Wildwood Tarot

My regular readers know that I'm given to rants about how acquiring things is not the same thing as practicing a serious Nature Religion.

You can buy every book that Lewellyn publishes (my bookshelves house more than a few). You can have Celtic-this and dragon-themed-that and unicorn-themed posters all over your house. You can cover your tables, walls, and yourself with cheap cotton Celtic-batik tablecloths (I've got a few!). You can wear high-Goth or expensive SteamPunk (OK, if I win the lottery, I am buying that hat). You can burn incense and sage from etsy 24/7. You can jingle when you walk from all the pentacles, LOTR-themed jewelry, and gypsy-hand amulets that you wear, but it doesn't make you a devotee of the Goddesses/Gods nor does it cause you to live in tune with Gaia.

And I work at practicing what I preach.

I own fewer than a dozen Tarot decks and I regularly talk myself out of buying yet another really neat one. I rely almost entirely on my Robin Wood, with some Tarot of the Crone, hand-made by Ellen Lorenzi-Prince, thrown in for mystery and the occasional Cheryl Richardson Self-Care Card pulled for an overall theme. On my iPhone, I have the Goddess Tarot app, and I find it uncannily accurate for one-card answers to questions. I have Joanna Colbert's Gain Tarot on order for this Autumn, and Joanna knows that if she ever decides to sell the painting for her Six of Water, I'm first in line. And, ok, someday I'm going to break down and buy myself the Peter-Max-inspired Aquarian Tarot, which I always buy as a gift for friends.

And, beyond that, there's only one other Tarot deck that I've seriously craved. Ever since my brilliant friend Stoat showed me his Greenwood Tarot deck, I've been seriously in lust. Supposedly based upon pre-Celtic, European themes, as well as the Wheel of the Year, it's been unavailable for some time (although occasionally one will show up on eBay for several hundred dollars and I'm not spending that kind of money for a deck of cards; my heart is happier with an almost-paid mortgage and some money in the bank).

Now, Mark Ryan, who worked on the Greenwood Tarot, has come out with the Wildwood Tarot, described as a "complete reconception and redesign" of the Greenwood Tarot. I got my copy last night, on the Full Moon.

My practice for getting acquainted with a new Tarot deck is to ground, center, call the Elements, and cast a circle. I smudge the cards and the LWB (Little White Book, although it's a largish dark-colored book in this case) and then I just spend time with them. I look them all over, in order, shuffled, and then, finally, with the LWB to help me learn the ones that are less-Rider-Waite based.

I'm in love.

Pictured above is my first reading with this deck.

What divination method do you use? Is there a new one you're thinking of trying? How do you handle your lust for "stuff"?

Read for Me?

I know that one is supposed to pretend otherwise, but I love birthdays. I love to make a fuss when family and friends have birthdays, and I love my own. Everyone deserves at least one day a year to celebrate the fact that they were lucky enough to incarnate on this breathtaking Goddess of a planet and that they've made it for another trip around the sun.

I'm 55 today, and proud of every single wrinkle, grey hair, and scar.

Like a lot of people, I do a reading for myself on my birthday, asking for some guidance for the coming year. (I want to make each one count!)

This year, I pulled:

A quality I need to foster this year: Playfulness

A Goddess with whom I need to develop a deeper relationship: Pele

My body/health/physical existence: Page of Pentacles

My job: 3 of Cups

My family/home/garden: The Star

My spiritual life & circle: The World

If you feel inclined, I'd welcome your readings in comments. May you, too, enjoy many wonderful birthdays!

Want!

Many Witches have a "favorite" divination tool, the one that they reach for regularly. For me, that's tarot, which is odd, given my almost complete lack of what are generally called "right-brained" skills. But almost from the first Rider Waite deck I bought and began to work with (which consistently, for years, showed me the 5 of Pents, the 9 of Pents, and the Chariot, until I acted on the message), the cards tell me the truth in a way that I can understand.

I own a couple (fewer than ten) tarot decks. I think that I realized early on that if I weren't careful, I'd be about tarot decks the way that I am about books or Hermes. And so I frequently see a deck that I'd like, get ready to buy it, and then invoke Fire, exercise my "Capital-W-Will," and tell myself, "No." (An even half-way-reasonably priced Greenwood Tarot deck, will, I freely admit, make me break my own rule, but I've yet to find one of those. And I sprung for the iPhone Goddess Tarot "app" (I'm an old woman, but I am so hip), which I find to be incredibly precise and predictive. And, you know, always in your pocket.)

However, I'm definitely planning to make an exception this Fall when Joanna Colbert's Gaian Tarot deck comes out. The imagery is just too beautiful and the cards are just too full of meaning. I've really enjoyed following the creation of the deck on Joanna's blog. Now, Joanna is presenting a series of videos that explain the deck. It's as if you could dial Pamela Colman Smith and Arthur Waite up on YouTube. (OK, I'm revealing my age. It's as if you could click on Colman Smith and Waite on YouTube. Or pull them up on your Blackberry.)

I was particularly impressed to hear her discussion of how her spiritual practice deepened over the years, as she prepared to create the Gaian Tarot deck. Starhawk once said something like: "the Earth is our sacred text, like the Bible, or the Koran, or the Torah, and most of us are illiterate in it. Well, I really took that to heart. And it was about this time that I moved to a small island. I began to spend a lot more time outside than I ever had before. I enrolled in a course where I could learn wilderness awareness techniques and I started studying the native plants and the birds in the place where I live[d] and I just fell absolutely and completely in love with the place where I was living."

I think that for many of us, and I include myself here, more or less, we love the Earth the way that illiterate medieval serfs loved the illuminated texts of the xian Gospels that they were allowed to see, maybe, a few times a year lifted up at Mass on the high holy days. That devotion can be intense and lovely and meaningful, but there is something deeper. There is the relationship that the learned monks who illustrated the texts had for their holy book. There is the relationship that comes from actually spending time with your beloved and learning all that can be learned about Her. There's the devotion that comes from reading, and re-reading, and spending time really considering the meaning of the text, from reading not just the text, but also the commentaries, the concordances, the Talmud.

What would that kind of thirst for deep literacy of the Earth look like? What does it look life in your own life, in your own landbase, in March 2010? What does it look like in urban areas, which is where most Pagans (irony of etymology) live today? What does it look like in areas beset by global climate change? What would you have to give up to acquire that literacy? What would you gain?

Picture found here.

Tarot

Here's my 4001st blog post:

Tarot never lies to me.

Picture found here.

Congratulations!

Joanna Colbert has completed her Gaian Tarot Deck, to be published in 2011. Her final card, available at the link, is a fitting conclusion and summation of the work.

Joanna's blogged the cards as she's created them, allowing us to watch the creative process unfold. My favorite is still the one with the women swimming in deep blue water, with an otter. (If Joanna ever decides to sell the paintings, that's the one I want!) But I've also done some deep meditations based on her picture of a young man lost in the woods and burrowed into a lean-to shelter and the card of bindweed (a particular bane in my front garden and an excellent metaphor).

Congratulations, Joanna! I don't buy many tarot decks, because otherwise I could too easily get out of control, but yours (and the Greenwood Tarot) are on my list for sure!

Photo found here.

(Almost) First Of The Month Bazooms Blogging

OK, yeah, fine, whatever. I missed the first of the month. My job was kicking my ass. My circle had its annual retreat. My garden seriously needed weeding. Whatever. Go get your damn mammograms anyway.


Ladies! Listen up! Detecting breast cancer early is the key to surviving it! Breast Self Exams (BSEs) can help you to detect breast cancer in its earlier stages. So, on the first of every month, give yourself a breast self-exam. It's easy to do. Here's how. If you prefer to do your BSE at a particular time in your cycle, calendar it now. But, don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

And, once a year, get yourself a mammogram. Mammograms cost between $150 and $300. If you have to take a temp job one weekend a year, if you have to sell something on e-Bay, if you have to go cash in all the change in various jars all over the house, if you have to work the holiday season wrapping gifts at Macy's, for the love of the Goddess, please go get a mammogram once a year.

Or: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention pays all or some of the cost of breast cancer screening services through its National Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection Program. This program provides mammograms and breast exams by a health professional to low-income, underinsured, and underserved women in all 50 states, six U.S. territories, the District of Columbia, and 14 American Indian/Alaska Native organizations. For more information, contact your state health department or call the Cancer Information Service at 1-800-4-CANCER.

Send me an email after you get your mammogram and I will do an annual free tarot reading for you. Just, please, examine your own breasts once a month and get your sweet, round ass to a mammogram once a year. If you have a deck, pick three cards and e-mail me at hecatedemetersdatter@hotmail.com. I'll email you back your reading. If you don't have a deck, go to Lunea's tarot listed on the right-hand side in my blog links. Pick three cards from her free, on-line tarot and email me at hecatedemetersdatter@hotmail.com. I'll email you back your reading.

I believe that I have yet to fail anyone wanting a post-masectomy tarot reading. I'm good for it.


Picture found here.

The Self-Described Washington Post

WaPo has a story about a "self-described gypsy," (Goddess, I get sick of this. Would they call someone a "self-described Italian-American"? I've taken the WaPo to task before for referring to "self-described" witches but never "self-described Catholics" or "self-described Hindus") challenging Montgomery County Maryland's laws against fortune telling:

Nick Nefedro didn't need to have his palm read or look to Tarot cards to know that his plan to work as a fortuneteller in Bethesda would fail. His fate was already written: Montgomery County says it is illegal to make money from forecasting the future.

But Nefedro, who says he is a Gypsy, is determined to change that. He has enlisted the American Civil Liberties Union in his year-long fight to overturn the law that calls his livelihood fraudulent. He argues that fortunetelling is part of his heritage and that prohibiting him from working as a fortuneteller amounts to discrimination.

The article notes that recent bans on fortunetelling have been reversed in a number of locations.

In Livingston Parish, La., a ban on soothsaying was found to be unconstitutional in 2008 after a Wiccan minister argued that his passing along messages is the same as a Christian minister purporting to proclaim God's word.

A similar ban in New Iberia, La., and one in Casper, Wyo., have also been overturned in recent years. Ajmel Quereshi, an attorney with the ACLU of Maryland, said it is a legal trend that bodes well for Nefedro.

Particularly egregious is the county's rationale for the law banning fortunetelling: "I don't think it's strange for us to have laws that protect against fraud," said Clifford Royalty, zoning division chief in the Montgomery County attorney's office, adding that "religion has nothing to do with it. He's not made that allegation in the lawsuit."

"The practice is fraudulent," Royalty said, "because no one can forecast the future." Call me when Montgomery County outlaws stockbrokers, financial advisors, people who tell you how much weight you can lose on their diet, car repair mechanics who tell you that your car will fail if you don't get a certain repair, tutoring services that promise to raise your child's reading level, nutritionists who tell you that you can avoid cancer if you eat as they say, and plumbers who tell you that you need a septic system overhaul if you don't want your toilets to back up. And, quick, someone block WTOP, where every damn morning they tell me that it's not going to rain, again, today.

It's worth clicking through to the article so that you can take the WaPo's online poll concerning the Montgomery County law.

Picture found here.

Learning Tarot From Three Year Olds

G/Son came over yesterday to spend the night with me. When he and his 'rents got here, I was sitting on my screen porch with a glass of iced tea, the computer, and, left out from the night before, my Tarot deck.

G/Son, at 3 1/3, is into games. We often play Hi-Ho-Cherry-O, sometimes according to "the" rules and sometimes according to rules that we make up as we go along because, Goddess knows, someone's going to teach him to color within the lines, but it's not likely to be his Nonna, the witch. This weekend, we tried our hands at Chutes & Ladders.

G/Son saw the tarot cards and said, "Nonna, Can I play?"

He immediately remembered that one time I'd brought them over to his house to give DiL a reading after she got her mammogram. He was pulling out the cards and exclaiming over the pictures: "Look, the horse's legs are on fire!" -- Knight of Wands, and "Look, she has a sword!" -- Queen of Swords. He asked, "Nonna, how do you play?"

I told him, "Well, I don't play a game so much as I look at the pictures and think about what they mean." Flipping over to the Empress, I said, "See, I look at her and I see that she has food all around her and enough wool to make yarn and she's going to have a baby, so I think this card means that everything will be ok, there will be enough, and new life is coming." G/Son said, "Why she is going to have a baby?" and I showed him how her belly is big because there's a baby in there. G/Son had a few questions about that and then he looked at the picture and said, "And, she has a watermill."

He was pointing to the Empress' spinning wheel. And I said, "Yes, she does. To me, that looks like her spinning wheel, to make wool into yarn, but if you see the wheel from a watermill, that's what it means for you." Of course, I will never look at that card again w/o seeing the wheel of a watermill, going round and round, grinding grain into flour for bread and plenty, and grinding each of us to create transformation.

I love that kid.

Photo by the author of the Empress card from Robin Wood's Tarot.

All Of A Sudden, It's A Problem?

One wonders if a xian streetcorner preacher would be asked to leave, as well. If she's not charging, I don't see how they can make her follow their rules for vendors.

After spending the past six summers giving free tarot readings beneath the redwood trees of Bolinas Park, the Rev. Joey Talley, the "Good Witch of West Marin," has come to think of herself as a part of the Fairfax Farmers Market.
Managers at the Marin Farmers Market see things differently. The organization, which operates eight farmers markets throughout the Bay Area, says Talley has never applied to work as a vendor or entertainer at the Wednesday night market, and they've asked her to leave.
"We don't want the market to become a free-for-all festival," said market manager Amelia Spilger. "I've had to turn down (applications from) masseuses, chiropractors and holistic healers. They all have a place in the community, but we have limited
space in the market."

PIcture found here.

Tarot

POEM
Having My Cards Read

BY W. S. DI PIERO

Hobos wail a garbage can against
the cyclone links. The monkey puzzle tree
droops its scaly tails above our heads
as she sets up near the zoo’s bonobos,
humping happy in their cages close
to chimps ripping off each other’s ears.
And in the cloud reposing on the sky,
cut by an F22’s long hookah puffs,
the cyan atmospherics rupture into
solarized platelets: her Ray-Bans foil
my own face back at me:
A time of renewals
though somewhere
dark cold woe
You won’t know what’s what
Comes a taste of sea to make her pause,
and marine gusts slice and spook her cards, my cards,
that flurry to the sidewalk, near the barred gate,
breaking fortune down faster as she speaks.
Source: Poetry (June 2009).

Picture found here.

The Quan Yin Sisterhood

NTodd's talking about this new study, that I love, finding that -- duh -- our happiness is connected to the happiness of those around us.

[H]appiness is contagious -- and . . . people pass on their good cheer even to total strangers.

. . . "Whether you're happy depends not just on your own actions and behaviors and thoughts, but on those of people you don't even know."

I was thinking about how much it amuses me to have confirmed by science what mystics and witches have always known: we are one. It's all just god pouring god into god. That fact explains what's been fundamentally mistaken with so much of what what's been going on in America since the days of Ronald Reagan: the odd notion that I can be happy while others are suffering and homeless, the Gordon Gecko, "greed is good," I've got mine, if I'm off in my McMansion or my Esclade I'll be happy no matter what's going on in your life ethos. And, yet, surprisingly, the people in the McMansion with the steam shower and the granite counters and the wine cellar are often -- unhappy. And we wonder why that is, how that could possibly be.

If happiness is "contagious" what do you think misery is? Only connect.

Then this morning I was listening to this podcast by Thorn Coyle and Medusa. It concerns the very human need to grieve when we are confronted with death. The whole podcast is worth listening to, but beginning at about 49:25, Medusa explains an image that she received during the Loma Prieta earthquake, of the Dead being able to use the tears of the grievers as the River Styx upon which their souls must travel. She says it's difficult for us to "hold the grief of a large number of people passing. . . . It does affect all of us. It is a disturbance in the force, Luke, when a lot of people pass at the same time and it is hard for them to be grieved because there are so many of them . . . . It's important that we hold that and we try and help in that process and I don't know exactly what that looks like, but I'm aware of it." Medusa and Thorn describe how grief can crack us open and give us compassion for the whole world.

And I thought immediately of Quan Yin, the Bodhisattva/Goddess who "hears" the cries of the world. (One of the Goddesses who has visited my dreams, Quan Yin came to me as an incredibly hip older woman with a younger lover/adept when my beautiful DiL was carrying G/Son. Quan Yin, in her house built like an indoor garden, assured me that a child of compassion would be born and then I pulled the tarot card that told me he'd come a bit earlier than the doctors predicted. The universe often laughs both at and with me. I return the favor.) Com-passion -- feeling the passions of others in common with them -- doesn't necessarily mean that we "fix" another's problems. It means that we acknowledge that we have a connection with everyone else, with those who are grieving, and with those, even those now "gone," who need to be grieved. It's so important to hear, to listen, to acknowledge the tears of the whole, entire world. (It's overwhelming work, but it's important work.) I cannot be separate from you. You are not separate from me, not even in your grief. Your happiness will ribbon into my life and light it up and your grief will affect me and season the flavor of my days.

A witch's job is to help to turn the wheel. Each of us finds our own way of putting our shoulder to the wheel. Certainly, not everyone is called to the work of Quan Yin, the work that Medusa has not yet envisioned, but is aware needs doing, the grieving for strangers who pass in numbers so large that they do, in fact, cause a disturbance in the force. And yet, it is work that needs to be done.

As our planet goes through Her death throes, that work is going to need doing with increasing strength and increasing frequency. And someone must grieve for the plants, the species, the planet Her Ownself. Where will we find the professional mourners that Thorn discusses? What would their training look like? How will these doulas of the second birth sustain themselves? How must we all change our practices at Sahmein and the Winter Solstice to do this work?

Tonight, I am v happy. And that, in itself, it turns out according to science, is important work.

It's all real. It's all metaphor. There's always more.

And, speaking of disturbances in the force and large groups who need mourning . . . .

Picture found here.

All I Want For Yule Is . . . .

How on Earth did no one think of this before?

Hat tip: Esoteric Book Review

(You have to click the link for Tarot and then select Transparent Tarot.)


Image found here.

Obama Or McCain?

Judgement, a major arcana card. This is an important election. This card, from the Robin Wood deck, shows a phoenix and depicts resurrection, a new beginning, something original and fresh coming out of the ashes of the old. It's often seen as a card that shows up when one has dealt with an old shame and is ready to move on. Sounds like America, on so many levels.

I think it's a good sign for Barack Obama (a Leo and, thus, a child of fire).

(Although there is a city in Arizona . . . .) Nah.

Soul Work

Just a few days until Samhein.

For me, this time of year is about introspection. Samhein is the beginning of a new year for witches, and the days leading up to Samhein are a time to pause and consider what I've accomplished over the past year and what I failed to accomplish. And the "why" behind the things that I wanted to accomplish and, yet, didn't accomplish is an important question for me.

It seems to me that when I want to do something but "just can't" quite "get around to it," a Shadow is often involved. (Assuming, of course that I really do want to achieve that goal and didn't just adopt it because I thought that I "should" or because others wanted it for me.) And my Shadows will, if approached gently, respectfully, in a light trance, talk to me. Those are important conversations for me, not easy or fun, but important to the process of becoming who I want to become, to the process of stripping off the layers and revealing/becoming my Better Self. I sometimes ask a Shadow for its name, ask if we can do a joint Tarot reading, ask what I can do to help the Shadow feel safe enough to let me make desired changes.

The Shadow that I worked with this weekend showed me her picture: the Two of Pentacles. How do you read that card?


Art found here.

Maryland Ren Faire

I'm going to take G/Son. I used to take another little boy.

How many tarot cards can you spot? I see the six of wands, the Fool, the Lovers, the Emperor, the Hermit, the three of cups, the six of cups, . . . .

On the Eighth Day of the Eight Month in the Eighth Year of a Benighted Century . . . .

Tomorrow is 8/8/08, the eight day of the eight month of the eight year of this benighted century. I'm not a big student of numerology; I'd say that numbers and I have a difficult relationship, but there must first be some relationship for it to be difficult. My left-brained self, she has a v difficult time w numbers.

But somehow, w/in Tarot, numbers make more sense to me. The Eights are interesting. Eight is twice four. In Tarots, the fours are where things get so stable as to become, perhaps, stuck. In the Gaian Tarot, "Eights illustrate the test of taking action out in the world to make your dreams a reality, in their respective elemental suits."

For a long time in my life, almost every reading that I did for myself resulted in the 8 of Wands showing up somewhere. That's good. Movement. Going places. Heading towards goals. The Eight of Cups is v similar. Something's missing! Let's go find it!

The 8 of Swords is a bit farther back in the process. Realize that you need to move! Have a new idea! Quit sitting still! And the 8 of Pentacles is, as are all the Pentacle cards, about the practical way to get from here to there. How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, practice, practice! Do the work! Even if you feel crappy, even if some practices are more about how NOT to do it, just do the work, chop wood, carry water.

May tomorrow, 8/8/08 be full of movement, practice, insight, and heading off on important journeys for you.


Art found here. Most Pagans in 2008 America live in cities. I love the idea of an urban tarot.

Shiny Things

I really love Lunaea's evocative tarot deck and often direct others to it.

I want her new her hew rosary madly.


Art found here.

Tarot

I've got too many tarot decks and I've gotten v picky about which I buy. But I'll buy this one as soon as it's finished. And, would someone please reprint the Greenwood Tarot????????

Hat tip: Lunaea.

The Seven Of Pentacles By Marge Piercy

Last night, my brilliant friend E. read this poem at our Ostara ritual. I'd forgotten how much I like it. The Seven, Eight, and, especially, Nine of Pentacles cards are v. important ones for me and show up v. often in readings that I do for myself. Piercy has a great way of looking at the Seven card, one that goes beyond the traditional satisfied, at rest, giving things time vs. dissatisfied, introspective, watching the pot boil interpretations of this card.



Under a sky the color of pea soup
she is looking at her work growing away there
actively, thickly like grapevines or pole beans
as things grow in the real world, slowly enough.
If you tend them properly, if you mulch, if you water,
if you provide birds that eat insects a home and winter food,
if the sun shines and you pick off caterpillars,
if the praying mantis comes and the ladybugs and the bees,
then the plants flourish, but at their own internal clock.

Connections are made slowly, sometimes they grow underground.
You cannot tell always by looking what is happening.
More than half the tree is spread out in the soil under your feet.
Penetrate quietly as the earthworm that blows no trumpet.
Fight persistently as the creeper that brings down the tree.
Spread like the squash plant that overruns the garden.
Gnaw in the dark and use the sun to make sugar.

Weave real connections, create real nodes, build real houses.
Live a life you can endure: Make love that is loving.
Keep tangling and interweaving and taking more in,
a thicket and bramble wilderness to the outside but to us
interconnected with rabbit runs and burrows and lairs.

Live as if you liked yourself, and it may happen:
reach out, keep reaching out, keep bringing in.
This is how we are going to live for a long time: not always,
for every gardener knows that after the digging, after
the planting,
after the long season of tending and growth, the harvest comes.

Save The Cape Griffon Vultures

Both Anne and Aquilla have up fascinating posts about efforts underway to save the Cape Griffon Vulture. There are only a few thousand known Cape Griffon Vultures left in the world. The population in Namibia is down to a mere eleven birds. The species is on the knife-edge of extinction due, primarily, to being poisoned (often as a result of eating the carcasses of animals that were poisoned), disturbance of its, breeding colonies, and electrocution. Which is to say, human overpopulation is killing off the birds much faster than they can breed.

Aquila explains that the birds mate for life and that each pair: lay and nurture a single egg, and the chick-adult bonding is strong . . . . But if this chick doesn't make it into a healthy, rickets-free adult, there are Going To Be Consequences.


The Rare and Endangered Species Trust (REST) is doing amazing work to try and save these gorgeous and ecologically-important birds. I don't run an annual request for funds, as do some other blogs. Blogging is a hobby for me and, knock on wood, there's enough money in the piggy bank at the end of the month to buy kitty treats for Miss Thing and olives for my martini. But if you read and enjoy this blog, and if you have a few dollars to spare, I would like to ask you to make a donation to REST to support their efforts to save the Cape Griffon Vultures. Let me know in comments that you made a donation and I'll gladly give you a two-card tarot reading in thanks.