Procrastination or Plan?

There are problems with creating, mostly procrastination. With editing. With rewriting. With being bombarded by great ideas when I'm supposed to be focused on another book that needs to be finished. So, is it procrastination or avoidance or just good sense to come up with an idea for a series of books, especially when series seem to garner the most attention -- and sales?

I'm going to go with great idea.

Looking at Piers Anthony, who my brother and youngest sister have raved about for years and I have avoided, brought me to a description for the first novel. He wrote hard and slick science fiction and then he hit upon fantasy and made his fortune and enshrined his name in Franklin Mint history with figurines from his best selling series.

I'm having trouble getting people to notice my serious books. He had problems getting noticed, although not as much as I have had. He decided to write fantasy and changed his fortune. I could write a series, other than the Memory series currently waiting in the wings to be typed up and published, and use the tarot cards. It's not a big deal. I wrote several articles, with examples, on using the tarot cards to spark that creative fire and create stories.

Why not, my brain insisted while I struggled through the usual dictations, use the fool's journey, which is the heart and origin of the tarot cards, to write a series of books, calling each series by the designations of the cards? Major Arcana, Minor Arcana, and four series to go with the wands, swords, cups and coins? I'll bet that would sell, and I might find the beginning for the fairy novel set in the event horizon of a black hole (time dilation which explains the whole few hours in faery and years lost on earth) I've been contemplating for a while. Anything is possible, and it makes good sense physics-wise. I think strange thoughts when I'm deep into sleep debt, and my dreams are very vivid. This is no dream. I was awake at the time and I think it would actually work.

The problem is not to think it to death. I have a problem with that, too. I plan out everything and then still end up writing by the seat of my pants. I'm a pantser. I admit it. I do, however, have dreams of being more disciplined, but I'm not. I work best when I wing it.

Anyway, it's an idea, one that may not last beyond this post, but an idea all the same that might propel me from the ranks of the obscure into a cabin in the high Rockies with a guest house, a jeep and the time to write while giving up wage slavery forever.

I kind of like that idea. Now I have to wait and see if it passes the next day test, sort of like dyeing your hair or getting it cut. If it still looks good the next day and I don't regret it and want to shave my head, then it's a good.

There. I've made a plan. On to the procrastination portion of this program.

Tarot: Sharing the wealth

When the moving finger writes and the Wheel of Fortune turns, it always comes around again -- as does karma. What you reap is what you sow and what you are given is multiplied. Now it's time to share.



The man in the Ten of Swords looks dead -- or just beat and at the end of his strength. A timid deer moves closer to take a look and overhead crows fly. Crows are psychopomps, guides of the dead and carriers of the spirit. They are flying away, so the man is in no danger of dying. Since the deer moves closer, it is obvious the man is no threat. The deer is also the symbol of purity of purpose, its nimble feet carrying it into the light that shines from the swords hanging above the man's body. The deer is also a symbol of strength and longevity. The race is not over, just this part of it.

The Ten of Swords is a message that it's time to hang on when you think you cannot go another step. The tide is about to turn and the Wheel of Fortune has come around. With a little bit of hope and determination, you will find you can go one more step, and one more step is all that's needed to gain solid ground because the reward for which you have worked so hard is at hand. Just as the swords glow and shed their pure light on the man, holding back the twilight sky to light the way, so does the Ten of Swords signify that your time is at hand.



Five men contend with other, pitting their strength and skills against each other, but the Five of Wands is not a battle to the death, but a time of scrutiny and attention to detail. These men are learning from each other and sharing their skills and experience with each other like brothers at arms training to battle the foe. In the grass beneath their feet, butterflies flit among the cattails and two mice seek food in the grass beneath the late afternoon sky.

The butterflies are the symbols of metamorphosis, grace and balance and the mice pay attention to the smallest details, assessing strengths and weaknesses.

This is the time to help yourself, like the butterfly that must battle its way out of the cocoon in order to strengthen its wings and earn its survival, a time to know yourself and reach your ultimate potential as the mouse knows where to find food and how to squeeze through the smallest spaces to get where it wants to go. Although the men compete with each other, each is also competing with himself. As you learn about yourself, take the opportunity to grow and help your companions grow and get better.

The Five of Wands reminds me of Jacob wrestling with the angel to earn the right to found a nation. Jacob was given a new name to honor his struggle. One thing Jacob was aware of was his motive; he dreamt of taking all he had learned and earned and making the most of it, of creating a new life and sharing what he had learned with his children and his people. That is the message of the Five of Wands. Improve yourself and society and use what you have learned to build, not destroy, for surely as you use your knowledge to destroy others, you will be destroyed.



An open chest overflows with bright pentacles. A ferret looks into the chest with a smile on his furry little face while below in the grass a turtle moves methodically and slowly on his way, unaware of the wealth falling around him and unconcerned about anything but the task at hand. Who has left the chest open and why is it unattended. Doesn't the owner care that someone will steal what he has gathered? No.

The Ten of Pentacles, like the Ten of Swords, is the end of a cycle. At the beginning, the Fool started with a single pentacle and through hard work and wise investment he has increased the gift he was given tenfold and now he is ready to repay his debt with interest.

I am always reminded of the biblical tale of the two servants and the ten talents when I look at the Ten of Pentacles. One servant buried his talents in the ground to await his master's turn while the other servant took the talents he was given and multiplied them, returning the original ten talents to his master along with the fruits of his investments. He shared the wealth while the other servant merely hoarded what he had been given.

The Ten of Pentacles reminds us to share the wealth, to give something back to the Universe. Whatever talents or gifts you were given and have increased by practice and wise investments should now be shared. Like the ferret whose sharp intuition and acute sensitivity give it the edge in knowing what and how to make the most of the least, make the most of the gifts you have been given by sharing them with those who need it most. My motto has always been that knowledge is wasted when it isn't shared.

The turtle in some cultures is viewed as an invitation to share blessings of heaven and earth, providing a doorway between worlds, between what was and what could be. All you need to do is walk through it. As always, with the four elements, ten symbolizes the end of a cycle. It's a time to rest, re-evaluate and share what has been learned and earned. Now is that time. Don't hold onto anything you can't use; spread it around.

* * *

A woman has reached the end of the trail. She is tired and foot swore and doesn't feel she can go another step. She falls to the ground, worn to the nub. What she doesn't realize is that the end of her journey is just beyond the trees that close in around her. She has learned so much on her journey and she brings help and knowledge back to the people of her town, but in order to fulfill her task and share what she has learned, she must get up and walk one more step through the trees. Just one more step is all that's left of her long and arduous journey. One more step and she can rest.

What was the reason for the woman's journey? What did she seek and what knowledge has she earned? What hurdles did she face and climb? What has she learned? Will she fail or will she succeed now that she is so close? Will someone come looking for her and help her get home or will she rouse herself for one last push? What story do the cards tell you?

* * *

One thing I have learned is that the Wheel of Fortune keeps turning whether we succeed or fail. Throughout our lives, especially as writers, there is a time to learn and a time to share what has been learned. Maybe it's time to share what you've learned, so find someone who is need of what you know and share it. Be sure your motives are pure and you are ready to move forward. Until you give a little of what you have learned back, cast your seeds into the fertile ground, you cannot move on. Will you stay down, weary of the struggle, or will you get up and take that final step, open your bag of tricks and share your treats? You can either bury your talents or increase them and share the proceeds. It's all up to you.

Until next week, give the tarot cards a chance to show you the stories they contain. The Fool's journey is the journey of every character and your journey as a writer. Take a leap of faith, trust your instincts, and use what the Universe has given you no matter where it leads you.

Tarot: The alchemy of theory in practice

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune... are always in flight to your location -- and mine. Doesn't it seem like as soon as one problem is solved another is queued up waiting to hit you with another shot? That's life. C'est la vie. And all that stuff.

For writers, you're only as good as your last book and that may be the root of the problem, topping one moderately or wildly successful book with another and another and another and . . . well, you get the idea. Sometimes it feels like the only way to get ahead is to stay behind, except if your first book fails, no one is going to queue up to contract another book with the idea that the next one will be better. Publishing doesn't work that way.

You could rely on workmanlike prose and stories that are consistently mediocre and produce good consistent sales with the occasional literary and popular spark of brilliance, and that may be the way to go, even if you never reach above good consistent, mid list sales. It's a living and a living that the bulk of writers make. Mid list writers are the fuel that keeps the publishing engine running while the wildly successful breakout books garner all the attention and the bulk of promotional dollars. Still, publishing remains a "what have you done for me lately" kind of business and one that writers, real writers and not dabblers or amateurs, can't and won't give up.

About the only thing that keeps writers down more than disappointing sales and okay to bad reviews, is the writer himself, paralyzed by fear of success or simply paralyzed by the blank page. So many ideas to choose from and so little time to write because it always seems like the deadline that was years away is looming closer and closer and you, the writer, are standing in the middle of the juggernaut's path like a deer frozen in the headlights of an onrushing truck. What's a poor writer to do?



The fagged out Knight in the Four of Swords lies beneath three sharp and glittering swords poised to strike him dead center in the heart. Instead of danger, these swords are the problems waiting him when he gets up to fight again. Actually, the war weary soldier is safe from the battle behind the impenetrable stone walls of his chamber where he can take a break before facing the next challenge afresh. In this stable and secure sanctuary, the soldier will be able to marshal forces and resources to solve the looming problems. The situation is difficult, but more problems will arise if he doesn't take a step back to get a fresh perspective, meditate and weigh his options and find his center while recharging his emotional, physical, spiritual and intellectual resources. He has carefully built a solid foundation and can rely on that to support him when he is rested and refreshed. The one thing he cannot and should not do is ignore the problem; it won't go away, and ignoring it will not solve anything. Once he is ready to plunge back into the fray, he must do so with single-minded focus and avoid distractions.



When I think of Temperance I think of old stories of Carrie Nation and her crusade against alcohol. For Carrie and her crew, abstinence was the only way and moderation merely a slower path to destruction. That is not the meaning of Temperance in tarot.

This fiery-haired, passionate and strong willed woman holds two cups in her hands. One is gold and the other silver. From these brimming cups she mixes the contents to produce something new, blending until she gets the brew just right, tempering extremes in behavior, belief or feeling. She tempers life as a smith tempers iron in a white hot fire, mixing in air and charcoal to produce a strong and flexible sword to win battles and maintain order, maintaining and expressing passions perfectly. This wondrous wench is an alchemist who knows that in order to live well one must live life fully with one's internal beliefs in perfect harmony with external action and with the world around him.

Temper life physically, spiritually, emotionally and intellectually, mixing and blending with skill and wisdom so that life is a blend of elements in perfect balance. Beware extremes in behavior and don't let fear of making a mistake lead to inaction or stasis in which nothing is gained or solved or lived. Choose action or inaction appropriate to the current situation.



The Page of Swords is a youth in the first flush of knighthood. He has not been tested in battle, but he has spent years practicing and honing his skills, learning battle strategies and etiquette and how to wield his sword with strength and bravery. He masks his fear with an air of confidence and pride that borders on disdain. He knows it all. He can do it all. He is an old hand and nothing surprises him. However, anyone who meets him can clearly see his apprehension and his doubts. They know he knows his trade and how to use his sword -- in theory. He's not been tested in battle.

He is ready to face new challenges and turn theory and logic into practice, but behind his bravado is fear. He is scared. What he doesn't know is that fear is understandable. Everyone is afraid before their first encounter, yet he also knows there is no substitute for experience, an experience he lacks. The only thing he can do is put on his armor, sharpen his sword and plunge into the fray, trusting what he knows and has worked so hard to achieve. Battles are fought with sword and muscles and intellect, but it wouldn't be wise to over analyze his opponent or strategy.

Swords in the tarot cards symbolize the intellect. The message of the Page of Swords is that too much thinking and planning will paralyze you. The other meaning of the Page of Swords, as with all pages of the court cards, is that a message is coming that usually deals with a current problem, issue or belief system. Basically, don't think too much, take things as they come and trust what you know.

* * *

Rest. Reboot. Temperance. Trust.

Life is a series of problems to be solved and wisdom to be gained and Francoise is no exception. She has worked hard to reach the top of her profession as a clothing designer, learned the essence of style and knows the way fabrics, color and embellishments work together or fight each other to a fashion nightmare standstill. She is an apprentice to a world class designer who has suddenly fallen ill and will not be able to helm the coming show for the new spring fashions. As his second-in-command, she understands his vision for the season and she is suddenly thrust to the forefront to finish the designs he began and create the rest of the designs in time for the showing. She's afraid she doesn't know enough and that she has not had enough time to prepare. Her career will be made or broken in one month and she's terrified. How will she manage?

In addition to her problems at work, her relationship is on the skids and heading for disaster. If she doesn't act quickly, the love of her life will walk away. She is being pulled in two directions: work and love. Both are important. Her relationship works best when she is caught in the fire of creation and her creative juices flow best when she is happy and in love. Everything is spinning out of control and time is running out.

You decide. Will Francoise rise to the occasion or fall flat on her face? Will this opportunity be a chance to make her mark or will she, after all the years of hard work and honing her talent, analyze herself into a professional coma? If she spends too much time on work, she'll lose George, and if she spends too much time with George, she won't be able to work. It's your story and your choice. What will you choose to illustrate?

* * *

Life is all about choices and using learning as a springboard to bigger and better things. Sometimes the best way to handle a problem is to take a step back and a deep breath, close your eyes, summon your courage and everything you have learned and take a leap of faith, trusting in what you know. Facing the blank page is difficult, but you'll never get a single word down if you don't face the page and trust yourself. The good thing about writing is that you can always revise, edit and revise again before committing your vision to print. Luckily, even after the contract is signed, you can revise, edit and rewrite again and again until everything works just right.

Once the editing is over, your vision is out there for everyone to see. Don't worry so much about how your writing will be received, get busy on the next book, story or article. It's like being thrown from a horse. In order to conquer your fear, get back up in the saddle and do it again quickly before fear paralyzes you. Trust what you know and remember that writing, like life, is a learning experience that always leaves room for more experience. Trust what you know and don't be afraid to try new things. That's how writers grow and evolve. Lay the groundwork and layer in texture bit by bit. There's always room for improvement.

Tarot: Passion's Journey

After spending most of my life traveling, I still balk a little when it's time to set off, often leaving some things until the last minute just in case I change my mind. Once I do make up my mind and take that first step, there is no hesitation and everything is done quickly and efficiently. Sometimes I think I need that moment of doubt, a chance to change my mind or wait just a little while to be sure I know what I'm doing and why. It's impulse control of a sort.

I am a spontaneous person about many things, at least on the surface. When it comes down to it, the spontaneity has an element of careful thought, weighing and measuring the options and the effects of what I am about to do -- or not do. Even with passion, I think about what I will and won't do before I lose myself in the moment. No one sees it, but it is there. I am always aware of it. And I have learned not to let my careful thoughts derail the passion or rein it in too much when I finally let go. It's like making sure there is a net or the safety harness really is adequate for the task.

The Knight of Wands is ready for battle: armor polished, lance sharpened and ready, horse and knight both rested and anxious for the next adventure. The Knight of Wands is confident and sure of his purpose and his stance and colors denote passion and bravery. He is an accomplished knight ready for whatever adventures he finds and his passions move him quickly onto the path because he's excited about what he's facing. He has no fear and the adrenaline sings in his blood as it does in his fiery steed's blood as the horse prances toward the next grand adventure. If adventure doesn't find the Knight of Wands, he will find adventure.

Our Knight is a dark-haired romantic who is witty and can be quite flirtatious. He also tends to be fierce, short-tempered, impulsive and often impetuous. He is a spiritual wander, a traveler and adventurer who needs to learn that the prize he seeks is not always the goal. Sometimes the mission provides nothing more than change and transformation of who he was and will be.

The Knight of Wands' Achilles heel is his passion. He needs to be aware of a tendency toward recklessness and keep it reined as closely as he reins his horse during a charge. Passion and bravery are fine attributes, but like a nocked arrow or a couched lance must be aimed. It pays to be careful.

The man on the shore in the Three of Wands is a man of substance and wealth, a man who has succeeded in nearly every endeavor. He watched the ship in the bay sail away on the tide and now he must wait. He has invested well in the past, but there is no telling whether or not his current venture will be a success. He can only trust to the winds, the weather and the competence of the sailing master to bring the ship back laden with riches. It is out of his hands and no amount of worry or second-guessing is going to change the future. He has no control over anything but what he has invested and what he carefully planned and put together.

This is a time of gestation, not action. The choice is made and nothing he does or feels or things will change the outcome of this venture. The situation will provide him with a good opportunity to learn patience and control and let the forces he has set into motion follow their own course.

He should rely on the strength of the venture he has put together and the insurance he has had to foresight to put in place. He has done his job to the best of his ability. Nothing else is required of him, but that he focus on the next task or venture.



The richly clad young man facing the rising full moon at the start of a journal in the Eight of Cups has it all -- or at least looks like he has it all. He has tasted the fruits of his rich life and found them missing something. There is a void inside him that cannot and has not been filled by his present life and he feels empty, so empty that he needs to do something, go somewhere, find something to fill the void inside him. It can't be filled by what he already has, so it must be "out there" somewhere beyond the life he has created.

Looks can be deceiving. A man who looks like he has it all doesn't always have very much at all. Life is not all about houses, bank accounts, jobs, financial security and family, especially when the family is little more than a paper family. This man lives in a house, but it's not a home, no matter how much he does to make it comfortable and keep it well maintained.

The Eight of Cups is about temporary success, waning interest, troubled relationships, abandonment and fear of commitment and depends on the cards that precede or follow it. The mole in the lower right corner signifies blindness to the truth, to surroundings and to what really drives a man to abandon everything and look for more outside the life he lives.

It may well be that he has been blind and most likely has chosen to be blind to his surroundings and relationships. As he faces the rising of the full moon lighting up the darkness, he opens his eyes blinks and must acclimate to the brilliant light shining down on him. He feels something pulling him out of the darkness and into the light toward the dawn that colors the far horizon. Will he be able to face the full force of the sun or will he close his eyes again and retreat back into the darkness where it's safe?

He has a choice to make: follow the voice inside him that urges him to turn away from the shallow comfort and empty silence of his present life or remain willfully blind and unfulfilled. He must be careful. His restlessness may be no more than a desire to run away from his responsibilities or it may be the true calling of his soul. One thing he must do before he turns his back on his empty life is to clean up his mess and set things in order. The Eight of Cups does not tell him to run away from his problems or find temporary solace somewhere else, but to face up to his mistakes and past choices and walk into the light unencumbered by the past to follow the calling of his heart and soul, to fill the empty aching void inside himself.

* * *

A dark-haired man who has worked hard and become successful finds that he has lived a narrow and confined life. He has done everything he was supposed to do -- work, make money, marry and have children -- but something is still missing. Once upon a time he chose the safe path and now on the verge of retirement he wonders if he hasn't wasted his life and his resources.

He owns several homes and is financially secure and his neighbors and colleagues see him as a successful man with a happy life. It's all a sham. He has given up everything, including his self respect, to maintain the fiction that his life has become, spending his whole life providing for others instead of himself. Oh, he has done some of the things he wanted, but always at a high personal cost.

Inside he feels empty and hungry for something more. He is a passionate man who has curbed his passions to keep the peace, but what about what he wants? Can he turn his back on everything he has built and find happiness? Does he even deserve to be happy if he makes others miserable?

What do you think? How would you tell his story?

* * *

Until next time, pull out the tarot cards and see what they show about the motivations, dreams and possibilities for your characters.

Tarot: Victim or Victor

I once told a friend who was intently pursuing a man who turned her life inside-out and upside-down and then walked away only to come back again and again that the reason he didn't stick around was because she had nothing to offer -- not to him or to herself. She couldn't make up her mind about what she wanted to do and bounced from job to job and school to school, constantly changing her major and her goals. She was scattered, uncertain and spent her life moving from one friend's house to another, watching their children in exchange for room and board and a little money. Everyone took advantage of her, but she didn't see a way out. She had to have a place to stay and couldn't hold a job long enough to earn the money to get a place of her own. She had grants for school and kept flunking out or failing to show up, always ready with excuses. "I didn't have a way to get there. I didn't have any clean clothes. I got up too late."

She had more excuses than anyone I've ever seen before, and yet she kept getting one break after another. Jobs fell into her lap and she seldom held them for more than three weeks, and it was always someone else's fault. She had nothing of her own and didn't mind living off other people -- or other men. Some guy was always ready to bail her out and she played the damsel in distress very well.

By contrast, Jason, the guy she was obsessed about, had a good job and had a place to live. Granted, it was his mother's house, but he paid the bills and kept it clean. His family had several homes and he came from a wealthy family, so where he lived was really no surprise. He was used to better. So, here comes this girl from the ghetto with no ambition and nothing she could call her own and she wanted him. He enjoyed her company and the sex, but wasn't ready to make their relationship permanent. He didn't mind helping out from time to time, rescuing her from her latest situation, but he didn't want the job full time.

I told her she needed to get herself and her life together before he would consider her as anything more than a booty call or occasional girlfriend. She needed to do it for herself more than anything else, get her life settled. She was almost 30 at that point, and being almost thirty with nothing to show for your life is a very sad situation. She wasn't the kind of girl that rich men went out of their way to wine and dine and shower with riches, but rather the girl who would do their nails. No class, no education and nothing to show for her life except a string of failures. She didn't listen. The only thing she wanted to know was how to trap him.

And trap him she did. She got pregnant. After seven abortion, because the fathers weren't him, she got pregnant. It happened under the effects of drugs and alcohol when he forgot to use a condom or pull out in time. She had him dead to rights and she let him know when she was far enough along that an abortion wouldn't be feasible that he was going to be a father. He ran away from her and refused to have anything to do with her. She pursued him and, when he wouldn't give her what she wanted, she went to his family.

She now has a son, his son, and he pays child support regularly. She still has no job and no prospects and no place to call her own. She's living with her mother for now, but time is running out, so she has made a plan to get help from Welfare and other charitable organizations to take care of her and her child. She's 31 years old and still hasn't learned.

So what does this tale have to do with today's cards? It depends on whether you see my friend as a victim or a victor.

The Nine of Wands shows a soldier weary from battering against an insurmountable blockade. He has put everything into the battle and leans on his remaining support, remaining upright by will alone. When he went into the battle, he was certain he'd succeed. Everything was on his side: experience, intelligence, skill and desire. He is puzzled. Why didn't he succeed? What went wrong.

Beside him in the ivy is a scarab, symbolizing the quiet voice of the soul, the voice that says, "You need time to figure this out. Retreat and regroup."

He needs to contrast his belief in success against his worldly experience and reconcile the data, balance his experiential and emotional checkbook, so to speak. Failure has caught him napping and nothing turned out as he had planned; he is not certain why. He needs to go over the data, reflect and find the flaw in his approach, learn from his mistakes and find a way to turn defeat into victory, and then try again.

The message of the Nine of Wands is not to despair when a difficult situation seems insoluble and confusion. Nothing is impossible. Sometimes it is a matter of taking a few steps back and re-evaluating the situation, learning from the mistakes while healing and figuring out a different pathway through the barrier. Above all, don't use this setback as a reason to escape from life. Life is about struggle. Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose, but the losses can become victories if you take the time to learn from them. We often learn more from our mistakes than from our victories. Victories are easy and failure a chance to grow and expand knowledge. Don't waste it.

Pentacles are earthly symbols, the sign of the material. In the Nine of Pentacles, a wealthy and accomplished woman stands in a flourishing garden gazing intently at the hooded falcon on her wrist. She takes pride in her surroundings and her pride is evident in the garden, a feat she has achieved alone. She is a strong woman who has chosen a solitary path and she's comfortable in it, comfortable with herself and in her own skin. She has a right to be proud and in spite of her choices she is not lonely. She needs no one.

The nines of the minor arcana are symbolic of nearing the end of a journey. There is still a little more to come and for the accomplished woman in the Nine of Pentacles what is to come is a companion, someone to share and enjoy her garden and all she has accomplished. After all, success is a dish that tastes better when shared.

It's it often the case that those who want for nothing are the ones who get the best breaks and people are always willing to do things for them? Think of movie stars and celebrities. They have more money than they can spend in 100 lifetimes, and people fall all over themselves to give them whatever they admire. For instance, Queen Elizabeth of England often goes down to the high street to shop. Whatever she admires is given to her free of charge.

I remember a story about Hedda "the Hat" Hopper, the gossip columnist. During the depression when most people had nothing, Hedda mentioned in her column that she couldn't find a decent hat to wear. Tens of thousands of readers made hats and sent them to her, many of whom had little enough for themselves.

That's the way it goes. Make your life a success so that you have everything you need or want and, when you least expect it, more will be added. In the case of the Nine of Pentacles, that more would be someone to share your life.

The Wheel of Fortune, or Fate as some call it, turns beyond our control. It is mechanized and in perpetual motion, turning round and round, like the clockwork mechanism of the sun and planets and universe. It defines and is moved by the rhythms of nature and life, attuned to the energy and music of the spheres. The sun in the background symbolizes the mind: centered and secure, never worrying about the wheel. The mind is not at the Wheel of Fortune's mercy; it is apart, free. Everything that happens -- good or bad or indifferent -- depends on your point of view. The situation could be a blessing, a curse, a tragedy or an opportunity, or so much more or less, depending on what you see.

When the first colonists came to the New World, they viewed the natives as savages without culture or wealth, owning nothing and having no morals or society. The native viewed the colonists as children, idiots who did not see or understand the wealth around them or how they could feed and clothe and house themselves. They were over dressed, over sexed, and over here, to borrow a saying from England during World War II. The colonists saw the land as something to possess, put their fences around and set to orderly rights. The natives saw the colonists as intruders intent on forcing everyone and everything to conform to their way of life without respect for the millennia of culture and contented life that existed before them. Each saw the other as an obstacle to remove and bloodshed followed. It was all a matter of point of view who was right and who was wrong.

Out of great wrongs came The United States of America, a country hacked out of the a Garden of Eden, raped and pillaged and born in fire, bloodshed and death along a trail that extended from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Much great has come from America, but there has also been much harm. Which outweighs the other no one can truly tell because everyone sees things from a different point of view. What is good to one person is evil to another. And so it goes. The Wheel of Fortune turns, grinding down all in its path who fail to see that, although time and fate march on without us, as long as we understand and accept what can and cannot be controlled, life need never be a tragedy or a disaster.

See the cycles of the Wheel for what they are. Don't use fate as an excuse to avoid responsibility or a reason to blame someone else for bad luck or misfortune. Learn to control what you can and let the rest go. Accept blame only for what you did wrong. Take responsibility only for what you can control -- and didn't or wouldn't. There are enough people to take the blame for the rest. Above all, learn to find the good in a bad situation because every situation is a learning situation.

* * *

A woman owns a large piece of land on which she has built a home, tends a garden that provides herbs and food and beauty and she runs a successful business. She has it all and she is happy and content.

In her youth she spent a lot of time trying to find the right man with whom to share her life, but she had nothing to show for all those years except scars, experience and a drive to make something of her life on her own, depending on no one. She had been taught by her mother that a woman needs a man to complete her, to protect and give her everything she needs and, when she was young, she bought her mother's philosophy. When she couldn't find a man to complete her -- none of them were right and she ended up either supporting them or standing in the background -- she decided to make her own way. The result of all her hard work and effort is success, happiness and a feeling of contentment. She doesn't miss having a man around. She doesn't really need one, not with BOB, her battery operated boyfriend.

Midwinter night, December 21st, she sits in front of her fire after a pleasant meal sipping a glass of Merlot. As the full moon rises, she hears a knock on the door, a pounding really that fades into a faint scratching. She goes to the door and finds a naked man collapsed on her porch, shivering and blue with cold. She brings him inside, wraps him in warm blankets by the fire and fixes a cup of hot chocolate with a shot of rum. As he warms and begins to get back some color, she asks him who he is. He shakes his head, confused. "I don't know." He doesn't know where he was before he saw the lights in her windows or why or where he lost his clothes. The only thing he remembers is waking up, seeing her light and knowing there is where he'd find safety and warmth.

In my mind's eye, I see a different story than the one that will occur to you. Do you see a mystery or a fantasy? Is he a con man or something else? Who is he and what will happen in the days to come? Using the message and images of today's cards, how will you write this story's end?

As always, until next week, or when work slackens enough for me to be able to take the time and delve into the stories hidden in the tarot cards, keep writing.

Tarot: Dream a dream and work

After reading zombie stories, it was inevitable they would creep, or rather shamble, into my dreams, waking me up with a pounding pulse and a need to get away. The disorientation lasted a few seconds before sleep claimed me again, adding weights to my eyelids, body and limbs so that I was dragged back into the dream, but I was prepared for them. I changed the dream, shifting people and monsters, going down different roads and heading for more familiar territory until the dream was behind me. It's called lucid dreaming.

Dreaming can be a release, for writers a way to work out plot points and get closer to their characters (whether they want to or not) and a way for the unconscious mind to surface and pick up threads from every part of the conscious mind and memories to weave a fantastic tapestry of people, places and events that can heal, relax and scare the bejeezus out of the dreamer.

And dreams are a way to reach for more in the waking life. Dreams are also a place to start, but not a place to linger or end.



Asleep under a tree, the young man is dreaming, completely unaware of the full cups beside him or the full cup right in front of him. He's more intent on his dream than on what he already has or is given. The squirrel in the tree and the mouse in the grass are more curious about what's in the cups than the dreamer. The mouse and squirrel follow their instincts, but the dreamer is locked in his dream, dreaming his life away.

The young man is a romantic who is looking for something better to come down the road toward him or to find something better over the next hill, around the next corner, instead of seeing what is right in front of him. The Four of Cups symbolizes a quest for order and stability in a perfect world; it does not exist. The Four of Cups shows a disdain for reality, someone who is unwilling to see the gifts he has in plenty and more gifts offered, but keeps looking for something more, the ideal, ignoring the happiness he has and could have because he cannot see the difference the connection between his gifts and realities. There are no guarantees and expecting or demanding a guarantee will guarantee that what is right in front of you will disappear either because they were ignored or because someone with sense will pick them up and take them away.



Blind Justice has no power to harm, but holds the balance of karma in her own hands. Justice stands on the fulcrum between past and present, a guide, not an active force.

Past actions determine the present, but present actions can change the future. You cannot change the past, but you can change course and walk into a brighter future by what is decided at this moment, and this moment, and the next moment. The future is changeable. The past is fixed.

Look to the past to understand what created the present situations and take responsibility for your actions. Use that knowledge to make better choices for a better future. Learn from the errors and make choices based on the lessons of the past to realize and make a happier future a reality.



The Ace of Pentacles is the gift of resources: money, raw materials or time. Use skill and determination to make use of the available resources given and be grateful. Do not give in to the temptation to under value or squander the resources. Some resources are best used when they're offered. Don't hoard them or save them for a rainy day or when you have more time. There is no time like now.

Resources and gifts may seem mundane or not a true gift of the universe, but there are no coincidences and no accidents. As Einstein said, "God does not place dice with the Universe." The Ace of Pentacles offers a straight forward message: the riches of life are yours if you have the good sense to take them and use them. Don't waste time or money or the raw materials of talent or the earth because you only waste your own happiness. Remember the lesson of the weasel, take what's offered and don't look back.

* * *

My mother has always called me a dreamer and my quick response was that without dreamers she would still be huddled in a freezing cave gnawing raw meat from a sated lion's kill terrified of the snarls and growls just outside the cave entrance. Okay, it's a little more descriptive than I used to say, but not by much.

Yes, I'm a dreamer, but, even when it takes me a little while, I do make my dreams come true. I've walked the wrong paths, looking for something better, when I had everything I needed within my grasp. Luckily, I figured it out before I died.

* * *

Daria is a fortunate woman. She met an English duke who fell in love with her and offered her the world, and his heart. She cared for him deeply, but wasn't sure if he was the one. Still, she said yes to his proposal and followed him to his estate in England in the heart of the country where legends of Merlin are still told.

A great oak tree of massive size, centuries old, dominates the landscape. It is said that Merlin still sleeps within and waits for a woman willing to sacrifice everything to free him.

Daria and her duke have an argument and, as she has so many times in the past when happiness was within her grasp, she considers breaking off the engagement. Still angry and in tears, she takes a walk and ends up under Merlin's oak where she decides to sit and figure things out. Falling asleep, dreams of Merlin creep into her imagination and whisper that she is the woman who can set him free.

Awakened by workmen laughing and joking about cutting into Merlin's heart and seeing if the old oak bleeds, Daria begs them to wait until word can be sent to the duke. Daria refuses to leave the tree and convinces the foreman to send one of his men to find the duke. As she waits, it occurs to her that breaking off the engagement would seal the tree's doom and ruin any chance to free Merlin, so when the duke arrives she agrees to patch things up if he will give her the old oak as a wedding gift.

In order to save the oak, she must sacrifice her dreams and marry the duke, giving up any chance to free Merlin right away.

How do you think the story will end?

While you ponder the story and your own dreams, consider returning next week to see what stories the tarot cards will reveal. Until then, don't just dream it, be it.

Tarot: A sword divides past and present

The past and the present are tricky. Spend too much time in the past and waste the present. Spend too much time dealing with the present and ignoring the lessons and experiences of the past and life becomes one-dimensional. There has to be a balance, but how do we find that balance?

Today was an unbalanced day for me, but I finally managed to get it together and concentrate on today's tarot post. I am not surprised that Mercury is in retrograde because communications have been on the fritz. It was so much easier in the past, but it's best not to dwell in the past and risk losing what is available in the present, although it's nice to have the option. Or is it?



The Queen of Cups is intensely sensitive to others' feelings and can seem like she's reading their minds. In a way, she is a mind reader because she pays attention to the details. Don't let her romantic looks and the far away look in her eyes fool you. She is focused on a dream and, although she seems slightly tragic and moody, thinking about ill fated princesses in fairy tales, she is deeply concerned for the welfare of others. That is what gives her insight. She has been down those roads and knows what it feels like to be poor, in pain, loved and lost. She has done and felt it all.

The Queen of Cups' heart is engaged with deep concern for loved ones and her own emotional well being. She knows that things aren't perfect, but sees the sensual beauty of the life around her. Her message is simple: Look to the needs of the heart. Don't be bewitched or swayed by emotion and don't let emotion overshadow the truth or reality until the truth is no longer visible.

It's one thing to be concerned about people and another to be so arrogant and controlling that people are no longer allowed to make mistakes and learn from them. That is how people learn, but making mistakes and fixing them. It's a heady feeling playing god/dess, but it's not so heady for those who are smothered by such overly attentive care. Remember the butterfly struggling out of its cocoon. Help it and it dies. Let it struggle and it will be strong enough to feed itself and live to procreate.



In the garden of childhood, before Pandora came with her mysterious box full of hardship, woe and illness, children played in verdant fields and filled their cups with flowers and animals. It was an enchanted time. In the foreground of the Six of Cups is a cat. It is clearer and more real than the idyllic scene behind it. The cat is the present and the happy, laughing children are the past, a memory of happy times.

Memories are tricky. Memories can evoke happiness, warmth and security when life was young and innocent, inspiring us to share the nostalgic, romanticized remembrance of things past. Too much time spent reliving and remembering the past can cause profound sadness and disappointment with the current situation, fraught with the ills and evils that flew out of Pandora's chest of gifts for mankind. In memory, the past is always better than what is available now, but was it so wonderful? Were things so much better? Were there not problems to solve and people and situations that broke the heart?

The Six of Cups reminds us to pick and choose our memories careful and remember that time and distance, and current desires, have a tendency to color the past in soft, water washed colors. The way to deal with the past is to remember the good, accept the bad without question and balance it all with the needs of the present, use logic and reality to show the best path forward. If the past controls all actions, the path will never be clear and life will slip out of control. It's a matter of balance. Isn't it always?



A sharp sword cut through the Gordian knot and solved a riddle; it was the keen edge of intellect and the rational mind, the sign of the Ace of Swords. But with power comes danger. The Sword of Truth will cut through the toughest problems with ease. It is the tool of the complex mind and the mind is the key to controlling reality.

The Ace of Swords is the symbol of communication and the weapon of communication are words, words that can hurt as well as heal. The sword bring the gift of thought, a gift that grants the ability to see the world clearly, communicate effectively and create a happy and healthy environment, a stable reality. Sharp words spoken with unguarded thought can destroy it all. A clever wit is a blessing, but it can be a curse if it is used to hurt or destroy. With the Ace of Swords, the Sword of Truth confers the desire for honesty, and that is its guard and guide in order to know where and how to strike. It's in your hands.

* * *

A man sits at a bar drinking a glass of soda. He doesn't drink alcohol because he likes to remain in control. His world is about to spin out of control.

A group of men come up to him and address him but name. He doesn't know them and it turns out they don't know him. They've made a mistake. Someone with the same name is scheduled to appear and give a talk, but no one knows what he looks like. It's a subject with which he is familiar, and speaking to the group will make it possible to drag himself away from the edge of the abyss of despair and depression. He agrees to talk to the group and has such a good time an idea occurs to him.

His name is common and a quick Google search provides tens of thousands of men with the same name, many of whom are the same age, so why not try on their lives for a while, see what it's like had another path been chosen, and possibly find a life that makes him happier than his own. Research will provide enough background and he can relive his youth when anything in the world was possible before he chose the wrong path and ended up miserable and trapped in a marriage with a wife who doesn't respect him and controls his actions. He had a chance at love, but waited too long to take it. If he can't have love, he might as well have a little adventure . . . as long as no one gets hurt.

No doubt, my mood affects my creative vision today, but it happens. Best not to dwell on it. I still have next week and three new cards to tempt the muse. Where will the muse take you with these cards?

Tarot: From Excess Road to Wisdom Palace

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom; for we never know what is enough until we know what is more than enough.

~ William Blake

The fool wonders, the wise man asks.

~ Benjamin Disraeli

How much is enough? Is it really necessary to follow the road of excess to find out?

I know when I've eaten too much or sat too long because my body tells me quite clearly and in very obvious ways. I know when I've gone past the point where the need for rest overwhelms me and I fall asleep no matter what I'm doing, often falling asleep while sitting up. There are times when it's more difficult to tell when I've reached the "too much" stage. How much reading is too much? How much silence is too much? How much loneliness, depression or pleasure is too much? It's less easy to tell.



The Devil conjures images of bodies writhing in torment in the fires of Hell, but the Devil is a Christian symbol, the antithesis of all that is good and wise, cobbled together from pagan gods and demi-gods: Pan, Dionysus, Cernunnos, Baphomet. The Devil card in tarot is indicative of the addict or the victim, which is to say they are the same.

The Devil's horns are exaggerated, excessive, out of balance and he is blind to everything and everyone. He is the essence of repressed emotions, rampant passions and overweening ambition, the shadow side of life. The Devil is reminiscent of the god Pan, from whom the word panic is derived, fear out of control, the frenzy that comes with Dionysian excess -- too much wine, women and song -- but also too much isolation, blindness and fear. Addiction is just as limiting and overwhelming as the fear of becoming addicted, making the addicted a victim of their own demons and dark side, afraid to lose their social standing, their material possessions, of climbing too high, too far, too fast.

The Devil is associated with the earth signs of Capricorn, Taurus and Virgo. Devil is lived spelled backward. He is the stagnation of fear and isolation, blind to the possibility and love.



When I look at the 9 of Swords, I see a woman waking in the middle of the night at the darkest hour when dawn and the sun seem farthest away. Above her nine swords are poised to strike, but neither the candlelight nor the moonlight streaming through the window reflect off the swords. They are not real. They are figments of the imagination conjured at the edge of nightmare. The window is open, only a few steps from the bed where fresh air and freedom await. On the window sill an owl is perched, waiting, ready. The owl is the avatar, the symbol, of wisdom, Athena's companion Bubo who acts as mediary between the gods and man, the conduit where wisdom flows down to enlighten man and relieve the darkness.

The Nine of Swords shows the dark night of the soul. Anguish and despair strike when we are most vulnerable. The woman holds herself, but she is warm and safe. Her body language is closed off and she is locked within herself, struggling with her dreams and nightmares, unsure of what to believe or how to reach out when all she needs to do is unlock her arms and hold out her hands, reach out and take what is freely offered -- wisdom, enlightenment, reassurance. She is not alone unless she chooses to be alone, a victim of her own fears.



Ever since man looked up into the night sky and saw the twinkling light of the stars and was able to see them as more than distant fires, The Star has guided, inspired and filled him with hope. When he looks at the stars, he is looking at the past, at light that has traveled thousands, millions, billions of miles and years to greet him and show him the light of other days. It is in the darkness when the moon is barely visible that the stars shine the brightest inspiring dreams, providing enlightenment and a glimmer of possibility.

We wish upon stars, make promises under the stars and expect that every night, even when they are barely visible through the city's obscuring lights, they will be there high in the darkness shining down. They are there in the light, too, but we cannot see them, and yet we feel their influence, constant, undimmed and ever present.

The Star is a promise and it is wish fulfillment. The dark lady's brow shines with starlight, twin to the star above her, centered on the brow at the third eye, the seat of higher consciousness, through which we are connected to a higher power, to eternity. In her hands she holds two pitchers, pouring their contents into the water and on the land where she kneels. She pours out everything, not afraid of the pitchers being empty because she knows that they will be filled again, filled over and over like Ganymede's pitcher from which he fills the gods' cups with ambrosia, the sweet water of life, the water of immortality.

The Star is associated with the air sign of Aquarius which is ruled by Uranus, the sign of freedom and rebellion. The Star is intellect and wisdom, the tools of the writer.

* * *

On the surface, the cards move from the shadows through fear and isolation and into the light of the eternal stars. They begin with the earth and end up in the air.

In some interpretations, what we have is an addict, a victim of his own fears, who represses his emotions and cannot or will not reach for help. He is locked in his fear, isolated and alone, though the answers he seeks are within his grasp, so close he can touch them. He is afraid of reaching out, afraid that he will find only illusion, but he is already trapped in illusion, the illusion that he is living the good life. He has material wealth, a wealth he constantly guards and fears he will lose, social standing and the semblance of security, but he could lose it all, and that is what he fears. He is unable to see that when you hold on too tightly everything slips through your fingers. It's like trying to hold back water or the sands of time.

Only when we are ready to pour out everything is the cup of life refilled. The pitcher stands ready and full, but in order to fill and refill the cup, he must reach out and take it, but in order to do that, he must stop holding himself back and see his fears for what they are -- insubstantial phantoms, figments of his imaginations. The only way to live is to embrace life, to reach out and accept the help that has always been within his reach.

What story do these images inspire in you?

Tarot: The Midas Touch

The cards I've pulled lately have to do with success in one way or another and today's cards are no different. Success is a fleeting thing, as well it should be.

It's in the cards

The High Priestess is contradiction. She obscures and she reveals.



Clad in a diaphanous gown, she floats above the waters of consciousness with one toe barely skimming the surface. Crowned with a diadem of stars that represent the nine planets of our solar system, she hangs between two pillars capped with machines of unclear purpose, impossibly intricate and logical and yet enigmatic. The night sky behind her is a poetic mystery comprised of the logical course of the stars and planets while the music of the spheres is a haunting refrain just out of reach on the edge of understanding.

The High Priestess is beguiling, promising knowledge that can prove dangerous. Accept her energy and wisdom with caution. The knowledge she offers is beyond logic, a wisdom that should be guided intuition. Understand that science is but one path to wisdom, a path illuminated by the other senses. Inspiration is useless without action. Honor the muse, but don't be here slave.



The 4 of Pentacles shows a wealthy man dressed in rich robes and holding a shining pile of pentacles. He takes pleasure in his wealth, much like King Midas, caressing his hoard as though a lover, jealous of anyone or anything that comes between him and his prize.

Wealth is an abstraction. It represents the ability to obtain the necessities of life. In and of itself, wealth is static, pretty to look at, but not useful unless it is traded for services, food, clothing and shelter. Wealth is beautiful, a shining pile of gold, silver or coins, a bank balance ending in lots of zeroes, but it is not real.

Like Midas who loved his gold and was granted the golden touch, he found that gold is tasteless and provides no nourishment. Gold was an anchor that weighed him down and destroyed everything he touched, even the golden curls of his beloved daughter. Midas learned the hard way that gold must be shared, a resource that renews itself only when it is put into circulation.

Like Midas, writers must learn to use their resources and not hoard their writing like gold in a vault. Writing must be shared and practiced in order to flourish. Even mushrooms that grown in darkness, must have nourishment. Writing can grown in darkness, but must seek the light in order to evolve and mature and grow.

Midas learned the hard way by losing what he valued most. Writers cannot afford to lose if they are to succeed. The wealth of inspiration and ability is nothing, an unfulfilled future, unless it is used wisely and well. Don't give everything away until you have nothing left. Use your wealth wisely.



The World is mastery. A woman holds a wand in each hand, surrounded by the laurel wreath of victory, balanced and assured. The wands represent the balance and mastery of will in tune with the conscious and unconscious. Now is the time to celebrate great accomplishments, to be recognized by the world and the self upon completion of a hard won accomplishment. The woman is in unity with the universe and knows mastery over herself that is natural and effortless. She moves to the rhythms of nature and her own heart. But beware the false sense of security.

The woman does not rest on her laurels. She is in motion and knows that success is temporary. In order to grow, she must move forward, evolve and experience life and the world. She takes a moment to enjoy the freedom success provides, understanding that once a task is completed and the goals accomplished, it's time to move onward and upward, take the next step to a new level. Life is a learning experience and learning requires action to absorb and to build on.

***

In vampire lore, the vampire is a static force, locked in stasis, a relic of an ancient past. Anne Rice characterized it by vampires turning to marble when they couldn't not evolve and move with the times. That is why Lestat chose to make Louis. He needed someone who understood and moved easily in a world where Lestat was an anachronism.

An mid-list author learns from his doctor he has less than two years to live. There is a book the author has been meaning to write, but has put it off many times. Now that he knows how much longer he has, he decides to pull out the manuscript, finish it and get it published, using his terminal illness as a way to push the book through the slow moving publishing industry and to promote sales. The book is an instant success and the author becomes a very wealthy and famous writer. He enjoys his success, but as the last months of his life wind to a close he finds out that he's not going to die.

What will he do? Will he choose to die and leave a success or will he admit the truth and continue to write the stories he has held back, stories that would have made him famous without the death sentence.

How would you finish this story?

Until next week, may all your stories be successful.

Tarot: Beggar's victory

When I pulled the cards a few days ago, I didn't see their meaning right away. They didn't seem to have any connection, but everything is connected in one way or another and the connections aren't always easy to discern.

A storm blows up in the Arctic and snow swirls along deadly, cutting winds, scouring the surface of the tundra until all is laid bare and clean. It's a local occurrence that doesn't reach the nearest Alaskan town or freeze the icy waters. It roars its wintry defiance and dies down, leaving a pristine wilderness of frozen waves and sculpted in the snowy plain.

Meanwhile, in continental America, the summer sun blisters freshly laid tar and macadam bubbles lightly in the streets and on parking lots, burning anyone who braves the scorched surface barefoot. The dog days are here. The relentless sun beams down from a brazen sky and clouds drifting over the mountain's edge grow wispy and disappear.

A faint breeze ruffles sweat-soaked curls lying heavy on bronzed and reddened shoulders alike, and every face turns to the breeze, breathing in the promise of cool fall days to come before it is gone like the clouds. Another breeze tinged with Arctic breath blusters and the timid clouds mass as the Arctic storm, now long quiet, makes its furious onslaught felt, pushing its frozen presence felt. The temperature drops and the darkening clouds rumble and spark, loosing a torrent of rain and hail that batter the bubbling macadam and cooling the fresh tar into a sea of shining black now pock-marked by hail. Sweat cools and chills. Bronzed and reddened shoulders hunch. Everyone dreams of smoky, spicy fall and golden aspens where the autumn winds whistle in harmony with crackling fires and hot chocolate.

***

The first card is the Ace of Wands, a fiery brand upheld in human hands. Every Ace is a gift from the universe, but the molding of this gift is in human hands. The spark of creativity is given to mankind to temper and shape. This Ace is the kindest and most generous gift of all. It is the beginning of life, inspiration and passion. This gift requires an exercise of will and to achieve the goal and courage to see it through. It is an opportunity, but, like all opportunities, it means nothing without active pursuit. Don't wait. take action. Use the fire of inspiration to see the potential of pure, raw, unbridled creation and unleash what lies inside with confidence, being grateful for what is offered.

Crippling poverty and fear are obvious in the Five of Pentacles as the ragged woman clutches her tired and hungry child to her breast, her other hand outstretched in supplication. She needs help but is ashamed to ask. She feels guilty for getting squandering what she has and does not realize that she is making her problem seem bigger than it is. Her outstretched hand is tentative as though she isn't sure she should ask and doesn't really know what to ask.

Standing in front of the glorious stained glass window, she is unaware of the help that is available, has always been available, if she'd only look up, open her eyes and see what is right in front of her. Help has always been just within reach, but she is too sunk in despair and misery, afraid that if she looks up all she will find is an empty purse and a closed door. The door is always open. Someone is inside or the window would be shadowed and not so bright.

In earlier decks, the Five of Pentacles was the card of the mendicants, missionaries who chose a hard road without seeking or accepting the help that was always ready for them. Their fear was palpable and bowed their heads so low they couldn't see what was right beside them, an open door where warmth, sustenance and help were theirs for the asking.

It was a day for fives when I pulled these cards, but the Five of Swords seems much different from the Five of Pentacles. A man stands with upraised sword victorious on the field of battle. The enemy lies dead or dying around him and he holds the booty of war in his arms. This is a Pyrrhic victory, a victory won at heavy cost. There are no comrades celebrating this victory, only the defeated. What is victory worth when all is lost? Was it worth the effort?

Wars and battles are not always way to resolve conflict, not when they come at a high price. There is no profit in humiliating the enemy because they will come back even stronger with revenge and destruction in their hearts. In an intellectual conflict or verbal argument, sometimes it's better to take a step back and look at things from a different perspective instead of battering an opponent until there is nothing left. To assert superiority in such a way is not only poor sportsmanship, it is also unnecessary and the victory is short-lived. There is more to be learned and to be gained by leaving a little room for the opponent to maneuver. It's never a good idea to push the enemy into what Sun Tzu called "death country" from which there is no retreat and safety. The enemy has nothing to lose and will fight even harder and more wildly and the cost to defeat them may be the decimation of the army.

The fives in the tarot deck always spell trouble or a crisis that needs resolution. It's up to you to turn the tables and make the best of a bad situation before it is too late. The Five of Swords shows victory, but it could just as well point to dishonor, malice or slander and, in such cases, no one wins even when they're proven right.

It's like picking up a frozen snake near death and warming it near your breast. When it wakes, it will repay your kindness and generosity with death. That is its nature. If you must pick up the snake, take it to a fire or somewhere warm, but don't linger. It's safer that way.

***

There cannot be a connection in these cards, or can there? The fire of inspiration, a gift of possibility and opportunity that must be acted upon cannot have anything to do with beggars down on their luck and unwilling to see that help is within reach, and it certainly cannot have anything to do with a costly victory. Can it?

A woman digs in her garden and finds a rag wrapped bundle. It smells foul and crumbles to bits in her hands. She tosses it onto the heap of branches and cuttings that will go into the trash. The bundle breaks open and out spills a wealth of jewelry: diamonds, rubies, emeralds, pearls of all colors, sapphires. A king's ransom in stones and silver and gold. Thinking it must be stolen, she gathers it all up in a trash bag and hides it beneath a loose board in the floor of her closet, placing her shoes and suitcases over the spot to hide it from prying eyes.

The woman is of middle years and has worked hard for what little she has, spending her life's savings on the little cottage with its rose and herb gardens. She continues to work, but the cost of upkeep is almost more than she can afford. She's not ready to give up and is used to getting by on short rations. The wealth hidden in the floor of her closet would be enough to fix the place up and set her up for life. She would never want for anything. She could sell the jewels one at a time to different places so no one would make the connection, but it might cost more than the jewels would bring that way. She could call the authorities or check old newspapers to see if something like that was stolen just to be sure she was safe. If she did that, someone might say she had no right to it and take it all away from her, or she could return it for a reward. That might be enough to see her comfortable.

What should she do? I'll leave the end of this story up to you.

Until next week, may all your stories be full of life.

Tarot: Drunk on the moon

One of the questions most writers are asked is "Where do you get your inspiration?" I usually respond by asking, "Where do you not find inspiration?" Maybe it is peculiar to writers, but everything I see, hear and read provides inspiration. Today, it's the tarot cards.

Nice segue, don't you agree?



"O, swear not by the moon, the inconstant moon, that monthly changes in her circled orb." Juliet, in Romeo and Juliet chided Romeo not to be inconstant like the moon who shows first one face and then another, much like most men believe women do. The moon -- and women -- are constant, although the light shines on them in varying degrees, sometimes in shadow and sometimes in full light. The moon reflects the sun's light, playing hide and seek with the sun, its opposite, behind Earth.

The moon speaks to the soul, stirring our deepest fears and haunting our nightmares. The moon also shines a light on our best dreams. It is a shining beacon in the night that inspires us to romance and changes the way we view the world and ourselves. Thomas Harris, through Hannibal Lecter, asked an FBI agent if they had seen blood outside under the moon. It's black, he said. Fresh blood is shiny, liquid night under the moon's glow. On the nights of the full moon snow is blue and the world is faintly tinged by blue light, a much smaller arc of the full spectrum of light that the sun provides. You must be careful when viewing anything under the moon's glow or listening to whispers in the night, they are shadowy messages that might not hold up in the full light of day.

Some believe the moon brings on madness -- lunacy (lunar madness) -- and some believe the moon calls forth the savage nature inherent in the soul. We can be certain of nothing under the moon's influence. It shows only half the story, half the truth, but where there is light, there is truth, and even a half truth can be more satisfying than a lie.

The card shows the moon above a clockwork chronometer that measures the movements of Sun, Earth and Moon, ticking away in measured movement. Yes, the moon shows us a different face every night, but it is the same face that a lunar month from now it will show us again. Everything that goes around comes around. As above, so below. What at first seems like deception and inconstancy is just the face of the moment, that point in an ever changing cycle that has at its heart a regularity by which clocks and stonehenges keep time.



Beneath the bloody light of dawn, a man kneels, hands clasped, grief clear upon his face. He is grieving, mourning a loss. Is his loss connected with the contents of the three cups that lay empty and on their sides next to him? Why does he not see the full cups behind him? He has not lost all, although the loss seems greater than he can bear. He is so sunk in despair and grief that he is oblivious to what he still has, to what he has always had.

When I look at the Five of Cups, I think of a man who has a good life. He is successful and he has been successful in his life, although not without sacrifice. He is a knight of middle years who has no doubt seen death and destruction, often at his own hands, through many wars, and he is still alive and well. Three-fifths of his life is gone and it seems he can see nothing but what is over and done. He cannot see that he still has two-fifths of his life to live, years full of happiness and joy, cups full to the brim that will satisfy his thirst and his needs. He is too sunk in misery to care or to see, concentrating on what he does not have instead of enjoying what he does have.

If his grief continues, he will waste his life in mourning, prolonging the drama and the grief until it is little more than a bid for attention, a minor melodrama blown up to the proportions of tragedy when there is no tragedy. Yes, he has lost someone or something dear to him, but so much more remains. The long night is over. The moon has set and there is daylight coming up over the horizon. Will he look up at the new day , drag himself up out of his depression and pick up the life remaining to him or will he choose passive suicide and deny himself the comfort that lies waiting within his reach?



There is no way to look at the Three of Cups and not be filled with excitement and laughter and pure joy? Three dancers dressed in bright colors celebrate the bounty of life and love. Blue is the color of the swords, the color of the sky, the element of air and inspiration. Green is the color of the bountiful earth, lush and fertile and full of life, the symbol of the pentacle and success. Red is the color of fiery passion and emotion, the symbol of the wands.

The cups overflow with golden waters, a fountain of youth and vigor, full of life and joy. This fountain of golden cups stands in the endless sea from which the depths of emotion flow. Emotional experience binds the past, present and future, giving birth to and nurturing inspiration until it becomes the achievements that bring joy and happiness. However, it takes time to celebrate and appreciate achievement, whether yours or someone else's, and attention must be paid. Acknowledge your own achievements, and do it with joy and true happiness, but don't forget to celebrate the achievements of those around you without rancor or jealousy. We are all connected, like the fountain of cups that support the graceful dance of air, earth and fire among the waters of eternity. To celebrate another's success does not lessen your own unless you ignore their pleasure to hoard what you have. Like seeds in a dank and cobwebbed cellar, nothing grows that stays in the dark underground. Seeds need light and warmth and water while they lie in the earth before they tap the energy at their heart and send forth tiny tendrils to seek out nourishment and the sun. Sitting on a dusty shelf, the seeds like dormant, their energy and life untapped, their potential wasted.

Don't focus on your own problems, no matter how pressing they may seem. Practice gratitude and reach beyond yourself and you will soon see what develops.

As I chose the cards for today's column, the overwhelming grief of the knight in the Five of Cups and the Moon card provided a strange sort of inspiration. I envisioned a man who had lost the love of his life. Kneeling by the deathbed of his lover, he swore to never see the sun again. He leaves her and sets fire to the house, the flames licking high in the blackness of the night toward the faint sliver of light on the night of the dark moon. It is a night of dark omens as he sets out in his limousine and orders his chauffeur to drive west, following the path of the moon. His driver keeps pace with the dark, shadowed orb above, chasing down the moon.

The man is wealthy, beyond wealthy, and he can afford to chase the moon. By plane, by ship and by car, he follows the moon around and around the globe, sleeping and eating when the demands of his body get beyond his control, but never seeing the sun again. Under cloudy skies or clear, always under the moon, he sails in the shadowy world of waxing and waning moonlight, a slave to his grief, trying to outrun the dawn. He knows deep in his mourning heart that if he fails and the sun rises, then his lover is indeed gone and he must go on without her. As long as he follows the moon and never lets her out of his sight, he is safe. The night will never end and time will forever stand still.

The waning moon, not far from full, filled my head with dark thoughts and, under its influence, I dreamed of shadows and grief. How do today's cards and the moon inspire you?

Tarot: Truth, Strength and Success

One thing I've found is that the more I use the tarot cards to create stories and backgrounds for characters, the more I discover about myself. Like most writers, a piece of me and bits and shards of my life are interred in each story. Using the tarot cards helps me to see which bits work and which shine a light on the right path.

I've sometimes considered writing a story about a writer -- nothing new there -- who feels they are disappearing with everything they publish, nibbling away at their essence to create art and worlds that will spin on after the writer is gone. Immortality through writing, although that is more difficult these days with more and more people deciding they want to write and publishing their tales. With the current technologies that is becoming easier all the time. Those who would have kept their stories to themselves or hidden them between the pages of notebooks, diaries and journals stuffed into shoe and hat boxes, buried in drawers and boxes or saved onto disks for computers long gone when the writer upgraded. It has probably always been that way, but more people believe their work should be published and take advantage of the technology and send their fancies, fantasies and dreams speeding along the information highway and sometimes into print for a price. It is their truth and they want to show it to the world.

One man's truth is not another's. Truth can be subjective, depending on your point of view.




The hermit carries a lamp. Caped and cowled he prowls the streets and alleys looking for an honest man, looking for truth.

Diogenes he was called, a cynic who looked for something beyond the reach of his lamp, steadying his journey with a staff, the only flash of color the cord around his waist. The Hermit's lamp is the light of acquired knowledge, his staff the power of his will and the red cord about his waist the passion that drives his search. The truth the hermit seeks is the truth that speaks to him, the truth that resolves the clamor in his heart and makes him whole. He must be careful not to become entrenched in his search or too sure of his knowledge for there lies dogma and stagnation. Ever vigilant, the Hermit seeks for the truth of his soul, trusting himself and what he knows to get him farther down the pathway.

"The Cynics rejected all conventions, whether of religion, manners, housing, dress, or decency, advocating the pursuit of virtue in a simple and [non-materialistic] lifestyle." You could say those who press for the world to go green are cynics in a sense, casting aside the materialistic trappings of the modern world in favor of a gentler and simpler approach to life and sustenance, returning to the earth for nourishment and the bounties of the rivers, lakes, seas, winds and geothermal properties of this planet for a sustainable answer to comfort against the cold of winter and the stifling heat of summer. Like any truth, there is always another angle, another side to the multi-faceted jewel of truth. Be careful not to become trapped inside it.



This strong lady has the powerful lion on a chain held loosely in her hand, almost carelessly, as though she neither leads the lion nor follows him. She is not careless of her hold on her animal passions and has learned to use the strength they give her power and courage when they are needed. Her strength is not immediately evident, except in her direct and clear gaze, and is demonstrated subtly and quietly, like the feeling of a lover's or friend's hand when your own are trembling. That soft, calm touch is sometimes all that is needed to rally the spirit and stiffen the spine when facing a trial. It is the powerful muscles and sinews of a lioness hunting, at first alert and almost languid when roused to action, always aware of her surroundings, the direction of the wind and the resources of her prey. She holds her instincts in check, reining in her passion for the hunt, until it's time to spring into action and bring down the quarry, a symphony of grace, instinct and strength unrivaled.




The Six of Pentacles is a picture of success and open-handed largess. This man is successful and willing to share his wealth with those around him. He is a benevolent man who believes in fair trade. He's not out to cheat anyone; that is not how he became wealthy and successful. He recognizes the responsibility of his wealth and his success to give back a little of what he has honestly earned.

He shares his success without strings or conditions and is most likely a little uncomfortable receiving compliments or gifts in exchange for his favor. It's a small failing considering all the good he can do and has done. A momentary prickle of embarrassment he covers by offering a helping hand or a cup of water or wine to those who need it. He is no fool, nor will he be made a fool by those who seek to cheat him or take advantage. He is a moderate man who can be aroused to anger or disappointment to be so used.

In these cards is the story of a seeker, a woman who has followed the path of knowledge but is not without her charms. She is not ruthless, but she is determined and strong, although you would not know it to look at her. She is canny and can spot the smallest flaw or make a connection where none seemed to exist before.

This time she is after a rare map that is considered a forgery, but her researches indicate that in the proper light the map will lead her to the find of a lifetime. She's had a successful career, so it's not about the riches or the fame. It's about adding to her knowledge and deciphering the clues that have eluded her and countless other seekers.

The journey is dangerous and arduous, but she is well aware of her strengths and weaknesses and has taken time to cover all her bases with an experienced support crew that she pays very well -- for their secrecy and their expertise. When she finds the prize at the end of the journey, it will add to her knowledge and the knowledge of the rest of the world, something she will share without hesitation, for the prize belongs to the world. History will yield up its secrets to her because she has marked the path well and is certain of her success. She has prepared well and left nothing to chance.

Anxious to begin her journey, she waits for the right time of the year and the right conditions. What she seeks has been hidden for centuries, a few more days or weeks won't matter in the end for she is the handmaiden of fate and she will succeed.

What story can you weave from these images and insights? What will they say about you -- and to you?

Tarot: Magical Mystery Tour

There are men who have the world by the tail and then there are men who just think they do. Which one are you? Oh, it goes for women, too.

Some women project an aura of confidence and expertise; they don't feel it inside. In the deep recesses of their hearts and minds, they are weak, ineffectual frauds who have learned how to fool the world, and sometimes themselves, into believing they are more competent, more self assured, more real than they are. They are magicians. If you look closely, you'll see these magicians aren't really good at their tricks. There's a card peeking out of their sleeve or the tail of a handkerchief cooing softly. Their magic is nothing more than illusion, not like the beginning of today's tarot post.



Look closely at the magician. He is he second card in the tarot deck, behind the fool who begins his journey will little experience and knowledge, but is game for anything. However, the magician's number is one (1) and he knows the secrets of the universe, can balance all four elements -- fire, earth, air and water -- and knows the best way to mesmerize you and put you under his spell. Or does he? Never forget the reversed card signifies a scoundrel, con-man, grifter or incompetent magician who just cannot seem to get his timing or his tricks straight.

The compelling gaze of the magician assures you he is aware of the laws of cause and effect and that he is in control. He is disciplined and responsible with the power he controls withing and between his hands with the tools at his disposal. He is focused and has honed his skills to a keen edge, yet he is aware of how much control to exert and that manipulating such power can blind him to the realities around him.

The magician is the messenger of the gods and he embodies the spirit of Mercury with his winged heels and hat as he flits between earth and the Olympian heights. When he delivers his message he never stammers or fumbles over the words; he has the patter down cold. He is a master of misdirection with the self confidence, talent, will and cunning to turn the world upside down, turn lead into gold and hearts to putting in his capable hands. Be careful how you deal with this magic man because he can see through your tricks and behind masks. The master magician knows the difference between illusion and reality whether it's his own or someone else's.



Even though the man in the Seven of Wands faces danger and a strong opponent, he is strong and brave and can face the odds in any conflict. He is practiced in the art of war and he will succeed in whatever war he enters. Though the enemy threatens, this warrior is certain of his strength and will, but don't look beneath the surface. The strength he projects covers his deep lack of understanding of what he guards. Behind the door is a balcony and night has fallen. He has nowhere to go but down and he probably doesn't realize it as he focuses on his opponents and relies on his mastery of the weapon he wields. This warrior doesn't fear attack to his beliefs. He is on solid ground. His beliefs are simple: serve, protect and don't question, and yet he is capable of change. He knows it never hurts to examine his position because it will add to his knowledge and his ability to defend his position, his beliefs or his country. He is not an obstinate child. He is willing to admit defeat when he's wrong and refine his position and he never gives up because he's afraid. There is nothing to fear in knowledge, except the lack of it. He is a staunch ally.



It is said that opposites attract. The Chariot could be seen as the opposite of the Magician.

Here is a woman of power so profound that she moves forward through all obstacles. The sun above her is the sign of immense power and focus and yet she is busy looking off in another direction. In her royal purple robes, she is ruler of all she surveys, but she is distracted, a little off balance, as she looks away from her chosen path. Don't get the idea she isn't in control; she is always in control -- most of the time. She is a woman with a strong will, but she has achieved her strength and her position without really understanding it. She has the ability to maintain order in the midst of chaos, but she lacks focus.

The sphinxes that pull her chariot are adept with riddles. One is silver and the other gold, opposites or opposing ideas, but they continue to move forward, posing their riddles to all who cross their path just as Oedipus once did. Oedipus was luckier than most. He solved the sphinx's riddle. Will you be so lucky when you find yourself in the path of this juggernaut?

Don't worry. You can do more and are more than you know. Set your goals and keep going. Don't stop moving forward. Don't stop learning because no matter what you know, or think you know, there is always more to learn and accomplish. You are in the driver's seat.

These three cards suggest a story. On one hand, there is a strong and confident man, sure of his abilities who is confident he can achieve whatever he chooses. He is adept and his skills are hard won, but he knows that there is nothing he tries that he cannot achieve, that is until he meets with a woman who is as strong and confident as he. She is his match in almost every way, but one. She doesn't want to settle down. She is a traveler, a seeker, a woman of power and privilege who intimidates most people, but not him. She is independence and spirited with a taste for adventure and conquest. He understands conquest because he has conquered himself and the elements. He is a scientist or doctor at the top of his profession. She is earthier and more basic, goal oriented, but easily distracted, and he finds that he wants to catch her attention. This is a mystery he is anxious to solve, if he can just get past her defenses and gain her attention long enough to get her focused on him so he can discover the secret she is determined to guard -- from him and from herself.

The thing about using tarot cards to help lay the groundwork for writing is that the cards provide the seeds and you determine how and where they grow. What these particular cards suggest to me this morning may not be what they will suggest tomorrow, next week or even next month. Each moment, each experience changes us and how we view the world around us. A casual conversation, a phrase or an idea can grow into so much more. When it happens to me I write it down, especially when I'm working on something else (I don't want to lose it), and sometimes I find a way to fit it into my current work in progress (WIP). Stretch your mind and the possibilities. Don't be afraid to step back or look away for a few minutes. There's now way to know what will change or how it will change if you're willing to stop and take a breath before continuing on your way.

For instance, Mary Ann and I were talking the other day and she mentioned that athletes inhabit their bodies differently than non-athletes. As I watched part of Brideshead Revisited last night a stray thought burrowed down and came up this morning into a new thought. It's not just athletes, but people from all walks of life that inhabit their bodies -- or skin -- in a palpably different way. You can tell the difference between someone who is comfortable with wealth and someone who recently became wealthy just as you can tell when a couple are close and when they're at odds. They don't have to say anything. It is in the way they move -- alone or together. Body language is more accurate than words most of the time. The trick for writers is to take body language and infuse it into their characters, help them inhabit their bodies more believably. Writers are magicians, but they can be adept or fumble their tricks. It's all all about practice and observation and knowing how to inhabit your body and how your characters inhabit theirs.

Until next week, what will the tarot cards reveal about your characters?