Today’s card is from a darker deck. I used this one for this week’s Tarotscopes. It’s a self-published deck from the instigator known as Inappropriate Tarot. I saw an image on Alison Cross’ Game of Thrones blog (a marvelous blog on Court cards) and loved it. It’s dark. It’s funny. It’s tragic. It makes a statement.
Here we see either one giraffe with two heads or two giraffes perfectly silhouetted against one another. As one reaches up for leaves, the other reaches down for what look like skulls. The card is splattered (trademark of the art on this deck). The words read Balance, Restraint. If you’ve ever seen a giraffe drink, you understand immediately why this elegant but gawky mammal might make an appearance as this card.
And it reminds me that I am a lizard petter. Jarring transition? Maybe, but stick with me. On my morning amble with the wuppy dogs, I saw a lizard on the fence. An anole to be exact although many of us call them chameleons. This was a tiny baby. My little finger was longer than he or she. I reached down slowly. She (or he) turned to look at me with big little baby lizard eyes. This was no reaction of fear–just curiosity. I gently stroked his (or her) back. S/he didn’t run but s/he did indicate movement so I withdrew. Just as slowly. Then I walked on.
My mama used to laugh and tell me I thought I was St. Francis of Freaking Assisi because a sparrow landed on me when I was sitting in our backyard. By her telling, I was about five years old. But it is true that I’ve always had an affinity for animals. My friends and family who travel with me sometimes express amazement at the animals I can spot. It’s particularly surprising when you understand that my vision in my right eye is 400/20. No, that’s not at typo. I’m technically legally blind in one eye but it is correctable with lenses. I used to be the kid with coke bottle glass. Grin. Yes, glass since the other eye was 40/20 then. It’s gotten a bit worse now that I’m in my 50’s and wearing progressives.
But back to lizard petting and giraffes and balancing acts. That lizard and I performed a very delicate act of moderation. I wasn’t trying to grab for her/him. S/he wasn’t running immediately. We were restrained in our actions which led to a tiny, brief, miniscule moment of balance.
I pet lizards. Do you? Do you want some help learning to balance your own life? Contact me (look to the right and click that contact me button). I can help.
Seek joy, y’all. Pass it on.
Get your own copy of the Darkana Tarot.
Interesting article! I’ve studied tarot a bit, inspired by my mother who’s a master tarot reader, but always come back to my Angel cards! I enjoyed the reference to the sparrow landing on you – a few years ago I was ‘testing’ the Law of Attraction by focusing on 3 things and seeing how they’d come into my existence. One of those items was a bird. A day after having focused on birds, flying, etc., I had a Chickadee land on my head! It was the strangest sensation – and the funny thing was, it had to fly over my 6’4″ hubby to land on me, 5″2″! Anyway, enjoyed the read, off to share it now!
In Light, Alexandria
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I too have a “thing” for/with animals. Born and raised in Africa (fifth generation), I had all kinds of “pets.” My second blog post for UBC was that wonderful essay, well, part of it anyway, by Henry Beston on our relationship with them. As for lizard petting, I’m there.
Oh! You are so lucky! On our honeymoon, we spent two weeks in the Florida Keys. One day, we went for a walk through some swampy trails at a park (it was boardwalked, but through those mangrove trees.) Eric kept seeing lizards EVERYWHERE. He would see one and say, “Look!” (They don’t have them in MN.) So I would look and after considerable coaching, I would finally see it. He did this like five times and I kept trying to see one myself so that I could point one out to him. It became an obsession, but I never did see one!
I did, however, nearly trip over an iguana. A rather large one that was being fed at our resort. It was Eric, once again, who pointed out its presence and I could most definitely see it after he pointed it out. He also pointed out to me the pelicans. He said, “Look at those pelicans!” I looked, and they were all standing super still on a dock a ways away, so I chided him and said that they were fake. “No,” he said. “They aren’t. Keep watching them.” So I watched them for a few minutes and still did not believe him because they NEVER MOVED ONCE as I was watching them. Then one moved and I was blown away. It was pretty cool.
During that same trip, we went snorkeling for the first time. I had not told Eric that I was scared of breathing through a tube and he had not told me that he was scared of fish. So the boat took us wayyyy out into the ocean to the coral reef area and then they said that we could get in and snorkel around. Everyone else had left the boat and Eric and I were both panicked in the water next to the boat. I had never seen Eric scared before and I actually was hyperventilating, which I have never done in my life before or since. We were quite the pair! We did OK, though. The people in the boat were really nice. Eric got over his fear of fish and I learned to relax and breath through a tube in my mouth and it was one of the best experiences we’ve ever had. By the end, they had to practically drag us into the boat. We did not want to leave! Now one of our dream vacations is to go and help plant coral to help the coral reefs. I think that would be fun, but we will probably have to learn snorkeling for that. Another adventure!