ARCANALOGUE - Tarot By Tom Blunt

A Radiohead Oracle - In Rainbows, OK Computer, and the Tarot

2010-10-22T00:00:00.005-04:00

When Radiohead released In Rainbows almost exactly 3 years ago, Puddlegum posted an article picking apart the album's hidden meanings. A series of binary number clues seemed to hint that it was inexplicably linked to their third album, OK Computer, and Puddlegum asserted that if you shuffled the two albums together, the result was a 22-song playlist that was nearly seamless, both musically and thematically.

Naturally whenever I notice anything with 22 parts, I instantly begin looking for associations with the Tarot's 22 trump cards. (Occultists have been playing this game since before the days of even Aleister Crowley and Eliphas Levi.) So, playlist assembled, I simply laid the cards numerically alongside the songs, hoping a few of them might comment interestingly on each other.

What I saw in there really sort of blew my mind.

In many cases, the title alone comments interestingly on the card's meanings. In nearly all cases, the lyrics are uncannily apt. For example, the 22nd card, The Fool (which is usually numbered zero, and so in this case was saved for the very end), features a man stepping toward a precipice with a tiny dog nipping at his heels. The corresponding song, "The Tourist" (ha!) opens with the following lyrics:

It barks at no-one else but me,
Like it's seen a ghost.
I guess it's seen the sparks a-flowin,
No-one else would know.
Hey man, slow down, slow down,
Idiot, slow down, slow down.

And so forth! There are a few which are harder to connect than the others, but as I looked at each song I grew more and more excited, seeing an incredible opportunity to use the Tarot as a symbolic key to unlock hidden doors into these wonderful albums (and vice versa, as the lyrics offer a unique, distinctly dystopian commentary to the the deck's already rather apocalyptic narrative). What you will find linked below is the playlist, exactly as presented by Puddlegum in 2007, with a sample lyric and links to individual posts for each song. The posts contain the full songs, plus any additional insight I might have. Construct your own playlist, listen along, and let me know what you hear.

1. Airbag (OK Computer) - The Magician

"In an interstellar burst
I am back to save the universe..."

2. 15 Step (In Rainbows) - The High Priestess

"Did the cat get your tongue?
Did your string come undone?
One by one
One by one
It comes to us all
It's as soft as your pillow..."

3. Paranoid Android (OK Computer) - The Empress

"Please could you stop the noise, I'm trying to get some rest
From all the unborn chicken voices in my head..."

4. Bodysnatchers (In Rainbows) - The Emperor

"I have no idea what you are talking about
Your mouth moves only with someone's hand up your ass..."

5. Subterranean Homesick Alien (OK Computer) - The Hierophant

"I'd show them the stars
And the meaning of life
They'd shut me away
But I'd be all right
All right
I'm just uptight..."

6. Nude (In Rainbows) - The Lovers

"You'll go to hell for what your dirty mind is thinking...

She stands stark naked and she beckons you to bed
Don't go, you'll only want to come back again..."

7. Exit Music [For A Film] (OK Computer) - The Chariot

"Wake from your sleep
The drying of your tears
Today we escape
We escape..."

8. Weird Fishes/Arpeggi (In Rainbows) - Strength

"I'd be crazy not to follow
Follow where you lead..."

9. Let Down (OK Computer) - The Hermit

"Transport, motorways and tramlines
Starting and then stopping
Taking off and landing
The emptiest of feelings
Disappointed people, clinging on to bottles
And when it comes it's so, so, disappointing..."

10. All I Need (In Rainbows) - The Wheel of Fortune

"I am the next act waiting in the wings
I am an animal trapped in your hot car
I am all the days that you choose to ignore..."

11. Karma Police (OK Computer) - Justice

"This is what you get
This is what you get
This is what you get when you mess with us..."

12. Fitter Happier (OK Computer) - The Hanged Man

"Like a cat
tied to a stick,
that's driven into
frozen winter shit..."

13. Faust Arp (In Rainbows) - Death

"Wakey wakey rise and shine
It's on again off again on again
Watch me fall like dominoes
In pretty patterns..."

14. Electioneering (OK Computer) - Temperance

"When I go forwards you go backwards
and somewhere we will meet."

15. Reckoner (In Rainbows) - The Devil

"You are not to blame for
Bittersweet distractor
Dare not speak it's name
Dedicated to all human beings..."

16. Climbing Up The Walls (OK Computer) - The Tower

"And either way you turn
I'll be there
Open up your skull
I'll be there
Climbing up the walls..."

17. House Of Cards (In Rainbows) - The Star

"No matter how it ends
No matter how it starts

Forget about your house of cards
And I'll do mine..."

18. No Surprises (OK Computer) - The Moon

"No alarms and no surprises,
Silence, silence..."

19. Jigsaw Falling Into Place (In Rainbows) - The Sun

"Wish away the nightmare
You got the light you can feel it on your back
You got the light you can feel it on your back
Your jigsaw falling into place..."

20. Lucky (OK Computer) - The Last Judgment

"Pull me out of the aircrash,
pull me out of the wake,
'cause I'm your superhero.
We are standing on the edge."

21. Videotape (In Rainbows) - The World

"This is my way of saying goodbye
Because I can't do it face to face
I'm talking to you after it's too late
From my videotape..."

22. The Tourist (OK Computer) - The Fool

"It barks at no-one else but me,
Like it's seen a ghost.
I guess it's seen the sparks a-flowin,
No-one else would know.
Hey man, slow down, slow down,
Idiot, slow down, slow down."

The Fool - "The Tourist" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:21:00.001-04:00

It barks at no-one else but me,
Like it's seen a ghost.
I guess it's seen the sparks a-flowin,
No-one else would know.
Hey man, slow down, slow down,
Idiot, slow down, slow down.

Sometimes I get overcharged,
That's when you see sparks.
They ask me where the hell I'm going?
At a 1000 feet per second,

Hey man, slow down, slow down,
Idiot, slow down, slow down.

Hey man, slow down, slow down,
Idiot, slow down, slow down.

The World - "Videotape" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:20:00.003-04:00

[Mainly speaks for itself. The videotape is a physical record of an earthly life -- much as Blake imagined the books of Urizen in his 1974 creation myth.]

When I'm at the pearly gates
This will be on my videotape, my videotape
Mephistopheles is just beneath
and he's reaching up to grab me

This is one for the good days
and i have it all here
In red, blue, green
Red, blue, green

You are my center
When i spin away
Out of control on videotape
On videotape
On videotape
On videotape

This is my way of saying goodbye
Because I can't do it face to face
I'm talking to you after it's too late
From my videotape

No matter what happens now
I won't be afraid
Because I know today has been the most perfect day I've ever seen.

The Sun - "Jigsaw Falling Into Place" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:19:00.008-04:00

[The perils of inner- and outer-space voyaging have ended. The traveler has gained the power to "wish away the nightmare."]

Just as you take my hand
Just as you write my number down
Just as the drinks arrive
Just as they play your favourite song
As your bad day disappears
No longer wound up like a spring
Before you've had too much
Come back in focus again

The walls are bending shape
You got a cheshire cat grin
All blurring into one
This place is on a mission
Before the night owl
Before the animal noises
Closed circuit cameras
Before you comatose

Before you run away from me
Before you're lost between the notes
The beat goes round and round
The beat goes round and round
I never really got there
I just pretended that I had
Words are blunt instruments
Words are sawn off shotguns

Come on and let it out
Come on and let it out
Come on and let it out
Come on and let it out

Before you run away from me
Before you're lost between the notes
Just as you take the mic
Just as you dance, dance, dance

A jigsaw falling into place
So there is nothing to explain
You eye each other as you pass
She looks back and you look back
Not just once
And not just twice
Wish away your nightmare
Wish away the nightmare
You got the light you can feel it on your back
You got the light you can feel it on your back
Your jigsaw falling into place.

The Last Judgment - "Lucky" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:19:00.007-04:00

[A wave of relief optimism arrives as life ends and the weary traveler approaches his destination.]

I'm on a roll,
I'm on a roll this time.
I feel my luck could change.

Kill me sarah,
kill me again with love.
It's gonna be a glorious day.

Pull me out of the aircrash,
pull me out of the lake,
'cause I'm your superhero.
We are standing on the edge.

The head of state
has called for me by name
but I don't have time for him.
It's gonna be a glorious day!
I feel my luck could change.

Pull me out of the aircrash,
pull me out of the Wake,
'cause I'm your superhero.
We are standing on the edge.

We are standing on the edge.

The Moon - "No Surprises" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:17:00.004-04:00

[The entire song is a beautiful, hopeful illusion barely masking a cold, unfriendly reality. And yet in the darkness, hope is incredibly valuable for its own sake, however delusional it may seem.]

A heart that's full up like a landfill,
a job that slowly kills you,
bruises that won't heal.
You look so tired-unhappy,
bring down the government,
they don't, they don't speak for us.
I'll take a quiet life,
a handshake of carbon monoxide,

with no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
Silence, silence.

This is my final fit,
my final bellyache

with no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises,
no alarms and no surprises please.

Such a pretty house
and such a pretty garden.

No alarms and no surprises (get me outta here),
no alarms and no surprises (get me outta here),
no alarms and no surprises, please.

The Star - "House of Cards" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:16:00.003-04:00

[Beyond the the ruins of Tower, the escapee discovers the illimitable pleasure of autonomy.]

I don't want to be your friend
I just want to be your lover
No matter how it ends
No matter how it starts

Forget about your house of cards
And I'll do mine
Forget about your house of cards
And I'll do mine

Fall off the table,
Get swept under
Denial, denial

The infrastructure will collapse
Voltage spikes
Throw your keys in the bowl
Kiss your husband goodnight

Forget about your house of cards
And I'll do mine
Forget about your house of cards
And I'll do mine

Fall off the table,
And get swept under

Denial, denial
Denial, denial
Your ears should be burning
Denial, denial
Your ears should be burning
Denial, denial

The Tower - "Climbing Up the Walls" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:15:00.001-04:00

I am the key to the lock in your house
That keeps your toys in the basement
And if you get too far inside
You'll only see my reflection

It's always best when the covers up
I am the pick in the ice
Do not cry out or hit the alarm
You know we're friends till we die

And either way you turn
I'll be there
Open up your skull
I'll be there
Climbing up the walls

It's always best when the light is off
It's always better on the outside
Fifteen blows to the back of your head
Fifteen blows to your mind

So lock the kids up safe tonight
Shut the eyes in the cupboard
I've got the smell of a local man
Who's got the loneliest fear

That either way you turn
I'll be there
Open up your skull
I'll be there

Climbing up the walls
Climbing up the walls
Climbing up the walls

The Devil - "Reckoner" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:14:00.001-04:00

Reckoner
You can't take it with yer
Dancing for your pleasure

You are not to blame for
Bittersweet distractor
Dare not speak it's name
Dedicated to all human beings

Because we separate like ripples on a blank shore
In rainbows
Because we separate like ripples on a blank shoree

Reckoner
Take me with yer
Dedicated to all human beings

Temperance - "Electioneering" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:13:00.003-04:00

[A twisted view of the equanimity and compromise traditionally depicted in the card. The angel is a cold, almost political agent merely doing its job.]

I will stop, I will stop at nothing.
Say the right things when electioneering
I trust I can rely on your vote.

When I go forwards you go backwards
and somewhere we will meet.
When I go forwards you go backwards
and somewhere we will meet.
Ha ha ha

Riot shields, voodoo economics,
it's just business, cattle prods and the I.M.F.
I trust I can rely on your vote.

When I go forwards you go backwards
and somewhere we will meet.
When I go forwards you go backwards
and somewhere we will meet.

Death - "Faust Arp" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:12:00.001-04:00

Wakey wakey rise and shine
It's on again off again on again
Watch me fall like dominoes
In pretty patterns
Fingers in the blackbird pie
I'm tingling tingling tingling
It's what you feel not what you ought to
What you ought to,
Reasonable and sensible
Dead from the neck up
I guess I'm stuffed, stuffed, stuffed
We thought you had it in you
But no, no, no
For no real reason

Squeeze the tubes and empty bottles
I'll take a bow, take a bow, take a bow
It's what you feel not what you ought to
What you ought to,
The elephant that's in the room
Is tumbling, tumbling, tumbling
And duplicate and triplicate and
Plastic bags and
Duplicate and triplicate
Dead from the neck up
I guess I'm stuffed, stuffed, stuffed
We thought you had it in you
But no, no, no
Exactly where do you get off?
Is enough
Is enough
I love you but enough is enough,
Enough of that stuff
There's no real reason
You've got a handful of feathers
You're gonna melt into butter

The Hanged Man - "Fitter, Happier" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:11:00.001-04:00

Fitter, happier, more productive,
comfortable,
not drinking too much,
regular exercise at the gym
(3 days a week),
getting on better with your associate employee contemporaries ,
at ease,
eating well
(no more microwave dinners and saturated fats),
a patient better driver,
a safer car
(baby smiling in back seat),
sleeping well
(no bad dreams),
no paranoia,
careful to all animals
(never washing spiders down the plughole),
keep in contact with old friends
(enjoy a drink now and then),
will frequently check credit at
(moral) bank (hole in the wall),
favors for favors,
fond but not in love,
charity standing orders,
on Sundays ring road supermarket
(no killing moths or putting boiling water on the ants),
car wash
(also on Sundays),
no longer afraid of the dark or midday shadows
nothing so ridiculously teenage and desperate,
nothing so childish - at a better pace,
slower and more calculated,
no chance of escape,
now self-employed,
concerned (but powerless),
an empowered and informed member of society
(pragmatism not idealism),
will not cry in public,
less chance of illness,
tires that grip in the wet
(shot of baby strapped in back seat),
a good memory,
still cries at a good film,
still kisses with saliva,
no longer empty and frantic
like a cat
tied to a stick,
that's driven into
frozen winter shit
(the ability to laugh at weakness),
calm,
fitter,
healthier and more productive
a pig
in a cage
on antibiotics.

Justice - "Karma Police" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:10:00.001-04:00

Karma police, arrest this man
He talks in maths
He buzzes like a fridge
He's like a detuned radio

Karma police, arrest this girl
Her Hitler hairdo is making me feel ill
And we have crashed her party

This is what you get
This is what you get
This is what you get when you mess with us

Karma Police
I've given all I can
It's not enough
I've given all I can
But we're still on the payroll

This is what you get
This is what you get
This is what you get when you mess with us

For a minute there, I lost myself, I lost myself
Phew, for a minute there, I lost myself, I lost myself

For a minute there, I lost myself, I lost myself
Phew, for a minute there, I lost myself, I lost myself

Wheel of Fortune - "All I Need" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:09:00.004-04:00

[A view from the hub of the wheel, the "middle of the picture." Everything is simultaneously all wrong and alright.]

I am the next act waiting in the wings
I am an animal trapped in your hot car
I am all the days that you choose to ignore

You are all I need
You are all I need
I am in the middle of your picture
Lying in the reeds

I am a moth who just wants to share your light
I'm just an insect trying to get out of the night
I only stick with you because there are no others

You are all I need
You are all I need
I am in the middle of your picture
Lying in the reeds

S'all wrong
S'alright, S'alright
S'all wrong
S'alright, S'alright, S'alright

The Hermit - "Let Down" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:08:00.003-04:00

[All I will say is that aside from the mood of this song being exactly right, it's not the first time I've seen the Hermit depicted as insectile.]

Transport, motorways and tramlines
Starting and then stopping
Taking off and landing
The emptiest of feelings
Disappointed people, clinging on to bottles
And when it comes it's so, so, disappointing

Let down and hanging around
Crushed like a bug in the ground
Let down and hanging around

Shell smashed, juices flowing
Wings twitch, legs are going
Don't get sentimental
It always ends up drivel
One day, I am gonna grow wings
A chemical reaction
Hysterical and useless
Hysterical and

Let down and hanging around
Crushed like a bug in the ground
Let down and hanging around

Let down again
Let down again
Let down

You know, you know where you are with
You know where you are with
Floor collapsing, falling, bouncing back
And one day, I am gonna grow wings
A chemical reaction (you know where you are)
Hysterical and useless (you know where you are)
Hysterical and (you know where you are)

Let down and hanging around
Crushed like a bug in the ground
Let down and hanging around

The Chariot - "Exit Music (For a Film)" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:06:00.008-04:00

[The charioteer is usually thought to be the child of the two Lovers, rejecting their world and setting off on his own dangerous course through life. I can't imagine a more wrenching departure than this...]

Wake from your sleep
The drying of your tears
Today we escape
We escape

Pack and get dressed
Before your father hears us
Before all hell breaks loose

Breathe, keep breathing
Don't lose your nerve
Breathe, keep breathing
I can't do this alone

Sing us a song
A song to keep us warm
There's such a chill, such a chill

You can laugh
A spineless laugh
We hope your rules and wisdom choke you
Now we are one
In everlasting peace

We hope that you choke, that you choke
We hope that you choke, that you choke
We hope that you choke, that you choke

Strength - "Weird Fishes/Arpeggios" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:06:00.006-04:00

[This is the only song in the entire playlist that seemed like a complete stretch to me, in that none of the visual elements of the card seem to match up. However, the song does seem to be about submission and surrender, which is interesting. Someone recently told me that she considered the "strength" in question to actually be beauty -- both the lion and the woman are beautiful, and recognizing each other's beauty, they discover a commonality that creates perfect peace between them.]

In the deepest ocean
The bottom of the sea
Your eyes
They turn me
Why should i stay here?
Why should i stay?
I'd be crazy not to follow
Follow where you lead

Your eyes
They turn me
Turn me on to phantoms
I follow to the edge of the earth
And fall off
Yeah, everybody leaves
If they get the chance
And this is my chance
I get eaten by the worms
And weird fishes
Picked over by the worms
And weird fishes
Weird fishes
Weird fishes

I hit the bottom
Hit the bottom and escape
I hit the bottom
Hit the bottom to escape
Escape

The Hierophant - "Subterranean Homesick Alien" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:03:00.006-04:00

[Funny, I've always already imagined the title of this song to be a metaphor for Christ, and the lyrics to be evoke a distinctly post-Christian longing...]

The breath of the morning
I keep forgetting
The smell of the warm summer air

I live in a town
Where you can't smell a thing
You watch your feet
For cracks in the pavement

Up above
Aliens hover
Making home movies
For the folks back home

Of all these weird creatures
Who lock up their spirits
Drill holes in themselves
And live for their secrets

They're all uptight
Uptight...
Uptight..

I wish that they'd swoop down in a country lane
Late at night when I'm driving
Take me on board their beautiful ship
Show me the world as I'd love to see it

I'd tell all my friends
But they'd never believe
They'd think that I'd finally lost it completely

I'd show them the stars
And the meaning of life
They'd shut me away
But I'd be all right
All right..

I'm just uptight
Uptight..
Uptight..
Uptight..

The Lovers - "Nude" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:03:00.004-04:00

Don't get any big ideas
they're not gonna happen
You paint yourself white
and feel up with noise
but there'll be something missing

Now that you've found it, it's gone
Now that you feel it, you don't
You've gone off the rails

So don't get any big ideas
they're not going to happen
You'll go to hell for what your dirty mind is thinking

[Sometimes Thom Yorke adds this verse when performing:]

She stands stark naked and she beckons you to bed
don't go, you'll only want to come back again

The Emperor - "Bodysnatchers" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:02:00.005-04:00

[A dispatch from the jabbering puppet on the throne.]

I do not
Understand
What it is
I've done wrong
Full of holes
Check for pulse
Blink your eyes
One for yes
Two for no

I have no idea what I am talking about
I am trapped in this body and can't get out

You killed the sound
Removed backbone
A pale imitation
With the edges sawn off

I have no idea what you are talking about
Your mouth moves only with someone's hand up your ass

Has the light gone out for you?
Because the light's gone for me
It is the 21st century
It is the 21st century
It can follow you like a dog
It brought me to my knees
They got a skin and they put me in
They got a skin and they put me in
On the lines wrapped round my face
On the lines wrapped round my face
Are for anyone else to see
Are for anyone else to see

I'm a lie

I've seen it coming

The Empress - "Paranoid Android" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T21:00:00.004-04:00

[This seems to be a very vengeful, angsty Empress, one who wishes to wrestle power back from the overreaching Emperor. Of all characters, the sensitive and earthy Empress would probably be the one most driven mad by the waste and novelty of the modern world.]

Please could you stop the noise, I'm trying to get some rest
From all the unborn chicken voices in my head
What's there? (I may be paranoid, but not an android)
What's there? (I may be paranoid, but not an android)

When I am king, you will be first against the wall
with your opinion which is of no consequence at all
What's there? (I may be paranoid, but no android)
What's there? (I may be paranoid, but no android)

Ambition makes you look pretty ugly
Kicking, squealing, gucci little piggy
You don't remember
You don't remember
Why don't you remember my name?
Off with his head, man
Off with his head, man
Why don't you remember my name? I guess he does...

Rain down, rain down
Come on rain down on me
From a great height
From a great height... height...
Rain down, rain down
Come on rain down on me
From a great height
From a great height... height...
Rain down, rain down
Come on rain down on me

That's it sir
You're leaving
The crackle of pigskin
The dust and the screaming
The yuppies networking
The panic, the vomit
The panic, the vomit
God loves his children, God loves his children, yeah!

The High Priestess - "15 Steps" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T20:59:00.004-04:00

[The ambition and certainty of the Magician is immediately undercut by the elliptical utterances of the Priestess, which offer both mercy and severity. I don't have a special Tarot understanding of the "15 steps" -- other than that the card that's 15 steps away from her is the Star.]

How come I end up where I started
How come I end up where I went wrong
Won't take my eyes off the ball again
You reel me out and you cut the string.

How come I end up where I started
How come I end up where I went wrong
Won't take my eyes off the ball again
First you reel me out and then you cut the string

You used to be all right
What happened?
Did the cat get your tongue?
Did your string come undone?
One by one
One by one
It comes to us all
It's as soft as your pillow

You used to be all right
What happened?
Et cetera et cetera
Facts for whatever!
15 steps
Then a sheer drop

How come I end up where I started?
How come I end up where I went wrong
Won't take my eyes off the ball again
You reel me out and you cut the string.

The Magician - "Airbag" by Radiohead

2010-10-21T20:56:00.002-04:00

In the next world war
In a jackknifed juggernaut
I am born again

In the neon sign
Scrolling up and down
I am born again

In an interstellar burst
I am back to save the universe

In a deep deep sleep of the innocent
I am born again

In a fast german car
I'm amazed that I survived
An airbag saved my life

In an interstellar burst
I am back to save the universe

In an interstellar burst
I am back to save the universe

"Straight-Acting"

2010-10-04T09:45:00.011-04:00

This is the fourteenth installment in a series of short essays inspired by the 22 Trump cards, featuring original artwork by Greg Erskine (Click and scroll down for large version).

I met Earl late one night in 2003 when I was cruising gay chat-rooms on the Internet. Within minutes we figured out that we lived just one block away from each other -- we were typing from less than a hundred feet apart. In the spirit of adventure, he jovially invited me over for a beer. Whatever sexual strings might be attached were not discussed, so I figured I had better be prepared for nearly anything. I wrote down his address on a scrap of paper and left it on my pillow where my roommate could find it if I never turned up again. Three minutes later I was with Earl in his apartment.

He was as handsome as his photograph, a dying art in the world of online hook-ups. He was my age and seemed, in the parlance of hook-up culture, “straight-acting.” Over beers he talked to me a lot about law school and the time he spent studying abroad. He was so warm and engaging that I wasn’t alarmed in the slightest when asked if I “wanted to take some pills” with him. He was just being a good host, I reassured myself. When I demurred he merely shrugged and set to work crushing up the mystery pills with a paperweight on his desk so he could snort them. Already considering the evening’s social experiment a success but not wanting to push my luck, I yawned and made a gracious exit.

Earl and I hung out several more times in short succession, usually over drinks at a local bar. His easygoing nature made it unclear whether he was even remotely attracted to me, and naturally I was reluctant to find out otherwise, so I didn’t push it. When one of my emails and then the follow-up message I sent a few weeks later both went ignored, I figured I had my answer, along with a reminder that chance friendships have their own hyper-accelerated natural life-spans.

Not long ago I met a gentleman at a bar who was from Savannah, Georgia. “I used to know someone from Savannah,” I told him. “Maybe you know Earl?” And that’s how I found out that my old friend had been dead this whole time, nearly six years.

Earl, I learned from my new friend at the bar, came from a prestigious Savannah family for whom a gay son would have been a crushing liability. Well aware that there were eyes and ears and mouths even in New York City that, in one way or another, had connections back home, he was compelled to keep an extremely small and tidy closet. He surrounded himself with beautiful women and straight male friends, publicly dating the former whenever necessary and hiding in plain sight among the latter. Earl avoided making homosexual friends, and had only officially “come out” to one or two people in the whole world. I’d just happened to end up small-talking with one of them.

One evening in 2004, not long after he and I had met for the last time, Earl fell off the roof of an apartment building on the Lower East Side. It was one of those huge parties where people go up to the roof to smoke, and since everyone smokes, everyone is on the roof, laughing and screaming at the skyline and having the time of their over-indulgent young lives. There is drunken horseplay. In rare cases, I have heard, it is possible for a young man, even a second-year student in a prominent law program, to misjudge the true distance between two rooftops, to decide that he could easily leap from one to the other, to inadvertently cast himself into the alleyway like one more crumpled, empty wrapper.

I vividly remember a dream I once had in which my great-grandmother showed up at a family wedding, but refused to come all the way into the chapel. She paced back in forth in the foyer wringing her hands and protesting tearfully that no one had remembered to invite her. It was true, no one had, because she’d been dead for nearly a year. Upon waking up I realized that it was exactly a year ago, to the day, since I'd attended her funeral.

From that morning on, I always sort of assumed that people have a way of unconsciously keeping tabs on one another, even across unpardonable distances. During this encounter with a stranger in a crowded bar, during which our forgotten beers warmed in their bottles, I felt the subtle strings of that web winding around me again. To this stranger I was an important find -- I was proof that Earl had at least been secretly exploring, reaching out over the squalid Internet in the wee hours of the night, making contact, perhaps even having sex. I was evidence that Earl had lived, in some small way, as himself.

For me, there was only a grief gone stale before it could even be felt. Walking home that night I wondered if I’d ever remember anything about Earl except those messages I’d sent over the years, shout-outs no eyes had ever seen. Or the occasional fruitless searches on sites like Facebook -- fruitless because the person I was looking for had long since ceased to exist. It had been so easy to let it go after a few cursory attempts; to release Earl to what I assumed was a busy, illustrious life. If I’d been just a little more curious, I’d have had no trouble finding the page set up by his family to memorialize his “tragic accident.”

It’s hard not to grow bitter, reading those two words repeated over and over in comments posted years ago by people who had never known, would never know the truth. Tragic accident. As if the only the fall itself had been tragic, independent of anything leading up to it. As if some accidents could not be predicted with terrible accuracy by those in possession of more facts.

I wish I’d known them myself when it could have still mattered. But I must admit it was nice of Earl to circle back around anyway, after all this time, to let me know in his way.

Court Portrait - Queen of Cups

2010-09-10T10:57:00.011-04:00

Think you know yourself? Try your hand at acting, and you may be surprised at what surfaces.

I've given it up myself, mostly. There was a time when I used to find myself onstage quite often, but one night during a painful argument with a close friend I realized I had lost my ability to subjectively grasp my own emotions. As my eyes welled up tears, I caught myself thinking: Should I let the tears fall, so he sees how hurt I am? Or should I stifle them so that I seem more independent? Which would be preferable?

I became bothered by the fact that I was having these thoughts instead of actually experiencing the moment as it occurred. If I was detached enough to play director, how hurt could I really be? So I ended the argument, and I took some time off from acting.

There are people I know who make me want to do a lot more of it. I knew Amy Lee had that quality before I'd even seen her onstage -- in our few chats she struck me as being more genuinely interested in others than most actors I'd known, and more self-aware. Naturally, I assume there's a sad story behind all this. But that is what drew me to AL, the access she granted to both her joy and her sadness, the former shining just above the surface, the latter suspended just below the crust like a rich vein of oil. I've seen Medea smile lovingly with those lips, seen Nurse Ratched weep real tears from those eyes, and somehow they were just as believable as the snarling. As real as the blood.

You can imagine my pleasure in seeing this portrait of the artist as a woman confronting her own reflection, hovering on either side of terminal point where the observation threatens to switch places with her observer. On one side of the glass bright lights emanate, on the other side you see the darkness creeping in from behind. The cup, suitably enough, is just another prop; the litter of empties hints at the long day behind, the long night ahead.

This particular figure, the Queen of Cups, is often imagined to be somewhat inaccessible, gazing raptly into inner space. If she ever hopes to share the observations that lie within, she must either attempt to drag them to the surface (a task better suited to the Princess/Page of Cups), or she must lure people down into the depths where they can apprehend her vision with their own eyes. In my opinion, that is the real challenge and magic of theatre: convincing a stranger in the audience to hold his breath, suspend his disbelief, and dive (not to mention pointing him back at just the right moment, before he can panic and drown).

I don't know if I have the elemental infrastructure to spend any great amount of time exploring those reefs -- my last stab at acting commanded more introspection offstage than on. But will always love watching others try, and I love following them down to the places which they know so well, the underwater fumaroles that give off such surprising heat.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Queen of Cups

Court Portrait - Page of Swords

2010-08-09T13:02:00.008-04:00

If you ever decide to explore the nether-wharfs and industrial rockslides of Brooklyn and Queens, I recommend bringing a friend, or a camera, or both. Matters of aesthetic appreciation aside, personal safety is an issue you do not want to neglect -- you need to maximize the odds that at least one of member of your party will stagger back to the police station, hair blanched into dandelion fluff from pure shock, to file the report. Or at the very least, that a poorly-lit photo providing clues about your last few moments will turn up on the internet.

Colin has been a great companion on these adventures. He has a great photographic eye, an hyperactive imagination, and all of the reflexes necessary to slither over or around a chain link fence without harm to life, limb, or lens.

In the city, carrying a camera is almost like carrying a weapon. Cameras utilize the same terminology as guns (aim, shoot, reload), the same focusing and timing skills, the predatory instincts. We use them to grasp, perceive, capture, and indict each other. Pretty much everyone is packing a camera these days on their cell phones, but even so, nothing raises suspicion faster than poking around and taking pictures. Many cities are making efforts to criminalize this sort of activity, even as government surveillance of the public continues to escalate. This spring I was stopped and questioned in Mesa, AZ while walking around in broad daylight taking pictures of old roadside motel signs; the cops were polite enough, but couldn't figure out -- even after I explained -- why anyone would be doing what I was doing.

The backstreets, waterways and blasted heaths of the outer boroughs are a rich breeding ground for inspiration, but you have to be willing to go out and look for yourself, to brave the unpleasant sights and smells and maybe people, to always be ready with brave smile and an excuse should you run into trouble. Whatever you bring back with you (the memory of a silver egret seen dancing among piles of shredded tires, a photo of an ancient mechanical relic) is yours to keep and sow into whatever you are working on or thinking about.

That's the idea that I think this portrait has captured. The Page of Swords seems perfectly at home in a world of lush decay, both organic and technological, dense with information. Even the sky has writing on it! Colin appears truly innocuous -- a mixed blessing, he would probably say -- but he could very easily be up to no good. There is a tension here too, as if he's spring-loaded to vanish at the first sign of alarm. What is he looking at, and why? As he hovers there on the ledge, you want to see what he sees.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Princess of Swords

Court Portrait - The Page of Wands

2010-08-08T11:18:00.007-04:00

July 18th, 2010 8:29PM:

me: I was wondering if you could bring yourself to write a few sentences about how you feel you might relate to this card. Really, anything. I'll fill in the rest.

annsley:Yes, I will write something

annsley: but not right now when I'm hungover from daydrinking

me: haha

me: I might use this conversation in the post...

We all have our own preferred way of seeing ourselves, and I'm always interested in observing which Tarot cards an individual is personally drawn to, which expressions of self they choose to identify with. In our haste to classify ourselves, we often forget one of the Tarot's underlying principles, which is that each of us contains all of these characters, they reside in us and surface with very little effort, despite the apparent contradictions that they expose in our personalities. In that light, I find it just as interesting to note the cards in which an individual (including myself) is least interested.

In this series of posts that follow, I do not aim to pigeon-hole certain friends of mine into specific categories of characterization. The assignment of cards was a nearly random process; in some cases the subject chose for themself, in other cases I chose. Some of the images are self-portraits, some of them were shot by me personally. In all cases the subject was asked to consider how they felt they could relate to their assigned card, and I will pass on those reflections to you wherever possible.

Consider the case of Annsley, pictured above. Consider her salubrious Fourth of July barbecue, also pictured. Historically, Annsley is not someone I would've associated with the freewheeling, childlike, unreliable Page (or Princess) of Wands. Annsley is very responsible, a hard-headed intellectual who also happens to be scarily attuned to her own emotions, and is therefore often extremely intuitive with regards to her own motivations as well as those of others. If anything, I figured I'd probably turn her loose with one of the Swords cards.

That brings us back to the barbecue in question, to which I arrived quite late. In terms of drinking I caught up with everyone pretty quickly, and in terms of eating I was happy to pick through the ripe remainders piled high on the picnic table and eavesdrop on everyone's chats. It was in the middle of my third cream-filled cupcake that something occurred to me: Annsley is really good at throwing a party. She's also really good at attending a party. For someone who comes across as so well put-together, she's got a real knack for relaxing and letting things fall spectacularly out of control; she doesn't seem to question how the rebound or the recovery will occur, she just assumes that it will. That's a true gift for any hostess to have -- at my own parties I often find myself too busy imagining how I'll put everything back together to truly enjoy myself.

The Page of Wands is a mingling of the Fire and Earth elements, it revels in the heat of the former and the bounty of the latter. In her Complete Book of Tarot Reversals, Mary K. Greer writes: "You are likely to be frank and candid, artless and unstudied. You might explore things that are close at hand with a certain fearless grace and could be in strange surroundings where everything is unusual and fascinating... it suggests unexpected information, surprises, and new possibilities that might require immediate actions." Anyone who has attended one of the MetaFilter meetups Annsley's organized can probably attest to the veracity of this observation. By the end of these nights, when everyone is sweaty and broke and borderline incoherent, we still feel as if we have accomplished something truly great.

So that's the first chapter in what will be a sixteen-card series of snapshots. My challenge to the reader for each of these: consider how you would portray yourself in these cards. What would you have to reveal or conceal about yourself in order for others to glimpse your inner multitudes? If you'd like to share pictures of your own, please send them to me and I'll put together a gallery for them after these sixteen entries are complete.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Page/Princess of Wands

My Friend Vince's Wallet Shrine

2010-07-03T01:17:00.002-04:00

Aesop's Fables - The Tarot Trumps

2010-06-18T15:15:00.007-04:00

The following posts examine the 22 Trump cards (or Major Arcana) through the lens of Aesop's fables. I was moved to create this series after flipping through a crusty old book my friend Emily and I found at a secondhand store. I was instantly transported to the long car-trips of my childhood, during which I often read and pondered these fables quite gravely; it had never been explained to me how true or important these lessons were meant to be. Did they belong in the same canon as the Bible stories I'd heard in Sunday school? The book presented destiny as an inescapable force, I noted, and yet its characters' poor choices were constantly tut-tutted. It was heady reading for a young brain.

Emily wound up snagging the book (I bitterly concede that she did see it first) but she agreed that I could mine it for illustrations to scan. From what I can deduce online, they appear to date back to around 1900. In the process of snagging beauties like this one:

and this one:

I began to feel a tingle of familiarity from the symbols on display. While the Tarot isn't based on Aesop's fables, the artists who designed it certainly relied on the weight of classical symbols in religion and folklore to anchor many of their concepts. The imagery on Tarot cards was meant to evoke familiar concepts and stories; they were meant to be easy to read, fairly practical and transparent in meaning. The cards only seem opaque and mysterious to us now because of the centuries of cultural shift. We have forgotten the stories, and the ones we do recall are only half-remembered.

I have presented the following myth/card match-ups purely as a thought exercise, to see how neatly they might (or might not) line up. I don't feel I had to stretch particularly far to find matches, though I was limited by the selection of fables that happened to be in this particular book. I hope that you enjoy the fables, the book's wonderful illustrations, and whatever additional contribution I might have have provided in my comments.

Aesop's Fables - The World

2010-06-18T14:51:00.004-04:00

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Wait, didn't I already post something about this very idea not long ago? Yep, which is why I was sorely tempted to assign the World card to an entirely different fable purely out of principle. I was going to run with this one, because the accompanying illustration was so much lovelier and tied in visually with a particularly famous version of the card.

But as much as I try to keep style and substance perfectly balanced, it's an unavoidable fact that the more humbly illustrated fable up above is perfectly on point in its message. The wisdom the man has attained by the end of his life echoes in what you've learned here at the end of your current phase.

Undergoing an intense journey of self-discovery reduces your fundamental elements to their purest form. Just as every stick in the bundle is its own unit, these disparate elements can remain separate even while joining together to create a whole, self-contained world. We only appreciate how true this is at certain rare moments in our lives, and the power of this revelation is what spurs us to set out into the world once more and conform reality to our desires, even as we conform our desires to reality in exchange.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The World

Aesop's Fables - The Last Judgment

2010-06-18T13:42:00.004-04:00

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In today's version of the Judgment card, it's the trumpeter himself who is judged. Let that be a lesson to any of us who feel we are beyond reproach!

That being said, the beautifully concise moral "Words may be deeds" sets us off down the slippery slope which holds us accountable for our own mistakes down to a practically cellular level, regardless of whether this is just.

The post-apocalyptic awakening of souls for judgment that the card usually portrays has fallen out of favor in many modern interpretations, most notably in the Thoth deck version which was renamed "The Aeon." The newer versions describe the great reckoning as a purely internal affair. We judge ourselves, we take "a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves," as they say in AA. Whereas that's only the fourth step in the recovery process, it's the penultimate step in the cycle of Tarot trumps -- once you have endured judgment by the higher power of your choosing, you are free to ascend to the promised land, graduating out of this world and setting out into a new one. (The Tarot's metaphor applies more to life as it's actively being lived than to what comes at the end of it.)

As much as we'd like to rely on ourselves to navigate these proceedings, it can be profoundly helpful to have some sort of person, belief or idea or idea to reach out to, someone who will advocate for us and ensure that the trial we're undergoing is a fair one. Our poor trumpeter certainly learned this the hard way...

Speaking of trumpeters, don't miss this video. Before 22-year-old assistant band director Brandon Franklin was shot dead this last May, he had casually mentioned to his boss that, were he to die, he'd want "all the bands" to play at his funeral. After his tragic shooting, nearly 300 band members assembled in tribute. The resulting cacophony is a wondrous and cleansing thing, perhaps it will move you to turn your gaze inward, to sort out what you can, while you can:

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Last Judgment

Aesop's Fables - The Sun

2010-06-17T14:18:00.003-04:00

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First of all, note to those punks and rogue elements out there who think they might be stronger than the Sun: you totally aren't. I can't believe we are even having this conversation.

As a Tarot card, the Sun represents a time when you are finally able to participate actively, consciously, and joyfully in the work of being yourself. It's a special triumph, a merit badge earned by exploring dark and perilous trails, the hurdles of all the cards that came before it.

With the awareness you gain from reaching this special place, you're certainly better equipped to judge others' efforts -- but you're also in a great position to help those struggling up the path behind you. Enjoy your newfound strength and let it shine on others, I'm sure most of us could use the encouragement.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Sun

Aesop's Fables - The Moon

2010-06-17T13:31:00.003-04:00

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The lessons of The Moon card, like the hard lessons of the nightingale, can only be appreciated in retrospect -- at the actual time of learning we know only loss, uneasiness, and frustration.

This fable seems like it could be merely a dream the laborer was having, an idea reinforced by the accompanying illustration. It makes me think of how many dreams I've awoken from with a profound sense of heartache. Experiences I'd wanted to be real so badly, gifts I'd received, even actual friends I'd made whom I felt profoundly connected to -- all wiped away with the opening of my eyes. One time I found myself crying piteously when I realized I'd spent what felt like days getting to know someone whom I'd never meet again, at least not in this world.

These experiences, however confusing and upsetting, contribute something important to our lives that is difficult to pin down and articulate. They round us out, they inflate our inner worlds to the point where they are barely constrained by reality. Returning to that reality is almost always a let-down, but we return quite changed. Embracing these experiences and wringing meaning from them subtly alters the paths we take in our real lives, uniting our conscious and unconscious minds and inching us forward along the path to self-awareness. When you get there, you'll find plenty of evidence that all your time groping in the darkness and mourning lost dreams was time well-spent.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Moon

Aesop's Fables - The Star

2010-06-14T16:49:00.006-04:00

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The moral of this fable, "Outside show is a poor substitute for inner worth," seems to have been written specifically as a response to the demolition of the Tower in the previous card. It's the mantra that the Star recites out loud in hopes of summoning the courage to set out alone, unprotected, without artifice.

This disembodied, in-between-worlds quality is what makes the Star seem so ethereal and desirable an icon. It's also what fascinates us about real stars -- both the outer-space kind and the Hollywood kind. We gaze at them, memorize them, even worship them; they do not, can not, gaze back.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Star

Aesop's Fables - The Tower

2010-06-14T14:33:00.005-04:00

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When I was growing up my mom hung a cute little placard on the fridge that said "Blessed are the FLEXIBLE, for they shall never BREAK," with the word break spelled out in a shattered-looking typeface.

I couldn't help noticing that even when my mother left my father some years later, the sign stayed up on the fridge for quite a long time afterward; she took very few belongings with her when she moved. Periodically my sisters and I would ask if she wanted us to bring her some of these things -- heirlooms, keepsakes, things that were undeniably hers. Her yearbooks. Her china.

"No," she'd say quietly, "That was part of my old life." And that would be the end of the conversation.

In reference to the end of her own marriage, my aunt Judy wrote: "The break, when it came, was so swift and clean that sometimes I dream I went walking in the coulee behind the ranch house and emerged on the far side of the mountains."

I find that obscurity, as mentioned in the fable pictured above, is hardly the quality that set the reed apart from the mighty tree, nor is it a quality that saves anyone from anything -- though it does keep people from receiving the help they may need in a crisis. The two plants seem equally smug about their respective abilities to withstand the storm, but in the end neither has any more control over their structural integrity than you or I do.

Far less, in fact. As humans we're able to overcome more physical limitations in our own lifetime than any other organism in the history of the world. We have the advantage of pulling up our own roots when we see the storm coming -- if we see it coming.

The Tower card is an emblem of these emergency adaptation procedures. Whether or not you manage to avoid the lightning strike is irrelevant: you will not always be as you are now. If you cultivate flexibility as you go, the inevitable upheavals will be less likely to shake you to the core.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Tower

Aesop's Fables - The Devil

2010-06-14T12:56:00.006-04:00

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By picking apart perfectly conventional behavior and making a case for how irrational or illogical it seems, the satyr here plays his role as trickster archetype to a tee. It's just a shame that his offer of food and shelter turns out to be nothing but a game to play with desperate, unwitting humans, right?

But ultimately it's our job, not the trickster's, to tie up the loose ends in our nature, to reason and rationalize. He points out our silliness, and we decide whether it's something to be corrected, embraced, or ignored. If we accept his handiwork at face-value, we just get outraged and completely miss the point.

I thought about this after watching Lars Von Trier's most recent film, Antichrist. (It's still not available on dvd in the US, but you can watch instantly on Netflix!) Maybe you heard the spoilers that were freely circulated about the film's sensational moments of sexual violence? Just in case, I won't repeat them here.

Von Trier is a provocateur, but he isn't the kind of manipulator who yanks one way in order to force the audience to yank back in the other. There are no easy answers to the questions he raises, there is no "right" reaction. As a culture we too often prefer for our artists to do all the thinking for us; we've been trained to respond poorly to narratives which are open-ended or which refuse to fully resolve the emotional disturbances they trigger. We don't mind being directed to examine our own dark side as long as we're already pretty sure what we'll see there, and we hate (HATE) the idea of some smug jerk out there reveling in his moral or intellectual superiority.

One of my favorite interpretations of Antichrist is that it's a response from Von Trier to those who have accused him of misogyny based on films such as Dogville and Dancer in the Dark. The heroine of Antichrist, played by Charlotte Gainsbourg, reveals to her husband that she believes women are inherently evil. By introducing an openly misogynist female character -- who may or may not be a mouthpiece for the director's own ideas -- Von Trier demonstrates his awareness of the debate already in progress, and adds considerable depth to it, all without insulting our intelligence with any platitudes or pat answers.

It's just like what wicked queen Sigourney Weaver says at the end of Snow White: A Tale of Terror when young miss thing accused her of having no heart: "That's too simple." Hate her, Von Trier, or any other morally-ambivalent trickster all you like, but she's got that part right.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Devil

Aesop's Fables - Temperance

2010-06-11T18:47:00.003-04:00

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I selected some of these fables because of how perfectly they dovetail with a certain card's traditional meaning or imagery. In several cases, though, the fable zigs where the Tarot zags, resulting in an combination that reads a bit like a reversed (or upside down) card.

The Temperance card seems to have been designed explicitly to counter Aesop's message. It's as if our angel heard the pots' conversation, walked out across the water to retrieve them, and then proceeded to show them how to keep company, uniting them in a common purpose while holding them delicately apart, meanwhile judging the strengths and weaknesses of each.

This card actively encourages experimenting with seemingly opposite qualities, blending them to see what will emerge. Are the they truly at odds, or do they represent two extremes on the same scale? Often you will find that the strong and the weak may keep very good company indeed, may even become indistinguishable from each other. Or perhaps the term "strong" will prove subjective to the point of becoming utterly meaningless.

Whatever the results of this process, no important discoveries (whether personal or scientific) would be possible without it.

Previously On Arcanalogue: Temperance

Aesop's Fables - Death

2010-06-11T17:47:00.006-04:00

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I think Aesop misses the mark here. The old laborer wouldn't necessarily be sorry if his wish had been gratified; he'd just be dead.

The real lesson of this fable seems to be about our inability to measure our own readiness as it pertains to crossing certain thresholds. At the critical moment, at the jump-or-don't-jump point, we never feel ready. Later on, whether we jumped or we didn't, we hardly remember being given a choice.

My friend Chris can attest to this; he went skydiving recently with his boyfriend, and there's a really good picture of him taken at the critical point, right at the door of the airplane. You can tell just by looking at him that he's not even really there -- his mind has been blown and he's as blank as a ping-pong ball. It's obvious that whatever happened next, whether he leaped into the sky or clawed his way back into the recesses of the plane, it would be done automatically, half-consciously at best.

Chris and I have laughed together at this bug-eyed picture on many occasions. I'd like it's the exact same expression that the old laborer had on his face when Death suddenly appeared in the form of a grisly skeleton:

But you know, ultimately Chris did jump. And so will you, too... when you are truly ready, or are given no other choice.

Previously On Arcanalogue: Death

Aesop's Fables - The Hanged Man

2010-06-10T22:24:00.005-04:00

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This is one of those fables I really took to heart as a child; it just seemed like the sort of thing that might really happen to me if I didn't watch out.

I think the important lesson here as it pertains to the Hanged Man is that we ought not trust our own intentions toward others when we're in a bind (metaphorically or otherwise). You aren't exempt from acting like a human being just because you're temporarily backed into a corner or swinging upside down; take that extra moment to reflect and gather yourself before you decide to inflict your "difficulties" on anyone else.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Hanged Man

Aesop's Fables - Justice

2010-06-10T22:08:00.003-04:00

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The moral of this fable, "Vices are their own punishment," should be etched in marble in front of every church and every courthouse in the nation. It is merely the flip side of "Virtues are their own reward," and yet what a difference that flip makes.

But what the story itself describes is how easily and readily humans use rules and laws against each other, brandishing them like weapons despite the fact that most of them were invented to protect people from harm. Reading today about the "worst divorce ever" made me wonder whether things had changed at all since Aesop's time.

Previously On Arcanalogue: Justice

Aesop's Fables - The Wheel of Fortune

2010-06-10T15:20:00.002-04:00

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As Hercules helpfully points out, the Waggoner has become so reliant on the strength of others (his horses) that he overlooks what he himself may contribute to the situation, he forgets the value of own strength. Maybe that extra push will be enough to get them all out of the mud, and maybe it won't -- but let's not invoke the gods (or demigods) until all earthly possibilities are exhausted, okay? Wasting divine intervention on something like this is ridiculous. It's like using one of your three wishes to make the genie do your laundry.

As an emissary of the Fortune card, this fable reminds you of the role you play in the formation of your own destiny, whether or not you believe in any higher power. You have to meet all opportunities half way. And when it comes to people (or demigods) assisting you in your struggles, they'll be more impressed by the evidence of your effort than by the sound of your whining.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Wheel Of Fortune

Aesop's Fables - The Hermit

2010-06-10T12:27:00.005-04:00

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As a child I had great sympathy for the bat; if there was truly to be no conflict between the birds and the beasts, he should have been welcome at either table. The hypocrisy on both sides was appalling.

As an adult, I've reconsidered my stance. The bat's identity politics are rather frustrating -- why would he tell the birds he's a beast, and then still go try to party with them afterward? It's one thing to deliberately test social boundaries, but his self-pitying sigh at the end seems to indicate he has taken all this rather personally, and I find this kind of contrariness to be exhausting in people as well as bats.

Like in the fable I associated with the Lovers, what we have here seems to be an inability to commit to a single course of action. Does the bi-curious bat really feel he is neither here nor there, or is he simply unable to make up his mind? His actions after peace is declared suggest the latter. One also has to wonder why he hasn't initiated any friendships with other bats. Or flightless birds, for that matter, or even octopi.

So it appears to me that the bat's solitude is a self-induced condition, whether or not he'd care to admit it. Meanwhile, he has all the makings of an Aesopian hero of independence and specialization -- now all he has to do is realize it, and act accordingly.

Walking the Hermit's path is hard work, and it's not for those who rely on attention (positive or otherwise) from others to fuel their introspection. Reach inward! For those already on the path who are looking for the off-ramp, remember this: we often actively contribute to our own isolation from others in ways we're not altogether aware of, even if it's companionship or understanding we crave. Reach outward!

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Hermit

Aesop's Fables - Strength

2010-06-10T11:59:00.004-04:00

(Click here for large version)

One thing about these fables that blew my mind as a kid was how certain astonishing details were presented casually, with zero explanation. For example, you are just grubbing along trying to make a living and then one day a lion decides he wants to marry your daughter. It's the kind of thing that would never occur to a parent to worry about. Or, as the story tactfully says, "The old people did not know what to say."

Even as a child I knew I'd like this story more if the lion had actually gotten the girl in the end. It is never really explained why the lion is considered an unsuitable mate; he's a king, he socializes with humans fairly well, he goes to great lengths to prove his devotion. In fact, the girl's feelings for the lion are never mentioned, and no contact between them is ever described. I'd like to consider the Strength card either a prequel or sequel to the actual tale, in which we witness their initial meeting -- or perhaps their elopement.

Previously On Arcanalogue: Strength

Aesop's Fables - The Chariot

2010-06-10T11:13:00.003-04:00

(Click here for large version)

The message here as it relates to the Chariot is twofold. First, we have the lesson that the horse learns about shortsightedly sacrificing one's independence, a warning which any potential charioteer ought to heed. We often sign contracts and forge alliances in the heat of the moment, only later realizing to what we've been bound.

Then there's the man's perspective, which demonstrates how a disinterested party can ride the wave of others' conflicts and reap their benefits. It's common to regard this behavior as evil, but look at what card this is! No one puts on all that armor and charges off across the countryside purely because of the beautiful Spring weather. Even if he's committed to doing good deeds -- going rescue missions, for example -- the Chariot isn't a harbinger of peace. If he sees the chance to perform a slam dunk, he will totally use your back as a ramp:

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Chariot

Aesop's Fables - The Lovers

2010-06-10T10:33:00.005-04:00

(Click here for large version)

"The Man and His Two Wives" impressed me as a child because of the polygamy angle, but I have a particular appreciation for it now as an adult coping with trichotillomania.

I've posted before about how early versions of the Lovers card showed a man choosing between two women (as opposed to the done deal portrayed in other decks). If the card is meant to signify choosing between Virtue and Sensuality, then it appears that the man in our fable has waffled on the question and failed to make that choice. Having surrendered, he is subject to the caprices of both women, passively allowing himself to be plucked bald.

Thus, the fable offers an interesting elaboration on the card's challenge: whatever you're going to choose, you'd better get around to doing it while the matter is still in your hands. Everyone knows that of the two we're supposed to choose Virtue, but perhaps it's less damnable to actively explore the wrong choice than it is to lose the agency required to make any decisions at all.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Lovers

Aesop's Fables - The Hierophant

2010-06-09T17:45:00.008-04:00

(Click here for large version)

This is one of the few tales in the book that does not provide a succinct moral in medieval typeface at the end. If I had to write one, what would it be? How about this:

"Our successes often arrive at their expense of our beliefs."

I'm reminded of Laurie Anderson's story about the Egyptians using mummy rags to power their steam engines:

"They burned their ancestors for fuel." It sounds so disrespectful, but time is such a erosive force that virtually anything from the past that adds momentum to the present must be considered a viable resource. The Hierophant is any figure who arbitrates this process, bridging the gap between history and the current moment, between the esoteric and the immediate.

He's not what you'd call a safe and transparent figure, because he will never offer any information that could possibly lead to his being deposed. In this way, he often serves just as much as an obstacle as he does as a conduit. Sure, those coins emerged at a crucial moment, but they'd also been sitting there uselessly all along while the man endured constant hardship. Eliminating the middle-man was obviously a wise decision in this case.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Hierophant

Aesop's Fables - The Emperor

2010-06-09T17:18:00.004-04:00

(Click here for large version)

A fairly self-explanatory read for the Emperor card, which itself encourages the exertion of authority, wealth, judgment, and reason. You could substitute any of those words into the moral and still be thinking like an emperor: "______ unused might as well not exist." No one who sets out to build an empire ever knows peace for more than a few days at a time; each new campaign carries forward into the next one, and so forth until the last proud, ragged breath.

If the miser had begun investing his gold as he earned it, perhaps he'd be a mighty nobleman by now. Of course there's always the chance he would have lost everything along the way. But since he did anyway, it was hardly a risk he couldn't afford to take.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Emperor

Aesop's Fables - The Empress

2010-06-09T16:54:00.005-04:00

(Click here for large version)

I find the moral of this tale to be deliciously ironic coming from Juno, one of the most fiercely competitive females in the history of folklore. She urges a contentment and humility that she famously lacks -- "Do as I say, not as I do!"

That said, Juno was also the patroness of marriage and could be exceptionally generous when it suited her. As the queen of heaven itself she exemplified feminine power and vulnerability. I often describe the Empress card as being the "Queen of Queens" -- she contains the traits of all four of the deck's leading ladies. A meta-queen, if you will.

And in case you didn't know, this (no thanks to Juno) is what a peacock actually sounds like:

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Empress

Aesop's Fables - The High Priestess

2010-06-09T12:12:00.004-04:00

(Click here for large version)

The moral here, "Nature will out," ought to sound incredibly encouraging. But to the extent that our culture depends on repression as a cure for most of our problems, personal and otherwise, it is a terrifying thing to hear.

The Priestess card represents a secret that will reveal itself to anyone who pays special attention. It may be a quiet truth, easily drowned out by the volume of every day life, but it is there all the same, waiting patiently to meet us when the noise dies down. Unearthed details have a way of hiding in plain sight; the idea that a man could unwittingly marry a woman who had recently been a cat says far more about him than it does about her.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The High Priestess

Aesop's Fables - The Magician

2010-06-09T11:14:00.003-04:00

(Click here to view large version)

Aesop's fisherman is a true magician in the Tarot's terms: he is a humble performer, but he also has true magical powers. The moral implies that these two qualities are related, that the power a performer wields over his or her audience is fully dependent upon his or her ability to influence others in the real world; this may be true of the utterly talentless, but those who are truly skilled in language, art, or music usually have no trouble getting the fish to dance, as it were, without the use of a net.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Magician

Aesop's Fables - The Fool

2010-06-09T11:05:00.010-04:00

(Click here to view large version)

...In which Aesop has nothing encouraging to say about an ass's folly. I can't help but note the slight parallel between the illustration for this fable and the classical Tarot card design for the Fool. In the card, the canine's role is rather ambiguous, but in Aesop's version the clever "dog" definitely gets in a good jab at the fool in question.

It's hard to say whether the true moral here is that one should avoid foolishness altogether, or that it is ultimately impossible to conceal it. Personally, I say that if you're going to go, go all the way. Some delights are worth the cudgel, and shaming from people who don't understand can be easily laughed away.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Fool

Sketchbook - Three of Wands

2010-06-03T15:57:00.003-04:00

Whenever my family took long drives through the country during my childhood -- which was often, since we actually lived in the country -- I would gaze tirelessly out the window at the utility poles going by. They seemed like living things to me, enormous kachinas strolling across the landscape and waving at us with rigid arms as we passed. Even the simpler ones like the ones in my sketch held my fascination; stretching out as far as I could see in either direction, they created a thread of continuity across the wild desert.

The poles and the railway tracks above ultimately serve the same function: continuity and follow-through, connectivity and opportunity. They are worldwide symbols of power, evolution, and commerce. I threw in a handful of stars above to light the way, to temper the conceit that feeds off of our forward momentum, and to remind us of the true power out there that inspires but simultaneously dwarfs our own.

Our dreams often carry us forward at the expense of others. Indeed, we often even double-cross ourselves along the way, such is our ambition. You can follow the winding paths of the poles and tracks to get to the next civilized outpost; in the meantime the stars are your moral compass, by which to judge your true position in the cosmos at any given moment.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Three Of Wands

Sketchbook - Five of Coins

2010-05-31T22:44:00.005-04:00

There's nothing quite like the feeling one gets upon discovering a customer has left a really shitty tip. It's the perfect crime, a deeply personal affront for which there is rarely any recourse or rebuttal. Sometimes you totally see it coming; other times it comes as such a shock that you end up inventing all sorts of excuses to explain it away. (A mathematical error perhaps. Could happen to anyone!)

But all too often there is a message specifically encoded in the amount left on the table. I'm not talking about the words "F-U-C-K-Y-O-U" spelled out in pennies -- though I have seen that happen. To someone else. It's usually way more subtle, though; tips are about power, they are expressions of judgment or non-judgment. We consider the statement we're making as we calculate the amount, and it often has very little to do with the service that was provided. So when I get a really bad tip, I always have to wonder: was this about me? Or about them?

(I prefer to think it's always about them.)

Anyhow, above is a sketch of an actual tip that I've actually received. Yes, the person took the time to write out that they were leaving a cash tip. No, there aren't any dollar bills hidden just out of frame. In moments like these, I try to temper my discouragement with the knowledge that this experience is literally built into my job. If I was fundamentally opposed to get royally stiffed now and then, I wouldn't show up at all. Right?

Anyhow, this card illustrates one of those occasions when the drawbacks of a situation are more apparent than the benefits. Are you going to let it get to you, and wind up spreading the bad vibe to your other tables? I'd like to think that no reader of mine would not so easily succumb to this kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. Opportunity is all around you, don't let a few losses (no matter how profoundly irritating) wind up determining your next few steps.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Five Of Coins

Sketchbook - Ten of Swords

2010-05-28T20:00:00.003-04:00

I don't know what led me to this drawing. Perhaps I was inspired by the lone moth in the Ace of Cups I drew many weeks ago, a free creature enslaved by its desire for illumination. Perhaps it was the Puma's Moth King sneakers, a limited run which apparently I'm a year late in discovering, and which I'll bitterly have to make do without. Perhaps it was this month's BPAL's new series of fragrances based on moths and butterflies (scroll down). These are limited edition as well, but I guarantee you I'll be smelling like the "Great Grey Witch" for many months to come.

Partly I wanted to make a version of this card that effectively communicated its meanings without resorting to the rather strident traditional imagery. And what are those meanings? Funny you should ask, as this week I added a label to the site which gives you three basic meanings for each card (for a particular reading, just choose a card from the sidebar). The Ten of Swords entry says:

1. Surrender
2. Undisciplined thought
3. Failure of a plan or project.

So there it is. At a certain point things become get so intense that there's nothing left to do but quit struggling and face the facts -- you're pinned. Whether the cause of the derail is natural or unnatural, personal or professional, this is totally irrelevant and you will gain no peace of mind from twisting about trying to understand the significance of it from your current position.

The Ten isn't pure doom and gloom -- just as every cheerful card carries its own warnings, every "dark" card contains the key to its own shackles. In this case you are urged to cultivate stillness, reflection, and humility, in hopes that you will actually recognize your next big idea when you see it, and follow it out of darkness into the light.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ten Of Swords

Sketchbook - Six of Cups

2010-05-27T17:39:00.004-04:00

I used to be able to enjoy rides like these, but now my vestibular system protests vigorously against them, getting other bodily systems involved if necessary.

This is the first sketch in a while that I've been a little disappointed with, once I saw the final result. Part of it is that I was stuck using a sucky pen and had to fix a lot of mistakes, but in general I see myself compromising left and right here to make up for my lack drawing ability. I don't hate it, it's just not exactly what I envisioned. And the perspective is a little weird -- I think I might have given up on this one too easily purely for the sake of getting it over with already.

Since the Six serves as the midpoint of our journey from Two to Ten (excluding the Ace, which is merely the catalyst that triggers this journey), it occupies a point of near-perfect equilibrium. Perhaps that's why I drew half of the teacups full and half of them empty...

There's been a lot of speculation about Pamela Coleman-Smith's version, apparently people have a hard time grasping what they're seeing. Are the figures children, or tiny adults? It pains me to say so, but it seems that the perspective in PCS's is a little off too.

More than anything the Six of Cups speaks to me about the simple pleasures in life, the ones which require little risk on our part. (There is a sort of gravitas in the Two of Cups, for example, that feels anything but casual.) In the cards that follow the Six, we are closer to the end than we are to the beginning; perhaps that's what's necessitates this last, idealized look back over our shoulder. We are nothing like what we used to be, but it is still possible to search ourselves and discover traces of our origin.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Six of Cups

Sketchbook - Ten of Coins

2010-05-24T01:24:00.005-04:00

Behold, the Tetractys. I wrote about it once before, in reference to its four rows of points. I apparently can't keep my mind off it -- here we are, basking in its beautiful symmetry once more.

Let's get the practical card-reading stuff out of the way first. I wanted to diagram the arduous process of refinement one cultivates while traveling through the suit of Coins. In the beginning it feels like a marvel that you're able to manifest anything concrete at all; as time passes and pressure mounts, diamond-hard points begin to emerge from the grit you started with, until finally you have access to the treasure that you hoped was there all along.

And it was there all along -- that's extremely important to remember if the product isn't quite what you expected. In this case, seeing a project through to its completion has been the most significant reward. You should be proud! But you should also know when it's time to stop polishing and move on to the next hunk of rock. Remember, the thrill is in the process of attainment, it's rarely in the actual possession. This is how empires are built.

Now for the Tetractys. In my drawing above, the ten points are connected by 21 pathways -- exactly like the qabalistic Tree of Life diagrams you see floating around out there with Tarot card associations doodled all over them. That's right, 21 pathways for 21 cards (the Fool is either unnumbered or assigned to "zero"). Sure, you could easily connect more pathways between the points on either diagram... but then that wouldn't be nearly as mystically coincidental, would it?

But that's the wonderful thing about numbers and geometric figures: you can customize them to fit almost every need. And if what you need is an elegant framework upon which to drape a complex system of symbols, then the Tetractys has got you covered! You could assign the 21 Trump cards to these 21 pathways, or you could divide them into 3 groups and embed them in the figure's 3 empty layers like fossils suspended in sediment.

Forget the Tree of Life; the Tetractys is a more beautiful and complex system by which to organize your Tarot cards. For example, it's radially symmetrical. It replicates seamlessly, illustrating both microcosm and macrocosm. It has a firm base and won't tip over easily.

Anyone who uses the qabalistic model for their card interpretations, I'd like to hear what you think about this. Whose version of the Tree do you use as a reference, and why? Which parts would you keep, and which parts would you rather throw away?

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ten Of Coins

Sketchbook - Seven of Swords

2010-05-19T16:10:00.010-04:00

Hey, it's my professionally strong friend from the Four of Swords! Apparently he does a little bit of everything at this particular carnival.

This is the kind of act I can't watch too much of; honestly it seems to me that he's really pushing his luck with that seventh sword. He appears to be perfectly in control, and the audience is surely convinced he knows what he's doing, but ultimately we're talking about cold steel versus delicate flesh, and accidents do happen. In order to outshine our competition and electrify our audience, we suspend our own disbelief and summon inadvisable levels of confidence -- making it all too easy to misjudge distances, ignore warning signs, and generally proceed without caution.

There's a lot to be said for displays of cleverness, but it's only a matter of time before you get so caught up in the razzle-dazzle that you begin treating reality like some kind of sport, forgetting about the very real consequences your decisions may have -- on yourself as well as others. Relying on self-deception to consistently fool people is a fine short-term game, but the longer you play, the greater the odds that narrow blade will turn back on you. Perhaps you'd better take a step backwards and judge your situation from a less engaged position.

Oh yeah, and that's totally a chest tattoo of Pamela Coleman Smith's signature, which you can find on most of her RWS cards. How odd; I suppose it's possible they had some sort of dalliance when his show toured Europe...

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Seven Of Swords

Sketchbook - Five of Cups

2010-05-17T22:15:00.011-04:00

I typically manage adequate care for whatever plants I bring home, but along the way I've killed one of everything. Sometimes my laziness or ignorance has totally been the problem, but sometimes things just wither for no reason anyone can figure out. A few years ago when I was dealing with problems in my relationship, the responsibility of indoor gardening became too much of a psychological burden altogether. So I gave away all my plants, breathed a sigh of relief, and moved on to other things.

Recently it occurred to me I might be ready to start again; I picked up a hardy-looking aloe vera plant at a local nursery and we're learning to love each other.

In the picture above, everything has fallen into decrepitude. Who cares why? Drought, inattention, pests -- it could be anything, and the result is the same. The important thing is that the biggest, roomiest pot of all still shows signs of life, imploring you not to retire your fork and spade just yet.

By the looks of the emotional terrain on display here, you may not be the master gardener you thought you were. That's just fine, people (like plants) go through many seasons, and inconsistency is thoroughly human. But dwelling on your failures may cause you to overlook the small patches in your life that still need tending. The RWS Five of Cups is very clear in this regard. Mourn your losses, but not at the expense of what's survived. See that bridge in the background? Get over it already.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Five Of Cups

Sketchbook - Eight of Cups

2010-05-17T00:04:00.006-04:00

Often I find I have some item laying around that I no longer want or need, but which I can't bear to throw away -- keepsakes that have outlived their value, token objects no one but myself would ever treasure. But these things aren't garbage, so it seems improper to just discard them unceremoniously among the orange peels and cat litter. So instead, I put them in the river.

My friend Chris was horrified when I let this slip. "You can't just throw your old shit in the river," he scolded me. I tried to explain that I consider the East River to be a sort of long-term safety deposit box. When I put something in it (an old ring, a busted pocket-knife, a pair of underwear I will always have fond memories of) I always know where that thing is -- it's at the bottom of the river. As opposed to when you throw something in the garbage, in which case, who knows where the hell it goes?

Chris remains judgy and unconvinced. Look, I don't do it often. And the river is already full of sewage, dissolved metals, and runoff from Newtown Creek (itself one of the most polluted waterways in the US). I think a pair of plaster antlers is the least of its problems.

The worn remains of this industrial area have fascinated me for years. Right now I live just three blocks away, and visit often. It's a quiet place where people go to sit and think, or drink. Sometimes you even see people fishing there. I often see Canada geese there, looking a little lost and disappointed. It's a desolate, wild place on the edge of a great civilization.

These are the kinds of areas that the Eight of Cups compels us to wander through. The Eight oversees our rituals of renunciation; it illustrates the moment when you finally loosen your grip on a relationship or a vision of yourself that you've been clinging to for far too long. We invest in these things emotionally to the point where we're desperate to keep them even when they don't mean anything anymore.

Walking away is always an option, the card reminds us. Sometimes it's the only option. Why fight a losing battle with the past when nine new cups await just over the horizon?

So I drew a picture of myself throwing the old ones into the river; I can honor their existence without keeping them in my (tiny) apartment, without dragging them around with me from place to place for the rest of my life. It may be hard to let go, but at least I'll always know exactly where they are.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Eight Of Cups

Sketchbook - Seven of Cups

2010-05-16T19:34:00.005-04:00

On the surface it seems like such an innocent moment, just pure wish-fulfillment. That's what the carnival is for, isn't it? So, drunk on the possibilities, you reach out to accept everything that's offered.

Who cares if it's too much ice cream for just one person, more than you could even physically eat? Who cares about the visible cracks in the cone, the hot summer sun, the carelessness with which it is handed to you -- all the myriad factors actively correlating to keep you from enjoying your fantasy-come-true? Desire eclipses reason, intoxication outpaces temperance.

That's the story of the Seven of Cups in a nutshell: fantastical visions getting mixed up with all-too-real possibilities, blinding us to our true needs and natural limitations.

I get sick almost every time I go to Coney Island, because I think that food you ingested for pleasure doesn't really count as having been eaten. I remember when I bought a cheap piña colada on the boardwalk once, in one of those gigantic goblets that looks like genie bottle; I tried to show the woman my ID and she laughed in my face. "Hello?? This is Coney Island!" she explained, gesturing at the landscape around us. Then she stage-whispered that she'd give me a free refill if I tipped her well. So naturally I wound up drinking two of those hideous corn-syrup cocktails, probably 32 ounces in total, and felt seasick for almost 48 hours afterward. I'm sure the cheap-o onion rings, pistachio soft-serve, and fried oysters didn't help.

(As of today I haven't eaten any refined sugar in eight days. I didn't think of it until after I started, but it just figures that I'd wind up drawing ice cream.)

(And yes, that seems to be our sideshow strongman from the Four of Swords forking it over. I didn't expect to see him again... Initially the arm was just going to belong to an ice cream truck vendor, but the picture wound up having a sort of "Get into my van" quality which, as interesting an interpretation as that would have turned out to be, was not what I set out to evoke.)

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Seven Of Cups

Sketchbook - Two of Swords

2010-05-15T01:38:00.004-04:00

I spent a lot of time over the last couple days trying to imagine some sort of harmoniously double-bladed apparatus. I thought about the way incisors work together to chop up our food, or the way propeller blades achieve lift even though they oppose each other. But none of these things seemed like anything I wanted to draw. Then I thought about bees -- how an entire swarm of creatures, each armed with its own venomous barb, manage to work together for the good of the hive. The bees pictured above may look like they're squaring off, but ultimately they know that all the pollen they gather is going back to the same place. Their swords are always visible, but never unsheathed.

Previously On Arcanalogue: Two Of Swords

Sketchbook - Six of Wands

2010-05-13T15:25:00.004-04:00

Let's add this to the list of things I'd never have heard of it wasn't for my partner. Fasces are an emblem or design motif that you've probably seen everywhere, without knowing they were. "It's like a bundle of sticks," Tex told me. "Wait," I said, "Don't you mean faggot?"

No, it turns out. He patiently went on to explain that this symbol for victory and strength is where we get the term fascism. The core idea is that a bundle is harder to break than a single stick. "AH," I said, "Like that monologue of Richard Farnsworth's in The Straight Story!" Yes, exactly -- only sometimes there's an axe or arrow blade nestled in there too, to show you mean business.

It was good timing -- I just so happened to have drawn the Six of Wands as my next sketching project. I felt like I was cheating, resorting to an actually well-known symbol for success and achievement, but at least I learned something new. Also, while I sat in the park sketching, a butterfly landed on my knee and stayed there for several minutes. I'm pretty sure it was a monarch.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Six Of Wands

Sketchbook - Eight of Wands

2010-05-01T02:09:00.005-04:00

I started off with the best of intentions. After days of contemplating appropriate Eight of Wands imagery, I was inspired by the vague "Here we come to save the day!" quality of its staffs and decided to find something truly useful for them to do.

So you know how in zombie movies people are always busting up the chifforobe or whatever so they can board up the windows? What could be more providentially useful than that?

But you know, once I had it all sketched I realized that this is one creepy-looking card. The Eight is usually described as sudden news or developments that disrupt the game already in progress, possibly tipping the scales in your favor -- anyone who draws this one in a reading is bound to overlook the ever-helpful boards and focus instead on the onslaught of shambling revenants. That's just not right.

It does, however, offer an interesting visual counterpoint to the Seven I sketched just a couple weeks ago. The little hammer-wielding Morlocks seem to have grown almost overnight into a inhuman street gang, hellbent on revenge! Though once you easily overwhelmed your adversaries, now they overwhelm you right back. The Eight's intervention is no deus ex machina, but it will hopefully buy you just enough time to fix the radio, hunker down in the basement, or top off your Molotov cocktails.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Eight Of Wands

"These Are the Creatures in Lady Walton's Garden..."

2010-04-25T10:29:00.005-04:00

It's impossible to spend much time with the RWS deck without becoming aware of the distinctly horticultural overtones of Pamela Coleman-Smith's illustrations. The artist presents the natural world and its amazing potential and cruel reckonings as a backdrop for all our human struggles, a metaphorically rich landscape from which anyone could glean insight into their feelings, habits, and destiny. This is a common theme in art from the turn of the 20th century, a reaction to the jolting forward momentum of modern civilization.

The art and music of the early 21st century has echoed this era in many ways; we cast a longing glance back over our shoulder to the past even as we hurtle into the future. The new album The Creatures in the Garden of Lady Walton by the band Clogs has been on repeat at my house for most of the spring, inspiring many sketches and card interpretations. The band cites as their chief influence the band cites "the botanical paradise created by Lady Walton (the widow of the late British composer Sir William Walton) on the island of Ischia in Italy's Bay of Naples." William Walton died in 1983, but the music evokes a time much farther beyond the horizon of the 20th century, native to another world entirely.

People create gardens as places to escape into. Rich and poor alike know the need to carve out spaces within their everyday lives where their inner worlds can manifest, to populate these worlds with plants, animals, and sensory experiences. The garden a person tends is a portrait of who they are -- or more importantly, of who they wish they were.

It's amazing to me how many Tarot decks reflect this. Thumb through any of your favorite decks and you're likely to see variations on the same visual motif.

Incidentally, Shara Worden of My Brightest Diamond provides vocals for most of the album, including the haunting "Owl of Love", which paints a compelling landscape of the same garden by moonlight.

It's become my favorite track on the album, one that I immediately associated with specific Tarot imagery such as the Moon card in the Fantastic Menagerie deck, the Two of Coins from the Cosmic Tribe deck, and also this painting I recently found online somewhere. (I can't seem to trace its origin, but I believe it's called "Moloch").

Sketchbook - Eight of Coins

2010-04-20T17:50:00.005-04:00

My knowledge of complex machinery isn't so great, and I suppose when you get right down to it, you can't even really describe a laundry-wringer as "complex". I took a shot at drawing one without looking at any photos and I suppose mine gets the message across, in addition to having magical antigravity properties. You'll just have to assume that all the actual mechanical parts are carefully hidden just out of sight, behind the rollers.

The Eight of Coins speaks to us about making the best of things, and seeing projects through to their completion regardless of the inevitable hard times and disappointments that arrive along the way. This card also encourages us to seek innovative solutions, new ways of organizing our labor so that we're happier with the outcome.

I don't know why this image popped into my head. Perhaps it's the idiom of being "put through the wringer", in which we are forced to endure some sort of ordeal. Or maybe it has something to do with the many hours of work that simple mechanical inventions were supposed to transform into leisure time. People claim that we spend just as much time at our chores as we did before, but in many ways this complaint doesn't hold water. Regardless, I couldn't help thinking of the eight "coins" as rollers that could somehow wring me out, effectively preparing me for the next cycle.

In Crowley's Thoth deck, this card is labeled "Prudence". In that spirit, I'd also like to share this anecdote from my aunt Judy's book Breaking Clean, one of many misadventures from her childhood in rural Montana:

"And I recall one day shortly after the power came, when I carefully latched the bathroom door and climbed up on a chair next to the old washing machine. The washer had two tubs, with a powerful wringer mounted between them. The wringer looked like two wide white rolling pins pressed tightly together, and it worked just like that, too. Shirts had to be fed through carefully so the wringer didn't pop off the buttons, and heavy items like towels or jeans were sent through more than once to squeeze all the water out. As a safety feature, a stop-bar ran along the bottom of the wringer, and when something got jammed up, a blow to the bar would pop the jaws of the wringer apart and stop them from turning.

I soon had the wringer running, and was mesmerized by the hum of the rollers and the splash and trickle of water. I fed dripping socks and washcloths in with my left hand and caught them with my right as they emerged from the rollers flat and damp-dry. I did this with a feeling of great maturity, for while I'd been allowed to feed socks and smaller items into the wringer before, I was not allowed to reach around the wringer as my mother did, and catch them. I was set to surprise her with my proficiency, when one of the socks stuck to the roller, as they sometimes did, going around and around instead of exiting the other side. When this happened to Mom, she loosened it with a flick of her fingers, and I reached to do the same, not thinking which side I was reaching toward, which side ate the socks, and which side spit them out.

The rollers caught my fingertips and steadily, mindlessly ate their way up my hand, squeezing my flesh flat as I hung back with all my strength, trying to pull free. Though I'd been shown how to use it, I never once thought to hit the stop-bar. And though I didn't think to call for help either, by the time the rollers were grinding past my wrist and up my arm I managed to produce a guttural squawk, the sort of noise that lifts the hair on a mother's neck two rooms away. The door seemed to explode before my eyes. The hook-and-eye latch flew apart, and my mother charged through, and in one leap had hit the bar with the feel of her hand and dragged me back from the jaws of the wringer. While my pride suffered a devastating blow, my arm did not, Mom held me on her lap as I sniffled, and within a few minutes my poor flat, white arm had gotten back its blood and the feeling in its fingers, and was none the worse for wear."

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Eight Of Coins

Sketchbook - Five of Wands

2010-04-19T15:47:00.007-04:00

To illustrate the competitive and combative spirit of the Five of Wands, here are five crane-claws in one all vying for a single plush toy. It's hard enough to win this game when you're playing it alone, so adding others into the mix would only tangle things up considerably, especially if you were all focused on the same prize.

I think the triviality of this game is also important to note. These kinds of failures (or even victories) provide no useful commentary on your actual abilities, and the results of gameplay have no lasting effects on the arc of your personal development. Apply that reasoning to whatever exciting/frustrating/distracting games you're getting caught up in lately and you'll wind up taking things a lot less personally. In the meantime, you should still play to win:

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Five Of Wands

Sketchbook - Two of Coins

2010-04-15T23:16:00.003-04:00

This is one of my favorite cards to draw in a reading, for myself or anyone else. It communicates what we sort of already feel by the time we're sitting down in front of the cards -- a pregnant pause, a shift, a tilt, everything sliding about as we maintain a sort of impossible balance at the center of it all.

I wanted to draw something that would make that idea seem materially relevant and also put a fairly positive spin on it. Once I got the above image in my head, I couldn't seem to move on to anything else. Having grown too large, the hermit crab abandons his home for a more accommodating one. Doing so surely makes him feel quite exposed, at least for a short time, and even once he sets up camp in his new shell it can take quite a while to feel comfortable in it. There's no question, however, as to whether he made the right decision; he's doing what he was made to do.

I had a hermit crab as a pet for a while in grade school. The thing shed its skin once and it just about scared me to death -- there was this dead thing crumpled in the corner of the tank, and deep inside the shell, barely visible, I could see tiny pink legs and claws. You'd think he would have been bigger after the shed, but he looked smaller. And grosser. At some point I put a slightly larger shell in there, hoping he'd move into it one night while I was sleeping. Instead, he was just dead one morning. I was sad but not too sad; I'd wanted a cat instead from the beginning.

Anyhow, in my mind this card evokes two different Trump cards: The Moon and The Magician. You could say that the Two of Coins shows how these states of flux and/or suspended disbelief play out in practice, making us keenly aware of our vulnerability without compromising our ability or determination to still pull it all off, somehow.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Two Of Coins

Sketchbook - Seven of Wands

2010-04-14T18:11:00.006-04:00

Without really meaning to, I seem to have drawn a sort of arcade-style mirror version of the RWS Seven of Wands. Actually, I choose to believe that what you see below is a historically accurate portrayal of Whack-a-Mole as it was played in the 16th century:

I love Pamela Coleman-Smith's version because anyone can read it just by looking at it, yet no two people will see quite the same thing. It evokes at a story you can relate to, without explaining what that story is. That is the essence of a good Tarot card.

My drawing is unfortunately just a cheeky sort of update on the same notions of rivalry, competition, and being outnumbered. Obviously in the great Whack-a-Mole game of life, we all like to think of ourselves as Player 1, squishy mallet held high against hordes of goofy talpidae. But there's no getting around the fact that sometimes, we are the mole.

That's not a value judgment -- after all, sometimes the moles win the day. But the greatest power lies in understanding exactly what game you're playing and what team you're on, and acting accordingly -- regardless of what game you'd like to be playing, or what team you'd like to be on. "Pay attention and face reality or get knocked on your ass" ought to be right up there with gravity in the pantheon of natural laws.

(In this particular game, I am giving myself bonus nerd points for incorporating an emoticon into a pen-and-pencil sketch.)

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Seven Of Wands

Sketchbook - Three of Coins

2010-04-13T15:07:00.003-04:00

I have had cheese on the brain ever since I bought a hunk of 2-year aged gouda at Murray's this past weekend that made my salivary glands turn positively inside out with delight. It wasn't even that expensive, maybe $6.75 for a wedge that will last all week.

So it was only a matter of time before it showed up somewhere in one of these drawings, especially since I'm always trying to find objects to stand in for Coins that aren't actually currency. Wheels of cheese have an earthy gravitas that make them perfectly fitting for use in this suit.

As for this particular card, the Three is all about the marvels that can be accomplished with a little harmonious collaboration. Some of the most satisfying fruits of our labor are also the simplest, but we often take those for granted in pursuit of our far-flung ideals. Working with others is a tempering process, and it's the surest way to keep your ego and fantasies in check.

I wanted to draw something humble that tapped into the same artisanal spirit of Pamela Coleman-Smith's version. Cheese-making is still a craft that entire families and communities devote themselves to, and I suppose you could see it as a joint effort involving humans, animals, and microbes (though realistically I'm sure a goat cares little for what you do with her milk once you've taken it).

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Three Of Coins

Sketchbook - Ace of Coins

2010-04-12T15:23:00.004-04:00

You're probably wondering if this is my "Happy Squirrel" card. I somehow doubt that it is...

My partner was recently accepted to Harvard Divinity School and spent part of last week touring the campus in MA. The visit was pretty uneventful mostly, but at one point he did call me to complain that at an albino squirrel had just thrown an Easter egg at him.

...Yeah, that's pretty much how I felt when I heard, too.

I guess the squirrel must have found a leftover egg that had been too well hidden. Do squirrels eat hard-boiled eggs, or did it just think this one was pretty? Regardless, Tex was nearly egged by an achromatic (and possibly very unhappy) rodent.

I told him I couldn't help but see that as an omen of some kind, and I admit I thumbed through the index of my Complete Book of Superstition, Prophecy, and Luck to see if there were any insights as to whether it bode well or ill.

I figure that anything the ghostly white hand of providence heaves in one's direction should be accepted as graciously as possible, and so I decided I would honor this strange little incident by reconfiguring it as my Ace of Coins. I am hoping that Tex (and by association, myself) can look forward to a new chapter of health, wealth, vitality, contentment, and generally enriching experiences. Spring, as Easter strives to remind us, contains the potential for all these things.

Maybe your opportunity will be handed to you, maybe it will be hurled at you from the top of a fence-post, or maybe you will have to do a little digging in the newly-soft earth to uncover it. Signs and omens are only as useful as the reactions they inspire in us.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ace Of Coins

Sketchbook - Six of Swords

2010-04-09T10:27:00.009-04:00

Getting out of an egg is harder than it looks, which is why most birds and reptiles are born with an egg tooth, a sort of biological crowbar that assists in the process and then drops off.

Most Six of Swords cards show a departure of some kind. The inspired mind undergoes a harsh trial-and-error phase, testing its own boundaries and running up against some inescapable realities. The Six indicates your need or ability to leave all that behind, to make a fresh start with the aid of the wisdom you've accumulated during this rocky period. If you can bear to scrutinize the errors of the recent past, you'll see that they actually point the way forward. That's the very definition of "sadder but wiser."

Until it's hatched, everything a creature knows about the world relates to the interior of its shell. Once that shell is broken, the burden of ignorance is ours to do with what we wish, to carry only as far as we choose. Or, to quote Lady Bracknell in Oscar Wilde's biting social satire, The Importance of Being Earnest:

"I do not approve of anything that tampers with natural ignorance. Ignorance is like a delecate, exotic fruit. Touch it, and the bloom is gone. The whole theory of modern education is radically unsound. Fortunately in England, at any rate, education produces no effect whatsoever. If it did it would prove a serious threat to the upper classes, and probably lead ot acts of violence in Grosvenor Square."

Ignore Bracknell's disapproval -- consider the Six of Swords to be a whole mouthful of egg-teeth, and get to work on your own jailbreak. You can only revisit the lessons of the past so many times before they become redundant. A world of brand-new experiments, adventures, and tragedies awaits!

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Six Of Swords

Sketchbook - Nine of Coins

2010-04-08T16:56:00.008-04:00

As warm and idyllic as Pamela Coleman-Smith's concept of this card may be, it doesn't visually convey much meaning, other than suggesting how nice it probably feels to be a rich lady with hired landscaper.

But in Tarot cards, all surface details, no matter how banal, have meaning. You just have take a moment to ruminate on them. For example, observe what Arthur Edward Waite (in his Pictorial Key to the Tarot) describes as "a bird upon her wrist." That's right, even the man who co-created this deck sees little going on in the Smith's drawing except this:

He seems to have completely overlooked the fact that this woman is a falconer. She's clearly wearing a large heavy glove on her bird arm, and the fowl itself (puny as it may be) is hooded. So what we're looking at is actually thematically closer to this:

That discovery became a window which allowed me to gaze very deeply into this card. At a glance it seems almost like Coleman-Smith is copy-catting her own Empress card, but in truth the two are vastly different. The Empress (Arcanalogue examples here) is an emissary of the forces of nature, which we see fruiting in unkempt splendor all around her.

There is little "nature" on display in the Nine of Coins. Rather, we see a woman who has harnessed the laws of nature and put them to work in a way which produces abundance. For example, consider her arbor: cultivating grapes suitable for wine-making is an obsessive, almost scientific discipline. So is training a bird of prey to hunt game. Suddenly this woman, fancy as she may be, does not seem nearly as frivolous as she first appeared. In fact there's something almost stony about her... she's probably daydreaming about hunting wolves in Mongolia.

Since I'm not a lady of leisure and means, I was forced to draw what I know. This is a picture of my tip jar at work. I've written a little bit about waiting tables here on the site already; I can never seem to get past how impossible the job seems while I'm doing it. When the restaurant is completely packed, every table full, with a line of people out the front door waiting to sit down, there is this wave of despair that washes over me. How in the world am I going to handle this, I wonder. I always manage to scramble and sweat and grin my way through it somehow, leaping through the hoops in an adrenaline-soaked frenzy. And not only that, I return week after week, well aware of what lies in wait for me. Instead of being horrified, I am awed by the discipline I've discovered in myself. Where exactly does it reside, and how do I tap into it and apply it to other goals?

The overflowing tip jar that greets me at the end of each shift has become a sort of magical talisman to me, it provides an immediate sense of validation (way more than, say, a direct deposit paycheck-stub). I leave the restaurant feeling like an alchemist, all of my physical exertion and mental pyrotechnics transformed into literal gold. Staggering home, I look like a revenant and smell like enchilada sauce -- but I feel like the woman in this card. Capable. Accomplished. Tested. Ready. Fabulous.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Nine Of Coins

"Effort That Is Simultaneous," She Says, "Is Effortless."

2010-04-03T22:58:00.018-04:00

This is the thirteenth installment in a series of short essays inspired by the 22 Trump cards, featuring original artwork by Greg Erskine (Click and scroll down for large version).

The first card you lay down in a reading is called the significator, explains the old woman. It's like a snapshot of the person who draws it, one moment frozen and instantly ponderable.

“So... I am the world, huh? I always suspected as much.” Smirking, you examine the card. It shows a girl dancing on air, surrounded by four heralds. Hush, the old woman says disapprovingly. Draw another card.

The next card is The World. “That’s odd,” you say, laying it down over its twin so the two cards are stacked like bunk beds. The second card, she continues, elaborates upon the first. It’s a backdrop, the stage upon which the significator acts out its role.

“So I am a world within a world?” you muse. She taps the card’s central figure with her fingernail. Or perhaps, she counters, merely one dancer standing on the shoulders of another much older, greater dancer -- our world itself, perhaps? Which in turn…

“Yes, I get it,” you say. “Microcosms, or something. But what does that tell me?”

Draw another card, your guide demands irritably.

The third card, too, is The World. You lay it down across the others -- perpendicular, so that the stack forms an X.

The third card represents the forces which oppose you, the old woman mutters. You study the crossed cards; while their dancers are identical, they're certainly facing two different directions. “So wait,” you pipe up. “Does this suggest I'm in conflict with myself, or with the entire world?” She says nothing, simply points at the deck resting between you, urging you to draw the next card. You oblige without thinking, selecting one from the middle. It is The World.

She snatches the card from your incredulous hands and lays it down a few inches above the first three, so that the new dancer seems to float just over the others’ heads. The fourth card, she says, Is your will, your intent, your conscious attempt.

You consider the card's slim, graceful subject, identical to those that came before. “It looks like she has pulled free from this whole mess down below,” you say. “She watches objectively, from above. She stands on no one’s shoulders, she has built a world that is completely her own.”

Ah, you are beginning to understand, the woman says with a hint of amusement in her voice. But you do not see all... Draw again.

So you do: it is The World.

“How is this possible?” you ask. “I should have mentioned it before, but it seems that all the cards in this deck are The World. There should be only one of them... shouldn’t there?”

The fifth card, she continues indifferently, Goes here. She lays it down a few inches below the rest, so that they form a column. The fifth card is the truth that lies buried beneath all the others, she says, as if this ought to imply something quite obvious. It is the hidden principle -- hidden from yourself, even -- that responds to subtle energies.

“Are they all supposed to be me?” you ask, “All of them? How can they all be me? How can I rise above something when I am also buried beneath it?”

Draw the next card, she says.

“It’s probably just going to be The World,” you complain, but the old woman just shrugs. You draw.

It is.

The sixth card goes here, she says, placing it to the left of the initial stack. It represents the past.

“Well if these others are all me right now, all scattered out like that, then maybe this card shows some previous time when this wasn’t the case, right? When they were all… unified?” There is no reply. “I mean, maybe it’s like a prism -- when light hits the prism, it refracts into a full spectrum of what seem like individual colors. Is that what happened to me? Is that what this world does to us?"

She gives no answer to this either, but you’re not quite sure you wanted one anyway. You attempt to recall some kind of undifferentiated existence, straining to imagine what that might have been like; it seems to shimmer just beyond the edge of your awareness. Before you can quite grasp it, her insistent command yanks you back to your senses: Draw.

“Hold on a moment,” you plead. You were almost… somewhere, in your thoughts. But she thrusts the deck at you, making it clear you have no choice but to proceed.

The seventh card, too, is The World, which she places opposite the sixth. You can’t help being disappointed by the redundancy of it, the futility of pressing onward if every card is going to be the same. Gazing out across the spread, you imagine yourself heading toward a future which is indistinguishable from the past. “Is it always going to be just the same?” you ask wearily.

Draw another.

You lock your fingers together in protest, refusing the deck.

Draw.

“I’m not going any further until I understand what all of this is about so far,” you state firmly. Again, she seems to find your annoyance quite entertaining. She relents with a wink.

Very well. What do you see in front of you right now?

You squint at the array of cards. “Well... lots of things. Maybe they’re arranged in a spiral, that starts here, in the past--” you say, pointing at the sixth card, “--And then winds around toward the center. Or maybe it’s a wheel, with these four ladies dancing in a ring around a central cluster. Top, bottom, left, right -- it’s like a compass, with the cards pointing in all four directions.”

It's while you're enjoying the idea of the four dancers pointing North, South, East and West, that you suddenly consider those first three cards in the middle of the spread, and immediately your visualization tilts. The one in the center of the stack, you realize, has one card above it and one below; looking at it that way, the layout expands outward into three dimensions, with “Above” and “Below” capping off the four cardinal directions. It’s not a wheel or a spiral after all, you realize -- it’s a sphere. A globe, turning on its axis.

The old woman leans in close to your ear, speaking breathlessly. Traveling in one direction at a time, you will never get anywhere, she whispers. Or rather, you will never get everywhere. Expanding outward from the center in all directions, in all dimensions, is the only way to leave no route untraveled. You can’t defy gravity by merely pushing against obstacles or pulling against your restraints -- it must be both. It must be all, at the same time! Or else nothing.

She recedes slightly from your personal space, giving you room to think. Effort that is simultaneous, she says, Is effortless. These are the lyrics to the song the Universe plays over and over again -- on the off chance that one day somebody may recognize the tune and begin dancing to it.

“Cosmic hold-music?” you joke queasily. You feel dizzy, as if the ground beneath your feet is spinning. It actually is, you remind yourself -- nothing is holding still. Everything is traveling, and your intuitive awareness of it is terrible and awe-inspiring. “But where am I going?" you ask your guide. "Where are we all going? Where is there to go?” You are desperate to know.

Turning the remaining deck over in her hand so the cards are all face up, she spreads them out for you in a wide fan, revealing the dozens of World cards left still undrawn, a multitude of dancers pressed shoulder-to-shoulder, like the Rockettes doing a kick-line, the heralds forming a vast, appreciative audience.

Pick a card, she says. Any card...

Previously On Arcanalogue: The World

Sketchbook - Nine of Wands

2010-04-02T15:07:00.005-04:00

During my first year of community college, a professor told my Psych 101 class that there were certain simple evaluations that clinics used to quickly determine whether or not a person might be suffering from mental problems. One of these, he claimed, was to look at someone's keyring and see how many keys were kept on it. The more keys they carried with them at all times, the more likely they were to have an illness of some kind.

(Remember, I did say this was a community college.)

Anyhow, I believe this was supposed to be a sign of obsessive behavior, or perhaps the sort of painfully inflated sense of responsibility or self-importance that a troubled person might have. I've never looked at my own keyring the same way since. Right now I have six keys, which I'm sure is well within the safe zone.

I do wind up picking up spare and scrap keys all the time, though. I find them all over the city, on the sidewalk and such. I kept a bunch of them in a coffee can until finally one day I decided to see if they'd make any sort of music as a wind-chime. I'm happy to report that keys are in fact quite musical. So then I went down to a locksmith and asked them if they had any scraps that they weren't doing anything with, and before I knew it, by entire backyard was lousy with wind-chimes. At least my keyring is normal!

The Nine of Wands is a strong reminder that you already possess everything necessary to ensure your success and stoke your confidence. Keys also happen to be symbols of influence, inspiration, and access -- the more you have, the fewer doors that can be shut against you. Keep too many of them, however, and you'll never be able to find the one you're looking for when you need it most. Bravery and prosperity only become a burden when the weight of them becomes too great for one to bear alone; I recommend finding a creative outlet for these blessings while they are still well within your grasp.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Nine Of Wands

Sketchbook - Four of Wands

2010-04-01T17:11:00.003-04:00

I'm not that interested in making my cards especially literal. You know, I didn't cram ten actual cups in the Ten of Cups, and so forth. And yet I think it would be self-indulgent to just draw whatever random thing pops into my head. I don't want to "force" an image to work, if I can help it.

Anyhow, this one took some pondering. I though I'd able to come up with four Wands-y looking objects pretty easily. You don't even want to know what sort of things I considered in my desperation. The Four of Wands, much like the Four of Swords, represents a brief lull or pause in one's relentless progress. Specifically, it is a time of celebration, rejuvenation, or homecoming. Think of the Vikings coming home from a long pillage, and how good that must have felt -- sure, there may also be some dead to mourn or some chores to tend to, but being able to do this in one's own time and space is practically a luxury after all that roaming and fighting.

Anyhow, I finally settled on just one wand. But it has four modes, and that's quite handy for illustrating the restraint you're encouraged to enjoy at this time. After all, "Park" implies that you intend to sit here for a while or maybe even shut down completely, and both "Drive" and "Reverse" are antithetical to appreciating exactly where you're at right now.

For now, "Neutral" will take you everywhere you need to go.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Four Of Wands

Sketchbook - Ace of Swords

2010-04-01T00:28:00.003-04:00

It's late, so I'll keep this brief. The concept for this drawing came to me all at once in a sort of perceptual burst, and I literally stopped whatever else I was doing so I could sit down and start picking away at it. Appropriate, since the Ace of Swords is the go-to card for intellectual hairpin turns that point in unforeseen directions, toward new possibilities.

The symbolism here is pretty straightforward. The suit of Swords is associated with the element of air, hence the feather. It's also associated with awareness and intellect, which makes the peacock's cycloptic plume especially apt.

But what I wanted to do beyond there is show the feather being split in two. I don't know about you, but I can't resist picking things apart -- straws, popsicle sticks, relationships, anything really. So whenever I get my hands on a peacock feather, its hours are numbered. They pull apart so perfectly! The individual barbs peel off into tiny sub-feathers, the shaft splits and unzips into long ribbons. Not even the perfect, iridescent eye, which only an unfeeling psychopath would ever want to put out, escapes mutilation.

The suit of Swords teaches us about the powers of discernment and discrimination, and the Ace is where it all begins: a unified vision, magical in its fleeting wholeness and ripe for shredding into individual thoughts and observations. Eventually even the shreds will be picked to shreds and the suit will have run its course -- at which point there is really nothing to do but throw the whole mess away and look for a new feather.

Hopefully you'll forgive me for starting in on this particular feather, threatening to divide the Ace before you've even had a chance to enjoy its perfection. I shouldn't rush ahead, I know. Considering how hard it was to resist pulling that eye apart into a set of binoculars, you should be quite proud.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ace Of Swords

Sketchbook - Four of Swords

2010-03-31T17:12:00.006-04:00

Today's drawing is a direct homage to the RWS version of this card, which has always fueled my imagination. Was the figure supposed to be dead? Praying? Sleeping? Waite himself didn't clarify matters when he described it as "The effigy of a knight in the attitude of prayer, at full length upon his tomb." Clearly there's a story here somewhere that no one is telling.

Whenever I read this card for someone, I make sure to point out that this brief moment of reflection is all that lies between the trials of the Three of Swords and those of the Five. In other words, you'd better catch your breath here in the eye of the storm, because round two is on its way. Whatever you do in preparation could wind up making all the difference.

I became drawn to the idea of the sideshow strongman as an inspirational figure here. His weight evenly distributed across the bed of nails, he is able to rest quite easily. There is quite a lot of discipline involved in learning to do these sorts of stunts, whether you're swallowing swords or eating glass or walking on coals. While physical conditioning is essential, ultimately the strongest muscle you have at your disposal is your brain.

(Yes, I know the brain is not actually a muscle.)

There are periods of actual respite when you can truly let go of everything, allow all your suppressed reactions to surface, begin healing, and finally move on. This card doesn't depict one of those periods -- it's more of a halfway-point, like the thirty-minute lunch break you get during an eight-hour shift. In fact, if you're a strongman, you may even actually be on stage for it, taking deep breaths so that you can remain perfectly calm while your assistant smashes a cinder-block on your chest.

There is a little bleeding, I'm told, resulting from incidental punctures here and there. Nothing to worry about; surely the tattoo on his bicep (a tribute to harder times) hurt and bled much worse. As for the snake inked on his forearm, let's just consider it a symbol of renewal and move on, lest we want to hear a long story about the trapeze artist who broke his heart back in '34.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Four Of Swords

Sketchbook - Ten of Cups

2010-03-15T16:58:00.005-04:00

When I cut the deck and selected this card, I was 27,000 feet over the Great Plains and surrounded by sleeping grandparents.

I really felt pretty torn about what to draw here; for a while I suspected that my Nine of Cups drawing was actually better suited to the Ten, what with its hierarchical overtones and effective infrastructure. But it also seemed a bit... dry, or utilitarian, in a way that seemed unsuitable for the suit's crowning card. The Ten is supposed to seek out that line where a good thing becomes too-much-of-a-good-thing, and then plant its flag right at that edge. Surely a little more fanciful excess was required to construct a proper Ten.

I meditated on this for quite a while -- I had all the time in the world, and no in-flight movie to distract me. Eventually I came up with the idea of a castle built literally on the water. Even though this is just a jaunty little sand castle and not the full-blown citadel I originally envisioned, it seems just as improbable and magical. This is a fortress built on intangible, irrational ideals that somehow manages to stay afloat. It's an embodiment of the suspension of disbelief required to thrive in emotional, mystical, unfamiliar settings. Without that suspension, we'd never be able to answer the initial call of the Ace of Cups, and building a house inspired by it would seem like pure madness.

And maybe it is, but it's a madness which takes us somewhere, offering us temporary shelter as we travel.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ten Of Cups

Sketchbook - Nine of Cups

2010-03-15T16:37:00.006-04:00

I drew this card and the Ten, back to back, while traveling on an airplane to Arizona for a family visit. Funny how the lesser Cups cards usually seem to refer to romance and the greater ones to family relationships. Perhaps it's because love has to be thinner and more aqueous in order to flow freely toward new people -- in streams as opposed to channels, pools or gulfs.

For the Nine I wanted to show how emotional expression could flow from many different points of access and unite in a common cause, whether it be familial or horticultural. Each cup gathers and re-routes its own small amount of condensation or rainfall, an insignificant effort made great when you appreciate the scale of the entire network. Working in concert to distribute life- and love-giving attention where it is needed most, this ungainly construction illustrates the benefit of granting others access to the tender parts of ourselves which are still growing.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Nine Of Cups

Sketchbook- Three of Swords

2010-03-05T17:46:00.006-05:00

The Three of Swords is sort of inverse echo of the Three of Cups, in which feelings of fullness and satisfaction are seeded with awareness of the emptiness and loss that will inevitably accompany them. It's a case of runaway brain, dragging the heart behind it like a tin can.

I decided to show this with an apple which has been dealt exactly three cuts. It's been picked apart, vivisected. While it is surely still perfectly edible, something ideal has been lost; the fruit's wholeness can never be restored. The knife lingering nearby distracts us from the deliciousness of the bite, reminding us instead of the violence of the cut.

The two wedges that have been created remind me of the two falling figures in the Tower card, or Adam and Eve discovering their nakedness. They did not exist as independent entities until this moment, their division from each other and from the whole having been wrought upon them by unknowable forces. It may seem like little consolation, but each slice contains seeds from which future expressions of that original wholeness may still spring.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Three Of Swords

Sketchbook - Three of Cups

2010-02-26T02:12:00.005-05:00

O, delicate triumvirate! How the world envies your happy dancing.

I really wanted to think of something that would indicate the fullness and delicacy of this card. Here we see three conjoined soap bubbles, remaining magically intact as other bubbles burst all around them.

A wand looks on approvingly from the sidelines -- its actions may have brought them all together, but now it's perfectly superfluous. Though it does serve to remind us that expressions of openness and love are always more accessible than you think they are. There are always more where these came from, and the phenomenon never fails to enchant.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Three Of Cups

Sketchbook - Four of Cups

2010-02-25T09:53:00.007-05:00

At first glance this may seem like an unnecessarily forbidding image for the Four of Cups, but that's because we all tend to automatically look at the Venus fly trap from a bug's perspective. Attempting to relate to the plant itself is a little more challenging -- it has mandibles, but no brain or eyes, no cute earlobes to pierce or cheeks to pinch.

So here are some of facts about the fly trap that fascinate me, and which also inform its association with this card:

1. It gives off a powerfully sweet odor, something like overripe citrus.

2. As voracious as it looks, the plant doesn't actually need to eat insects to survive -- it can make do quite happily on a diet of sunlight and water.

3. Each individual set of jaws can only open and close a handful of times, after which they turn black and drop off.

4. A healthy fly trap will flower, just like most other plants. But it's recommended that you pinch off the flowers, so that 100% of the plant's energy will be invested in growing more traps.

I find it interesting that I focused on a similar image when I last wrote about this card. Something about the sight of all those mouths seems unnatural but also strangely human -- we want so much, but we are so difficult to satisfy. The idea that the Venus fly trap has so many more mouths than it needs is interesting to me, because it takes such a great deal of energy to produce such elaborate technology. The fact that we encourage this instead of letting the plant complete its regular reproductive cycle makes me think of the ways in which we forestall our own growth, wanting to keep things just as they are for just a little bit longer, clinging to the recent past out of longing, indolence or fear.

We have a strange relationship with pleasure and nourishment; a dearth of it impoverishes us emotionally and physically, but so does a wealth of it. Where is the line between the splendid fruition of the Three of Cups and the hungry hyper-abundance of the Four? I suspect that one can only ever find that line by crossing it.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Four Of Cups

Sketchbook - Six of Coins

2010-02-23T20:07:00.006-05:00

As I sat there trying to figure out what to draw for the Six of Coins, one of the first things I thought of was of the I Ching, and how its hexagrams can be derived from the tossing of coins. I decided to see if I could find a hexagram that I could associate with this card.

The one I chose was Pi, also known as "Holding Together" or "Unity":

"What is required is that we unite with others, in order that all may complement and aid one another through holding together. But such holding together calls for a central figure around whom other persons may unite. To become a center of influence holding people together is a grave matter and fraught with great responsibility. It requires greatness of spirit, consistency, and strength. Therefore let him who wishes to gather others around him ask himself whether he is equal to the undertaking..."

I think that in a perfect world, strength equals generosity. The person you help up is also helping you. That's just my six cents.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Six Of Coins

Sketchbook - Ten of Wands

2010-02-22T22:50:00.010-05:00

I brought paper to work today so I could work on a sketch if I had time -- but once I got there, I realized I'd forgotten to pick a card to work on. So I called my friend Chris, and he drew one for me, and I knew what I'd be drawing the moment I heard what it was.

I work a few days a week at a restaurant around the corner from my house. My work schedule is really wonderful for my creative life (not to mention this blog), but on the days I work, I work insanely hard for hours and hours. And while today was certainly one of those days, I stole a few moments here and there to sketch it as it happened.

The Ten of Wands is all about work and he humility it imposes, even upon the successful. Most decks seem to have taken their inspiration for this card from Pamela Coleman-Smith's version. I merely adapted its message to my actual job, showing some of the complications that I deal with from one moment to the next, or even all at once. It's a burden that I bear gladly right now because of what it allows me to do, and it's one that I've deliberately engineered, but still -- yikes. It can be physically and mentally ruinous.

The Ten card in any suit represents fulfillment of some earlier idea -- at this point, you've gone about as far as you can on the track you're on. If you stay on it you're just going to keep going in circles. Some might consider them victory laps, others might say it's a holding pattern. Some are just building up the courage to launch themselves into the next challenge, and some are just killing time and waiting for the future to reveal itself to them.

In my case it's all of the above. It's getting me where I need to go. So I'll continue to serve brunch and wipe down tables and take phone orders. I'll continue to spend that first quiet hour setting up the dining room as if I'm throwing a huge party, and to spend the seven hours after that scrambling around like a whole hill of ants. At the very least, being embroiled in all this is a constant reminder of what I originally set out to do. If I was able to pick it up in the first place, I must be strong enough to carry it just a little bit further.

PS: Our phone totally doesn't have one of those old-fashioned receivers like the one in the picture, but cordless phones aren't interesting to draw in the slightest. And the flowers are carnations, they're for the bud vases on our tables.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ten Of Wands

Sketchbook - Two of Cups

2010-02-21T01:36:00.004-05:00

I was kind of excited to go for my fourth post in four days, until I actually cut the deck and drew. You have got to be kidding me -- first the Two and Ace of Wands, now the Ace and Two of Cups. Again I almost cheated and went ahead to a sexier card, and again I decided to just play 'em as I was dealt 'em.

So. I sat and thought for like ten minutes and couldn't come up with anything. I really like this card in readings, but I couldn't think of anything very interesting that remained true to the card's meaning of fellowship, love, reconciliation, and unity.

I figured the bells cover all of that -- some will instantly see them as wedding bells, but bells toll in celebration of pretty much any major event. They even toll the simple passage of time. Tex and I live close enough to a churchtower that we hear its bells toll every hour (five minutes fast) and I am always surprised by how reassuring the sound is. You'd think you get used to it after a while, but apparently no.

And of course, turned up like that, the bells can also be seen as a pair of cups. I kept them as white as possible so they'd look like they were announcing good news.

Also, bells are hard to draw -- they have a totally inflexible curved surface. Try it sometime, you'll see.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Two Of Cups

Sketchbook - Ace of Cups

2010-02-20T00:14:00.010-05:00

I was looking forward to a little more action today, hoping to draw something exciting. Instead I drew my second Ace in a row. I nearly cheated and went with the card beneath it instead, but I decided to sit and think about it for a while first -- and I'm glad I did, because that's when I remembered the pineapple lamp.

I got the pineapple lamp at a flea market in Connecticut. Since I had only a certain amount of cash to spend, I was walking around the market in a sort of panic, afraid that anything I paid for would wind up being trumped by some other treasure a few tables over. Meanwhile, anything I passed on could get snapped up by someone else any moment! It was like being in a dream where everything you want is laid out in front of you, but you can only choose one thing.

When I saw the pineapple lamp, I felt a sort of click in my brain. I knew I wouldn't find anything I wanted more than this. I think my friends thought it was a sort of odd purchase, just sort of a 1950s old-lady's-nightstand kind of lamp. "Wait until you see it in the dark," I told them. And... well, I don't think that changed any minds exactly, but I was convinced and that's all that matters.

The lamp is a kind of creamy white ceramic studded with cracked-glass nodules, and the grooves in its surface are filled in with gold enamel. I think it's supposed to look like the base of a pineapple, but it looks more like those eggs in the Alien movies:

The surface is divided into a geometric pattern that combines with the glowing nodules and creamy, golden background to create a beautifully organic ambient warmth:

Anyhow, this isn't the first time I've associated it with the Ace of Cups. It has the same sort of splendid energy I've seen in other portrayals of this card. For example:

So I decided to see if I could sit down and actually draw the pineapple lamp in a way that would do it any justice. I'm pretty happy with what I ended up with, and surprised that it's at all accurate -- that pattern is pretty intense. I left the lamp in the picture unplugged so you could see that its radiance was not dependent on electricity. The pineapple runs on emotional energy! And the moth is sort of a pun based on the dove you see in the RWS version of the card, in this case seduced into the lamp's bioluminous maw. The moth is also a sort of avatar for myself in this case; I imagine that he and I were both to gaze into the pineapple, we'd each see the same thing.

UPDATE: Just saw this today:

The city of Guzhen, China, will soon be home to a "colossal 833-foot luminaire," Metropolis reports. According to the building's own promotional literature, it will be the "world’s only architecture shaped like a huge Western classical oil lamp."

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ace Of Cups

"When's Mommy Coming Home?"

2010-02-19T13:08:00.009-05:00

This is the twelfth installment in a series of short essays inspired by the 22 Trump cards, featuring original artwork by Greg Erskine (Click and scroll down for large version).

When I decided to move to New York City, my parents were as supportive as they knew how to be. “If something bad happens, or if it’s just not working out, or if you need anything,” my mom said, “Just call… and we’ll buy you a ticket home.” Aside from this one-way offer, I’d have to sink or swim on my own, which I figured was only fair. So I proceeded to do both those things, sinking a little here, swimming a little there, and floating when I got tired -- which was often, because I couldn’t afford to eat much of anything.

Right away I landed an unpaid internship at a small publishing house. To my eyes this was a career-defining opportunity, a chance to make up for the vast waste of my old life. Who cared if it meant I couldn’t get a real full-time job anywhere else? This internship promised better things down the road, I told myself, which were more important than food. As long as I could scratch up enough to pay for my daily grapefruit and Cup-O-Noodles, I was set.

Then winter came, and hunger didn’t seem interesting or sexy to me anymore. It became a real drag, actually. My left eye began to twitch and flutter all the time, as did my left ventricle. I felt myself zombie-walking through my magical internship, trying to appear industrious when actually I was hoarding energy, trying to look like I was reading manuscripts when I was actually snoozing like a housecat. If it wasn’t for the illimitable fresh berries and mini-quiches of our catered publicity events, I probably wouldn’t have even made it till January. But even so, I woke up one morning with a definite sense that I’d reached the end. Rent was due, I was a hundred dollars short, and I had nothing to eat for breakfast. It was eleven degrees outside. Dragging myself to the office that morning, I knew what must be done.

Dear Mom, I typed. I hoped it wouldn’t come to this, but…

I was about halfway through the email when my boss pulled me aside. It just figured, I thought. Getting fired from a job that paid zero dollars an hour was the just the sort of final indignity I had coming to me.

Ted waited to speak until I’d closed his office door behind me. “How are you with kids?” he asked. Was I hearing right? He and his wife, he continued, had a four year old girl and eighteen-month-old boy. They were looking for a new babysitter. They were willing to pay ten dollars an hour. Did I have any experience with children? “Oh loads,” I said, lying through my teeth with starvation-flavored enthusiasm, “I come from a really big family, there were always babies around. I’ve been babysitting all my life, actually!”

I was prepared to claim wet-nurse experience if it meant I could stay in the city for just a few more months. And it wasn’t a monstrous lie. I had done my share of reluctant babysitting in high school; surely I could just call my mom if I had any questions. This, I decided, would be my gift to the rich, spoiled publishing heirs and heiresses of Manhattan. I would be just their Mary Poppins, with additional nose-ring and whisker stubble.

The job began immediately, as in that day. Ted’s wife, Iris, welcomed me into their sprawling brownstone. Immediately, my heart began to ache for her; she was clearly a sensitive and intelligent woman, but her naked gratitude for even five minutes of adult companionship made me wary. It also made me wonder how late Ted came home at night.

The children were cute, at least. The baby boy, Cal, was one of those radiantly sweet children with wise eyes who never cried more than absolutely necessary. His big sister was a fey beauty (by pre-school standards, anyway) and also quite a little storm-cloud. The first time Iris left us alone to play together, Alice set the tone for all our future days and nights together.“I am not your friend,” she said, looking up from her coloring book to punctuate the warning with meaningful eye contact. “Not yet perhaps,” I replied cheerfully, “But over time I hope we’ll grow to be quite good friends.” She just stared at me for a moment and then gently shook her head as if I was the thickest person she’d ever met.

And just like that, my ass was saved. I couldn’t believe my good fortune -- nor could I believe how trusting this family was. What kind of parents would relegate their children to a starving intern who’d lived in the city for less than six months? Ted had never so much as checked my references nor even seen my ID, yet here I was, in charge of keeping his baby from falling down the stairs. I was determined not to abuse that trust -- but I still couldn’t resist helping myself to a share of whatever food was prepared for the kids. A handful of Cheerios when Iris had her back turned, a jelly sandwich the second she left the house, a piece of chicken, endive from the Park Slope co-op -- anything left lying around was devoured. These people were rich by any definition I was familiar with, and they didn’t seem to notice or care how much they spent on food. Whenever I took Cal out in the stroller, Iris would hand me between five and ten dollars to buy him a snack, pointing me toward a nearby bistro. “He especially loves their stewed greens,” she told me. She never once asked for the change. Since he usually slept soundly through our entire outing, I ate for two. I didn’t see any harm in it, and besides: the greens were excellent. That baby had great taste.

The more time I spent around Iris, the worse I felt for her. I got the impression that she felt a bit out to sea, spending her late thirties chasing after two kids all day and night while Ted enjoyed quiet, civil days at the office, surrounded by the kind of New York aesthetes who spontaneously start speaking French over dinner in SoHo -- people whom until recently had been her contemporaries as well. Iris adored her children, but she was bitterly self-conscious about the changes motherhood had wrought on her body, her marriage, her entire identity. The few stolen hours she got to spend reading and writing poetry or swimming laps at the Y only enhanced her awareness of her isolation.

As months passed, she grew increasingly fragile and restless. She wanted to begin living her life again, she explained to me, but she couldn’t seem to remember where she’d left it. Once, at her request, I read her Tarot cards. I did so with much trepidation; I wanted to help her a little if I could, but I was already out of my league as a babysitter, I didn’t need to add impersonating a therapist to my list of crimes. Besides, I was afraid of her desperation, afraid of being relied on for more support than I wanted to give. And in my own hungry little heart I was quick to remind myself of the financial risk I’d be taking if I gave in and started feeding her the honest advice and support she craved. This job was the only thing keeping my head above water; if I wasn’t careful, I could wind up talking myself right off a ledge, with only a free ticket back to Arizona left to cling to.

I tried to avoid becoming a part of their family, but in the end, there I was: a queer sort of relation who came and went at odd hours, tending and eating and festering alongside the others for as many as thirty hours a week. As the gulf between her parents grew wider, moody little Alice had no choice but to accept my affection and entertainment. As grateful as I was for the concession, as happy as it made me to read to her or play the funny/scary monster in her games of make-believe, I could tell she resented having to outsource the work. The baby, of course, loved all of us with perfect angelic equanimity, regardless of whether anyone stayed out all night, or cried on the phone for hours, or broke dinner plans yet again. I hoped whatever was happening between Ted and Iris would sort itself out before Cal was old enough to be damaged by it. In the meantime I took more pride in helping him learn to walk and talk than in literally anything I'd ever done on my own. The children got to me in a way Iris had never been able to, slowly eroding my mercenary edge. The end of my year-long internship should have been a perfect opportunity to break away and pursue that real job I’d been pining for; instead, I began taking care of the kids full time.

As a result, the revelation of Ted’s affair wound up having more impact on my life than either of us would have liked. It was awkward: the woman was my age, and I knew her from the office -- we’d been interns together. Iris was the one who broke the news, which she presented to me as a triumph. Hadn’t she always known something was up? Not only did the discovery of this younger, slimmer, more confident woman confirm everything she suspected about Ted, it sprayed gasoline onto the suspicions she had about herself -- that she had been swallowed up by her own obsolescence, her loss of purpose, the age creeping over her soft body.

They would need me more than ever, she told me, to help get through this awful time. She wanted to leave him; naturally, Ted wanted her to stay and just sort of deal with it. “He says he loves us both, and wants to be with us both,” she complained tearfully, “Do you think that’s even possible?” I was so used to telling her whatever I figured would cause the least harm, I discovered that I no longer had any real feelings or opinions worth sharing. If I felt nothing, then I had nothing to hide.

She began losing weight, first industriously and then obsessively. She left her journals (she kept several) all over the house, no doubt planted for Ted so he could read all about the agony he was putting her through. Knowing he would never bother, I read them all. I analyzed each dog-eared page, scanning for signs and portents of the future -- mine as well as hers. What could I do to help? I am not her friend, I tried to remind myself. But if that was the case, why did I bother, why did I return day after day? Why delicately peel up the dried pool of indigo paint from their exquisite hardwood floors, why scoop the cats’ shit out of the bathtub or the rotten food out of the kitchen sink, why scrub marker scrawls off of the walls? Why try to erase the signs of depression and decay creeping in from all sides -- because it was my job?

The children and I clung to each other during this time. We had many late nights together. “When’s MOMMY coming home?” Alice would demand, enduring as the promised nine o’clock hour came and went, followed by ten, then eleven. “Soon,” I’d say, no longer sure which parent would return at this point, let alone when. At the sound of the key in the lock, both Alice and her brother would burst into spontaneous cranky tears of impatience and relief. Or worse, they’d both be fast asleep across my lap with the TV light shining on their sweaty foreheads, having long ago succumbed to the realization that all grownups are liars, that no one was never coming home.

One evening mommy came home early. Alice was still upstairs playing with the neighbors, so I had a few minutes to talk with Iris over the baby’s head as he built the longest toy railroad track in the history of the world. She barely looked like herself anymore -- her hair was freshly chopped off short, and she’d slimmed down to the point of looking frantic and angular. She even sounded different, more intense. I made a mental note to see what prescriptions she was taking. “Ted says I’ve got to get a job,” she said acidly. The idea of entering the work force at her age, after six years of full-time mothering, had stoked her fear and anger. She couldn’t stop thinking about that bitch, how she was now practically running things over at Ted’s office. “I’ve never been that kind of person,” Iris lamented, “That type-A personality who can just show up and take charge.”

At least I could relate to her there. “You know what? Me neither,” I chimed in, momentarily letting down my guard. “She started working there around the same time I did, but it seemed like she already knew how to do everything,” I explained how lost and inadequate I’d felt having to learn from the ground up, while competing against people like that bitch who seemed to have everything figured out. I was a bit surprised to find myself talking to Iris so freely. Bonding, even! I guess I should have known better.

“Oh right, because she’s so great, right?” she sputtered, cutting me off mid-sentence. “She’s perfect, she can do anything, but I can’t! That’s what you’re saying, right?” I stared at her, surprised into silence. “Well, thanks a lot. Maybe you’d better go.” She got up and whirled out of the room. I was cut to the quick. What was I supposed to have said? Then there was a sudden crash in the guest bedroom, and the sound of glass breaking.

“Iris? Are you okay?”

“Keep Cal in the living room,” her quavering voice floated to me through the door, as if she was somewhere very far away. “I… um, I think I’m going to take this place apart.” What? There was another crash, louder, larger. The baby began to cry; I gathered him up in my arms. I listened as she tipped the heavy glass-doored bureau in the TV room onto its face. The floor shook.

I hid Cal’s face as Iris emerged and stampeded down the long hallway, toppling the furniture and tearing framed pictures off the walls, destroying everything she could reach. Shattered glass was strewn behind her in a glittering warpath. I followed delicately behind, listening to her grunt and cry as she demolished her own bedroom. I didn’t see any blood -- it was a miracle she hadn't been cut. Having run out of things to break, Iris lunged toward the window and threw it open with all her strength, leaning out over the alleyway and screaming her lungs out at the night sky. At the sound of it the baby began to shriek and convulse in my arms, as if in physical torment.

That was my limit. Seizing her by the hand, I yanked Iris back from the windowsill and marched her back down the hall and depositing her body on the couch. She was already deflating, as if all the energy had drained out of her with that awful scream. I thrust Cal at her. “You scared your son,” I hissed at her. “Take care of him! Alice will be home any minute and there’s glass all over.” In a trance, she accepted the child. Mother and son panted together quietly.

Where to even begin? The glass was absolutely everywhere -- had been pulverized in places, the dust sparkling in the cracks between floorboards. Holding back tears, I moved from room to room alternating between bare hands and dust pan, scanning and scraping, determined to sweep up every speck and make the house safe for children again. I righted the bureau and replaced all its contents, keeping an ear cocked in Iris’s direction in case she acted up again. I double- and triple-checked every surface with my bare hand -- better to have to tweeze the slivers out of my own flesh than from Alice’s or Cal’s. But this was the final threshold of my responsibility; I swore to myself I would leave this house and never return. Nothing was worth this.

I was just dragging a huge cardboard box full of wreckage out into the stairwell when Alice returned from her play-date. “I ate dinner upstairs,” she said cheerfully. Maybe the neighbors had overheard the demolition going on below and decided to keep her until things had quieted down. I swung her up onto my back so she wouldn’t see the tears in my eyes.

Within minutes I was gone; I left Iris sitting on the couch with a child on each knee. The woman looked pale and distracted, nodding and smiling unconvincingly as she listened to stories about Alice’s schoolday; one of her hands tapped and scratched against the coffee table absently, as if still intent on pulling something into pieces. I was afraid to leave, but I couldn’t bring myself to stay for even one more minute, or even to speak. “Goodbye!” she called after me as I shut the door. I didn’t reply, didn’t turn around.

On my way to the train I dialed a number I’d jotted down on my way out the door -- a friend of Iris’s who took her out to lunch sometimes. “This is Tom the babysitter,” I told her. “Iris is in really bad shape. In about five minutes you need to call her, and you need to stay on the phone with her until you can tell she’s okay.” I hung up and went underground before she could ask any questions. Never again, I consoled myself. My commitment to this family was severed. Never again.

When I returned the following week, we both acted as if nothing had happened. On her way out, Iris left five dollars on the counter so we could get ice cream.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Empress

Sketchbook - Ace of Wands

2010-02-18T19:43:00.009-05:00

Ugh. Well, I'm happy to have moved on to the next sketch, but I have issues with this one.

First of all, when I cut the cards and then drew this one, my first instinct was to pick another one instead. After all, just yesterday I drew the Two of Wands, and I was hoping for a little more variety in my life. So I went ahead and picked the next card from the stack -- and it was the fricking Two of Wands again. So clearly I just needed to stop whining and start drawing.

I was pretty happy with some of the detail here, and while the concept isn't terribly original, I still think it communicates something about the card. Unfortunately all I can see right now is that I have drawn my second disembodied hand in two days. I need to be a little more fearless when it comes to choosing what to portray, lest we end up trapped here:

Just when I became proud of myself for making it look like this new hand was actually supporting the cupcake (I was a little disappointed yesterday that my chopsticks weren't being gripped -- they just sort of dangled there lifelessly), I realized that the hand is still pretty much even in the same position as the one in the Two. As lazy as that may seem, maybe it's also an interesting comment on the relationship between these two cards. The Two takes that burst of energy and potential and does something with it. No major adjustment necessary, it's pure follow-through.

In this case at least, there's way more thematic precedent for the disembodied-hand trick. That's sort of what I was thinking when I started sketching it out. I don't plan to hew very closely to the RWS deck from here on, but in the very beginning I can't help keeping things as simple as possible.

I think I unconsciously hit on the cupcake idea because of this thread on MetaFilter about "cupcakes for men". (Can't get any more phallic than this one, boys!) I left the banner deliberately blank, thinking that it might symbolize all that is unwritten and unforeseen in bold new leap into the future. Looking at the scanned version, however, the whole card seems eerily... empty. I need to get braver about filling in all that space -- it's totally all mine to fill. Like, if someone tells you to blow out the candle and make a wish, you don't wish for all the sorts of things you could obtain pretty easily. You make the biggest, most shameless wish you can imagine!

I guess if nothing else, this page turned out to be a one-card reading about this whole sketchbook thing. Going forward, I'll try to inject more of that Ace intensity into my drawing and get a little messy.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ace of Wands

Sketchbook - Two of Wands

2010-02-17T21:31:00.005-05:00

I haven't spent any significant amount of time drawing in many years, and that makes me sad. So for my new regular Tarot meditation, I'll be drawing one card from the deck and then literally drawing it, making up a new version on the spot based on whatever's in my head at the time. I'll try to spend no more than about a half hour doing each one, so don't expect anything fancy.

Today I pulled the Two of Wands. I thought of the chopsticks right away because, well, I was sitting in a bubble-tea cafe at the time. In fact, I pretty much completely lifted the hand/chopsticks outline from the instructions on the little paper wrapper that my real chopsticks came in, though I added plenty of my own touches.

I liked the idea of the two "wands" being tools you might use in tandem to select, grapple with, or manipulate something. From there, I surprised myself by gravitating thematically toward the Waite-Smith version of the card, in which a baron of some kind surveys his territory and dreams of owning more, MORE. These chopsticks couldn't just be chasing after some crispy radish fritter or deep-fried cuttlefish ball -- it had to be the world, or at least one specific world out of many. Ultimately I guess I was trying to show someone in perfect possession of their own faculties, setting their sights on a desired outcome and then scooping it up with ease and self-assurance. Mmmmm...

(Or maybe unconsciously I was thinking of this:)

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Two Of Wands

"At Once More Poetic And More Precise..."

2010-02-03T16:54:00.007-05:00

Dreamers, activists, malcontents, I'd like to introduce you to Emily Wernet's fledgling webcomic Moonlighting. Its heroine, a high school girl named Billy, has a secret life that she is still only dimly conscious of -- which probably has to do with the superhero sightings pouring in from the streets of her boring suburb.

What I love most about the orange-tinted supergirl -- and what cements her as a Princess of Cups -- is the way she expresses herself. Where others speak mere words, her speech bubbles are filled with images that express her intent symbolically. It's a wonderful motif that illustrates what it would be like for a dreamworld creature to interact with everyday people. It also reminds me of the alien creature's telepathy in this Aeon Flux episode. (As Trevor Goodchild describes it, "Her language of pictures is at once more poetic and more precise.")

Rather than inducing a state of paralysis or stagnation, the Princess's suspension between the material world and the watery dreamworld compels her to action in both realms. She may not yet understand herself, but she will learn by doing and speaking, articulating her inner vision as it reveals itself to her. Incapable of the Queen's deep-sea excursions, the Princess trains by executing a series of shallow dives into her unconscious. This has the benefit of making her more accessible to the surface-dwellers out there, and let's face it, we all need a hero who encourages us to straddle that divide ourselves.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Princess of Cups

"Standing Directly Over A Forgotten Source Of Joy..."

2010-01-29T13:41:00.008-05:00

We depend on photographs to link us to our past, but they are static, dimensionless things and they fail us. In fact, sometimes they make looking back harder instead of easier -- the past they show seems to exist in its own world, curiously remote and emotionally inaccessible. "Now" and "then" seem to exist independently of each other, showing no signs of overlap, regardless of what we remember.

What I like about the Looking Into The Past project's photos is that they force our physical and emotional awarenesses of time and space to intersect. By informing the eyes, heart and mind simultaneously, they are sort of hyper-realistic. The truths they tell are slightly truer because of their complexity, and whatever lies they tell us are no worse than the ones we are already telling ourselves.

The illusory difference between "then" and "now" is an ever-darkening line that we are always struggling to erase. When we find a way to reach back and connect vividly with our own history, it heals us in both directions, giving purpose to our past while also pointing us onward to the future.

Don't get bogged down in the hurts and dead hopes of the past. "Nostalgia," Don Draper reminds us, "literally means 'the pain from an old wound.'" But neither should you refuse to commune with yourself. We bury our happy memories like so many acorns, hoping they'll help us survive the winter. You may be standing directly over a forgotten source of joy, stored just out of sight. Hungry? Cold? Miserable? Find a soft place in your memory and start digging. Explore your room, your desk, your computer, until you turn up an artifact that makes you real to yourself again.

I just did this now. Here's what I turned up:

I remember every inch of that yard; I will probably never see it again, will never be able to hold this photo up against it to see the changes wrought by time. In this picture, my mother is younger than I am now. It pains me to see it.

But underneath it all, somehow: "Wheeee!"

[Via]

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Six of Cups

"More Subjects, More Objects, More Love..."

2010-01-21T16:52:00.004-05:00

When it comes to symbolic gestures, you really can't beat Ecuador's "glass frog". Since the creature lacks any pigment, you can literally see his heart beating through his chest. Awww... More awwws for this barely-there gecko, also recently unearthed. Researchers are racking up the discoveries down there, but they're still only the beginning -- National Geographic speculates that, all told, we've only identified a tiny percentage of all the world's life forms. And I bet you thought we'd more or less sorted it all out by now!

The glass frog is my hero today. I've put him at the helm of the Three of Cups because of his all-too-poetic transparency -- I ought to channel his fearlessness a little more often and let people make of my lungs and pancreas and feelings what they will. But really all these "new" animals deserve a spot on the card, because collectively they are a reminder of the life our planet is teeming with, the opportunities yet to be discovered, and the vulnerability that is universal among all life forms -- as superior as we humans consider ourselves to be, what with our chain-mail and wisecracks and neatly pressed khakis, we are not much different than a horde of pencil eraser-sized lizardettes swarming across the jungle floor.

While the love in the Two rebounds back and forth in a closed loop between two subjects, the Three invites you to open up in search of more -- more subjects, more objects, more love. It heralds a season of availability and generosity, regardless of how this jibes with your fastidious economic principles. Conserve through giving -- when it comes to emotion, ecology trumps economy every time. [Via]

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Three of Cups

"I Managed, Even In My Preposterous State, To Blend In..."

2010-01-20T13:24:00.008-05:00

This is the eleventh installment in a series of short essays inspired by the 22 Trump cards, featuring original artwork by Greg Erskine (Click and scroll down for large version).

Years ago when my sister Leah applied for a job as a bank teller, she was caught off guard by one of the interviewer’s questions: “What’s the craziest costume you’ve ever worn?” She figured it was just one of those insidious getting-to-know you questions meant to give insight into her character. Ever the good sport, my sister admitted to having been a bag of jelly-beans once, for Halloween. She got the job -- but instead of ending up at a regular bank like she’d expected, she was assigned to one embedded in the side of a Wal-Mart. She didn’t draw a connection back to the interview question until the day her boss sent her wandering up and down the aisles of the store with a giant sombrero on her head, handing out fliers for free checking accounts.

Surrendering control over one’s appearance to another party is an exercise in humility that few adults are willing to endure -- and with good reason. We’ve already wrenched that control away from our fanciful (if well-meaning) parents. We’ve outrun the image-obsessed peer pressure of high school. We’ve fought damn hard for the right to determine our own self-image, even those of us who rarely change out of our bathrobes. We curate ourselves like overpriced historical exhibitions, a conferring this responsibility requires a lot of trust; otherwise, you’re just letting someone trot you around in a funny Mexican hat in exchange for a paycheck, making everyone who looks at you feel very sad.

This fall I found out that a friend of mine who's an opera director was desperately looking for a tenor for his upcoming show. I’m not an opera singer by anyone's standard, let alone what you’d call a tenor. I average about a C+ on karaoke exams. I’m not even really an performer anymore; I abandoned the idea in my early twenties when I left Arizona, a place where the local community-theatre pond was much smaller and safer to paddle around in. All of these details are the basis for a very funny joke I decided to make, in which I sent Scott a message offering my services. Wouldn’t it be hilariously awful, I wrote, if you tried to pass me off as a real singer? Just imagine.

When I woke up the next morning, there were an emails from Scott containing a rehearsal schedule, a synopsis, and a full vocal score.

This was no classical piece, it turns out -- it was an original work of operatic satire written by a thrice-Grammy-nominated composer. The part Scott was desperately trying to cast was the titular “know-it-all, full-of-himself, sadomasochistically well-endowed hog” who flees the farm to become a famous painter. Rehearsals were to begin in five days. Opening night was in three weeks.

I felt ill, felt as if I’d accidentally swallowed some kind of poison bait. Just as I was about to induce vomiting, the phone rang -- Scott calling to follow up. Despite my misgivings I picked up, afraid that if I didn’t answer he might start showing up at my house.

I have to wonder sometimes if Scott's success as a director is completely owed to his supernaturally mellow voice and light, rational demeanor. He may have missed his calling as an obstetrician. “The conductor and I have agreed that having a trained singer in the role isn't important,” he reassured me. “An actor would be just fine -- someone who can dive into the character and keep up with the rhythm. You can just speak-sing all your lines, just like Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady!” Scott had directed me once, years ago, he reminded me. I'd been part of his chorus of horny sailors in a community-college rendition of South Pacific. He was charmed at the idea of working together once more, and seemed convinced that I could pull this off.

Also, the job would pay five hundred dollars.

I stalled at the edge of this decision quite miserably. I was terrified of humiliating myself and disappointing a friend -- maybe even ruining his career by casting permanent dispersions on his judgment. I'd have to seriously upset my work schedule to account for the show’s three-week run. And not least of all, I was intimidated by the costume, which would include, as he gently put it, “a full-body leotard and a fourteen-foot prosthetic dick.”

But then I remembered how wistful I get whenever I go to see a play. I always leave feeling so proud of the actors, and so jealous, remembering the excitement I used to feel onstage. I wasn't about to actually go out and audition for anything, but I’d always thought that if an opportunity ever “happened along,” I’d be game.

And again, five hundred dollars.

"I'll do it!" I said. I expected that once I committed to the project, I’d feel much more at ease; what happened instead was that I barely slept for the next three nights. Scott’s endless affirmations aside, I could not come to terms with the fact that I had accepted a lead role in an opera -- a sexually explicit one, no less. The only explanation for this seemed to be that I was mentally unstable and could no longer be trusted to care for myself. I lay awake those nights as if I was awaiting the executioner's axe, imagining the dismay my classically-trained cast members would feel the second I opened my mouth. The bewildered silence of the audience. The gleeful bitchiness of the theater critic. The sight of my thirty year-old, sedentary ass in pink spandex. For the first time since high school, I prayed for God to kill me and spare us all.

By the evening of the first rehearsal, I was definitely holding out hope that Scott would realize his error and replace me while there was still time. To my delight, everyone else in the cast seemed just as nervous as I was. A petite soprano named Melanie put me at ease by anguishing over how drastically under-prepared she was. “I’m going to be the person here who makes you feel much better about yourself,” she groaned as we prepared for the conductor’s signal. A moment later, she leapt into her part, singing gloriously and fearlessly through the opening scene. I couldn’t help feeling betrayed. All around me, voices braided in harmony, perfect to my ignorant ears. When it came time for the Pig to enter the farmyard, I growled and sneered through my lines like a good sport. It was as though I'd tracked mud into the music box, but nobody seemed to balk.

At the end of the night, our director gave us a pep talk. “I know this is scary, but we have no time to indulge in insecurity," Scott said in dulcet tones. "I guarantee you, veryone has something unique to contribute. At this point we all have to sort of drop our pants, look around, and get an idea of what we collectively have to work with.”

That evening he and I went costume shopping, hitting up Times Square's few remaining adult boutiques. He’d already rigged up a long coil of pink PVC hose to serve as my megafaunal shaft, he told me; now we just needed a way to anchor it to my body, and something to cap the end. And we must be very picky customers, as whatever we bought had to last the full run of the show. There were nothing left over in the budget for replacement “parts”.

After comparing several different strap-ons, both in and out of their boxes, Scott proclaimed a winner. He was afraid the black faux-leather belt might clash with my pretty pink leotard, but, he mused, it could always be painted to match. I eyed the thing begrudgingly. “Scott, the belt has a vagina,” I complained, pointing out the easy-access gap positioned just below the nubby dildo attachment. “It’s made for a woman. Don’t you think it’s going to look… well, strange on my body?”

“Oh, it’s going to look strange all right,” he grinned, lapping up my discomfort. He held up a round magenta knob from a nearby bin. “How about this for the end? I want it to be something that fits in your mouth, in case we work that into the blocking. You know, for when they gag you during the trial!” I weakly admitted that I could probably manage to make it work. No doubt impressed by Scott’s natural air of authority, a passerby interrupted us to ask for recommendations. “For my wife,” the old man clarified, “...She likes ‘em pretty big.” My acting may be pretty rusty, but I still know an exit cue when I hear one.

The next evening I came to the studio early to try on my stretchy pink leotard. It had little pajama footies at the bottom and a zipper up the back, and was just close enough to the color of my actual skin to make me look strangely naked, like a carcass in a butcher shop. “You’re going to have to wear different underwear,” Scott observed. Looking down, I could see my dark briefs showing through, the seams standing out in bas-relief, like welts. I might as well have been wearing them on the outside.

Hearing voices approaching in the hall, I began struggling back into my clothes. “I just need a minute to change before everyone comes in!” I grunted. “I think you’ve misunderstood,” said Scott. “From now on, this is your rehearsal gear.” He tossed me two pairs of black socks to cover my hands and feet -- my “hooves” -- and then opened the door to let the others in. My humiliation lasted only as long as it took for the rest of the costumes to be passed out; there were enough udders, frilly tutus and rubber animal noses flying around that I managed, even in my preposterous state, to blend in.

Over the next two weeks I struggled to grow into my costume; I figured out exactly how to spool my cumbersome yards-long hose over one shoulder so that it would unroll from my groin in perfectly flaccid coils. I learned how to adjust the cords of the nightmarish strap-on belt so that everything looked… well, symmetrical at least. In the final scene, after the Pig was slain by the greedy Farmer, I had just a few seconds backstage to wriggle into an enormous pair of feathery wings, re-emerging as a filthy porcine angel. I got through these rehearsals by pretending I’d been cast in a John Waters movie, where there were no rewards for a half-hearted or self-conscious performance: only through an unwavering commitment to pure nonsense would I be redeemed.

It was in this spirit that I decided to perform a little surgery on my crotchless strap-on garment, counterbalancing its feminine construction with a huge set of fuzzy pink testicles. Crafted from a three-dollar pair of ankle socks and pinned dangerously close to my real anatomy, I had to admit that the balls were quite eye-catching -- a final absurd touch which I hoped would give me an extra boost of confidence on opening night when I finally faced the firing squad. I submitted my new junk to Scott for director-approval.“Those are… well, they’re really out there!” he said. If even he seemed doubtful, I knew I had to be on the right track.

As I crouched behind a dark curtain on opening night, awaiting my cue from the orchestra, I practiced blocking the audience from my mind entirely. I planned to go onstage as if I was diving into cold water; I'd jump, swim to the edge in a panic as soon as I landed, and get out as fast as I could. And then I'd cover up with a towel.

When the moment arrived, I held my breath and walked out onstage. Instantly there was a brief pause as air was sucked out of the room by gasps, followed by a whoosh of laughter as it was exhaled. Laughter! I'd been taking my dilemma so seriously, I totally forgot there would be laughter. When the Farmer yanked my schlong out of my hoof-hands and unrolled it so that the chorus-girls could use it as a jump rope, the hoots from the crowd drowned out whatever inhibitions I had left, like a balm spreading over my brain. It ought to have been the ultimate humiliation (by my mother’s standards it probably still is) but my fears of exposure were laughable as well. I was invisible -- my real persona was perfectly hidden behind a veil of snout and fuzzy balls and gravelly pig-voice, to the point that I vanished utterly the moment eyes were laid upon me. It was, after all, just as Scott promised. All they saw was the cartoon, not the screen it appeared on.

The spell only lasted as long as the performance itself. During the audience meet-and-greet after the curtain, I received heartfelt congratulations from my friends, but among the lingering strangers there were few who could look me in the face; everywhere I looked I saw eyes skim over and past me, smiles shyly averted. Crap, I thought. Without the "magic of the theatre" lending credibility to my skinny shanks and unforgivable protuberance, I realized, it had turned out to be just another one of those sombrero moments after all.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Fool

The Cup And The Tower

2010-01-17T00:05:00.011-05:00

I give an awful lot of readings, but it's not often these days that I get one myself. Last night a friend of mine laid out an incredibly personal one. The first and main card was the Ace of Cups, and the card crossing it was the Tower. It was a Waite-Smith clone deck, and we were immediately struck by the symmetry of the two cards. We laid them end to end so that together they seemed to form a single bipolar structure, terribly concrete and finite on one end, spectral and eternal on the other.

This is the loop I am caught in lately. I feel an incredible connection to what I'll call the "subtle realities" I've discovered, which fill me with a great deal of hope and peace, but I am also painfully aware of the limitations of this material existence and all the ordeals and that lie in wait for me somewhere within it. I fly back and forth between these two modes of awareness lately like a yo-yo. They follow and chase and consume each other, and I get dizzy trying to accept both of them simultaneously. They do not negate each other, but neither do they dwell comfortably together.

The reading showed me the parts of myself that set all this into motion, focusing on elements of duality in my life that I am well aware of but understand poorly. I think I have an idea how to proceed, but the first thing I did afterward was create the image above, a literal conjoining of these two cards that illustrates what I've been experiencing. It's amazing how they fit together -- look at the little yods that flow through both backgrounds, notice how the spouts of water seem to extend the tower's dimensions, how the people fall or rise through the watery barrier into a bizarro-world.

My goal for the new year is to stretch out on one of those lily pads floating on the thin skin between worlds, and camp out there for a while.

"You Rare Stallion Among Shady Ladies..."

2010-01-15T14:51:00.005-05:00

Meet "Markus", proud bearer of the dubious title "America's First Legal Male Prostitute." A technicality in Nevada law which accidentally excluded men (something about legally mandated cervical exams for all sex-workers) has been overturned, and the Shady Lady Ranch ("Voted Best Small Brothel for Seven Consecutive Years") has recruited this painfully earnest 25 year old to boldly go where no man has (legally) gone before.

In the interview with Details linked above, young Markus explains the deeper aspects of his work -- in his opinion, a gigolo must have "the heart of a saint, the mind of a philosopher, and the skills of the devil." He reviles any comparisons between this job and work in pornography. "It's closer and more personal," he says. "Whichever woman may walk through the door, she's appreciated. A surrogate lover will love that woman for a whole hour, or however much we charge here [$200 for 40 minutes], and she'll leave feeling much more empowered, and much more confident in herself."

In this case, "Prince of Coins" is more than just a witty pun. (Get it?? Because he sells himself for... ah, forget it.) While it's clear from his comment comparing himself to Rosa Parks that young Markus still has much to learn about life, I find the spirit in which he's setting forth on his quest to be rather endearing. It's the classic folly of youth, masquerading as hard work; he's going through the motions of establishing himself in the world, in hopes that one day he will have something definite to show for it. "A gigolo knows how to cook, clean, and do the things necessary to upkeep himself," he says. "He's totally independent. He can cook a 3-course meal, and at the same time, serve wine." He's made up an entire charter of principles he hopes to maintain on his journey, imagining that his time at the Shady Lady will make him healthy, wealthy, and wise. His optimism is... well, it's cute. Totally misguided and ridiculous, but completely devoid of irony and cynicism, which is refreshing at least.

We typically think of the Prince of Coins as being... well, husband material, a patriarch in training: dependable and staid and intense, nearly single-minded in his determination to learn the lay of the land so that he might one day own and cultivate it. But this kind of energy manifests in all different ways, and sensuality is one of them. It very well may be that Markus's naivete will confine him to eternal Princehood, never to become a King. His plans to dazzle countless women with illusions of love, empowerment and independence don't sound like they'll leave him much energy to invest in more tangible, enduring relationships. But that's what our youth is for, isn't it? We see our errors through, we test-drive them until some adult crisis or another forces us consider a more sensible approach.

Markus, you rare stallion among Shady Ladies, you have my blessing. Go forth and nail thy charter to the door of the lesser brothels, plow the fallow fields of Nevada and bring them to fruit. The day may come when this all seems like folly to you in retrospect, but until then I hope that, as you sow, so shall you reap. [Via]

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Prince of Coins

"Perhaps You Are That Messenger..."

2010-01-13T20:53:00.005-05:00

I'm pretty sure I know what my next destination is. How do I get there, now?

Looking at the concept artwork for Kolelinia, the transportation revolution designed by architect Martin Angelov, I look forward to a time (however far-off) when I can depart from the road and glide through the air on my own steam. Maybe it's nothing but an elegant dream that will never exist in real life, but if you've ever risked a bike ride through city traffic, you probably got the same giddy feeling looking at this thing that I did. The concept scratches an unconscious itch in the hearts of bicycle commuters, it captures the imagination and shows us how fast things can change.

If you look at the diagrams, you'll see how it's supposed to work -- the bike tire fits in a deep groove that keeps you balanced perfectly upright as you zip along, your handlebar secured from the side to prevent any wobbling. I can't help fantasizing about crossing the East River this way -- it's way more exciting than the water taxi.

Consider the Eight of Wands as a messenger already in flight, on its way to present you with news, inspiration, or 11th hour revelations. Or perhaps you are that messenger, calibrating yourself to land perfectly in the right place and time to alter the course of events for others. Either way, the lines are open and the wheels are in motion. Keep your eyes on the skies, work those thighs, and don't forget to moisturize. Okay I'll stop now. But you get the point -- the wind that blows at your back is pushing you forward, and the wind that blows in your face bears traces of what is to come. Use them both. [Via]

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Eight of Wands

"As Reliable As The Numbers From One To A Hundred..."

2010-01-03T20:57:00.006-05:00

Maybe everything is a lot easier than we think it is. Maybe there are better ways to do things, keys that unlock the potential hiding just under our surfaces. I was charmed and astounded watching this video of a child solving math problems quickly and accurately using Chisenbop, an form of finger-counting that may date back to the abacus. See if you can figure out how he does it:

Here's a tutorial. Chisenbop has cropped up in American curricula from time to time, but it's largely unheard of here. Why is that? I can understand the need to instill kids with a completely conceptual grasp of how sums and multiplication tables work, but not everyone's minds work the same way. And anyway, this is like walking around with a calculator in your pocket -- bound to come in handy at some point.

The Ace of Swords exists to usher new decisions and perspectives into our lives, pointing ever forward. All we need do is sail on its wind, relaxing our grip on obsolete or irrelevant ideas and embracing progress and self-knowledge. Is there a better way to do something? Then so shall it be done. Is there potential hiding beneath the surface? A series of swift, careful incisions ought to free it.

We are often urged to "know ourselves" and "be ourselves", but there is no knowledge without learning. Study yourself just as ardently as you study your surroundings. In your sharpest moments, your consciousness is a membrane between the inner and outer worlds -- a line carved into the fabric of reality, as thin as the edge of a knife and just as difficult to balance on. The Tarot's suit of Swords describes our attempts to maintain that balance. If the failures seem costly, it's because they are blows against our very identity and sense of purpose; try to keep in mind that equilibrium is only ever achieved through a series of errors and counter-errors. With a little discipline and effort, the contents of your own mind may one day seem as familiar to you as your own hands and fingers, and as reliable as the numbers from one to a hundred. [Via.]

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Ace of Swords

"Damn The Gods!"

2009-12-29T16:29:00.006-05:00

There seems to have been a lot of uproar about Warner Bros.' decision to remake creaky old Clash of the Titans, even though everyone knows it's only considered a classic because of Ray Harryhausen's spectacular low-tech special effects. I'm a Harryhausen fan myself, and honestly I don't think even he would mind seeing "realistic" CGI effects used to spruce up the myth-inspired dragshow that is Clash.

The overuse of digital effects is typically one of my biggest complaints about new movies, but when it comes to incredibly expensive, incredibly trivial pieces of pop-cultural ephemera like this one, I can't help but become 9 again. Giant scorpions! Evil gorgons! I want to see them. For a little point/counterpoint action, here are the trailers for both the original and the remake:

As opposed to some of the inexcusable and out-of-left-field remake attempts (stuff like The Pink Panther or the announced remake of Hitchcock's The Birds) the new Clash is arguably a true update -- we have experienced a real special-effects revolution in the twenty-*ahem* years since it was made, and the trailers certainly showcase the difference. As to whether it will effectively upstage its predecessor, only time will tell. When it comes out, people will tug back and forth over it, everyone claiming that one version clearly triumphs over the other. Why bother? Even the original was completely frivolous. I (perhaps foolishly) maintain that there's room in our memories for both combatants.

The Seven of Swords is all about this desperate need for validation, for unambiguous victories to be declared, however tenuous the real circumstances. In the Waite version of the card you see one person fending off numerous (perhaps only perceived) threats from above; the card is designed to make you immediately identify with the defender and not the attackers, but no one gets to be the former without first being the latter. Graduating from the Six to the Seven of Wands seems to bring this out in people -- give us a taste of success or encouragement, and we squander it by losing focus on our original mission. We become unsteady, defensive, insecure, prideful, easily distracted -- but hopefully for just a short time, because there is actually still plenty of work to be done before a solid victory is declared.

The film industry seems to exhibit all our ambition-related personality quirks and deficits, exploding them into huge expensive debacles and full-on wars. Clash of the Titans is not only up against every other movie coming out in March, it's also got to stand up to its over-hyped predecessor. When it's all over, who will even care? We all will have already moved on to the next over-hyped challenge.

Previously On Arcanalogue: The Seven of Wands