Cat's Eye View

 Ananda Tarot ~ Hanged Man/Reverse

I generally see the Hanged image as being locked in, by circumstances, indecision, roadblocks, fear or anger keeping me from breaking lose and going forward; sometimes pure unadulterated stubbornness, often simply blinders. 

I'm reading a kind of crazy book, The Dalai Lama's Cat, it is a little heavy handed on 'the moral of the story'...but by fact checking and one thing leading to another I've learned a some interesting things about Dalai Lama and his home town. He has a number of fine watches for instance, the one he wears the most is a Rolex Day/Date. Why not? A watch is a watch is a watch, and why not beauty and fine workmanship. He also likes working with tools and fixing things. Does he actually have a cat? I don't think so but has often been photographed in the company of animals.

The point being, I think, by taking a completely different cat's eye view of a revered personage, I've unstuck something else, and been able to move forward. I seldom understand my method to the madness, but it works for me.

Better Not Bitter

 Ananda Tarot ~ Knight of Cups

As Knights we begin to acknowledge there are forks in the road forward. I'm full of advice and criticism about the paths other people walk, particularly this past year, but who am I, who has often focused on paths that are destructive, hurtful, limiting, to judge?

I look back on the last thirty years as I've become more aware of alternatives and options for the high road or the low road. Or the safe road, which is seldom the most healthy direction. Looking inward has become my lifeline out of the strange year we've passed, hoping it is strong enough to carry me out the other side, better not bitter. Being a Knight of Cups is hard work. Being oblivious to my own faults will never be the answer though, only the easy one. 

My personal admission this week? The only angels I believe in are Snow Angels. 

Reality And Potential

 Greenwood Tarot ~ Ace of Cups

I've howled at the moon. My morning coffee will shortly be delivered by a handsome man, today is our anniversary, 51! And me just a pup still. I'll take this card and all it offers in reality and potential, and say thank you. Life is good. Knowing that is key. 

Red Alder and Vine Maple

 Greenwood Tarot ~ 4 of Wands

Ash Oak Birch Hawthorne create an enclosure within which to celebrate. Here we would create it with Douglas Fir, Western Red Cedar, Western Hemlock, Big Leaf Maple. I would incorporate Red Alder and Vine Maple. Foresters see them as junk wood, but an alder bottom or glowing vine maple undergrowth is a beautiful thing. 

Toward the bottom of this article from the on-line Salish Magazine is a mother tree, an ancient fallen long ago, perhaps in the Columbus Day storm of 1962, and an alder bottom, their trunks glowing with crustose lichens. I spent yesterday immersed in tree images and tree lore and celebrated living in the Pacific Northwest where trees are king. 4 of Wands, can't be beat. 

They Had The Sky

 Greenwood Tarot ~ 3 of Coins/Stones

Solar Horse and Lunar Oxen. Creations of the imagination. I can recognize the Big Dipper, but see the whole Ursa Major? Can I make Aries out of 4 or sometimes 5 stars? Do I see Gemini twins in that U shaped group of stars? No, No, and No. Does that mean my imagination is dim? I don't think so. More overwhelmed with too much all the time in the modern world. 

The ancients who named them, and the ancients before them who called them something else had the night sky for their entertainment. Undulled by billions of electric lights. Life for the majority of the ancients was short and hard, but they had the night sky, I envy them that. 

Backtracking The Hermit

 Greenwood Tarot ~ Hermit

A Hermit coming home? Have I ever seen this before? Backtracking the blog, The Shining Tribe presents a door just beyond the tree. The Drogi Hermit seems to be clutching a tree rather than a staff. As a credent in a crypt in the Cathar. He is actually in the tree in the Victorian Fairy Tarot. The Green Witch Tarot presents him apparently fleeing a house. In Sacred Sites he comes home to an abandoned Petra. Jane Austen Tarot presents the Hermit as Mr. Bennett in the library. In the Whimsical he now appears to be sneaking into a child's room. Funny how time changes our viewpoints, part of the Hermit's gathering of knowledge. In 2007 when I last used that deck that idea would  never have crossed my mind, Hermit as a pedo. 

And when I drew this hermit in 2010, I used this quote. Still applies.  "If a hermit lives in a state of ecstasy, his lack of comfort becomes the height of comfort. He must relinquish it." ~ Jean Maurice Eugène Clément Cocteau 1889–1963

Trail Of Tears

 Greenwood Tarot ~ 10 of Wands

Potter has presented her 10 as carrying logs across ice. If we'd like to look at it as good news, there is a warming fire ahead and refuge is in view. We have options to shout good job well done and get on with life, or spend days at the fireside retelling our travails. Which are probably worth hearing, if for no other reason than a cautionary tale, story with a moral. 

Some of our worst experiences make for good storytelling, way down the road when time has left just the humorous bits, or parts that can be made funny. I've been reading the ancient tales of the Choctaw, tales of creation of the tribes, the great journey when they decided to travel east to new hunting grounds, how corn was presented to them, how man and woman came to be. A good portion of the stories as presented with humor. Not the Trail Of Tears ones, no, that bitter history is not told with smiles. Time has only enlarged the indelible stain on the government, the loss of life and land and culture. 10 of Wands indeed.

A Long Way Baby

 Greenwood Tarot ~ Ace of Coins/Stones

The beginning is where we measure from. My mother-in-law used to laugh and say "I haven't come far have I" because in her 80's she ended up about a mile from where she was born, yet her life was anything but motionless. Where we live seldom has much weight, it is what we do on the journey. 

I've set lots of personal goals, but don't know many people who set life goals. A nephew who vowed to be a millionaire by the time he was 25. He has bypassed that many times now I think. Rob wanted to be a truck driver, was, be careful what you wish for... Lots of people who went to college to be X and spent their lives doing Y and Z. 

Whatever method we use when we review needs to be flexible rather than rigid. Because we've come a long way, Baby. This 1968 ad is a good example. And cringe worthy. And probably current too. 

Instrument Of Renewal

  Greenwood Tarot ~ 9 of Swords/Arrows

Generating healing energy. I couldn't see how this reflected me, laid the card aside, and wrote a long letter to my cousin. Then I realized, because we didn't get any family support when I had my cancers, that this could be considered a form of healing energy. To her, sharing a bit of what is coming and how I dealt with it, and to me, expressing it. Beautiful card. She uses the bow as a musical instrument, turning an instrument of death into an instrument of spirit renewal. 

Woodpeckering Page

 Greenwood Tarot ~ Page of Swords/Arrows

Woodpeckers are methodical in their day to day drilling work, so they don't miss anything worth knowing/finding. Then in many instances they come back filling the holes with provender for elevenses and laters. In the spring they drill madly and as loudly as they can to show their skills to a potential mate. Or later they come back to a choice selection and drill out a home nest. 

I've seen all three practices here, two small trees in the front are covered in small holes. Our metal roof attracts the spring hammerers. The 100 foot utility beeper pole that used to stand in a field near us, when taken down had six holes one to two feet long in it. 

The point being, as a Page they enjoy different tasks, motivations, notions. Not so much for the upper courts, once their titles are clamped on, they are defined by their status. Sad that, to me anyway, who has always taken the meandering woodpeckering Page path. 

Human Uberite

 Greenwood Tarot ~ 7 of Swords/Arrows

Potter sees this card as insecure, unprotected, anxious. Yes, I'm that. I'm also belligerent, defensive, pushy, obstinate. Human. Sometimes I don't give myself enough credit for that, just being human, I treat it like a stain. It is a tough job, but we keep on doing it, driven by our mad monkey mind and emotions. 

I've been working with images this week of ancient creatures bones and fossils. It makes me melancholy. Sometimes we are the rider, sometimes we are the one underfoot. Maybe the key to this card is whether we ride on, or if we stop to give the struggling a lift? Are we living a hit and run life? Or balancing with a bit of human Uber? 

Dedicated

 Greenwood Tarot ~ Queen of Wands

Dedicated to my cousin who had cancer surgery yesterday. 

She and her husband are resolute walkers, high walks, long walks, while I go along in my chair via her blog. She the Queen, me... distant Page, connected by blood, experience, and memory. 

No One's Ancestor

 Greenwood Tarot ~ Hierophant/Ancestor

Profound insight, guidance, on the right path. My interest in genealogy didn't take long to waver and then fade away. Couldn't see the point in the end. Do I think I have french, german, and choctaw blood running in my veins? Eeh.. not really. Blood doesn't have a nationality; perhaps the mind does, if it only cares to look backward. 

If I were to be defined by ancestry though, it would be choctaw, indigenous, earth based, not defined by possessions or racial prestige. Or is that the sin of pride speaking? Some sort of reverse elitism? 

The path this Ancestor is drumming...it isn't my path, mostly because time apparently teaches nothing. Going forward I can seek my own insight, my own path. I'm to be no one's ancestor after all. I may though, get my native bodhran down and go down into the forest and drum, work on my insight...

Won The Lottery

 Greenwood Tarot ~ Pole Star

Formed from stardust, we return to stardust, in this deck anyway. If I think about that one in millions chance for a unique me, meeting and attaching to the one egg...it is a bit boggling. Our first lottery, and I won. How could I grouse about anything ever, after that win?

Every time I see this card today, I'll appreciate that pure chance conception, and be a Star. Dressed to the shoes, wearing lipstick and earrings... I'm alive and I will not take that for granted.  

Accepting

 Greenwood Tarot ~ 9 of Cups

Open to abundance and in turn generosity. I know I've said it before, but it's funny how we can so freely give, and have so much trouble accepting. Is it human nature or something our mothers instilled in us?