do you ever plan to open a store?

Jac: No, I like the freedom of web work. With kids and other interests, it suits us better. We used to fantasize that way but it's not practical. Other people can do the store!

Mark: Nope. Well, maybe a chain.

Carlo: Out here in Western Mass, there is another well-known wholesaler and retailer of Pagan sundries and such...Azure Green. Do you work with them, or are you their competition?

Mark: We work with them on a psychic level. Our plan of attack is entirely complimentary. We've talked about joint-company picnics and Quidditch leagues but that's it. Marin and Adair are really nice people and have been warmly supportive of us as people and a business.

Jac: We know them and love them. But, we are really a different sort of store. We don't try to meet everybody's needs with one catalog. We provide a particular style that might add to a store or a person's collection. We do a lot of direct sales. Stores pick us up as something special to enhance their stock incense and pentacle jewelry. A lot of other alternative stores buy our stuff too. Bookstores, Pride Stores, Hippy-Groovy stores...Hip Girl Boutiques. But Paganism is our root. We are serving a lot of Pagans and a lot of Goddess lovers and a lot of other folks who like what we do independent of Paganism.

Carlo: Wackyjac.com. By the way, your website is fabulous. I noticed that your links page has a link to Lovestarz.com and that many of your links have a theme of girl power. Do you have friends at those sites, or do you just like them?

Jac: Mark is a master at co-partnerships, and schmooze. The girl power sites love us and love Mark's smooth tongue.

Mark: The femme gURL sites....they are very cool. I'm attracted to the aesthetic and the politics. BUST Magazine especially is doing some very cool stuff and the crossover between G-Power and Witch-Power is significant and very interesting. I've always been interested in subversion and infiltration. The witch is a powerful icon whether you are one, wanna be one, or fear them.

Carlo: Are the Goddess undies your best sellers?

Jac: At present I would say Eat Organic sells the best but Worship Here has had a huge response and all the undies do very well. Undies are what we sell far and above the rest.

Carlo: Who made up the slogans for the Goddess undies, they are soooo funny!!!

Jac: It's really a group effort. Mark came up with Worship Here which started us off. We both design and create it all. It's a 50/50 deal. Mark is more of a goof while I'm more of a wack.

Carlo: Where did you come up with that little witch logo?

Jac: She came from my 'witches are sexy' picture that I drew on a whim the Halloween before we started. She just fit the company.

Carlo: And who's the hotty on the postcards, in the black Witch T-shirt top? Is she from a modeling agency? ? She looks like she spends plenty of time at the BUST.com website!

Jac: That's me!

Carlo: What are your plans for the future? Are you planning a takeover of Azure Green? Now would be the time, with the market so low.

Jac: Yeah, right. We see ourselves as a new hip pagan feminist multi- generational marketplace which evolves as we grow and our audiences grow. I want to keep growing. I want to also develop a number of other sites which may or may not relate to WJ. I want to make a good living, enjoy myself, educate and entertain, raise my kids well, follow my bliss, and at some point take a completely new turn. Besides being an artist as well, I am a writer. I've been working on a novel for a few years now in my minimal spare time - in a way it brought on WJ too. It's full of wackiness, god(s) & fairy inspired adventure and sex. It's really fun to write.

Carlo: What would be your ideal five-year plan for WackyJac.com?

Jac: Geez, ask a small question why don't you! 1. Stay authentic to ourselves 2. Make a good pagan living 3. Have fun 4. Reach many more niches, and take pagan aesthetics and awareness to new levels 5. Grow with the times 6. Create the zine I've been dreaming of for the past year expressing WJ's vision in many forums-shop being only one 7. Not work too hard and enjoy my family

Carlo: Okay, this one is for Mark. Do you ever put a pair of Goddess undies on your head when you are picking and packing boxes for shipment? Please be honest.

Jac: Oh..so you think Mark packs!

Mark: Washed? Ooops, did I say that?

Carlo: This one is for Jac. Say something wacky.

Jac: something wacky.

Paganism has been a great venue for me to free myself of a whole lot of inhibitions, Wacky Jac has been yet another, writing a novel even more so...but still when put on the spot I can't think of a darn wacky thing to say. I think I'm more of a naturally wacky gal. Less wacky talk more wacky being. Cynical, observant, biting and happy all once. An optimistic Bitch. I wore my 1 year old's pants on my head for the last photo shoot of me for the WJ Samhain postcard. anything wacky there? Ha...and you thought mark put pants on his head.

Carlo: Finish these sentences: WackyJac is different because...

Jac & Mark, chanting languidly:...we are self-styled, ever evolving, and not interested in being like anyone else except to bring more people in on our eccentric electric bliss.

Carlo: Chicks like WackyJac.com because...

Jac & Mark:...we worship them!

Carlo: WackyJac is the best place to...

Jac & Mark:...shop for the revolution.

Carlo: The one thing I won't eat raw is...

Jac & Mark: TV.

Carlo: And there you have it. We hope you will visit Jac & Mark's excellent website, wackyjac.com, and even try your own pair of Goddess undies. Until then, this is Carlo Ravin saying Bright Blessings and...

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