Only Endless Memory

Monday, December 8, 2008

Ooops, High Priestess

I realized that I forgot to post the High Priestess write up that I did for the tarot cards, so I wanted to put my post in. I also wanted to say that I am having surgery on my back on the 16th of the month, so I am being stressed. I have been very erratic for the last two hours since I found out when surgery is. i have just been kind of bouncing from one thing to another and not been able to focus at all.

The High Priestess

The High Priestess is a woman of knowledge, but unlike the Magician whose knowledge comes from books and study, her knowledge comes from a high level of intuition. She is highly empathic and respected as such. Spiritually, she is a leader of her people and a guide to the Goddess. Her knowledge will help others reach an enlightened state and to get in touch with their own inner wisdom.

The High Priestess is a number two of the Major Arcana, two's usually represent a period of waiting or a partial success with a further success coming later.

In my Fantastical Creatures Tarot Deck, the High Priestess is a Winged Serpent lying on the ground with its' front half off the ground and its' wings spread. The ground is stony and matches the scales on the serpents hide. There are two scrolls lying on the ground in front of the serpent and words are illuminated behind it. Light shines down from an unknown source directly onto the serpent. Besides the light and the words behind the serpent, it looks like it could be night and outside.

Again, I see the signs of knowledge from the scrolls in front of the snake. The words that are glowing behind the snake, I see as innate knowledge or wisdom. The snake itself is a symbol of transformation and change as it sheds its' skin as it grows and changes. The illumination itself I see as enlightenment, reaching a place of higher knowledge and connection to higher forces then ones' self.

Some other thoughts I have , especially if there is a reversal: The fact that the snakes skin matches the ground around it and the darkness around it indicates to me that it might not always be easy to see the clear path of intuition. One should be aware of relying too heavily on intuition or receiving intuition from one who might be deceiving you. Try to keep a balance between intuition and “common sense”.

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Friday, December 5, 2008

Tarot - The Emperor

Well, another day, and I have seen the surgeon again. I have to make up my mind about surgery. It seems that though I have had less pain, that may not all be a good thing, as I have had more numbness and tingling which means that the nerve might be having more damage. I am not sure what to do at this point. It is looking more and more like surgery.

The Emperor

The Emperor is the patriarch of the family, the wise ruler or leader. He is a man of strength and will, whose passions lead him to make the necessary choices to rule with wisdom. He does not make his decisions blindly, but first seeks out the truth.

Being a number four card, the Emperor often stands for a plan coming to fruition or the space or foundation for things to grow or the manifestation of an idea.

In the Fantastical Creatures Deck, the Emperor is represented by a pegasus flying across a chasm. Over its' head a wind or cloud seems to take a shape showing three faces, all masculine. One face looks forward, one which appears to have glasses on looks down and the third appears to be looking skywards. The pegasus is flying beneath the cloud and does not seem to notice it. Around the neck of a the pegasus there is a cord with two white feathers wound into it. Small rocks are stirred near the back hooves of the winged horse and also further in front of it. It appears it is just taking flight. Some red flowers cling to the face of one side of the chasm face.

As many other people have spoken much about seeing fire signs in their Emperor cards, I find it interesting that I am seeing mostly air signs in my card. I also see a very different meaning then what I would normally say for the Emperor from this card as well. I am seeing the chasm as an obstacle to be overcome. It is one that is overcome with wisdom and knowledge and by correctly using the information one has to make a decision. So, I suppose that is not too far off from what I did say. The main difference is that there is an obstacle to be overcome.

I see the winged horse as a symbol of air as well as action and energy. It is a means to get over the obstacle of the rocky chasm in front of it. Above it are the onlookers, the three faces in the clouds. One looks down, looking for further dangers, one looks forward doing the same. The third face looking up is thanking the Lord and Lady. Also, the three faces could be representing body, mind and spirit. The red flowers growing are the place I see a fire symbol, passion and tenacity growing on the side of a cliff.

The concern I see with this card is that it is knocking rocks off into the chasm and may not notice what is below in the chasm that it may harm. So, a reversal may be that there is the possibility of overcoming the obstacles but not looking around to see who may be hurt in the process, being too focused on success to see a larger picture.

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Monday, December 1, 2008

The Empress

I am continuing with my Tarot updates with The Empress. I have yet to hear from the surgeon about surgery on my back. I have been thinking seriously about not having the surgery as I have been feeling better, but have not had a chance to talk to the surgeon to arrange anything with him, so things are very much up in the air. I have no idea what is going on for the holidays. Bah Humbug!

The Empress

The Empress is the matriarch of the family. She is an older mother, not the mother with child, but more the mother whose children have grown into their teens and she is keeper of the house. While she can be demanding, she is also fair. She holds great knowledge, but it is not always easy to get it from her as she knows that the most important lessons we learn we must learn on our own.

The Empress is a number three card which usually suggests a situation involving more then one person or a group. It can also signify a delay or a partial success and then a wait before the situation can come to fruition.

In the Fantastical Creature Tarot, the card shows an older woman wearing a gown with a pattern of vines on it. It is covered by a blue cloak with gold trim. A headband keeps her hair from her eyes, but otherwise it flows loose behind her. A radiance surrounds her. At her feet there are some ferns and some rocks with spiral patterns and three apples. A rabbit sits on a nearby rock and above her head a raven flies. Behind her is a tree with gnarled roots.

I find this card very interesting because of all the symbols in it. The raven itself is a symbol of occult knowledge. It is also seen as a harbinger of death. The tree, especially the one with the gnarled roots strikes me as a tree of life image. The tree of life expresses both life and death in it. Apples are seen as a symbol of knowledge and wisdom. Rabbits symbolize fertility, while spirals are another symbol of the cycle of life as well as a symbol of the divine female.

All of these symbols together seem to suggest a lot toward knowledge and also gaining this learning through transformation. This may be a bit outside of the norm for other Empress cards, but with the amount of death or transformation symbolism I see in this card, I have to say that transformation is part of the learning process that comes with the wisdom that must be gained.

In keeping up with reversals, I think that the thing to worry about here would be to be overwhelmed by all the little details. The opposite is also possible, to focus too much on yourself and to not see the lessons outside of yourself that you need to learn. I think it could go either way, and that would vary on the reading.

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Friday, November 14, 2008

Tarot - The Magician

So, I have been sick this week. I got a flu shot a few weeks ago, and now I am sick. It was not a live virus, but I just find it humorous that I get a flu shot for the first time ever and I think this is the earliest in the season I have been sick. I do think that my immune system is suffering from my lack of being able to sleep well because of my back pain.

I wake up constantly having to find a new position that hurts less. I would say a position that doesn't hurt, but I have not found one of those. It is just a matter of degrees of pain. I then eventually reach a point where I can't move into a position that I can actually sleep in and have to get up. Getting a new futon did not make getting out of bed any easier, I still have to use the chair and crawl out of bed. So, now that I have whined about pain long enough time to post this weeks tarot card.

The Magician

First thing I think of with the magician is that he is a worker of magic. In traditional decks, he has all the tools of magic laid out before him. This shows him as a man of wisdom and knowledge, much as a woman who works the craft carries knowledge and wisdom as well.

Being a card with a number one, it also usually signifies beginnings, things that have to begun to manifest. Another thing that most people know about magic is that it does not just happen. magic is not simply about the physical acts of ritual either, it is about the will and focus that we put into those acts. Therefore, I see this as a card that signifies a place of beginnings and opportunities and as well a need to focus our energies to achieve our desires. The possibilities and skills our all laid out on the table before us, it is up to us to take the steps toward bringing our goals to fruition.

Now to look at the Magician from the Fantastical Creatures Deck. The picture shows a winged cat sitting on a table with his front paws on a wand. laid out on the table are two books, a crystal ball, some runes, and some stones. Behind the cat are some shelves with more books, and a few bottles. There is a dreamcatcher on the wall, as well as what looks like herbs hanging from the ceiling. Light filters in through a single window. The cat also has a collar with a bell.

Once again, we see many symbols of the craft, tools of divination, and of learning. One of the things I see when I look at this is that it seems highly focused on the intellect. There are books all around, the divination tools, the wings on the cat and even the bell. All of these show the intellect which may give a warning of a reverse meaning of the card being to be aware of being too much into the intellectual that you miss out on being in touch with your emotions.

So, overall, I see all of the tools and knowledge is there an available for the person to succeed if they are willing to put forth the effort of will to do so. The thing to be wary of is to not lose oneself in the strictly intellectual and forget the emotional and spiritual components along the way as well.

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Friday, November 7, 2008

Tarot Card - The Fool

So, yea, I know I have not written in over a month. It has been a pretty crappy month which has mostly contained me being in pain because of my back still. There was the good news of Obama winning the election. There is also the news that I have a new doctor now because I got sick of the last one. I am much happier with the new doctor already. It is nice to have a doctor who will actually spend time with me and make sure she checks everything she needs to.

As the subject says, I am writing about the Tarot card - The Fool. I have gotten involved with a pagan group online that started an offshoot for Tarot discussion. I have loved tarot cards for many years now. I was first introduced to them about twenty-five years ago. My mother used to read tarot some, and showed me her deck. Of course, when I told her that I had someone ask me to read cards in their store her comment was "I figured you would do something stupid like that." My mother was not the most consistent person in my life. Anyways, the group started the tarot discussion and I did a write-up on the Fool. I am hoping that I can continue to do this for the whole deck.

Yes, It is ambitious for the person who can't keep up with a daily blog, but I am hoping that the group will inspire me. I also have some other pagan writings I would like to be doing over the next year or so. I have had a lot to think about over the last month. So, without further ado, this is what I have written about The Fool... seems fitting for my project.

Tarot – The Fool

The fool is a starting place in some ways, being the “start” of the deck, so I see it as a reference to beginnings in that aspect. I also see the Fool as a balance in many ways between the general impetuous nature that one would expect from the Fool and the wisdom that is also inherent in the role as well. I think of stories and traditions of the king playing fool for a day in many cultures and the the fool taking the place of the king. In this way, it teaches the king humility and allows them to be closer to his people.

I also think of the Fool in regards to the idea of tabula rasa: a blank slate which is there waiting for knowledge. In accepting that one is a fool, there is a great wisdom for you are able to open your mind and accept more possibilities then if you have preconceived notions.

For the first time as I am writing this I think I am understanding how reversals can be used. I have always had a hard time in the past doing a reading with any reversals because I tried to use the booklet definitions for what the reversals meant and they never made sense to me. As I think about it now, I see that the reversal in the case of the Fool could be a warning to be aware of going too far into the impetuous side of things, or to be open to new ideas (as in the blank slate concept), but do not allow yourself to be lead astray by the “foolishness” of it and to curb impulsiveness and gullibility with wisdom.

Now to actually look at a card and see if I get more impressions from it. I am using DJ Conway and Linda Hunts Fantastical Creatures Tarot. It is a deck I have looked at a little, but never tried to do a reading with, so the impressions are more fresh (in theory, at least). It could prove to be interesting as I look at it, because they are non-traditional images. Things I see that stick out in mind mind when I look at the art: 1) there is a path going off into the distance 2) the beastie that is the main figure is a sort of Quetzalcoatl looking thing that has two snake heads pointing in different directions and it is perched on a tree 3) the grass has pretty red flowers, but the sky is grey and stormy 4) there is a stone wall that has an opening for the path.

My quick breakdown of those various images are 1) a path can represent a journey, be it physical or spiritual 2) the beastie looking in both directions can either be a balance or confusion, like it isn't sure where it is headed 3) while things may look nice, pretty and easy from the serpent that is looking towards the ground, the one that sees the skies knows that there are dangers and things to be cautious of 4) the wall is an obstacle to be passed just as the clouds above are something to be weathered.

Bright Blessings!

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Wednesday, October 1, 2008

The Age of Disconnection

There has been much talk about how much more in touch people are in this day in age. Everybody and his brother (well, except for me) has a cell phone. Computers are in a large number of homes creating networks of information. Information is available just a web search away.

If you want to talk to discuss something, there are email groups for almost any subject you can think of. Cancer survivors, beagle enthusiasts, fetishists, and dice collectors can all talk with other like-minded people. Players from all over the world log in to mass multiplayer online games and talk in game or use programs like ventrilo or teamspeak to speak to each other in "real time" on voice chat.

We are more connected to each other then ever before, but the more connected we are to each other all over the world, the less connected we seem to be personally. I often see a groups of people walking down the street together and more often then not, it seems that one or more of them are too busy talking on their cell phone or text messaging to actually spend time talking with the person that they are walking with. In stores, I see people in a check out line who barely see the cashier as they are on their cell phone.

Even when I lived with my old roommates, often while we were all in the same room or a room away from each other, we each were playing our games or doing our own things on our respective computers and spent little time actually talking to each other. Myself and many other people I know as well reach out to people across the country and the world through the computer but rarely go out much with friends in "real life."

I have made steps to try to get myself out more and to spend time with new friends, but it is often a struggle. It really is much easier to have the friendships over the computer where there is a certain distance that is maintained through the written or spoken word. For myself, I know it is a choice that I make and it is something that I can see.

What I begin to question, is for the children that have grown up in this age of computers and cell phones, is it a choice? Do they notice the distance they have put between themselves and those around them? I was in the hospital emergency room yesterday and there was a young girl who was sick and had two friends with her. One of her friends, that I believe was there to support her, spent most of the time text messaging someone else.

Is this the present days form of dissociating from the things that are unpleasant or scary to us? Instead of facing the things that bother us, we spend hours living in a world with distanced texts or words on a phone rather then seeing what is in front of us? We spend hours net surfing, watching videos with little or no point, and finding our connections through a filtered screen rather then seeing the faces around us.

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Monday, September 22, 2008

Salem and a Writing Exercise

I went to Salem, Massachusetts on Saturday and spent the day walking (painfully) around town and doing some shopping at the pagan shops. In the evening, we went to a Mabon ritual held by Temple of the Nine Wells in town there. I was there with friends from the pagan group that we have running at our church, and we all seemed to have a good time. I had the money to spend on one of my pastimes of collecting tarot decks.

Yes, I do collect tarot decks. I have 44 separate tarot decks not counting the various other sets of divination cards or tools (i.e. The Visual I Ching, Throwing of the Bones, Rune Cards and Runes, Medicine Cards, Animal Cards, etc). If you are also wondering whether or not I do tarot readings, I do. I do not use all of my decks for readings. Some of them are only for art and I would not be at all comfortable doing readings with them. I use various decks depending on intent or the person I am reading for. I have been sticking with one deck more then another recently as I have found that I am working towards reading in a different manner then I used to (which was always using the cheat sheet that came with the deck). I am now working on reading cards intuitively mostly by what I see or feel from the cards.

I also mentioned a writing exercise in the title. It has been a while since I have posted a writing exercise, at least partially to the fact that I have not been writing as much as I had been. Well, in the effort to get into writing more, I am also working on writing more in general again, so it is time to do a writing exercise. I am not sure who, if anyone reads my posts regularly, or even irregularly, but if there is something they would like as a writing exercise or suggestion, I would be happy to take suggestions. Until then, I will stick with my old methods.

For my inspiration for this story, I used the Speculative Fiction Muse.
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On the Dangers of Dune Migration

Todd looked out across the sand. Well, there was not much to look at but sand. Some of the sand dunes were rather impressive, but it was still sand. There was also the sun, but Todd preferred not to think too much about that cause it made him think about things like being thirsty and how nice a glass of iced tea would be on a nice sunny day and how unlikely that would be about now out here with all the sand.

Instead he thought about sand dunes. Sand dunes were, on the whole, unappreciated by most people. They would think that a sand dune was a sand dune was a sand dune. There actually was more to a sand dune then just being a sand dune though. There were actually types of sand dunes. Sand dunes could be tranverse, linear, or star dunes and could be simple, compound or complex. Then there were whalebacks and, of course, the often misconstrued quicksand. He knew a lot about sand dunes alright.

He walked some as he thought about sand dunes and their migration patterns, starting to think of his own movement in a similar way. Being pushed by the wind until it was eventually forced over by the weight of time or some other outside force to then become the lower edge of a dune and continue the migration pattern. He was not sure his migration would go much further other then to become part of the dunes, which would not be an altogether bad thing in the big picture he supposed.

A light flashed off to his left and he turned to see more sand. What would cause a flash of light out here? Reflections of the sun off from some object. Some object that was not sand. Could he have a hope that it was water? He altered his course slightly, and headed off to the left. That would be the west, toward the setting sun. If the sun ever set around here. Of course the sun set around here. Another flash of light caused him to hurry his step slightly, and he stumbled. The first flash of light had not been his imagination.

Gathering himself, he continued on. Forcing himself to keep from trying to rush too much and waste his already waning strength. He still saw no real signs of actual water, just those brief flashes. None of the signs of trees or other plant life that generally surround an oasis, but perhaps it is one of the springs that comes to ground during certain times of the year. This would in ways be better then seeing the picture perfect oasis then he might start think he was seeing things. Even better when the flash came again, it was much closer.

He made his last push up the windward face of one of the larger dunes and that is when he saw Skye. He sat down and stared at the uncomprehending face staring back at him. "What? What are you doing out here all alone?" he cried out in confusion.

"I could ask you the same thing," her voice answered in return, sounding rather husky from emotion.

"I came out here to study sand dunes, and things were going so well, so I, well, anyways, I got caught in a sandstorm and lost my equipment and my bearings. I figured if I kept heading north, I would find something, I may have miscalculated. Who are you?"

"I'm Skye. I got lost, too. I figured I was going to die here all alone in this wasteland with nothing but sand for miles, but now you are here."

"I'm Todd." He looked around. He had not found an oasis or water. He had found another person who was lost. What were the chances of that? His mind was trying to come up with the rather astronomical odds when she spoke again.

"You don't know a way for us to get out of here either do you?"

Todd shook his head sadly, numbers still spinning in his head.

"It is better then being alone though. Will you stay though, Todd? I don't think I have the strength to keep walking on forever through the sands. Even if I count all the different types of dunes or sand flats."

"Yes, I can stay here with you, Skye. I don't want to be alone either. After all the walking I did, I think the think I was most afraid of was that I would die here alone in the sand and be forgotten by all but the sand.

Skye smiled, "I was feeling the same way. I did not want to die alone out here, but now we are together, and it won't be so bad. You will have more then just the sand to remember you. You will have Skye."

And so Skye and Todd was not alone when death claimed them in the cold of night. In the morning, the winds blew, already forming a new dune over Todd and the mirror he held in his lap.

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