REVIEW OF "The Tarot Activity Book" by Andy Matzner

[to order: amazon.com;
Beautiful Magical Tarot, the author's blog]

Something told me on seeing the title of this book that I would enjoy it. I have not been disappointed.

The author’s approach in this Tarot work book is gentle, caring, thorough, and knowledgeable. It consists of self-discovery and self-help exercises for personal growth and healing, and ideas for creative projects -- writing, visual, collage, and more -- all using Tarot in some way.

You truly do not need to have any prior knowledge of Tarot to find these exercises inspiring and useful. Nor do you have to learn any of the many meanings that have accrued to each of the 78 cards through the centuries. As the author stresses throughout, we already have the answers we seek somewhere within us. The Tarot images may simply help us to access them. I hasten to add that experienced readers (I’ve been a Tarot lover for almost 40 years) will also find a great deal to appreciate in these pages.

Reading this book straight through as I did was a challenge, but for good reasons. It offered approaches that I found myself wanting to try right then, and not wait until I was done with the book. (Especially once I got to the writing and art exercises in the latter part of the book!) Then there were all the psychological and spiritual insights the book offers that I found myself mulling over along the way. You could just dip back and forth in this book reading the exercises in whatever order pleases you, rather than reading it straight through as I did. Either way, it holds a feast of enticing possibilities.

“The Tarot Activity Book” has also re-vivified my use of the Tarot in my living space. E.g., placing card images from various decks around my rooms to remind or encourage me in some way. Right now I have four Queen of Swords cards displayed, from four very different decks, amplifying a personal issue. It’s been quite some time since I’ve done something like this and am delighted to have been inspired to do so.

Many exercises suggest thinking through an issue or question first and journaling about it, then consciously picking a Tarot card that in some way reflects that preparatory work. Based in my experience over the years with this, it is definitely a productive approach. However, maybe because of the many years I’ve been working with the Tarot, I prefer to pick a card at random first. That is, before I’ve examined an issue, before thinking or journaling about it. Then I use that random card as the jumping off point for my exploration of the issue. (I find that the randomness of this image I’m faced with often shakes something new out of the trees.) It is just this sort of tweaking of his exercises that the author supports. He even lists alternate ways of doing some of them himself. This recognition that each reader’s needs may vary permeates the book, helping to create a sense of safe space for exploring new territory. As well as encouraging the reader to listen to her/his own needs and creative urgings.

This next point is probably just a quirk of my own, but each time cutting, pasting, or painting of Tarot cards was suggested, I flinched. Maybe it’s the many years of collecting Tarot decks and becoming very attached to them, but I have never been able to do this. However, I do readily make color Xeroxes of the cards. Which I can then cut and paste and paint upon to my heart’s content -- a viable alternative for those of us who project maybe a bit too much life onto their cardboard cards.

And, yes, life. This book is filled with ways we can use The Tarot to explore and even heal our inner lives; lives which, of course, are contiguous with all of life outside ourselves. I recall a meaning I read somewhere for The Star card in The Tarot: that in healing ourselves we heal something of the collective, which contributes to healing the world.

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'til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot, in whatever ways it comes to you in your life,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under "View my complete profile")**** SEE ALSO: Roswila's Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila's Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Trying to Hold A Box of Light for digital photos only.

THREE OF SWORDS in the Steampunk Tarot

The Three of Swords in the Steampunk Tarot,
by Barbara Moore with art by Aly Fell
Llewellyn Worldwide, www.llewellyn.com

Given what life can be like, I suppose it's not surprising I've made many posts here referencing the Three of Swords. Yes, it has other meanings than sorrow and heartbreak, but as with most cards these major meanings are the ones that crop up most frequently. (Click here to read about one less common way that this card has presented itself to me in readings.) Today I am happy -- for my own sake -- to say the meaning I'm sharing is a more positive one. One that isn't without its pain but that does look forward.

Why the Three of Swords (3S) in the Steampunk Tarot? Because I've been very slowly, card by card, studying this fabulous deck. When I first saw the metallic heart of this version of the 3S it disturbed me. It felt wrong. How can a metal heart feel pain or any other feeling? But as I sat with the card it became like the Tin Man's metal heart (in the Wizard of Oz), the symbol of what was already a true heart. But then I thought of wooden Pinocchio becoming a real flesh and blood boy after all his travails. Which leads me to add this to the meanings of the 3S: the sorrow or loss or pain is making something come to life in a way that it may not have been before. And that something comes from one's deepest heart. At this point, only the shape of this transformation is apparent. The living substance will flood the container of this symbol soon enough. Hints of its arrival shine, reflecting off the swords.

The above is a good example of the extremes to which I will go to make sense of the occasional puzzling card in a deck that I basically really like and find stimulating. On the whole, though, I'm not having to do many of these sorts of acrobatics to connect to the cards in The Steampunk Tarot. It's a delight-filled ride. And I should add that I also greatly enjoy Barbara's accompanying book. (I sit with and study a card for a while, then read what she has to say.) I'll probably talk about and share other cards from this intriguing deck in the future.

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'til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot, in whatever ways it comes to you in your life,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under "View my complete profile")**** SEE ALSO: Roswila's Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila's Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Trying to Hold A Box of Light for digital photos only.

ANOTHER POSSIBLE "HERMIT" (IX) CARD for THE FOUND TAROT

This HERMIT card (IX) is another version of the picture I just posted to my photo blog yesterday. It hit me on posting that version -- called "Lantern" -- that it is also The Hermit. But when I looked at "Lantern" today it cried out for revision, for a larger space in which to bring out The Hermit. I also tried changing the color to reflect the more common pale blue/grey of The Hermit in many decks. But it did not work for me; I keep seeing the simple brown cassock of a monk in this now larger version above and that feels more fitting.

And for comparison, here below is The Hermit in the Rider/Waite/Smith deck:

As to a meaningful sense of IX in my life right now? (Whenever I trip over one of my photos that reveals a Tarot card it has something to say to me.) Some background is necessary. For many years before leaving New York City for California five years ago I was encouraged by others to teach -- Tarot, poetry, dreamwork. So, every so often I did teach classes. Yet somehow, though they were moderately successful, I never felt at home in them. I enjoyed the preparation but beyond that not so much. Here's where The Hermit comes in. One of the meanings for IX is "teaching by example." Well, I never quite liked that way of looking at it. (I have never been able to see setting myself up as an example for anything.) However, I continued to think more on it throughout those years. Eventually realizing it could be read as a very telegraphed way of saying to live your life. To "do your thing," honestly and fully, without concern about teaching others anything. Others will learn/absorb what they need/want to from you along the way. This felt fine, as I often do this with others myself. In fact I'd say I've learned more from others simply by witnessing their living process, than from any course or lecture.

I hope I'll be able to recall all this when I do my first poetry reading in our community's Talent show tonight in over a year. I will be lifting my little light, sharing what gives me joy and sustenance. And my fellow residents will receive what they need or want (or not), each according to their own lights.

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'til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot, in whatever ways it comes to you in your life,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under "View my complete profile")**** SEE ALSO: Roswila's Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila's Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Trying to Hold A Box of Light for digital photos only.

FOUND WHEEL OF FORTUNE CARD circa 1930 (unknown photographer)

This photo was in an e-newsletter that I receive regularly about books. (I highly recommend the site and their newsletter, Brain Pickings). I laughed out loud on seeing this circa 1930 picture, exclaiming "The Wheel of Fortune!" The more I looked the more it seemed appropriate for a rather modern day X in the Tarot. The men are all suited up and are above a city. I can't help but think of bankers in precarious balance. Who knows what change will come next, what rise or fall? It was taken in the 1930's which was the depression era. I wonder if the photographer meant for this picture to be a comment on the depression. Of course we're all at the edge of a "fiscal cliff" right now here in the USA, with Congress and our President stil dithering away. Could this old photo above be a more perfect illustration of that situation?

For comparison here's the Rider/Waite/Smith Wheel of Fortune:

The Wheel of Fortune is also a timely reminder for me personally at this end of life, as I get older and older. Just as I adjust to one element in my life changing, something either morphs again, or a new sort of change comes along. One might think (and this "one" did) that retirement means things slow down. That's an illusion, at least in my experience so far. Changes just keep happening when and how they will. I myself just move a lot slower, both literally and in how I make adjustments. And my balance, both literally and metaphorically, sometimes feels a lot like those men on the found Wheel of Fortune above: rather precarious. I can only hope the various life skills I've accrued along the way, and my joy in and will to keep learning, will stand me (pun intended) in good stead.

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'til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot, in whatever ways it comes to you in your life,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under "View my complete profile")**** SEE ALSO: Roswila's Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila's Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Trying to Hold A Box of Light for digital photos only.

THREE CARD READING FOUND IN A DREAM

Today’s post is a bit of a departure from my usual wont. I had a dream recently in which the Tarot played a major role. Oddly enough, this has always been somewhat unusual for me, so when the Tarot shows up in a dream I pay close attention not only to that dream but to any specific cards appearing in it. Three cards were clearly referenced in this dream of November 29th (with others implied). [If you’d like to read the dreamku (dream poem) I wrote and posted about this dream, click on this link.]

The three dream cards challenged me to relate to them as a reading. Below is what I felt and thought as I sat last night with them in my mind as if I had just laid them out on my lap desk. (The image before each of my card comments is from the Rider/Waite/Smith deck, though when I was “reading” them I did not “see” any particular deck’s cards. Rather I was aware of a layering of many different deck designs and portions thereof, as I do when actually viewing cards in a physical layout.)

TEMPERANCE (sometimes called ART): Living one’s life may be the most difficult and creative art of all. With all its givens, we often can create little more than our responses to life. Yet this is no mean feat, requiring balance, flexibility, and strength, and most of all acceptance. [Temperance/Art was the subject of the previous post to this blog and includes my Found Tarot version. Just scroll down.]

THE MOON: I recall that famous haiku of Basho’s about staring up at the moon and being “grateful that clouds come to rest our necks.” As if The Moon card’s liminality portends a time of relief from the insistence on clarity and definition. A chance to enjoy the ease of shadows and shapelessness, before the gnawing need to comprehend and find form asserts itself again.

THE WORLD (sometimes called THE UNIVERSE): Ultimately, yes, "the world is too much with us," but in any of its endless guises it’s always and ever the only show in town. And the curtain is always rising on some new act, or scene, or overture. Enjoy the unfolding of the cosmic play on infinity's stage.

[end of dream/Tarot reading]

That “advice” to "enjoy the unfolding of the cosmic play on infinity's stage" is what I keep hearing (in one form or another) and not only in Tarot readings. It comes up in lots of the literature I’ve been reading, both fiction and non-fiction, and even some T.V. shows as well. Not usually so explicitly stated and sometimes it’s just where I go on my own with what’s being raised. In any case, it would be nice if after kicking and fighting almost every inch of the way for 69 years, I could finally lay back more and just enjoy the show. Or as was said a great deal in my long ago hippie youth: go with the flow.

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'til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot, in whatever ways it comes to you in your life,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under "View my complete profile")**** SEE ALSO: Roswila's Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila's Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Trying to Hold A Box of Light for digital photos only.****

THE ART (card) OF THE FOUND TAROT

This one today may be a bit of stretch. Or maybe not. So here it is, a TEMPERANCE (XIV) card I just found today as I edited old photos. I've named the photo itself "The Alchemist," which is a clue as to how I connect it to TEMPERANCE in The Tarot:

Here's what I consider this photo's predecessor as the Temperance card: ART (XIV) in The Thoth Tarot:

And here's a more usual design for TEMPERANCE (XIV) in the Rider/Waite/Smith deck:

I usually have some sense of a "message" from any new Found Tarot card(s) once I've made the post here. But not this time. My version at the top speaks to me in a very non-verbal, right brain way. I just want to keep looking at it. Into that mesmerizing cauldron of light. Hm, there's something surfacing ...

There's encouragement and support for my increasing focus on creative efforts for their, if not life-saving, certainly sanity preserving pursuits. I also recall that XIV's path on The Qabalistic Tree of Life has been said to be the most difficult one. (Wish I could remember where I read that, so I could back it up.) I'd have to say that the path of those who are compelled by their basic natures to "make art" may not be an easy or comfortable one. It certainly has not been for me. And not that just "doing" the art is hard; it is and it isn't, and it has great joy, also. It's that having that sort of eccentric and endlessly questioning perspective does not go away when one is not writing or painting. It's part and parcel of how one perceives and experiences in every area of one's life. One is always in the crucible, so to speak, in the fire or flood, often at sixes and nines with others and/or with one's self. So having this card come up today is a big prompt to embrace this path and let go of wishing it would cool off or calm down. It's who I am at a deep level.

By the way, in the family of Tarot cards that are "mine" by numerology and astrology, XIV is what my basic card of The Hierophant (V) has been becoming. And I find myself oddly much more comfortable with XIV as my "descriptor," than V. Ultimately, I may never turn lead into gold, or find the philospher's stone, but I do find myself stumbling across a seemingly endless array of engaging things to try to combine and recombine in new or interesting ways.

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‘til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”)**** SEE ALSO: Roswila’s Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila’s Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Opening to the Light (for digital pix only).****

PLEASE NOTE ...

For the foreseeable future I will not be making new posts here. This is due to a combination of many different factors. One of which is the difficulty I've been having with the blogger system. (I hasten to add I am aware the the problem may be, at least in part, due to my having an old O.S.) But mostly, I just really need to focus my energies much more fully elsewhere for the time being.

Maybe for now you would enjoy wandering through recent posts or the archives. I will check in occasionally so that I can respond to any of your comments. I will also answer emails during this hiatus.

If I've not returned to posting by then, I hope you have a Happy Fourth of July!

Roswila
a/k/a Patricia Kelly

New Found Tarot cards: THE TOWER & THE MOON

Phew, it's been way too long between posts here. Wish I were the type of person who does these sorts of things because it's time or for some other motivating reason than just plain feeling moved to do so. Not that I don't think of this blog every time I do a Tarot reading for myself. I do. It just doesn't translate into action all that often since I've moved to California (4 years ago). Anyway, here's a photo I just worked on today, brand new. And as soon as I hit on this look for it I thought "The Tower"!

In a way it was a relief as I'd just edited three photos and all wound up with titles relating to the Moon. So I thought although I don't know if this is progress or not at least it's a change. :-) None of those three moon-titled photos evoked the Moon card for me. But here's another one of my pictures (I've posted other possible Moon cards here before) that puts me in mind of XVIII:

This possible Moon card is 2-1/2 years old and has had the title "The Romantic" all that time. So if I do a mini-reading for myself with the Moon being answered or followed by The Tower, I hear that some sort of overly romantic view of mine is being or about to be tumbled. Well, this is rather strange, given this pragmatic Capricorn with a Moon in Taurus has never thought of herself as much of a romantic. But others have said so about some of my writing and even the occasional photo so I suppose I should take this odd insight seriously. And see if it might bring something new to important issues in my life.

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‘til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot,

[aka: Patricia Kelly] ****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”)**** SEE ALSO: Roswila’s Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila’s Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Opening to the Light (for digital pix only).****

Of water dragons and new years ....

In honor of the Year of the Water Dragon

HAPPY

TEN OF WANDS in the Universal Fantasy Tarot & RWS Deck (slight revision of post)

Since early Fall 2011 I've been getting the Ten of Wands (10W) in my readings for myself. (It's actually been years since I've more than rarely read for others. And my almost daily readings for myself are meditative and much more like talking with a good friend than predictive in focus.) After the first several times the 10W showed up I blew up a color copy of it from the Universal Fantasy Tarot, as it was the deck I was using most then. I think you can see what I mean when I say this is an unusual and intriguing rendering of the 10W:


At that time I first noticed it turning up a great deal, I intended to use it as the underlying theme for my coming 2012 year. In January 2011 I had been "haunted" by Justice in this same deck. So copied it and wrote "Balance" and "Re-Balance" on the left and right edges of Justice, posting it to my bedroom wall. Balance and then re-attaining it (ad nauseum) has proven to be the connecting thread throughout 2011 for me.

So I sat with this large xerox of the 10W to see what it was saying to me repeatedly. (And I did not yet know that I had many weeks to go in which it would keep showing up. And it's still appearing regularly in my readings, sometimes along with the Eight of Wands.) Then it hit me, almost in the form of a haiku:

We expose, we burn
We create, we heal
We paint a new picture

I don't want to sound self-pitying, nor do I wish to sound like an egotistical "artiste." But I will lay claim to having a nature that not only thrives on pursuing creative urges, but needs to follow them in order to maintain her sanity. However, it's no easy road after that initial joy, i.e. once the work interfaces with the outer world. Or at least, it has not been an easy or very pleasant road for me. That's where a more usual version of the 10W such as in the Rider/ Waite/ Smith [RWS] deck comes in:


It's almost as if these two cards are about two different phases of the creative process. The RWS version (immediately above) being about the work once there's any attempt to take it out into the world. And the Universal Fantasy Tarot version at the top emphasizing my favorite phase: the actual creative process itself. (No surprise there, given the hermit/introvert I am. :-D) However, as with all phases of life these are not totally distinct from each other. Each informs, even entwines at times with, the other. Therefore, that little three line poem/ aphorism above.

By the way, I did post the Universal Fantasy Tarot version to my wall, but not as my 2012 theme. It just did not seem to want to be in that position in my life. This 10W with my little three line aphorism running around its edges, greets me every morning as I stumble out of bed, reminding me there's always a new picture to be painted. (A different card holds the 2012 theme for me, but that's for some other post.)

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‘til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”)**** SEE ALSO: Roswila’s Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila’s Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Opening to the Light (for digital pix only).****

REVIEW of Barbara Ardinger's SECRET LIVES, by Roswila

by Barbara Ardinger, available from Amazon.com;
BarbaraArdinger.com, with link to a Reader’s Guide;
Barbara Ardinger's FaceBook page; and
A full length review of Secret Lives

I’m rushing up this extremely brief, but nevertheless rave review of Barbara Ardinger’s SECRET LIVES because it’s the Holiday Season and this book would make a marvelous gift!

SECRET LIVES is a totally wonder-filled, thought provoking, moving, fun ride, and I’ve only read it completely (so far) in its earlier incarnation. I.e., as chapter by chapter rolled off the author’s typewriter (yes, it was that long ago!) and was mailed to me. I’m now currently re-enjoying what’s familiar in the beginning chapters from back then and greatly looking forward to what’s new (considerable, given it’s now 600 pages or so) as I finish reading it.

The story plays out in an all too recognizably troubled Southern California urban setting, salted with humor along the way. (That’s one of the things I love about all of Ardinger’s books, there’s always room for humor.) This story of witches of all ages in modern times, that reaches back into ancient times to the roots of today’s creative pagan ways and wisdom, is massively engaging. Ardinger is a highly educated and intelligent writer, pulling from different sources and spiritual systems in such a way that they all "live" together harmoniously.

I would wait until I’ve finished this great ride before posting a review here, but as I noted above it's Holiday Season and this book would make a fabulous gift. You can get a more in-depth feel for it from the links beneath the cover graphic. And my review, if incomplete and skimpy is not inaccurate or uninformed. As I also said above, I’ve had the pleasure of reading the vast majority of it some time ago. The elder witches now feel like old -- pun intended -- and very dear friends.

Get this bookt! Give it! Read it! You’ll love it! You won't want to keep it a secret!

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‘til next time, keep reading great books, and enjoying The Tarot,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”)**** SEE ALSO: Roswila’s Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila’s Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Opening to the Light (for digital pix only).****

A TRIO OF NEW FOUND TAROT CARDS

All three of the below Found Tarot cards -- digital photos of mine in which only after the fact do I see a card -- are really old photos. But I've had a fondness for them since first seeing them on my computer. Over the two-plus years since their taking and the "discovery" of a Tarot card in each, I've occasionally fussed with them trying to improve the cropping, color, focus, etc. I decided that I'd better post them now or I'd never post them. :-)

By the way, I have posted others pictures in which I see the same cards below. Many cards I post here have more than one possible version posted for them. Should I ever complete this deck and wish to produce a physical copy, I can pare down to one photo per card.

Here's a possible Eight of Disks (8P):


And here's a possible Tower (XVI):


Last is a possible Judgment (XX):


OK, I'd briefly wondered before I started choosing cards to post today if they would suggest a reading, which they frequently do. And seeing them up now in a draft view on blogger, yes, they definitely do. And also definitely not a light reading ... LOL! ... when are the readings for myself ever light? Not for this Saturnine Capricorn. Here goes:

This Found Tarot 8P suggests the vision I've had for a new life, a new path. And what stands between, if you will, me and that life is a lot of hard work. Which I have accepted and attempted to do, but somehow not accomplished, no matter how hard I struggle. In light of what I see below in the other two cards, there's a more traditional meaning to this card that can be applicable here. In the Rider/Waite/Smith version of the 8P the person is literally "making pentacles." (Sitting at a work bench with an awl and hammer working on a pentacle, with 7 others around him.) A Tarot teacher I had decades ago said this was another way of saying "doing spiritual work." Which is one way to understand the sort of life challenge and struggle I see here.

This Found Tarot XVI suggests a fall. But almost more a "raining upon" from elsewhere, of both shadows and light. That instead of focusing on not getting ahead, I need to be opening to what falls in grace. I'm not sure I can make this clear, but to recognize how little we ultimately control in our lives. And not to be so focused on what we fail at or don't get that it takes a two-by-four over our heads to open us to what rains down in grace at all times. I've even begun to wonder how much we can ever really take credit for having accomplished. How much might just be chance. Which may simply be another word for grace.

And this Found Tarot XX suggests that a new life does indeed call even as it opens. It's always beginning, unmissable, unmistakable, whenever I stay in the moment. This card also suggests accepting the impermanent nature of being in the moment (at least for me). It's not a steady state, but one I wander in and out of. A way of being that is illusive and ephemeral (again, at least for me) but one that always blooms again when I most need it. If sometimes only after a series of two-by-fours over the head, as in a more negative Tower (XVI) experience.

I don't offer these "interpretations" above as anything more than what I obviously needed to hear today. Though they are not totally unconnected to the more accepted and usual meanings attributed to these three cards.

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‘til next time, keep opening to the moment, and enjoying The Tarot,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”)**** SEE ALSO: Roswila’s Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila’s Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); and Opening to the Light (for digital pix only).****

THE FOUR OF SWORDS and THE MOON for The Found Tarot

Above is a possible Four of Swords (4s) for The Found Tarot. I posted it recently on my dreams & poetry blog with a dream poem. It's also one of those occasional photo and dream pairings that I print out and stick up on the wall near my computer. It kept drawing my eye more than these pairs do after the first day or two. I thought probably because I love the colors. But then it hit me: the 4S, duh! Its mundane name is "Dreaming of Home" and the figure on the Rider/ Waite/ Smith (RWS) 4S might be dreaming, too. (I gave it that name before I'd consciously recognized the 4S in the pic.) For comparison, here's the RWS 4S:


And here below is another photo that catches my eye every time I open it's folder for some other photo. Its mundane name is "The Road Back." I had lots of trouble naming this photo two years ago when I took it because I kept wanting to use "star" or "crab" in the title, but neither word really worked. And I'd not yet tripped over the idea for a Found Tarot, so not even "crab" clued me in back then to The Moon (XVIII) card:


For compasion, here's The Moon in the RWS deck:


A final note: the ultimate feeling I get from working with these two cards is of a desire to escape, to go home, to find or wend one's way home or back. And as happens every time with cards/photos I post here (and even sometimes with non-Tarot related photos I pick for my other blogs) there's more than a little truth in that spontaneous surfacing of "meaning." Those who know I've only been living in California for about 3-1/2 years might be tempted to think I'm home sick for New York City where I'd lived my entire life. But not so. The home I'm sick for is an internal one. The home inside myself that all too often folds up its tent and moves on without me. Leaving me lost and exposed and in the dark, "Dreaming of Home."

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‘til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”)**** SEE ALSO: Roswila’s Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila’s Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Opening to the Light (for digital pix only), and Yahoo DREAMJIN: Group for Dreamku – Haiku-Like Dream Poems.****

FINDING ANOTHER ACE OF WANDS, HERMIT and FIVE OF WANDS

I've posted at least one photo here before that suggests the Ace of Wands to me. However, when I saw this brand new one on my computer screen last night it fairly yelled Ace of Wands, too.


It's, um, mundane title is "Sentinel." Well, isn't that little pouch thingey on the palm trunk a gun holster? :-)

And here's another photo of mine for the Five of Wands. It's one I slightly edited when getting ready for a photo exhibit I just had. Though it didn't make my cut for the exhibit, it did net me another 5W:


It's mundane title is "Caught Up in the Light."

Last for today's post is another Hermit photo, though this is really more a joke than a serious sighting of IX:


The mundane title for this photo is "X Marks the Spot."

I have many more in my folder of Found Tarot possibles, but they all need some editing and/or cropping. They wound up in my Found Tarot folder during that exhibit preparation I mentioned above. It's going to be fun going through them little by little to see which ultimately survives the process and which gets returned to a more mundane life. :-)

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‘til next time, keep enjoying The Tarot,

[aka: Patricia Kelly]
****If you wish to copy or use any of my writing, please email me for permission (under “View my complete profile”)**** SEE ALSO: Roswila’s Dream & Poetry Realm for Tarot poetry; Roswila’s Taiga Tarot for taiga (illustrated tanka); Opening to the Light (for digital pix only), and Yahoo DREAMJIN: Group for Dreamku – Haiku-Like Dream Poems.****