-
Tarot Explorations of Neruda’s Book of Questions I
Recently, I stumbled across a children’s picture book of Pablo Neruda’s Book of Questions. It’s a beautifully illustrated book of intriguing, poetic questions, and I bought it, because I thought, this lovely thing can’t just be for children. I didn’t know much about Neruda beyond his love poems, and I certainly didn’t know anything about his Book of Questions, a collection of 74 poems, comprised of 314 unanswerable questions, questions that remind you of a child tugging at your sleeve, “what’s that” “why is” “what for” “how come” “why does”, to which when we apply our adult experiences maybe we can answer, maybe we can’t. When I read the questions posed in the…
-
Getting it Wrong
I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to be wrong on the internet. I don’t mean spreading fake news; I’ve been worried about my “collective” readings on Instagram, some of which, must be “wrong.’ This worrying about wrongness all started with just play. I like to practice Reading like the Devil with juicy questions, so on Instagram, I love when @twisttheeleaf posts their monthly tarot challenge for the discord group DiscordTarotHolics. The challenge always contains fun philosophy questions, like this one, “What’s the point of life?” i.e., “What’s it all about Alfie?” I posted this is in response from my favorite Majors Only decks, Sergio Toppi’s Tarrocchi i Universali: “What’s the…
-
Surrender Dorothy! My 2023 Mixtape
A few days ago, my husband completed his Van Halen vinyl collection with the arrival of For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, a Sammy Hagar fronted 1991 album. Rounding out the collection was no easy feat since during the later Van Halen years, CDs were the rage, and vinyl albums weren’t being pressed. Walking to work, we reminisced about when the album came out, where we were in our lives (college), and I mentioned that I thought I had that album on, gasp, cassette tape. I had an extensive cassette tape collection. I would stay up late at night, with the lights out so my parents didn’t know, and I would record Rock Over London…
-
Cranky McCranky Pants, or the People of the Tarot de Marseille
The other day, I threw some cards and asked if blogging was a good idea. I didn’t exactly get the answer I wanted, but that’s ok, I never listen to anyone anyway, one of my issues I suppose. But I enjoyed the process, and I particularly enjoyed using my Tarot de Marseille deck, Tarot de Marseille Jean Dodal 1701 restored by Jean-Claude Flornoy. Today, I thought I’d talk about the parameters of what I mean when I say “Tarot de Marseille” versus Marseille style tarot versus modern pip decks so there’s no confusion going forward. The oldest known Tarot de Marseille deck, the Jean Noblet of 1659 (ok, so there’s talk of an…
