The Joy of a Good Book

I was in a rush this morning, sadly. A rush to get dressed, to figure out some arrangement for my hair that didn't look completely awful, and to get to campus before my students did. I like pulling a card or two in the morning but didn't have a good moment for it, so as my husband battled traffic I sat serenely beside him pulling my 3-card Lenormand daily draw (the dashboard serves as a reasonable shuffling surface when need be, and my son's star blanket provides the lovely backdrop!).

My cards were Lily - House - Book.

Game of Hope Lenormand, Star Edition (reprinted by Lauren Forestell)

This line says a few things:

-Learning something new from a family member.
-The landlord making contact with a question in mind.
-Pondering a property's age.
-Relaxing at home with a book.

Yeah. That last one. In fact, yesterday a book I'd ordered a couple of weeks ago finally arrived in the mail. I flipped through it and know I'm going to really enjoy it, but haven't had the right moment to sit back and dig in. I'm feeling slightly under the weather, having caught a cold from my oldest daughter, and the last thing I need is to lecture my students for hours on the attributes of a good essay. What I really need to do is sit back with a hot mug of steaming ginger tea, and lose myself in the joy of a good book!

Result: It was indeed an afternoon and evening full of peaceful book reading. I did manage to spend quite a while reading my new book, mug of tea in hand, and I even read my son a new book about Trombone Shorty before he went to bed. All in all, a good way to end the day.

Creeping Out of My Cave

Since slightly before Yule/Christmas I've been on something like a sabbatical, really embracing the Hermit energy. I have a lot brewing that I will post about as time moves on, but I will give a recap of the past few weeks of my life:

Haindl Tarot - Strength

-I received the Haindl Tarot deck as a birthday gift. This is a deck I've been wanting for a long time, so I was very pleased to have it, and I've been working a lot with it in these past few weeks. I love the connection to the runes, as this is another system I work with. (It also features I-Ching, though I'm not so familiar with that!) I also like the fact that this deck follows the Thoth system. The Court cards are lovely, and pull from various cultures from around the world. I think Strength is quite possibly my favorite Major in the deck, depicting a woman intertwined with a snake on the edge of a river.

Winter sun in northern Michigan (O. Destrades)

-I spent a lot of time wandering the northern woods of Michigan, in and around the family cottage there. Sledding was serious fun, as was simply watching the lake effect snow fall over the hills as I sipped on hot coffee. While there I drew a card from Haindl deck on the question, "How would you describe the importance of being at this house to the people that come here?" I pulled the 2 of Swords - Peace. The image shows snow covered pine trees. I couldn't imagine a more apt card! The card itself mirrored my surroundings, and peace is precisely why we go there. With the steam from my hot beverage swirling around my nose, and large flakes catching in my eyelashes, I was allowed to feel removed from the steady pulse of my "regular life." No internet, no mail, no work, nowhere I needed to be. For a snapshot in time I was totally enveloped in peace.

Haindl Tarot

-My mother gifted me a beautiful, quartz pendulum handmade by the daughter of her Reiki instructor. It's been probably over 20 years since I've worked with a pendulum. It's gorgeous, and exploring this particular method of divination again after so long has been both intriguing and satisfying.

Game of Hope Lenormand - Star Edition

-On a very special Yule I found myself in Miami with my husband, kids, padrino and ilé. In the late evening I ended up doing Lenormand readings for several women, a totally impromptu session. I didn't know most of them, and the readings were very interesting. One woman told me, "You're the best reader I've ever been to, and that's saying something because I've been to a LOT. To be that good you have to really have a gift." I'm not saying that here to brag - I was really blown away and humbled and honored by what she said to me, and it was a wonderful, affirming gift to receive that left me warmed over.

-I met with several friends over the Christmas/New Year's weeks that I have not seen or spent much time with in years. It was wonderful. And our conversations helped me to gain some very helpful perspective on various elements in my life (namely my teaching work and my kids' education) that has been effective in allowing me to move into 2015 with increased clarity and purpose.

I'm grateful for having had the time for profound reflection over the past few weeks, and the opportunity I've had to recalibrate my inner compass. I'll say more, eventually. But now it's time for chocolate panettone and some ginger tea.....!