Skip to main content

Tarot Reflections from the Yurts of MFC

Image of trees and mountains from "the ridge" at Collins Lake Ranch

My life has been a bit of a whirlwind lately. I spent the past month visiting my grandparents, working at Mountain Friends Camp, traveling back home, and recovering from camp while trying to fill my days with meaningful activities. We have reached the point of the year where I stay home while my family goes to school/work, and I can feel myself slipping into the role of house spouse/sad spinster whiling away the hours.

Right before I left for New Mexico, I bought a Tarot of Pagan Cats mini-deck. I have gradually transformed into the vaguely-New-Age-pseudo-witch that my younger self would have resented, largely through a sequence of seemingly innocent purchase choices. When I left for study abroad, I left my two tarot decks back in California. However, I have since felt tarot's absence from my life, and I was happy to get back into the habit of pulling a tarot card every day and occasionally trying out a tarot spread.

To start off what I hope will be a month of daily blog posts, I am sharing a few of my daily tarot reflections from my time at camp. There will be some minor edits for anonymity and clarity, but I am otherwise leaving these entries as they were written. The tarot meanings listed are from Joan Bunning's online course Learning the Tarot.

Images of the tarot cards from Tarot of the Pagan Cats that inspired these reflections

Tuesday, June 25: Ten of Swords / / bottoming out, victim mentality, martyrdom
Today, I was listening to one of our counselors talking about Quaker Voluntary Service, and they said that it is about taking a year to learn about how to take care of yourself rather than burning out serving others. I hope that we can help to make Mountain Friends Camp more like that, and to avoid a Ten of Swords situation/mentality.

Sunday, June 30: Knight of Swords / / direct, authoritative, incisive, knowledgeable, logical, opinionated, blunt, overbearing, cutting, unfeeling
I am learning that it is hard to be The Staff Member, especially when there are other staff members in the room. Still, I worry that I am taking on a Knight of Swords attitude.

 Thursday, July 4-Friday, July 5: The Fool (0) / / beginning, spontaneity, faith, apparent folly
I was certainly somewhat spontaneous with the CIT Day Off today, going into it with very little previous planning. It went well, and not planning ahead allowed us to loosen up and have a good time. 

 Sunday, July 7: Ace of Wands / / creative force, enthusiasm, confidence, courage
I have felt a strong dip in my confidence and enthusiasm recently. A camper made a hurtful comment to me yesterday, and I still haven't fully recovered to my usual confidence and high spirits.

Monday, July 8: King of Chalices / / wise, calm, diplomatic, caring, tolerant
I have been trying my best to channel King of Cups energy, despite being tired and ready for my time off. I feel that I haven't been as calm and engaged as I normally would be at camp.

Wednesday, July 10: Queen of Chalices / / loving, tenderhearted, intuitive, psychic, spiritual
Today has been a day of recharging and feeling connected to nature. I haven't felt "loving" and "tenderhearted" so much as "prickly" and "eager to escape campers", but I suppose that's an area for improvement. 

Sunday, July 14: King of Chalices / / wise, calm, diplomatic, caring, tolerant
This was an important day for my King of Chalices traits, because it was camper arrival day for the second session. I worked hard to ensure that campers felt safe and supported, even in the middle of a lightning storm. 

Monday, July 15: Seven of Wands / / aggression, defiance, conviction
This card features a cat hissing angrily at six wands being held up in front of zir*. Behind zir, the seventh wand bears a red flag with a yellow triangle on it. I have grouch about other people's lack of trust in my ability to complete basic tasks, like gathering my campers and putting the appropriate number of chairs in a circle.

 I hope that you enjoyed this slightly unusual blog post, and that I will be able to return to posting regularly after such a long time away.

Best wishes,
Lydia

* I was trying to get Slightly Less Terrible about using neopronouns correctly, so I experimented with using ze/zir/zirs pronouns instead of they/them/theirs pronouns when describing tarot images.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Reviewing My August 2019 Goals

This is an image of my desk during Fall Semester 2018. On the right side of the photo, there is a vintage Singer sewing machine which, unfortunately, does not work. To the left of the sewing machine, there is a crate books inside. On top of the crate, there is a stack of Rookie Yearbooks with a crocheted jellyfish (wearing glasses) on top of it, and a picture frame containing a print that reads "all the time". To the left of the crate, there are a few more books. In lieu of a proper bookend, I have placed a tarot deck (stored in a black makeup bag) and a book-themed Halloween decoration (featuring book spines with the words "Potions", "Hexes", and "Spells") to keep my books from toppling over. I chose this photograph because, unlike my current desk, this desk looks like it belongs to someone who creates monthly goals. Hello! At the start of this month, I made a list of goals. As September 1 draws near, I am l...
Post a Comment
Read more

Media Round-Up: August 8, 2019

Image of pink, green, and light purple umbrellas suspended in the air between two buildings. Hello! Even with posting on my blog every day this month, I still spend significantly more time consuming content than I do creating it. With that in mind, here is a little roundup of some of the content I have been enjoying in this post-camp-pre-semester portion of my life. TV Show Superstore is a character-driven series about the employees of Cloud 9 (a thinly-concealed stand-in for Walmart). After watching America Ferrera in Ugly Betty and Ben Feldman in Drop Dead Diva , it is interesting to watch them in entirely different roles. Watching this show makes going to Walmart feel like a visit to a fully-immersive Superstore theme park. The between-scene cuts to bizarre antics happening at the store are one of my favorite little touches. Music I have been almost exclusively listening to Heathers . Somehow, I have become thoroughly desensitized to the fact that I am listening to a m...
Post a Comment
Read more

Remembrances and Retail Anxiety

A truly ominous stairwell in one of my school's buildings Bonjour! I got my study abroad card! Thank you to all of the people who signed my card. You are all so amazing and thoughtful! I am having a great time on study abroad, but sometimes I wish that I could be back at Soka with all of you. I feel much more adapted to my life in Paris. This experience has been peppered with worries that I am not taking full advantage of this opportunity. I feel like I should be doing more, seeing more, and spending more. I have had to remind myself that all of the experiences that feel normal now--from taking the metro to climbing up a spiral staircase--were entirely new to me less than two months ago. I am growing and changing, all while gaining a better sense of myself. With that being said, living here has really taken a toll on both me and my physical possessions. The first casualty was a shirt that my mom tie-dyed for me when I was in ninth grade, which tore while I was adjustin...
1 comment
Read more