Turning Things Around: The Inner Tarot Revolution Week 6
Faces of Death
This week’s set of tarot cards is, once again, quite timely. I remember turning them over on writing the previous chapter and not exactly looking forward to dealing with them, particularly due to which card is which this time around. I’m thinking I’m going to tell some stories in this entry that I had been planning to tell later. One obstacle in mapping out my expansion here is deciding how “chronologically” I want to tell my stories. On the one hand, a straight chronological telling is probably the easiest way to understand. On the other hand, we don’t necessarily deal with our Shadow, with our traumas, in the nice, neat, chronological order in which they were first visited upon us. Sometimes I think we go the opposite way, in fact. At any rate, that’s how my journey with Veronica has carried me through such things.
Before I introduce the cards themselves, I’d like to follow the basic pattern I’ve been following for the last few entries, and open up with an introduction of the core themes I see running through both cards this week.
On Fidelity
What does it mean to be faithful?
We can view the concept of faith/fidelity on a number of different levels: We can ask, for example, how “faithful” any of the Gospels are to the true events of Jesus Christs’ life, and in this case our concern is with factual accuracy. What really happened there?
The truth is, we will never know. And no matter where else our explorations on this topic might take us, this seems to be the most important thing to keep in mind.
Thus, we might ask, in light of the above: Regardless of the facts, do you have faith in Jesus Christ? Do you believe in him? Do you rely on him? Will he carry you when you need him to? And if so…isn’t that all that really matters? Do we need to know any more? And most importantly: Does his relationship with you have anything to do with his relationship with anyone else? Does his love for, say, your buddy in the suburbs, take away from his love for you?
Of course, I have been interpreting these cards, lately, in terms of the myth of Erowen and Sarsha, and the earthly relationship it represents: The one between Veronica and I. Have we been faithful to one another? That’s a deep question.
The first time I was forced to truly tangle with questions such as the above coincided with my first trip, with my father, to Thailand. At the time, I had yet another one of my long-distance, internet girlfriends, this one from New Zealand. She’d been visiting her mother aunt (I think) in L.A. over a summer and we had spent most of that summer on the telephone. I was living, at the time, with my friend from high school in his family home in Lyons.
I was on the phone with her just before flying out and she gave me a hell of a sendoff: She turned over her office chair, unrolled a condom onto one of its legs, and “rode” that leg to orgasm…and according to her, she’d done this for my benefit. She knew I’d like it. She’d done some work with me on coming to accept my sexuality, and even to transform it into a self-love practice.
There I was in Bangkok, one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world, a metropolis with loads of history and plenty to do on any given night. I had the advantage of being an American with an exchange rate that really amplified my spending power. And all I could think about was my girlfriend, and getting time in Internet Cafes to chat with her.
One afternoon, she broke the news to me that she had been having cybersex and carrying on a relationship with a mutual friend of ours, and that it had been going on for some time. We had some interesting discussions about it. My girlfriend, being a strong feminist, was about to give me what I would later come to recognize as a fairly standard argument from biology for polyamory: The idea that there is merit to sexual competition, that arguably, we evolved to do just that, and that it was as it should be for a woman to take many partners and let the sperm work it out from there. In earlier Pagan societies, child rearing was more communal anyhow, so it’s not like a woman really had to think too hard about supporting a kid. She argued, spiritually, that the idea of “owning” another’s body that way, even with consent, was morally blameworthy and caused social problems. The divine and evolved way of things, she said, was to get with the program and embrace polyamory. In other words, I was supposed to be happy for her that she had found such joy in this activity that broke my heart.
This had been a recurring theme with me and my girlfriends, one I have linked to my natal Saturn in Scorpio opposing Venus in Taurus. I pick the girls with the cheating hearts and get burned again and again.
It came up with my first wife, too. Her game, though, was more often to do this all “ethically” by first breaking up with me, then sleeping with the guy, then getting back together with me, but expecting me to be totally cool with her remaining friends with the guy she fucked. Even be his FB friend, and be nice and civil to him and shit. To never bring up what happened with my woman, even though we all know it’s sitting right there under our very noses.
And I went along with it.
All of this came to a head when that wife finally decided she was done with me and that I needed to go fly home to the U.S.
At that point, tired of having my heart walked all over, I started thinking about new lifestyles. Maybe I needed to date a sex worker or something? Seriously, maybe I needed to leap headfirst into this morass if it was just going to keep coming up.
I acted on that in ways I will describe in greater detail some other time. But where I ended up, instead, was married to a Polytheist Pagan Priestess who, the general consensus among my friends and I is, was also probably cheating on me left and right during our relationship.
I met my current partner, Veronica, on an adult personals site with the intention of our connection being a hookup. In our early courtship, I learned I was by no means her first rodeo on the site, either.
Can you imagine what my head does with that after being burned so many other times? Especially when this woman is now pressing me hard to take a big leap of faith and leave the state to live in financial dependence on her, when my 2nd wife also used her financial power over me to systematically break me down and drain me dry?
It’s not pretty.
This week’s Top/Sun card is Atu XIII: Death. The Shadow card is 6 of Swords: Science.
Top Sun Card
Let’s start with the basic card correspondences:
The astrological sign is Scorpio, which is fairly famous for being “the sexy sign” when it comes to dating: The Scorpio native is said to be a person with deep, probably secretive sexual desires and a spirit willing to sting you to satisfy them. This person often cannot separate “loving” from “fighting.”
It’s just a card, though, right? And what’s the other most famous thing we often hear about this card?
“Don’t worry, it doesn’t hardly ever mean an actual death. It’s just a transformation.” Yes, but a true and comprehensive transformation will entail the very real death of something old for the sake of metamorphosis into something new.
I’ll just be blunt here: Lately, I’ve been obsessed with the idea that Veronica has been unfaithful to me, with a friend or friends of mine.
I won’t get into too much detail about how that narrative formed, but suffice to say, it’s all unfolded in such a way that the very friend in question seemed to be dropping many of the hints to me himself. In other words, to add insult to injury, the nightmare scenario in my head is telling me that not only did my friend and partner both betray me, but they did it on purpose, in a coordinated way that they are waving in my face, and it all feels very mean-spirited. Like they sit around talking shit about me in between rounds on my friend’s sofa.
I’ll be real, too, whenever I have sat down to pull tarot cards about it, I’ve basically been sitting down to take headshots from a professional boxer. The cards seemed to be rubbing it in, too.
The message really seemed to be…one more time: “Your girlfriend is having sex with other men and you basically just need to be okay with that, or you need to leave her.”
The Hebrew letter for this card is “Nun,” which translates to “fish.” “Fish,” like the sign Pisces, is where my head goes. And the way Lon Milo DuQuette describes this card and the alchemical phase it represents, this fish smells horrible. His words are, “There’s something rotten in Denmark.” It’s stinky to the gills. And I laugh, also, because Veronica always did tell me she wanted to be a nun, too.
There are actually anywhere between 3-5 separate possible scenarios playing out in my head over all of this, each with slightly different details. In one, this is all a sick cosmic joke, and even the people involved (V and my “friend”) aren’t fully aware of how their own words and actions are really appearing to me. In another, that is just a story I am telling myself to cope with my friend and my fiancee fucking each other.
I know what Rose herself seems to be telling me: The same thing Veronica tells me. That Veronica has been faithful, and that once I move down to Texas, I’ll see the light, and life will be good, even better than I’ve ever imagined. That I just need to trust her, to follow my heart and trust her.
Man, I am trying.
But unfortunately (or, depending on how you look at it, fortunately) for me, the only way I have managed so far is by taking a “middle way” where I hold faith with my Lady whenever I can, but then I lean into the cheating fantasy when it comes up.
So basically, I am moving toward trust in Veronica, but only by slowly programming myself to not only be okay with, but to actually get off on the idea of V cheating on me.
It’s…a confusing place to be. But it’s better than where I was.
DuQuette highlights three important symbols in this card that are relevant to the transformative process it represents. It’s about how Scorpio takes multiple forms.
The Scorpion is only one form, and it’s the lowest! The Scorpion, in its relative immaturity, skitters around with claws and a thick, chitin armor that protects its tender insides. It stings others, yes, but in so doing, often stings itself (Let’s cheat on our lover, so we lose them!). When the Scorpion is backed into a corner, that is the only thing it knows how to do.
When I first met V, I was a Scorpion.
Next is the snake or serpent. This is an intermediate phase where the armor comes off and the claws disappear, but we still aren’t quite liberated and transformed. The phase is one of flux and rapid shifting between the twin poles of life and death.
Finally, we arrive at the “final form,” the Eagle:
The highest aspect of the card is the Eagle, which represents exaltation above solid matter. It was understood by the early chemists that, in certain experiments, the purest (i.e., most tenuous) elements present were given off as gas or vapor.
Very Jupiterian talk, there.
V swears to me that she has been faithful. A big part of me will only accept that with qualification, i.e., “She does sleep with other people, and it’s not ‘cheating’ simply because she rationalizes it that way to herself. Just take the love from her that she offers to share with you, too, and be glad you get that much of her.”
She tells me it breaks her own heart to see me talking that way. And I know and remember that feeling, from the constant accusations of my ex. Every time she spat them at me was another dagger in the heart.
I just want the truth, whichever way this shit swings. I am at a point where I can handle the truth either way.
And according to Rose, that is where I need to be, and yet, V has nonetheless been faithful, just as she says. The reasons for this are deep and mysterious. In other words, fidelity is alright, and we are allowed to expect it and enjoy its fruits, as creatures who do, by and large, engage in pair bonding. However, our hearts will always be vulnerable to jealousy and our egos will always, to some degree, be running the show until we break them down.
And a good “cheating” story arc will take care of that handily.
The journey to the center of the Labyrinth brings us face to face with the Self.
The truth is, when it comes to infidelity, I am not innocent here. I could make qualifications about it, and I will be exploring the nuance of it all eventually. I was dealing with a sexual trauma and have no desire to cheat, after unlocking a bunch of it and moving it through me; but in sheer black and white terms?
It is arguable that, in a tit-for-tat sense, I did have this coming. If anything did, in fact, “come” of this all.
Shadow Card
This weeks’ Shadow Card is Six of Swords: Science.
I’m going to tackle the traditional Colman version of the card first:
This card fucks with me. The general sense of this card is often that of a family moving away from difficulty or hardship. They are leaving some unpleasantness behind them and rowing toward a new beginning.
I love the hope and optimism that can represent. I would love this. I feel within my heart the ability to do this. However, all I can think, when this card comes up, is: “But that means there’s something to be moving away from. Now what really happened? What was the unpleasantness?”
To that insecure part of me, this card could very well be confirming my worst fears, and advising, “it’s water under the bridge. Accept that it happened.”
And again, like I said above, that is the only way to make sure I am never hurt in this way again. You cannot be hurt in this way if you lean into the idea that your partner may or may not be having sex with other people, and you’ve adjusted your attitude toward dealing with that if it happens to be true. If you are okay with sharing your partner, your partner can never “betray” you by sharing themselves with someone else.
It’s the only guarantee, but taking this road means unequivocally making the statement that I don’t trust my partner.
In Veronica’s words: “Si no bueno.”
In the Thoth deck, the sense of this card is different. It depicts an extremely balanced arrangement of the points of six swords so that they converge upon the center of a Rose Cross. That rose. It suggests leveraging the powers of discernment on the situation.
Why would I think my partner might be cheating? What reason might she have?
Last year, around her birthday, she received a serious health diagnosis. I didn’t handle it in the best way; I made a comment that was perceived as minimizing her condition (though in reality, from where I sit, my comment spoke more to just how strong and competent I think my Lady is, how much I admire her). She says that she took some serious injury there. And while she has not ever said so explicitly, she has dropped many a double-entendre to paint a fairly vivid picture of a woman who, feeling hurt and slighted, ran into the arms of another man who made her feel safe, picking one who would also teach me a severe lesson about undervaluing my treasure. Some of the double-entendre (and some apparent syncs involving other people, it must be admitted) suggests this carried on for quite a while. 8 months at the very least, but possibly more.
Some of them even suggest she knew my friend before I ever introduced them to one another.
Realistically, if she’s been as sick as her diagnosis has suggested, she doesn’t have time, energy, or inclination to be running around on me like that. And this scenario would involve her going to incredible lengths, for example, to make me think she was down in Texas while she was really up here sleeping with my friend (who is going through a divorce and very openly seeing other people). Again, this would also speak to how highly I view my Lady, because these scenarios involve her using a jailbroken phone and pulling some hacker moves with SnapChat…all of which she is very capable of doing, if such a thing is possible. This is a woman who used to write tutorials for flashing custom OSes onto Android phones, an operation I’ve tried numerous times, bricking several devices along the way.
Still. Possible though it is? It’s farfetched. And clearly a suspicion born of trauma. I note that this all did get much worse right about the time I started talking about my aunt in therapy.
At a psychic level, I am wounded and gushing blood everywhere. This shit is like a Tarantino flick, maybe Kill Bill.
I can handle the truth, whatever it is.
But I know I still want my Lady’s virtue preserved.
Marriage isn’t natural, no; my girlfriend from New Zealand was right on that front. It’s an artificial process, a commitment that forces certain changes, much like being forced to confront your partner’s cheating forces certain changes.
The question is: Which changes do we invite into our lives?
Maybe we should be focusing on those?