For Mother’s Day I called my mother and sang her a little Mother’s Day Song and then sent her picture messages throughout the day.
Katie and I took her mum on a ‘Magical Mystery Tour’ for the day. We had given her a handful of places we’d been thinking of going and then told her that she could choose any of them or that we could pick somethere and surprise her. She opted for the latter and so we procured the required music (see above) and plotted a course on the Tom Tom and we were off to a mystery destination.
Her mum was delighted at the idea of a mystery tour and at the music, she’s a big Beatles fan. We headed down to Salem, MA for the day. Katie and I love visiting the touristy trap shops and the metaphysical book/crystal/tarot/shiny rock shops, and so does her mum. So we drove down and arrived just before lunch. We poked through Crow Haven Corner, boycotted Laurie Cabot’s Exploitation Mockery Store, bought some shiny rocks and books at the Pyramid Books New Age Store, and had lunch at Asahi (which was delicious and HIGHLY recommended!). I tried a new kind of sushi which they called a Buffalo roll. It was spicy chicken with cucumber and spicy mayo. Delicious!!
While we were visiting Pyramid Books I picked up a deck of ‘inspiration’ cards called Cat Wisdom. When I attended the meditation classes UNH held this last semester the ‘Writing Meditation’ session used cards like those as journaling prompts and I really enjoyed that. So I picked out a deck to use for that purpose myself.
I also picked up something that I’ve been wanting for a LONG time. I found a book called Tarot For Yourself which is a tarot self-reflection workbook. I’ve got a silly number of tarot books at home but I really really wanted a workbook. I’ve already got Learning the Tarot, which has exercises and things in it and I plan to pair the two together.
I got into Tarot not really as a way to ‘divine the future’ because I don’t really think you can do that with Tarot cards, at least not in the Hollywood dramatic way that it’s always depicted as. I use the Tarot as a tool for self reflection and self analysis. I’ve done very few readings for other people (one of which was a rather spectacular failure since I barely new how to use the cards). I have used readings to explore my own fictional characters, which is great fun.
One of the webpages associated with a deck that I own describes the tarot in a way that I like: “You can use the tarot to see what happened in the past that is affecting your present. You can see what is happening now that you should be aware of. And you can, it is true, see what the probably future holds…but the future is always being remade with every moment that passes. Within those moments, you can make decisions that will change the future. And this is, in my opinion, the best time to use the tarot…to help make the best decisions possible to move toward a future you desire.”
What I would like to do is to use the tarot as a kind of meditation/self analysis exercise. I always mean to do it and I run out of time or rather fail to make time for it. Seems to happen a lot these days doesn’t it?
I have a small collection of tarot decks these days. The first deck that I ever got was the Lord of the Rings Tarot. I started out playing around with that, but I never felt any kind of connection with those cards and I actually never did a reading with them either. Later on when I wanted to do ‘real readings’ I got a second deck, The Robin Wood deck (and I bought the book that goes with that deck, Tarot Plain and Simple). I highly recommend that book, it gives very in depth explanations of card meanings and provides a few spreads and it’s pretty decent for a beginner to use. I still use that book along with a few others. After a few years I decided that I really wanted another deck. The Robin Wood deck is very traditional (which is one reason that I like it) but I wanted something more exotic. So I picked out The Revelations Tarot. This deck is beautiful and is still somewhat traditional, uses similar images and symbology to the Robin Wood deck. I picked that deck out at the same time as we gave Katie’s mum her first (I think) Tarot deck. We gave her mother the Guilded Tarot. Another deck that I have which is beautiful even though I haven’t used much is the Manga Tarot. We framed a print of the Two of Cups to give as a thank you gift to the wonderful woman who officiated our wedding ceremony. The last one (aside from the deck that I currently use) that I’ve got is the Mystic Faerie deck. I love that one because each suit tells a story through the cards. It progresses up from the Ace in each suit. I really like the way they parallel the Fool’s Journey in the minor suits. I don’t get the chance to use that deck very often, but I really love it’s artistry and the creativity that went into creating it.
Right now I’m using something else, one that I really like and I think I’ve finally settled on. The Universal Goddess Tarot. It’s beautiful and I like working with it. I’m still working on learning the card meanings and interpretations, but this is one deck that I feel very at ease learning and reading with.
