Tag: Hope

Chapter Fifty-Six – 8 of Swords

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide, Finding Balance, Memoir, Personal Growth, Someone Else’s Life, Tarot

I looked at the world around me.

I wondered how I fit within it and where I belonged. I didn’t feel like I belonged anywhere. I was between two places, where I was and where I wanted to be. An itch had started underneath my feet, and I didn’t know what it meant. I had chosen to stay. I would help Lisa through the birth of her child and then think of what I wanted to do.

The only problem was, I didn’t know what that was. What was after this? I felt stuck and not stuck at the same time, as if my body, mind and spirit all wanted different things and the only thing that I could think of doing was remain in place. I looked at Lisa and the life that she was growing within her and my life before, now and after. I had no idea where I was going. Lisa was fine with this life, but I felt like it didn’t fit me anymore. Yet, I was afraid of what would come after.

I felt damaged after Francis. It was as if by setting me free, he had taken all the confidence he had given me, too. I had felt like I could do anything but now I didn’t know how to. I was unsure of how to move forward. Francis had made a move for himself and left me behind to flounder in the dark.

I don’t know why I was having so much difficulty making space for myself without Francis. I knew that we were done and that there was no going back and nor would I want to. He hadn’t given me the respect that I had deserved. I felt lost and uncertain about where I was supposed to go and what I was supposed to do now.

It was Sophie that gave me the answer.

“You look like you need some kind of reset.” She told me.

We were at one of her dinners. Fox, Lisa, Jenn and a few others were there. We were sitting in the living room after dinner and Sophie pointed at me. “You have this look of a rabbit about your eyes, and you don’t know which direction to go in.”

“I’ve noticed it, too.” Lisa said. “I knew that you needed some space after Francis was such a dick, but it’s been a while.”

“Gods, was it that obvious?” I said. “I felt like I was hiding it pretty well.”

Lisa snorted out loud. “If you mean by hiding it that you’ve been wandering around our place looking for something you haven’t even lost, then you’re doing a good job of it.”

I felt my spirit sag within me. “I’m sorry,” I told them.

Jules, a new person to the group, took my hand in hers. “You don’t need to apologize. Fuck, when my last boyfriend and I broke up, I was a fucking mess for a year. Just because you know you’re done with the relationship doesn’t mean you’re done with the grief. That shit takes time.”

“What do I do in the meantime?” I asked the group.

“I just told you; you need a spiritual reset.” Sophie said.

“What kind of reset?” I asked, almost in a hushed whisper.

“I’ve already talked about it.” Lisa said. “We need to take you to the Kaleidoscope Festival.”

“Ugh, camping?” I said.

“It’s not as bad as all that. You’ve never camped with a bunch of pagans. Picture it, there are hundreds of us all camping at this site. There’s booze, magic and firelight.” The light in Lisa’s eyes shone and I knew that she was travelling back Kaleidoscope’s from her past. “There is magic all over the fucking place. Nothing I can say will do it justice, it’s something that you have to experience.”

“Besides, you’ve been wanting to immerse yourself in magic.” Jenn said. “Kaleidoscope is the way to do it. It’s a powerful place.”

I knew that I needed to break out of whatever funk I was in. If Kaleidoscope was the place for a spiritual reset, then I was going. Anything was better than the state I was in. I knew that it was all in my mind, that I wasn’t disposable and that there was a light inside me that desperately wanted to grow bright again.

I would nurture that weak flame until I could find the fire.  

Chapter Seventeen – The Star

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide, Tarot

We ate almost every day the Ottawa Mission.

Sunshine and I would go there to eat lunch and dinner. “The food is amazing,” he said. “It’s like its food being cooked by your mom. It’s that good. They let you leave with sandwiches and sometimes some soup. Every Wednesday, you can go and take three pieces of clothing from the warehouse in the back, and you can take as many books as you like.”

He said this with a smile because he knew that books were where I found my peace as much as tarot cards were where I found my wisdom.

I just remember the crowd of people waiting to get in the first time we went. Everyone was pleasant and even neighbourly. These were people I would have turned away from in my previous life and now I was one of them.

I looked at the cross that sat above the door of the Mission. Normally, the cross would have made me turn away. The cross was one of the symbols from my past that still didn’t sit well with me. The people that found comfort sitting under the cross didn’t make room or give tolerance to people like me. To me, the cross symbolized hatred.

However, there was no hatred here. The crowd held all kinds of people from all walks of life: teenagers like me, mothers with their children, men talking in groups and sharing a moment of laughter or one last cigarette. The crowd of people waiting was full of those who were trying to find their way back to the life that they had come from or those who had made peace with where they were.

There was no malice in the crowd though it began to grow, spilling down the stairs and along the sidewalk. No one pushed each other and there was this soft murmur of conversation that sounded like music. The door opened and as I made my way up the stairs into the main hall of the Mission, I eyed the cross above me. Part of me tried to imagine it was a pair of arms, offering a welcoming embrace. I needed to feel more comfortable in this place and my walls were coming up.

When we got into hall, the music of people’s voices rose higher so that it was steady hum. I closed my eyes and found comfort in those voices, and it was like my body was being swayed along, carried by the music. I looked behind Sunshine and myself and saw a sea of people, all filled with song. The hall was filled with round wooden tables and Sunshine and I took a seat. We were soon joined by several others and all of them were kind. They asked where Sunshine and I grew up and one man’s face opened up as if it had been lit from inside when I told him that I had been born in Ottawa.

“Me too, son. We Ottawa born and bred are few and far between. Everyone here has come from somewhere. No one was content to stay where they were and went off looking for the great wonders of the world.” He tapped his nose. “You and I know the truth. Ottawa is full of magic, so why leave?” He smiled and he looked years younger, his eyes looking like jewels among the hills and valleys of his skin.

When we got in line to get food, I told the woman I only wanted a small amount, seeing the large crowd of people behind me that had still yet to be served. The volunteer that was serving food gave me a smile as if she had known my thoughts. “Don’t you worry about anyone else at the moment. Here, I’ll give you a full plate, you need to eat.” I thanked her and tried to stop my cheeks from blushing.

The food was as good as Sunshine had promised and I was even able to go up for seconds. As we were leaving, someone offered us food to take home like sandwiches and soup; there was even someone offering essentials like deodorant and toothpaste. I felt guilty for taking these things, but Sunshine had no such qualms. He took a wrapped sandwich and cup of soup for me, so I accepted the deodorant and toothpaste. It felt like I had been offered a meal filled with hope and kindness and my whole body felt more alive than it had in a long time.

As we made our way from the Mission, I looked back at the door with the cross above it. If I squinted my eyes a little, it looked more like a star than a cross, a beacon of hope for all those that needed it, even me. I had to start believing that I was worthy of the kindness that other people showed me, even if it did make me feel uncomfortable.

I let Sunshine hook his arm in mine as we made our way back home, feeling for the first time in a long time that I was going to be okay.  

Chapter Fourteen – Temperance

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide, Tarot

After wandering for days with my mind, body and spirit split from each other, I decided to do what I could to bring them back together.

Sunshine could tell that I was still being affected by my mother, so he did what he could to draw me out of myself. I wasn’t speaking a lot, and I had forgotten that I was on a journey to find myself. I had stopped trying.

“Family is awful sometimes,” he said “They know how to hurt us the most. Why don’t you come and see my mom with me? It might make you feel better.”

I was a little shocked. “You still talk to your mom?”

“Yeah, of course I do,” Sunshine said.

I gestured at the concrete jungle around us, the people milling about on the streets too busy with their own tasks to acknowledge us. “But we’re here.” I said, as if that explained everything.

“Well, she let’s me live my own life, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have a relationship. When I get tired of being here, I can always go see my mother for an afternoon.”

“She let’s you live like this?” I was still hurting from what had happened with my mother, still not able to see on the other side of it.

“If you mean that she lets me live my own life, but she’s still there for me, then yes. She does.” He gave me a wink and a cigarette. “Come on, I’m taking you home to my mom. You need a hug.”

“You gave me a hug this morning.”

“Not the same and you know it.”

We took the bus to go see her. It felt like an extravagance, and I wondered when it would feel normal being in one world but coming from another.

On the bus, Sunshine and I sat in silence for a while, and I enjoyed the hum of the traffic and the sound of conversation. I tried to hear the music within the noise, the beauty within the racket, trying to distract myself from the torrent of water that still threatened to take me over. My emotions were all over the place and I found myself filled with sudden bursts of anger and shame. I tried to put that emotion into writing, to let the words flow from me, but they were stuck, too concerned with the fact that they might hurt someone else as much as I was hurting to come out onto the paper.

When we got to Sunshine’s mothers place, she greeted us at the door with a bright smile. She took me into a hug right away and it warm and comfortable. “Call me Sarah, everyone does, even this one.” She jerked a thumb at Sunshine. “You’d think he would have learned some manners by now.”

“I learned my manners from you,” Sunshine said with a smirk. Turning to me, he said “Don’t believe a thing she says. She’s lying.”

“Takes one to know one, son of mine.” Sarah looked at me, really took me in. “I’m sorry, but where are my manners? Come here, I want to give you a hug.”

“You already gave me one.”

“That was hello hug. Not a hug to help you heal. Come here, I won’t bite.”

“Unless you want her to,” Rainbow said cheekily. “I’m going to make a cup of tea, Do you want one, Jamie?” Not waiting for an answer, he went into the kitchen.

Sara wrapped her arms around me and this time, the hug felt different. It felt motherly and comforting. She held me while I cried, and I let the tears fall from my eyes. Sarah must have known that they were soaking into her shirt, but she didn’t stop hugging me. She said nothing, but made gentle noises while I cried and patted me gently on the back.

When the tears stopped, Sarah stepped back from me and held me at arms length. “There now, you look a million times better. You can’t hold on to all that sadness, Jamie. It eats you up. Instead, you have to make something from all those emotions.”

I shook my head. “My words keep getting stuck.”

“And so they will after a great upset. But you know what I believe? I believe that the greatest things are created when we’re full of emotions. Keep writing. Here,” She went to the kitchen and got a journal from a drawer. “I keep them around for Sunshine. He’s always writing something. Now you can, too.”

“Thank you, Sarah.”

“Never you mind. And don’t you worry, your mother will come around to the changes that are taking place for her, even as your whole world has changed. You’ll find each other again.”

“Mom, can I put brandy in my tea?” Rainbow asked.

“No you certainly can’t.” She slapped his hand as Rainbow reached for the bottle. “And don’t you worry, Jamie. I’ll be your mom for now.”

“Hey,” Sunshine said. “You’re my mother.”

“I have plenty of love to go around, I can be mom to both of you.”

“Fine, I’ve always wanted a brother anyways.”

We all sat with our tea, the steam coming from the cups, and I finally felt that I was going to be okay. I heard the water in me begin to rain and I wondered what would grow within me. As the rain continued, I flipped my new journal open to the first page and took hold of a pen, ready for the words to come.