Rit­u­als can be a balm dur­ing dif­fi­cult or tur­bu­lent times, and even when things are going well; they offer a way to main­tain some sem­blance of pur­pose and joy and pres­ence amid all of life’s demands. In Wendy A. Horwitz’s thought­ful new mem­oir, Milk­weed and Hon­ey Cake: A Mem­oir in Rit­u­al Moments, read­ers are treat­ed to a deeply intro­spec­tive med­i­ta­tion on rit­u­al told through a series of vignettes about the author’s life. The essays are not nec­es­sar­i­ly chrono­log­i­cal, but all coa­lesce around the idea of find­ing rit­u­al in the every­day. Through­out, Hor­witz writes elo­quent­ly, ele­vat­ing the mun­dane. Again and again, she asks what a rit­u­al is and how it is dif­fer­ent from a routine. 

As befits a for­mer pedi­atric psy­chol­o­gist now teach­ing writ­ing and health human­i­ties, Hor­witz tells sto­ries that doc­u­ment spe­cif­ic moments that elu­ci­date how rit­u­als can be expe­ri­enced. Sto­ries take place in her child­hood, with her chil­dren, in reli­gion, out in nature and the world around us. They address reli­gion and the author’s expe­ri­ence of writ­ing. One such essay that exem­pli­fies Horwitz’s atten­tion to detail and desire to ele­vate the ordi­nary is ​“Grad­u­a­tion in a Year of Won­ders.” Here she writes that when Covid inter­rupt­ed both one of her chil­dren and her niece’s respec­tive grad­u­a­tions, she was able to piv­ot and cre­ate mean­ing­ful moments for each of their spe­cial events. While a grad­u­a­tion rit­u­al might be famil­iar to many, Horowitz also shares rit­u­als that may be more inci­dent-spe­cif­ic and less com­mon. For exam­ple, in Writ­ing to the Dead, she describes how writ­ing let­ters to her deceased father not only helped her with her grief and to memo­ri­al­ize his life, but also helped her to han­dle chal­lenges in the present day.

Read­ing this book, I couldn’t help but be remind­ed of rit­u­als in my own life. Milk­weed and Hon­ey Cake offers read­ers a beau­ti­ful discourse.