memory of sun, outdoors

I suppose the Sun is one of those cards in this deck where its Swedish providence is especially noticeable - in the style of the clothes that the two children wear, and even more so in the prominence of the moose. It has to be a pretty northern country if such an animal is associated with sunlight and warm rather than winter, snow.

We have pictures of moose - from vacations is Alaska and, I think, perhaps Maine as well. I was too young then to remember much from those trips, and what does stick out in memory does not include any experiences with such creatures. Deer though, I do remember seeing, outdoors.

Its really kind of amusing how much of an outdoorsy scene this sun card is: children playing in the grass, roosters feeding, butterflies fluttering above it all. It's things like this that remind me of how much of a city kid I really am, both in experience and in outlook, preference and predilection. We had a house in the Pocanos in Pennsylvania for a while when I was a kid. It was a big change going out there - so very rural, foresty, quiet. There was lots of grass and forest, dirt roads, wildlife of all sorts. Yes, there were the deer that I saw, coming in twos or threes across the road to nibble at this or that plant. It was nice, sure, to be able to see them, something certainly not possible in New York City.

In America at least, I've only ever seen chickens and roosters at petting zoos, also in Pennsylvania. It was not they, but the goats, that tickled my fancy. For a while we used to drive down there almost every weekend, two hours in both directions, card trips I hated for the motion sickness they caused. There was so much grass to play on and forest to explore - I did neither, much. I was bored outside. It was boring and uncomfortable with all the bugs, the lack of man-made noise. I much preferred to stay indoors and play on the Sega Genesis: the Sonic games, street fighter games, that random game where you played a team of criminals, one short and fat and one tall and skinny, who had to successfully break in and rob various places. I read history for kids books about Pompeii and the sinking of the Titanic, about the life of Anny Oakley and about the Trojan War. I colored in coloring books or watched movies with my father, many of them (in retrospect) not especially age-appropriate but no one objected. I would sit at the table when my mother's friend, who lived nearby, visited and complained about her miserable job as a hotel maid and her husband, who was over twenty years older than her and who she had only married to secure a green card and whose grumpy ass she was now stuck with. He was nicer to his dogs than he was to her, she would say. I sat quietly and listened to them talk.

I did not see the appeal of that kind of outdoors. At home, playing in the backyard and in the street, on stoops and stairs of houses, always some other people around making noise, arguing, that was tolerable sometimes for our imagination games but so much quiet and trees and grass and bugs and why bother?

To this day I cannot help but feel this way. Place me in a city, any city in the world, and I will happily wonder round in it all day, on foot, and never grow bored. I love exploring cities, the nooks and crannies and changing style of the architecture of buildings, whether they be cities full of metal and glass skyscrapers or Eastern European medieval architecture or low slung white structures and fields of trash and wondering goats.  In a city I can enjoy the sun, and I love the contrast of trees and flowers to the man-made things all around them. Looking forward to taking pictures of the blooming cherry blossoms around DC again next week for just that reason. But in an actually rural place, the kind of naturey environs so many people find relaxing, a nice place to get away...I can appreciate PICTURES of such places, but actually put me into one and I will very quickly grow uncomfortable and bored and possibly very paranoid about bugs and feeling itchy for no reason and if forced to remain there I will very soon pull out a book or a game and ignore it all.

Different strokes, different folks and all that.

anxiety and perspective

So tomorrow, attempting to take a small but important step in the direction of dealing with some major negative things that have been going on both in the long and the short term, and have been feeling rather anxious about it all weekend. Also recognize that some of my attitude towards it is not exactly conducive to it being useful/productive, so decided to do a bit of a spread to try to work through that somewhat.

--
I. Where I am now/my situation:

A bit of a tricky one, this Sun card. We see it prominently, the bright orange and yellow light, the energy radiating outwards. An opportunity here, momentum, a powerful kind of potential, very bright. And yet it is not a comforting kind of sunlight, but rather so strong as to seem dangerous, overwhelming. The man in the image looks dark, sun-burned perhaps, something snake-like coiled around him. He gives thanks to the sun, and yet seems...both empowered and subjugated by it. You need the sun to survive and to thrive and yet in some circumstances, it can hurt you. This card makes me think of desert-dwellers, which is a perfect example of that phenomenon. It must be handled with care, this sun. I want this opportunity to work out, but I am rather afraid of those dangerous sparks....

II. How to handle hopes and expectations:

The woman here sits under the glow of a lamp; the light allows her to see clearly what she has despite the darkness that otherwise surrounds her. She holds her coins close, responsible for them, owning up to them, caring for them. By becoming sentimentally attached to these things she risks emotional distress if they were to shatter and break, if she were to lose them. And yet sometimes, we have to keep holding nonetheless. I've a tendency sometimes to distance myself from hopes, expectations. I am doing this because I should but of course I don't expect it to go well and so I will not be invested and if it fails it will be easier to bear. That works out well enough sometimes, but in this particular situation... not the best approach. Better to keep in mind, clearly and close at hand, what I hope to gain from this endeavor, and try to be pro-active in making that happen, insofar as I can.

III. How to handle anxiety and fears:

There is a clear contrast between this card and the proceeding one. Here, rather than a single figure in a single small space, we have not just the world but the universe, stars and planets and space. We have looking outwards, the bigger picture. letting go and letting the Universe do as it may. It's funny and a bit difficult to think of how huge the universe is and how tiny we are in comparison, so many huge forces moving through themillenia, and our lives so short in comparison. There are so many things in life we cannot control. The universe gives us strokes of amazing luck, things clicking into place and manifesting wonderfully, and small, unexpected surprises that make our day; and it gives us tragedies, efforts falling apart, unwanted burdens that we must learn to bear. Maybe this effort will be a stroke of luck and maybe another minor disaster. I can control my attitude and approach,  but not much else. Focusing on worst case scenarios prematurely will change nothing either way.

IV. Advice for adjusting my attitude/approach:

The man in this card has clearly lost something. He is soggy and sad, rain-soaked in his defeat, tired. Defeat perhaps, yes, and yet when we look closer, what has he really lost? He still has is sturdy cloak, and not one but five swords there at his disposal. Has he tried them all, seen whether any would suit is purposes? Five swords. I was give five new numbers to call on Friday; this is only the person behind one of them, that I am to meet with. I see in this card a reminder to keep things in perspective. Even if this does turn out to be a defeat, a failure, it is not the only option I have. I defeat would not be a disaster but rather a minor setback. Pick up the phone again, call a different number, try again. I am not destitute of resources entirely. I have been in the rain long enough to deal with it for a while longer, even if it does feel quite cold and icky in the moment. Perspective: do not make this out to be either bigger or smaller than what it really is.

My Favorite Majors: The Sun

So finally we get to the Sun card - the most clearly, unquestionably positive card in the Major Arcana. Its hard not to like this card, seeing as how in readings it pops up to tell us good things - reassurance, success and the like...

I find that there is a nice variation in how the card is presented in various decks, particularly since - unlike some of the other majors - there is a significant difference in how it is represented in the 'big three' - TdM, RWS and Thoth. Subsequent decks tend to do their own take derivative of one of those takes and...yeah, lots to choose from, among my decks. My final selections, as we can see, are a bit more on the 'out there' and of the spectrum.

XIX. Sun

Favorite:
I've written about this card before, and yeah, it is most definitely my favorite Sun card. I love the Magical Forest deck in general; it is a lovely, quirky, endearing take on the traditional RWS imagery. I think that having kangaroos represent the figures in the Sun card is brilliant. Having a joey in a pouch as the traditional child, with the flag of victory and everything, really works here and leaves lots of room for reading, as I kind of went into in more detail in the previous post on this card. I love the coloring - very sunny and yellow, but not in an overwhelming way, with just a bit of a suggestion of too hot, too much of a good thing, for that kind of potential reading into it too. Love the way the field of sunflowers is drawn. Everything, basically, about this card very much appeals.

Runner Up:
So it's a bit funny that this is my second choice because, as a rule, I tend to very much dislike the TdM tradition's take on the Sun...the whole children frolicking under the sun image doesn't really evoke for me the kind of happy success meaning this card is supposed to express, particularly when combined with the art style of most TdM decks. However, in the de la Rea, this image is abstracted to the point where I do not see children in the figures, rather just the concept of individuals - ageless, genderless - celebrating or enjoying themselves. In some ways - that ribbon - they are tied to each other, and in other ways they are distanced, disjointed, masked, apart: that great gap that always, even in the best of times, separates each one of us from everyone else. The deck also abstracts the actual sun in the image, makes that a mask too, which I appreciate on an aesthetic level - the gentle gold and silver paint on the cards in real life really makes this just lovely to look at. Love the colors on this card in general actually, the balancing of red, gold, blue, and the hint of minimalism - that broad swath of white background - really brings this together for me. I find it reads awesomely.

comparative Sun musings

So a recent post on the Tarot Thrones blog has had me thinking about doing something comparative with reading/my decks. I drew another Sun card today from my current/weekly working deck, and that got me thinking about variations on reading this major. And so - some Sun-centered musing follows...

So to start off with, my original draw, the Sun from the Corte dei Tarocchi deck - I actually quite like this take on the sun. I got this deck, recently, because I just found some of the cards so charming... We have the two little girls under the bright sun (love the details on their outfits!). They both seem to be suprised to various degrees my something - the one on the right looks shocked, the one on the left pensive, nervous.

An interesting reminder here, about the fact that sometimes, good things - great things - do fall into our lap quite unexpectedly. Sometimes, the things that eventually turn out to be absolutely amazing initially come at us in the form of an unpleasant shock. And sometimes, success, the prospect of some particular accomplishment - it scares us. All the work that must go into attaining that kind of sunshine...it can feel overwhelming. Sometimes even optimism, a positive attitude, can terrify - after all, if you have a fatalistic outlook and low expectations, you have a shield against dissapointment. To adopt a positive, pro-active approach is to open yourself up to risk, to pain.  Scary indeed, it can be.


On the other hand, in the Sun card of the Silicon Dawn tarot, we get quite a different image, and a different aspect of the things the card represents. Here we have an queen bee figure, almost a combination, really, of antromorphic bee and some kind of Indian goddess, if you look at her posture, the arms, the background of the sun.... Below, the large, rich hive is busy: worker bees creating sweet honey, everything illuminated in warm, golden hues...

Here, we are reminded of the fact that, excepting those situations where it really is just sheer luck, most of the time succes is built on hard work - work that is sometimes boring, sometimes repetative, sometimes deeply unpleasant and yet...necessary. We see that sense of inner accomplishment that comes from sticking to it, getting those things done. The inner pride, when you KNOW that it's your own hard work and skill that has gotten you what you have. Also, a reminder of how much teamwork, a larger group effort can achieve with effective leadership and good organization - in that case, the kind of collective sense of accomplishment - the elated, WE DID IT feeling.

Now with the Celtic tarot, we see yet another take on the Sun. Here, instead of golden, yellow hues, we have a lot of watery colors, a prevalence of blue. The picture looks a bit somber too...the ghostly figure floating up, the naked woman below, kneeling as if in supplication, the sun glowing dimly, as if it were about to go out soon...

To me, there's a reminder here, of the impermanence of all things. Everything comes to an end, and from all ends new beginnings spring, and so it goes. Good things - the bright blaze of the sun - last only so long. We can't expect them to go on forever, cannot expect one success to be all that we will have to do. On the other hand, in order to embark on the new, we have to accept the floating away of older things, even things very dear to us. We must be ready to adapt, to start again as many times as we must, to accept transience. The things that we can hold onto are within us: a positive attitude, the self-confidence that comes from past experiences, lessons learned.

Finally, in one more take, we have the Sun of the Magical Forest tarot, a personal favorite of mine. Here we have a rather clever take on some of the traditional RWS imagery - the youth, in this case a kangaroo joey, still in his mother's pouch with the red flag of success, with sunflowers all around and the bright sun overhead...

This card in particular makes me think of the effect that the right enviroment can have on outlook and on success - the joey here is safe and secure in his pouch, developing at his own pace, protected from the world until he is ready to face it on his own. In the meantime, he builds up his confidence with small accomplishments, gets experience under the belt. The field of flowers and the bright sun are just the right kind of setting for healthy growth. The right kind of support can be a real advantage. On the other hand, having the joey to protect gives the mother kangaroo a sense of purpose, a reason to seek out that bright sunlight...sometimes having that externalized sense of responsibility, needing to care or help out someone else...can do as much for the person or purpose we are trying to assist. Symbosis. Positive cycles and spirals.

the funny thing about anxieties...

So...interesting pair of cards coming up today. Interesting that they come up as a pair, that is: the 9 of swords and the Sun card - quite a contrast it seems, between those. In the first we have a cat on that familiar patch quilt, except here, with the suits and elemental symbols filled in it almost looks like a chess board of some sort - a challenge, a competition.

The cat sees danger everywhere. Beneath his feet. Around him. The swords box him in, cage him where he stands. Sharp blades are pointed towards his body. Who knows how long they will hang like that, threatening? Waiting for the sword to fall, waiting for the other shoe to drop... And doesn't that really describe the state of anxiety perfectly? It is the WORRY that kills you as much as whatever the negative event actually is...the pondering worst case scenarios, the dread...

And of course, when things are a mess, that kind of anxiety...well, at least it makes SENSE, is not...unexpected. But what about when things are going well, coming together? What about when you've just managed to succeed at something challenging?

Shockingly (ha!) enough, the brain will still find something to worry over - what if it all goes wrong now? What if you screw up and all that work is wasted? Now that you've set a standard, if you make a mistake, drop the ball, it will be even MORE of a disappointment to you and to others; the stakes are higher...

And of course, there is internal nitpicking. Did well? Well enough, sure, but surely you could have done even BETTER if you had tried harder, if you were really good enough, if you really belonged in this position, if you really had the skills people think you have...

Considering how easily these kinds of thoughts can come...I suppose it's not all that surprising that Impostor Syndrome is as common a phenomenon as it is.

Fundamentally, I guess, and depending on your exact nature, approach to things, how much work you may have done to deal with negative patterns of thinking, anxieties and worries are pretty much part of the deal of being a living, functioning human being, regardless of the external. Things are a mess? You worry. Things are fantastic? You worry. So it goes. The trick, I suppose, is that act of managing your thinking, keeping things in perspective, accepting irrational thoughts while recognizing that they are irrational and calibrating your actions accordingly.

Sometimes you just need to make a conscious effort to turn your thoughts away from the swords and towards those sunflowers in the background.

pleasant little adventures

So decided to do a final little two card draw this morning before switching off to a new week's deck...

Seeing these, it immediately brought to mind my day yesterday. I really like this deck's take on that three of wands...we have the ship in the sea, sailing, the possibilities, opportunities, horizons, travel aspects of this card...but also the dolphin the the foreground. We have a dolphin playing, enjoying itself. A bit of whimsy. A message to make the most of the moment, of whatever you happen to be doing. Enjoy the adventures you happen to go on. The sun really emphasizes that point too. Two kids, playing together under the sun's bright light - optimism, fun, a good attitude.

It was a very sunny Saturday yesterday. A got myself motivated, gathered up the energy to get up early and go out. There was an open house event at the embassies of the EU. I visited the embassies of Finland, the UK, Denmark, the Netherlands, Croatia, Lithuania, and Romania, as well as going inside the big Islamic center/Mosque which was also having an open house type event. It was a lot of walking, a nice day spent exploring. I enjoyed spending the time alone doing positive, interesting things. And in a legal sense, I visited the sovereign soil of quite a few nations indeed, ha.

So yes, I felt quite a bit  like that dolphin, moving around, checking out the possibilities, take advantage of an opportunity (the event is only hosted one day a year) and enjoying the weather, the sunshine.

I also like the dynamic movement of the two cards...the dolphin is swimming, dancing in the water, and the two kids are dancing on the grass...a message there, I think, about making your own pleasures, about taking an active part rather than sitting around and just...thinking. Or even just the fact that, nice as sedentary activities can be...when the weather is right, doing things that require some physical movement - walking, running, skating, biking, dancing, swimming, whatever - can be really beneficial, both physically and mentally.

Why Do I Collect Decks?

So I wrote a post response to a question on AT, and I liked what came to mind enough to want to expand on the idea here so....

Collecting Decks

So I have some 30+ tarot decks at the current moment, which I do not think is a particularly notable number by the standards of Aeclectic membership but which is, by the standards of the wider world, quite enough to be called a 'collection' and to qualify me as someone who can reasonably say that I collect tarot decks.

And I suppose I do, though for various reasons I don't really think of myself as a Collector the way some people are: I keep all my decks in simple bags in a large sack (after fire last fall, I like the idea of being able to quickly grab and take them all in an emergency), and care about boxes not at all - the only reason I keep those these days is for possible trading purposes, as other people seem to like keeping their decks in proper boxes with proper LWBs. I don't care about keeping my decks in 'mint' condition, even some of the rarer, OOP ones - if I think it will look better trimmed, I trim away, and gilt them too. I do not keep decks I cannot or do not want to read with, no matter how pretty or rare - all of my decks must be reading decks, working decks, because what the hell do I have them for, if not to read with?

And yet, nonetheless, I have enough that one might reasonable ask: why so many decks? Couldn't you read just as well with one or two? Does anyone ever need over thirty tarot decks? And to be fair, no I do not need them. And yet I am an INTP, and there is some underlying logic with which I justify my purchases. It comes down, I guess, to that one great love of mine in life - the love of learning, of gaining knowledge, expanding what I know and how I can think about the things I know of.

See, we all call it 'tarot reading' but in many ways that seems to be mostly a metaphor, figurative language. Do we really think of it as the equivalent of reading a newspaper, a book? And yet, the more I think about it, the more I want to say...perhaps yes. What is written language, after all? From the earliest pictographs to modern, current alphabets in a way, if you think about it broadly, writing is about visually representing abstract concepts. We have these little symbols we call letters, and we string them together this way and that, and suddenly that MEANS something to us, because we have been trained to automatically interpret them as such. So when you come across DOG, you do not see random squiggles: your mind automatically brings up the image or the idea of a certain canine animal. And when you learn other languages, you apply the same concepts. PIES brings to mind the same animal for me, because my mind has been trained to make that associated. So does كلب because again, written language acquisition is about training the mind to correlate visual symbols with sounds with abstract ideas.

Reading tarot is, in a lot of ways, is just the same. You have 78 cards with distinct images, and each card has a range of meanings attached to it - the exact details depend on which system(s) you follow, whether you read intuitively or whether you are deep into studying historical esoteric symbolism or whatever, and so on. In any case though, its a recognizable system with widely applicable card meanings, and as you get more experienced with working with the cards, and more familiar with them, the process of eliciting messages from the cards becomes easier. When you first start off, you draw a card and look at the picture, and maybe you have some vague concept of what it could maybe mean, but you aren't quite sure, and so you check in the LWB or whatever book you have, and you read the keywords and then you kind of stumble along, in broad strokes, trying to make some kind of connection that makes sense to you. The image and the abstract ideas are still separate and you are trying to bridge that gulf.

Later on, it just comes. I draw the 6 of cups and I automatically think of nostalgia, of childhood, of looking backwards, of longing, of people you used to know and things you used to do. I draw the 10 of coins and I think of houses, of families, of the people you love and the people you are tied to, of responsibilities and duties and burdens. A draw an Ace of Wands and I think of opportunities, of growth, of creative energy ready to be channeled, of new projects, of starting thinks, taking the plunge, boldness. I do not have to sit there and struggle to remember - it simply comes when I look at the image in front of me. The images of the cards you see, have been married to a whole range of concepts in my mind. It really is quite analogous to reading, except that what you are reading is a deck of cards...

Which brings us back to the idea of why so many decks? If you have a deck with which you have grown familiar enough to have that kind of connection, isn't that enough?

But you see, to me it does make a difference that what you are reading is not words but images, ART. Art, which can be created in so many different styles and mediums, which is both so inherently personal and so universal...Having many decks means working with the same core concept represented in a plethora of different ways. It really does broaden the scope of your knowledge, the pool of meaning from which you draw when you read. You'll see a card you feel you know so well drawn in a different way and it will trigger something in your mind, another way that you could approach the idea. It adds nuance and shade. Working with the Thoth so much recently has been doing that a lot for me - it really isn't so far removed from the RWS meanings, and yet it comes at them from different angles and perspectives and it makes me really THINK. It widens how I see the cards. Like Aeon instead of Judgement opened up that card for me in a way I never really got just from the standard christianity-based images of the Angel blowing the trumpet and resurrection. Or the post the other night about the Wheel of Fortune and the idea that life is made up of many wheels - wheel of career, wheel of love, wheel of emotional health - that all move at their own pace. These are ideas that would have never occurred to me if I had just been working with the ONE deck, and which once they do I can internalize and apply to all my future working with tarot, regardless of which deck it is that I happen to be reading at the current time.

And yeah, in a way each deck is also it's own 'dialect' because each one has it's own artistic take, little details that you can pick and pull apart as you interpret. Sometimes the answers the cards give can be QUITE literal, and that staircase or the hat or whatever in the deck you are working with happens to be exactly applicable - it wouldn't be there in another deck, but its here, in this one, an answer just for you.

Besides that, decks draw on all kinds of influences - each other, early 20th century occultist groups, ancient mythology, various cultural practices, astrology, numerology, qabbalah, various animal groups, whatever, and they do so in various ways and proportions and so, having many decks can also be a nice way to become at least a little bit familiar with other ideas or systems or whatever which for me - well, more learning is always, always a plus.

And so that is my overly long explanation about both what I think tarot is and how I justify spending all kinds of money on tarot decks when, one might argue one or two would be more than enough :D

A Deck of Quirky Courts

So I tend to try to stick to writing here about the decks that I am actually currently working with, but now and then...an exception.

I decided to take advantage of my access to a scanner here to get my de la rea deck on my computer for future such blogging purposes, and was reminded again why this is one of my favorite decks. It's on odd one, to be sure: offbeat art style, very Marseille based but everything is masks, pip minors with odd elemental associations illustrated differently than the usual Marseille patterns. Gold and silver paint on the cards, and they are so very pretty...this is most definitely an art deck, a deck for collectors, and for some at least, that's more or less what it is.

I have a rule though, about reading with all decks I own. If I cannot read with it, I do not keep it. And indeed, I've found a way - a very specific way - to get this deck to give me brilliant readings. I only ever read with it using the Comte de Mellet spread, no reversals. With this method, readings vary from short, with only one or two pairs of cards to read, to quite longer. In fact, after my scanning spree I was inspired to do a reading for myself with it...it ended up being six pairs, for a total of twelve cards, much more than my reading usual. As usual, utterly on point, accurate, and thorough. That reading is too long and too personal to post here, so instead I thought I would linger a bit on one aspect of this deck I find particularly charming - the courts!

It is of course an extra challenge to take the courts - often considered some of the trickiest cards in the deck to read - and show them as these masked, abstracted figures. Yes, what I love about these is just how well the 'feel' of each court is expressed. I love the knight of wands, for example, because he isn't quite the bold rushing forward figure of other decks...yet actually, expression not unlike that of the RWS really...uncertain, heading into unfamiliar territory perhaps, encountering some surprise, the ridicule of the horse...and yet he goes anyway. What's that saying about courage being about feeling fear and proceeding anyway? I like this queen too...majestic in the way she holds that cup, her hood over her like a canopy, the influence of intuition, mind...

I also quite like these two courts. The starkness of the coloring on the King of Swords really highlights the kind of harsh, unyielding intellectual nature of this figure, the width of his collar and garb how much space he takes up, his authority...everything black, white, red. Those shoulder masks... As for this page...the garb of a scholar, or at least it seems so to me, and the curious up-tilt of the head. She likes learning new things, this page, exploring, inspecting, enriching herself. Love the detail of the sprouting plant in the background.

But yes, love the quirky courts in this deck, and shall definitely be doing some exercises around them eventually, when I get back to working with this deck more regularly. It really is such a treasure: the majors are, too, quite awesome :]

making the most of good things

Now here, I think, is an interesting pair of cards, with an interesting message/idea to mull over. First we have the sun - success, fulfillment, victory. We have two winged butterfly children dancing over the fertile mountain, things almost completly achieved, the zodiac wheel, wholenes, the rose within the sun, light shining. This is without a doubt one of the most positive cards in the Major Arcana, full of good things to come, the happily ever after...

Except...is it ever happily ever after, really? Which one of us hasn't, after a certain age, with enough personal experience or acute observation under our belts, wondered about those fairy tale characters - was it really all so swell for EVER AFTER? Because success, after all, brings it's own challenges.

Absolute power corrupts absolutely, the saying goes. You get on top, money and power and glory is in your hands and...then what? Do you use it well, or to you give in to the tempation to act selfishly? Look at all the dictators out there in the world. Or, better yet, look at their children. Now there we often see corruption, entitelement, arrogance at its worst: the dictator, at least, had to climb his way up in the world. And the child who was born into luxury and power, who was born into a world where they are held in awe and in fear simply for existing, where expensive trinkets are simply THERE when elsewhere people are starving? Can anyone come out of that kind of upbringing undamaged, really?

Or more mundanely, that well known phenomenon: the job you get which pays well, really well. Better yet, it is also fairly prestigious. Your family and friends are impressed when you are hired. Suddenly you can afford all kinds of things you couldn't before. Luxuries, indulgences. Life is good, right? Except that truth be told, you fucking hate that job, hate the stress, the long hours, the things you have to do. You hate waking up in the morning and hate going to work. You spend the plurality of the hours in the week in a place where you are utterly unhappy, and what a waste of life that is! But you hesistate to leave, no matter how much your soul wishes it because...well, because it's such a good job, right? The wages, the way that people look at you when you mention it, impressed...

How about the tendency to buy things to try to cheer ourselves up? I am miserable so I will by a new pair of shoes or the shiniest new phone or another video game or another tarot deck or a designer bag or whatever your poison of choice may be...the vague idea that of course, this shiny new item will make things better, will put a smile on my face. But that kind of joy never lasts for very long, does it? How much debt can you rack up trying to improve yourself with things, things?

So yes, success brings its own dangers, if you aren't careful, mindful of what it is that you really want, need. Luxury may certainly seem quite nice from afar with those overflowing, glowing gold cups, but look closer: the darkening sky, the chill mist. The moment you level up is not, in fact, the time to settle in to a dull complacency, but rather to ensure that the good thing that just happened remains a good thing, that life is working you and the people around you to the best of your abilities.

simple pleasures

I wanted to try out the Marrakech a bit more, plus it's one of those days where I could really use a message that's just meant for the here and now and not tied to bigger themes/things, so here we have it -

Sometimes it really is about the simple things. Sometimes greater pleasures and comforts are simply out of reach: there are things that can't be fixed in a snap, burdens that cannot simply be thrown off, problems that tie themselves into your life like stubborn knots at which you pick and pick with little effect. Sometimes, in the moment, the best thing is to focus on what you have in front of you.

Like this Sun card, which is really a rather unusual take and quite interesting. The water carrier...a modest profession, it would seem, yet in a desert country, in a place where the sun's brightness is as much a danger as it is a source of light and warmth...how valuable is water then? How amazing the moment when the man comes to you and your friend, pours a cup of cool liquid, offers it to you to drink? How nice it must be, that first long sip, the feel and taste against parched lips? Suddenly the sun can feel nice again instead of overwhelming.

Sometimes you may have that friend with you, or a partner: someone to hold your hand, to rub your back, to tell you everything is going to be okay and keep you company. And when you don't? Make do with what you have - simple pleasures. Make yourself a cup of your favorite tea. Let it steep, cool enough to drink. Sweeten it just so. And then drink it slowly, mindfully. Enjoy the taste of it on your tongue, the way it fills up your belly. Or have a cup of your favorite wine, sweet and white. Enjoy the smell of it. Drink the glass bit by bit, savoring the flavors. Take your time, focus in the moment. Let all the bigger problems fall away for just a bit. If it's day, maybe take a look outside at the sun and enjoy the light; if it's night, maybe light a candle, let the scent of lavender waft across the room.

Yes, simple pleasures sometimes.

My most favorite Deck!

So...whether you are a tarot collector/enthusiast/reader with 2 decks, or 20, or 200, when it comes down to it, everyone has to have a favorite deck, right? The one that calls to you just a bit more than the rest; the one that gives you the really great readings; the one whose art just utterly enchants. For me, that deck, the most favorite of favorites, the one that I did indeed grab before anything else when firefighters broke down my door due to a fire in another apartment on my floor a few months ago is... Tarot Nusantara!

Not everyone has heard of it. It is, sadly, not so easy to get ahold of, and certainly not published by any of the major US or European publishers of tarot decks.

It's a pretty straightforward RWS clone designed and published in Indonesia and not so easy to get outside of Indonesia. I was lucky enough to find a fellow Aeclectic member from Singapore who was willing to sell me a copy. It was, at the time, the most I'd paid for a tarot deck, and to me at least, worth every penny.

I simply ADORE this deck. I've never been a huge fan of the standard old RWS. It's growing on me, I admit. Planning on getting a Pamela Coleman Smith Commemorative deck eventually, and also hopefully the Hoi Polloi but...for a long time I didn't like it at all, didn't connect with the images, just found it...boring, compared to so many other decks out there...

This clone, though? I really cannot express how deeply it appeals to me. The Indonesian art? The colors? The textures of the clothes? The awesome backgrounds? The way it reworks each RWS image in the new style but keeps them properly recognizable, takes out all the Christian symbolism which, while I intellectually get the importance of, intuitiveness has always been a turn of?

There is just so much for me to love about this deck.

I love the size of it. It's more or less playing card size; a bit bigger. Actually a bit bigger than the Silicon Dawn, so really not that small. For me, ideal-size. I'm of the camp that prefers smaller decks that are easy to handle than larger decks that are 'easier to see' but unwieldy...

Not that it is ALL quite...ideal. I wouldn't quite complain about the card stock. It feels really nice in the hands, and shuffles well. Certainly preferable to the super stiff lamination of some USG decks...

However, it is, I would say...delicate. The fronts are thinly laminated...the laminate actually has a really interesting/nice texture. But the backs are un-laminated. Which is a bit...concerning, shall we say. A spill on this deck would be a disaster. Creases easier-than-average to obtain. I've been careful as can be but...I like to carry around whatever deck I'm currently working with in my bag most of the time, because hey, you never know, but this does make me nervous.

But yeah. It's quite easy to read, being a RWS clone and all, and I'd imagine quite easy to learn with - by the time I got it I was well beyond that initial learning the meanings of cards phases, but yanno.

It also came with a nice book, of which I can understand none because it is all in Bahasa Indonesia, lol. Nice novelty item, though.

The titles on majors and courts are also in Bahasa Indonesia, which is a definite plus for me because, language-obsessed thing that I am, I just love it when my decks have TITLES IN FOREIGN LANGUAGES, and especially LANGUAGES I DO NOT UNDERSTAND.

So yeah. This is hands down most treasured deck in my collection. It makes me sad that it is so hard to get because uh, I think it totally should be widely available for all!

That would also make it easier for me to procure a much-desired second copy, lol. I live in fear of the insanity that would ensue if anything happened to the one I have :D