Tarophilia

All tarot enthusiasts are inclined to collect. I love my Gaian Tarot and Robin Wood Tarot decks, and yet I still surf the net looking at other tarot decks. 

I haven't purchased a new deck since the Gaian Tarot arrived on my doorstep three years ago. However, I am intrigued by a relatively new deck called the Mary-El Tarot by Marie White. Sometimes I wonder if this deck is more art than tarot. At other times, I see amazing ideas in the images the artist has created.


The Hierophant card shows malnourished children nursing from aged breasts. My first reaction was, "Gross! Who'd buy an ugly deck like that?" Moments later, I realized how brilliantly this image interprets The Hierophant or Pope card.

It reminds me of the title of an old, New England primer: Milk for Babes Drawn Out of the Breasts of Both Testaments and of a saying attributed to the Jesuits, "Give me the child until he is seven and I care not who has him thereafter." Brainwashed with their mother's milk! And yet un-loved and un-nurtured. What kind of world will these babies know? This is a very clever visual interpretation, especially because it makes me uneasy.


The Mary-El deck has pretty cards, too. (Pretty is good!) In the Three of Swords, a sweet bird caught the swords instead of letting them pierce her fair breast. Now she just has to be careful where she drops them.

What decks call to you? What card images do you find particularly compelling?

When Sleep Is Elusive

You don't need to be a parent to find this funny. You can just feel the father's frustration. 

Go the F**k to Sleep by Adam Mansbach:

I remember my dad frequently coming to my doorway while I kept my eyes shut and pretended to sleep. He would yell, "Go to sleep!" I wondered how he could tell I wasn't asleep!

Sister of My Heart

Rene Christina Lovall

November 18, 1954 to November 22, 2004

We all loved you.

And your memory still brings us joy.

What Is The Point of Your Spiritual Practice?

I've been watching YouTube videos posted by MIRTHandREVERENCE. They are very interesting and remind me of my "pagan days." I wanted to ask her what rituals I should do and then realized how silly that would be. I can ask her questions, but I can't ask her to tell me what to do.

I'm taking charge. So my first question for myself is, "What spiritual practices do I want to do?" I already have a few. They may be a good beginning, or they may be too many and too disparate. If I figure out why I like these things, perhaps I'll gain some idea of what else I should do.

I light a candle on my stove (hearth) every morning. There is an image of Hestia there because I want that archetypal energy in my new home.

Earlier this year, a woman in the Gaian Tarot Circle, Maurie, posted pictures of her shrine, and inspired me to create a few of my own, to Hestia, Earth/Gaia, my ancestors, and the elements.

Walking is a spiritual practice for me. In the past, hiking in the woods every day gave me a sense of peace and of being aligned with the rhythms of nature. My walks in Jerusalem still fill my dreams. A recent article by another Gaian Tarot Circle companion made me realize that walking is a meditation practice. 

I work with tarot cards because I think it’s important to exercise your intuition; if you don't use it, your lose it. Working with the cards makes me aware of when I need to be more in tune. The earth-based spirituality that inspires the Gaian Tarot appeals to me, but I also read with the Robin Wood Tarot.

Two days ago, another video by MIRTHandREVERENCE made me think of two of the animal spirit guides that were introduced to me last fall.

I don't have a Buddhist meditation practice, but started reading The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching by Thich Nhat Hanh. He encourages us to embrace our suffering and also "to touch deeply the things that bring you peace and joy." Buddhist meditation, however, is intimidating to me.

I also light yahrtzeit candles and Hanukkah candles, but choose not to light Shabbat candles. And I'm encouraging myself to traif up my fleishig dishes, which has been oddly difficult.

I'll continue these practices, but I probably won't start meditating. I should resume the "healing my sleep ritual" that helped me so much in September.

What is the goal of doing these things? 

They bring some grace and peace into my life. They cheer me up. No higher goal than that. And perhaps that's enough.

What spiritual practices speak to you? Why do you do them?

Cranberries

Hot, morning sunlight
Pouring into my kitchen,
Framing the stove in bands of light,
Filling a glass measuring cup.
The word “pint”
Inscribed in sugar.

from http://stock-clip.com

Poem for a funeral

A few hours after my father died, I called a rabbi and told him that I wanted to sit shiva. He responded, in a South African accent that had no trace of German in it, "Oh, no, no, no. But I'll send you a lovely poem, about the non-Jewish parent, that you can read at the funeral."

Stunned by my loss, I could only nod. He hung up and I tried to help my brother pack up my father's things, but I didn't know what to do and wandered around uselessly, unable to focus.

A few days later, I e-mailed the rabbi reminding him that my brother and I would be scattering my father's ashes that evening and that he'd promised to send me a poem to read.

It was several more days before the rabbi e-mailed the poem to me-- just the poem, not one word more. He didn't acknowledge that the funeral was past and he didn't offer condolences.

Here is the "lovely" poem:

This tradition, the way we remember our dead,
Is not yours.
But no one has a monopoly on grief-
Death comes to us all.
And I am deeply saddened to have lost you.
You made a mark upon my life which can never be washed away.
Which will never be forgotten.
And for which I will forever be grateful.
Your memory will be for me - a blessing -
That I have known you, and walked with you.
However briefly in this world.
Dayenu - And that will be enough.

I can't describe the emotions I felt when I read it, but I hoped it hadn't been composed for the writer's own father. The emotions expressed were tepid and shallow.

My father wasn't a "non-Jew." He was my father.

Much later, I realized it had probably been written by a prayer book committee and I wondered what kind of people would have written a prayer specifically for a "non-Jewish parent?"

On the first anniversary of my father's yahrtzeit, a non-religious, Jewish woman gave me two gifts. One of the gifts were these words, "It's written in stone that he loved you."

No news... good news?

As of today, Jerusalem is under attack, too.

None of the websites I just checked, CNN, NPR, USA Today, or the Wall Street Journal, mention it.

Between my tears, all I can say is, "I want to go home, I want to go home."

I wrote to one of my friends there, "Be safe and be brave. I love you for having the courage to be an Israeli and a soldier."

Pray for peace.

Demonstration at Hebrew University

This picture shows two demonstrations at Hebrew University in Jerusalem on November 15.

Both Arabs and Jews attend Israel's universities. Can you picture a non-violent demonstration like this in Syria or Egypt-- or Gaza? I can't.

The media is mostly ignoring the situation. People should see what has happened in Israel and Gaza. If you can bear it, here is a link to a few pictures.

How Homeowners View the World

Weeks ago, friends online were describing the glorious onset of autumn in various parts of the country. I couldn't contribute to the glee. Pine and juniper look pretty much the same all year round. All I could report was waking up to chilly, 70 degree mornings. (That's 21° Celsius.)

However, last Thursday, late in the afternoon, the cold arrived abruptly. A friend and I were stringing lights around the sunny balcony of her office when we noticed dark clouds rushing toward town and saw specks of rain on the old, wooden rails. 

The downpour began just as we hurriedly plugged the lights in. Inside her warm office, we pulled two chairs near the windows and gazed at car headlights bouncing and splashing down the wet street and at her Christmas lights flickering in the heavy rain. We wondered what liquor you use to make eggnog, or if liquor is even necessary.

The cold lasted only a few days, but long enough for the non-native trees, planted around the town by east coast settlers in the 1870s, to begin shedding their leaves.

Twelve miles away, my backyard looks snowed in. It is buried under the crunchy, golden leaves of a ten-year-old willow. 

Since we're in the high desert, yards here are landscaped primarily with gravel. My front yard, usually lifeless, dark, and severe, has been transformed into an inviting cushion of green and silver-gold, courtesy of an enormous willow.

Beautiful! At least that's what I thought...

On Sunday, a couple down the street were clearing leaves from their front yard. Raking leaves! What a novel idea! All I've ever done to leaves is admire and occasionally photograph them. 

I greeted Steve and Eydie (really) with a cheerful and meaningless comment about fall cleaning. Yes, Eydie sighed, it happens all the time because Roger never trimmed that willow tree. (Roger was the previous owner of my house.) 

I took the hint and called a gardening service. But really, it seems silly to clean up Earth's festive decorations.

You Are Part of This Whole Humanity

As a child in India, Krishnamurti was taken from his father by a group of British Theosophists. They believed he would become a great teacher of their beliefs, so they spent years training him and named him the head of their new organization, the Order of the Star in the East.

Years later, there was excitement all over the world as the Theosophists began preparations to announce that Krishnamurti was an incarnation of "The World Teacher." (Goyische for Moshiach?)

Before they could make the announcement, Krishnamurti renounced his position and returned the money and land that had been donated to the organization. He declared that no organized belief system could lead people to truth or to freedom.

However, during the next sixty-four years, people continued to ask, "Who are you?"

"When they ask you who you are, in that question is implied, 'You are somebody very great, therefore I am going to imitate you.'"

According to Krishnamurti, who we are is the result of imitation. We imitate fashions; the learning we acquire in school is imitation; even our inner lives are a result of imitation. He encouraged each person he met to discover who you are.

It is nearly impossible to step out of the "narrow circle" of our identities and to learn something new about ourselves. Our brains have become "sluggish, slow, dull, because we have conformed, we have obeyed, we have followed." To discover who you are requires a "psychological revolution in which there is-- at depth-- no conformity."

Don't conform, don't compare yourself to others. Inquire, observe yourself, and you will see that you are not "a small entity, struggling in the corner of the earth. You are part of this whole humanity," he reminds us.

I've relied on organized religion for many things, including a sense of belonging. Eventually, I realized that I already belong. I belong to the Earth, to myself, and everywhere is my home.

Although I had recognized that belief systems prevent a true experience of the world, until I listened to Krishnamurti, I did not consider how deeply beliefs penetrate my thinking. As I mulled over his assertion that we are the "result of a lot of imitations," I realized that everything about me is imitation!

His challenge "to step out of that narrow circle" of imitation and of absorption in our imitation-selves, does seem impossible, but he tempts us with a beautiful promise. This complete revolution in our thinking will give us "tremendous responsibility, vitality, beauty, love."