Short Stories From 10 Years Ago – April 12, 2004
Tarot Cards
Short Stories From 10 Years Ago – April 12, 2004 – During the summer of 1972 I went to see a psychic with a friend of mine. I had lost my brother Mike in a car crash the previous December and I was still reeling emotionally from that tragedy.
My mother had told me numerous stories of her visits to psychics when she was a young woman and I really wasn’t at all nervous about this outing. What I didn’t really know was that there are varying degrees of professionalism, within the world of the occult.
When it was my turn I went into the ‘reading room’ to see the woman who was waiting there. I’d never met her before, but she smiled warmly at me and suggested that I sit down opposite her. She looked across at me and asked me if I felt comfortable. I nodded. She then went on to say that I had recently suffered a tremendous loss. I said nothing.
She proceeded to tell me that I had lost a brother who was very dear to me. She couldn’t tell if I was older or younger, but she knew we were very close in age. Mike was a year older than I. She then said that in the month of November in one of the coming three years I was going to lose another member of my family very suddenly and tragically.
At the time I didn’t know that a gifted psychic would never say such a thing, even if she did foresee a calamity of that nature. Needless to say, I left there badly shaken. The power of suggestion is incredibly strong, and for the next three years I worried during the entire month of November. I was suspicious of anything bordering on the supernatural until about four years ago.
I was on the organizing committee of a charity fundraiser sponsored by my office and we decided on a Mardi Gras theme for the event. As part of the evening we had a Palm Reader and a Tarot Card Reader in attendance. I had no intention of visiting either, but a colleague of mine bought me a ticket for both and insisted that I use them. It was with a great deal of trepidation that I sat down opposite the Tarot Card Reader.
She asked me if I had ever had my cards read. I shook my head. She shuffled, then cut the deck three times and placed four cards, face down, in front of me. She explained that due to time constraints she couldn’t do a full reading, but she would tell me a few things of interest. I hadn’t asked her a specific question, but I was sitting on the edge of my chair, fully expecting the card of ‘Death’ to be turned over. Instead it was the Magician. She smiled at me as she turned over the other three cards.
In the next few moments she told me the following things:
You are an old soul who has learned a lot about life.
You worry a lot about money when you shouldn’t. You will always be able to provide very well for yourself.
You have a tendency to close people out of your life and you need to have trust in The Universe.
You take yourself very seriously and you need to “really” lighten up.
She picked up the cards and put them back in the deck and said that my time was up. There were at least a dozen people waiting in line to see her as I walked down the hall to the Palm Reader. She was a sweet, older woman who took my hand, turned it over, stroked my palm, and said, “You worry too much.
If you would just forget all the insignificant nonsense that rattles around in your head, you’d be able to see that you’re destined for bigger things”. Wow – I was delighted. No talk of death, devils, destruction, dismemberment, disease or disgrace – and just how did these two strangers know so much about me anyway?
Thus began my interest in Tarot Cards. I bought my first Tarot deck about two weeks later, along with some books on the subject. Over the last three years, I’ve collected about twenty decks of these exquisitely beautiful cards. I’ve learned a lot about the Tarot but still am a long way from being proficient with a reading. I use my books whenever I do a spread of cards and I can actually pull together a fairly decent interpretation of the question at hand. However I’d be at a loss without my reference books as a back up. I know the suits of Cups – Wands – Pentacles and Swords and understand the meaning of most of the cards in the Major Arcana and Minor Arcana, but with 78 cards in all, it’s difficult to keep their significance and their relationship with all the other cards in my mind.
I’m definitely a neophyte at this game, but I’m intrigued with the cards, their history and the uncanny way in which they seem to appear in answer to a person’s question. I’m no longer nervous when Death, The Devil or The Tower appear before me, because I’ve learned enough to know not to take their meanings literally. I’m aware of the beauty of the symbols in The Tarot decks and how much you can learn just by looking at the cards, their colours and the story evident in the illustrations.
I’m also happy that my thoughts are no longer tinged by the memory of the psychic I saw over thirty years ago. I have no immediate plans to run out and book a session with a fortune teller, but neither am I opposed to the idea of visiting a psychic again. Live and learn, and in the meantime, who knows what my Tarot cards may reveal.
