A Tarot Reading For All of Us

I lay in bed for a long time Wednesday morning. I lay awake in the darkness, not wanting to push back the covers and face a very dark dawn. It's like the opposite of Christmas morning, I thought, and I listened to the sound of my husband's breathing and the first birds stirring, just as I had the day before, and tried to find consolation in that.

I did get up. Eventually. And I cried. Not in stunned surprise. No shock and awe here. I had hoped that a different universe would be revealed, a better one, but that was not the case. The universe I'd hoped for, the one I'd aligned my will with, was fading into the past, atom by atom receding from possibility. It remained close enough to sense if not inhabit, tantalizingly near, almost reachable. Almost but never. That made the heartsickness worse.

So I went for a run in the park, a gray run by a gray lake under a gray sky. Running is a moment by moment activity, one foot in front of the other, repeat and repeat again. I usually love winter runs, the muted palette, the stark finely-wrought beauty of bare branches and textured clouds. And I eventually came to love this one, because it got me on my way, and because it got me home again.

I didn't ask the tarot for answers yesterday. I already knew those. Instead I asked it for a piece of hope, something to keep me moving forward, and not just for me. For my friends and family who woke up on this morning with tangible fear in their hearts. Yes, I said, I have seen The Tower. And I have seen The Devil. Show me something else, please. Pull back the curtain on what I can do with my own two hands, with my own heart, with my life.

And the tarot answered with the Ace of Cups.

Love. Inspire. Dream. Bless. And above all, keep my heart open for the giving and receiving of love.

There were other cards complementing this one, cautions and caveats. The Ten of Wands, a warning to avoid burnout and exhaustion of the spirit. The Five of Cups, a reminder of the necessity of grieving. But the heart of the reading, its crux and center, was Love. The big good kind. The kind that connects me to you, and you to me, and all of us to each other, and the whole of us to the Divine, however you perceive She/He/Them/It/All.

May it be so.