This is the first installment in a series of short essays inspired by the 22 Trump cards, featuring original artwork by Greg Erskine. (Scroll down for large version.)
I keep a short list of cards that come up in more readings a lot more often than they really ought to, and lately the Chariot has become one of them. Fortunately, compared to other cards that seem determined to defy statistical averages (I'm beginning to think there must be several Eight of Swordses in my deck) this one is a welcome sight, adding a burst of momentum to conversations about hopes, dreams, and ambition. The Charioteer's restlessness and readiness to evolve are qualities that people identify with immediately -- it's a vision of the confident self that they’re still searching for.
I’ll be the first to admit that New York is a tough city to live in, especially if you're still figuring out who you are and what you want to be. Every day, you’re surrounded by people who already know exactly what they want and seem uniquely adapted to their purpose. You hate and fear these people, of course, and you're happy when bad things happen to them. But since you also want to become just like them, you can’t help but watch them admiringly, studying the way they play the game. The city is for people what Darwin’s tiny island in the Galapagos was for animal species. Everyone must keep up the furious pace of mutation and diversification to survive -- even the panhandlers.
I remember an incident I witnessed one day on the F train. It was during rush hour, so the car was crowded with lots of professional suit-and-tie types who had been reduced to catatonic states by their long, vital-essence-destroying workdays in midtown. Therefore, no one looked up when we all heard a voice from the platform shouting, “Hold the train! Hold the train!” just as the bells chimed and the doors closed. Holding the train slows everyone else’s commute, so it generally isn't done. However, if the straggler happens to be a beautiful woman or can make a convincing case for an emergency (though no blood, please) special exceptions are made. Going against the grain, a younger guy in a gray suit shoved his arm between the doors, forcing them apart.
Fortunately this case turned out to be pretty special. He was scrawny, his clothes were filthy, and his brown skin had that rawhide patina that usually suggests a hard life spent mostly outdoors. But the most special thing about him by far was his enormous horse costume made out of rolled-up foam bedding. It was the kind of outfit that makes it look like you’re in the saddle, but your legs are actually disguised as the horse’s legs. It also had a shaggy mane out of yarn, and eyes and nostrils that had been crookedly drawn onto its face with black marker.
When that foam horse-head parted the doors and entered the train like the prow of a Viking ship, the reaction of the other passengers could not have been more predictable: they refused any acknowledgment whatsoever. Eyes were fixed straight forward at a newspaper, or on the floor, or anywhere other than upon this ridiculous spectacle. Attention is a valuable commodity, and New Yorkers guard theirs fiercely. But with the costume jutting out two feet in front of him and two more in back, it was hard to ignore that the horseman -- I figured he’d stay out of trouble as long as he held really still.
“¡PARA BAILAR LA BAMBA!” He began singing gleefully at the top of his lungs. “¡PARA BAILAR LA BAMBA, SE NECESITA UNA POCA DE GRACIA!” His steed began to prance in place, bumping into people as it bopped along to the melody. The man began to carve his way through the car, beaming infectiously as he serenaded his captive audience. It created an instant feedback loop -- the harder he pushed against their bubble of frigid silence, the harder they pushed back, collectively inventing an entire parallel reality in which the poor man had never been born, and of course this resulted in him butting the grungy horse’s ass even more playfully against their dour newspapers.
By the time he got to “SOY CAPITAN, SOY CAPITAN, SOY CAPITAN,” he was wearing down their defenses -- I could hear laughter being stifled here and there by people who could no longer contain themselves. When he reached the end of the car, a coffee can was conjured from some unspeakable hidden cavity in the horse so that he could solicit tips on his way back to the front, rattling coins in time to his energetic performance. When he passed by I gave him five dollars -- this was at a time when I could barely afford my groceries, but he’d done more to earn it than I had. When the doors opened at 14th Street, the car emptied as if it had been on fire. The little man galloped close behind his fleeing audience, ay arriba ay arriba, and then squeezed himself into the next crowded car.
Whenever I find myself lacking the courage to commit to some big new project or creative idea (or even when I’m shy about giving Tarot readings) I find myself recalling that man, his exuberance and his lack of self-consciousness. His entire livelihood depended on his ability to win over a whole new thoroughly-aggravated crowd every five minutes or so -- the risks I face seem practically nil in comparison. But I also try to remind myself (and others) that there’s no rush. A lengthy waiting period is a crucial part of your metamorphosis. Once you inhabit that armor and crack those reins, there’s literally no stopping you, so it’s best to come into them naturally.
Once when I was 21, a friend and I planned a weekend road trip from Phoenix to Los Angeles. Even though I was technically a grownup, my parents caught wind of this and sat me down for a long talk. My car was in no condition to make such a trip, they explained. I’d break down somewhere and then they’d have to bail me out. My father told me I had no right to jeopardize the family’s collective financial stability by taking such a risk. Of course, I saw this as yet another opportunity to drive them completely insane. “Oh, you don’t have to worry about that, Dad,” I said nonchalantly. “If I break down along the way, I’ll just stay where I am until I can earn enough to fix things on my own.” In the end they stepped aside, but only because they knew that having me involuntarily committed would probably wind up being more expensive in the long run.
The thing is, they were right about the car. It had weird electrical problems; the radio, AC, and automatic windows had given out long ago. It also overheated like crazy. Whenever the white smoke started blowing back from under the hood (which was every forty miles or so) there was no choice but to pull over wherever we happened to be and wait for it to cool down. Neither of us had a cell phone, and since we were making the drive overnight, the only other vehicles we saw on the road were ghostly 18-wheelers that whooshed past at a six hundred miles an hour. There were long stretches of highway where not a single light was visible in any direction except for the immense, operatic clouds of stars overhead.
Our progress through the desert that night was painfully slow, but I was convinced that we’d get to LA and back completely intact. And even though I cringe now when I remember how hard I pushed to take such an asinine risk, it just happened to turn out that I was right, just that one time. We returned home 36 hours later, rattled and relieved, but also perversely triumphant -- we had not waited for permission, we had not fed our plan through the logical system of checks and balances that govern other adults. We were independents: We set a course west, and then went west until we saw the ocean. What could be more important or less foolish?
“Now is the time to act,” I said recently to someone when the Chariot made its characteristic appearance. “You’re finally at the point where all you have left to do is dare yourself, and then off you’ll go. So do it.” It’s the opposite of anything my parents might have ever advised (though now that I've spent more time as a concerned bystander, I can better imagine how they felt). We become so adjusted to the slow arc of maturation that we forget nature's obsession with change -- without notice, any of us might sprout wings, or wheels, or even shabby horse's legs. Thus gifted, what is there to do but locomote your weird new appendages and see how far they'll carry you?
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