The fool

I really like this time of night. It's really quiet, and it seems like the rest of the world sleeps while you restlessly prowl around.

One of the projects I've got sitting on the shelf is to do an avant-garde tarot deck. This project has been gathering dust for a while now. It's pretty hard to beat Crowley's effort after all.

Every man and his dog is online nowadays, and you can even do a tarot reading with Crowley's deck online. Here are the results of one I've just done. I get all the good cards!

First card, representing me: The Star (Hope, faith, unexpected help. But sometimes also dreaminess or deceived hope.)

Second card, representing the current environment: Ten of swords (Ruin. Death. Failure. Disaster. Undisciplined warring force, complete disruption and failure. Ruin of all plans and projects. Disdain, insolence and impertinence, yet mirth and jolly therewith. Loving to overthrow the happiness of others, a repeater of things, given to much unprofitable speech, and of many words, yet clever, acute and eloquent.)

Third card, representing the obstacle: Seven of disks (Failure. Unprofitable speculation and employment. Little gain for much labor. Promises of success unfulfilled. Loss of apparently promising fortune. Hopes deceived and crushed. Disappointment. Misery, slavery, necessity and baseness. A cultivator of land, and yet is a loser thereby. Sometimes it denotes slight and isolated gains with no fruits resulting therefrom, and of no further account, though seeming to promise well. Honorable work undertaken for the love of it, and without desire of reward.)

Fourth card, representing the goal: The Hanged Man (Enforced sacrifice. Punishment. Loss fatal and not voluntary. Suffering generally.)

Fifth card, representing the basis of the current environment: Eight of Wands (Swiftness. A hasty communication. Letter, message. Too much force applied too suddenly. Very rapid rush, but too quickly passed and expended. Violent but not lasting. Rapidity. Courage, boldness, confidence, freedom, warfare. Violence, love of open air, field sports, gardens, meadows. Generous, subtle, eloquent. Can mean untrustworthy, rapacious, insolent, oppressive. Theft and robbery.)

Sixth card, representing the past: Seven of Swords (Futility. In character untrustworthy. Vacillation. Unstable effort. Journey, probably over land. Partial success, yielding when victory is within grasp, as if the last reserves of strength were used up. Inclination to lose when on the point of gaining through not continuing the effort. Love of abundance, fascinated by display, given to compliment, affronts and insolences, and to detect and spy on another. Inclined to betray confidences, not always intentional.)

Seventh card, representing the immediate future: Seven of Wands (Valour. Opposition, sometimes courage therewith. Possible victory, depending on the energy and courage exercised; obstacles, difficulties, yet courage to meet them, quarrelling, ignorance, pretence, wrangling and threatening, also victory in small and unimportant things, and influence over a subordinate.)

Eighth card, representing the future environment: Four of Disks (Power. Gain of money and influence. A present. Assured material gain, success, rank, dominion, earthly power completed but leading to nothing beyond. Prejudiced, covetous, suspicious, careful and orderly, but discontented. Little enterprise or originality.)

Ninth card, representing the influence of society: Five of Disks (Worry. Loss of profession. Loss of money. Monetary anxiety. Trouble about material things. Toil labor, land cultivation, building, knowledge and acuteness of earthly things, poverty, carefulness. Kindness, sometimes money regained after severe toil and labor. Unimaginative, harsh, stern, determined and obstinate.)

Tenth card, representing the challenge: Art (Combination of forces. Realisation. Action (material). Effect either for good or evil.)

Eleventh card, representing the outcome: The Priestess (Change, alteration, increase and decrease. Fluctuation for good or for evil.)