Tag: life

Chapter Sixty-Eight – Six of Pentacles

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

“I can’t believe you’re having me wear this to a bar.” I told Rhonda.

She stopped and looked back at me. I felt odd but oddly free wearing the black skirt and sparkly top. It was a beautiful skirt. It hugged my legs and went from my knees to my waist. There were buttons that ran the whole length of it and they were covered in velvet. I had never work anything so fancy in such a long time. The green crop top left my belly uncovered, but the sparkles made up for that. Rhonda had given me a pair of fishnets that had been the wrong size and I put everything together with my black Doc Martins that I had gotten at Rock Junction. The whole outfit really worked, and I was surprised how comfortable I felt.

“It’s what’s going to get you in without paying a cover. It’s fetish night at Frankies on Frank. If you go in with a fetish, you don’t pay a cover.”

“What’s my fetish?”

“Jamieson, cross dressing is a fetish, but it’s also very now. You look good, not every man can pull it off, but you got hips and curves. You gotta show those off. And look at your fucking legs! Why have you kept those covered up? You’re gorgeous and you’re covering your whole body. You don’t need to hide yourself because others were ashamed of you. You wore a fucking sarong to Kaleidoscope, what’s the difference?”

“We were isolated there.” I told her frankly. That was part of the truth. I was more vulnerable because of the shape of the skirt. There was nowhere to hide within it. It felt too open in downtown Ottawa. I was exposed here. I felt like I was in the open sea with the way that the wind brushed past me, and I could feel every perceived eye upon me. Part of me wanted to hide behind Rhonda, but there was a bigger part of me that was excited. I was thrilled at being brave enough or foolish enough to doing this. I loved the brashness of it and how alive I felt. My whole body felt at home within these clothes, and I was terrified and thrilled at the same time. I didn’t know what to do.

Rhonda could sense my discomfort. Putting a hand on my arm, she gave me a stern look and a grin. “You’ve got this, honey. Besides, going in with a fetish saves you five bucks and that can be used for a beer.”

I let out a laugh. “Well, then what’s your fetish?”

She made a motion with her right hand to encompass all of her form. “Honey, I am the fetish. This is my home. I’m among my kind here. Every Thursday night is fetish night. I am seen here and you will be, too.”

We approached Frankies and I was surprised to see that it was an old three-story house that had been made into a bar. “Bottom level is the dance floor; middle floor is the bar where everyone cruises for what they need and the third floor is where the strippers are, there’s always a cover for that floor, too. The place you want to be is the attic. That’s where we’re going tonight.”

I could hear music coming from inside the place and my spirit wanted to lose itself to the rhythm. The thought of a bar frightened me though, despite the call of the music. Gay bars had never been kind to me. I had learned to build walls around myself in places like this and now I was going to enter this place dressed in women’s clothes.

Stopping to look up at the house, the beat of the beat of the music pulling me closer despite my need to protect myself. Rhonda lit a smoke and took a few puffs before passing it to me. “Here, honey. It’s going to be okay. Just embrace the part of yourself that danced in front of the fire at Kaleidoscope. You’ve got the goods, now show ‘em off.” She took the smoke from me and took a few more puffs before butting it out. “Come on.”

We entered the doors and I felt the full pull of the music wrap its arms around my body. I could feel the music, and it felt like I had been immersed in water. The bar was softly lit and we were met by one of the bar tenders when we entered. “You’re not here alone tonight, Rhonda?” He was tall and thin and had brown hair that came down to his shoulders. He had deep brown eyes and stubble on his jaw. “Who’s the skirt?” He gave me what I hoped was an appreciative glance and a wink.

“This here is Jamieson. You be nice to him Jake. He’s new.”

Jake was standing by the door. I could see men and women mingling, drinks in their hands. The music that I’d heard from outside was louder in here and though it wouldn’t have the base of the dance floor, the music here moved me warmed me. The bar gave off this feeling of warmth and welcome. People were having fun here and the air of the place seemed celebratory. The sound of music and the voices of others pulled me in and I could feel myself moving away from where I was toward something I could not see.

It had been so long since I’d been to a bar and the whole thing seemed part otherworldly and part mysterious. There was an elated feel to the air that combined with the music that I could hear and the beat that I could feel in the floor from the dance floor down below.

“You here for fetish night?”

“Aren’t I always?” She gave him a wink. “That’s where the getting is good, you know that.”

She went up the stairs in front of me and I followed. I heard a whistle behind me, and I turned to see Jake giving looking at me up and down. “Nice legs,” he said.

I smiled awkwardly. Jake was cute. He had long brown hair worn in a shag cut that hung to his shoulders and he wore his green t-shit and jeans really well.  I could see the lustre and shine from his hair and his dark eyes more clearly from my higher advantage point. I felt cheeky and gave him a wink and made sure to add an extra wiggle in my butt as I was going up the stairs.

The wooden steps creaked as I made my way up the stairs behind Rhonda, the banister smooth underneath my touch from the thousands of others before me that made the same climb. We arrived on the floor where the strippers danced, and the music was stronger here. The air was filled with the scent of need and desire. A kind of musk filled the air. I had a fleeting sight of a drag queen in a red wig, a half naked man walking after her to what I presumed was the dance floor.

Rhonda noticed me looking. “They have the whole thing here. The dancers perform and if you want to, you can have a private dance in the champagne room.”

“You ever go?”

“No, I don’t like champagne,” she said giving me a wink. “The bubbles make me burp. Plus, I don’t need to pay to see a boy bump and grind. But we’re going one floor up. Mind your step, the stairs are a little slimmer here.”

She was right. I made my way carefully up the small flight of stairs and wondered what awaited me. There was less light up here and I could hear the melody of people’s voices grow louder as we made our way further upward. The stairs went around a corner only to open up into the attic. There was a bar to the left of the room and a bartender talking to one of the other patrons, but that wasn’t the first thing I noticed. In one of the corners of the room, there was a wooden cross set up like an X. There was a gentleman dressed in leather pants whose wrists and ankles were being gently placed into leather braces. The man placing him on the wooden X made sure that he was secure, kissed him and then gently began to whip him. Rather than causing the man on the X pain, the whipping seemed to be bringing him no end of joy.

I looked away wanting to give them both privacy and when I turned my head, I saw a woman with red hair who was topless. She was letting another woman gently apply clamps to her nipples and the whole act seemed to be not one of dominance, but one of love. I wasn’t used to seeing two acts that I would associate with pain, but the people that were being whipped and clamped were experiencing pain.

“There are all kind of ways to deal with pain, Jamieson. Sometimes, you need to find an outlet for it, a way to release the pain you’re carrying.”  Walking up to the bar, she motioned for two beers and handed one to me. “Maybe this will give you the release you need. Maybe it won’t, but I wanted you to see your options.”

I looked at the attic room filled with people who were unashamed of who they were and what turned them on. I didn’t know if I was ready to experience any of this, but it was comforting to know that I could be completely myself here, too, as much as I was in the Pagan community. It felt like Rhonda had shown me another side of myself, one that I had been ashamed of for so long, but she was showing me a way out of that shame.

“It’s okay to be wounded,” Rhonda said softly. “It’s how you learn. Sometimes, you have to move away from what is trying to hold you back. I’m not saying break ties but put up the boundaries you need so that you can do what you want.”

I knew that she was talking about a great many things at once, we had talked about everything after all. She knew that my finding a way forward mattered to me and she knew that not having a home of my own was a growing concern. She knew of my need to be out on my own despite the guilt I felt at wanting to leave Lisa’s place.

What she was telling me was that it was okay to move on. There would be pain, of course there would be, but I would be better for it.  “Thank you,” I told her.

“You’re welcome, now watch my beer. I’m getting some.” I watched as Rhonda sashayed up to the wooden X and allowed herself to be strapped into the leather cuffs.

Chapter Sixty-Six – Four of Pentacles

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in Uncategorized

With my resume out into the world, there was nothing I could do but wait.

I looked at every job board I could for work. Darnelle had given me a copy of my resume on a USB key so that I would have it with me at all times should I have need of it. I didn’t have a computer of my own, but with Darnelle’s help, I had uploaded it to several job banks. I still had my pager, so I used that as my main number, but she had also told me to put her phone number on the resume as well.

“I can take message for you and then you won’t miss anything.”

“Why are you being so good to me?” I said without thinking.

She gave me a smack with her eyes. “Because you deserve it, that’s why. I keep telling you that. I know you have to question everything to determine if the person is being sincere. I get that’s it’s a protection thing, but please just let me help you because I want to.”

“Okay,” I told her. Darnelle always was able to see into the heart of a matter and speak it plainly. There was no keeping anything from her. It wasn’t that she saw through a person. She helped a person find words for what they were feeling. I had seen her do it with Lisa and her son.

With her help, that flame that had begun with a spark of a decision I had made when I was with Franis had become a small flame.  It was the flame of hope. With each passing day, it was becoming more difficult to keep that flame alight.

I didn’t realize how long I would have to wait. I had hoped that this new part of my life would start quickly, but I knew that things would happen in their own time. I still didn’t like waiting. I had prepared myself mentally to get going, to move, for something to happen and now I had to wait. I had difficulty with being patient, especially when I was desperate for change to happen right away.

I asked my cards what I had to be ready for. I drew cards whenever I wanted guidance, my cards always nearby, but I kept drawing the Four of Disks from my deck and it was beginning to frustrate me. I knew that I kept drawing the same card because spirit wanted me to focus. I hadn’t learned what I was supposed to lean yet. My spirit was asking me to honour the rest between the spark and the want. It was enough for me to hold onto the idea, but I had to be patient while spirit worked on my wish. I had learned that magic was sixty percent intent, ten percent hope and thirty percent patience. I had little to no patience and hated that I was being asked to put my faith in time.

I wanted to move and welcome change, I was ready. I wondered if it was because change wasn’t ready for me. In the card, a man stands in an open field in front of a bird. They are standing in a stalemate; the bird is looking at the man, and the man is looking beyond the bird. He is ignoring the wisdom of stillness and waiting to see what the future would bring.

I felt like this, too. My roll of foam was becoming increasingly uncomfortable. It was like my body had decided that it wanted more. It dreamed of comfort. It had been so long since I had slept in a bed. My mind and spirit wanted the same and it was unusual for my body, mind and spirit to want the same thing.

There was the added problem that I felt guilty about hiding everything from Lisa. She had no idea that I had written up a resume and that Darnelle had helped me send them out. I kept telling myself that I wasn’t really keeping it a secret, but I knew that I was. Lisa wouldn’t be understanding of the fact that I was looking for work or that I had done it behind her back with Darnelle’s help. For all of Lisa’s talk of peace, love and light she was a true Warrior Witch and she would take down anyone that displeased her. I had seen her do it with others. She was always having a disagreement with someone about something. This was the first time that I had hidden something from her.

In the end, I knew that I was doing this for me. I wanted something different than what I had now and I knew that the only way to do it was to find work. I knew that I would find something, but I had no idea how long I would have to wait.

Outside on the back porch, I watched as the sky turned to dusk again. I could see the moths flocking near the brightness of the backyard light and felt the change in the wind as it shifted around me. I watched the smoke being pulled out of my cigarette. With every drag of smoke I took, I filled it with my wish so that when the wind pulled the smoke from my open mouth, it would taken my wish out into the air.

I hated waiting, but I also knew that I had to let the healing take its time. I took another breath and released the smoke out into the ether.

Chapter Sixty-Four – Two of Pentacles

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

I had big dreams, but I had no idea how to go about them.

It had been so long since I held a job. The last one had been during university, and I’d held a volunteer job a couple of summers before. I knew that the easiest way out of my current situation was to find a job.

For the past couple of years, I had only been concerned with obtaining food for my stomach and a roof over my head. That had been what drove me and it had been my only concern, aside from finding my way. I was fortunate enough to have met some everyday angels along the way. Lisa was one of them. She had taken me into her home and given me houseroom. Albeit on her floor, but still, she fed me out of the food supplies that we all got at the food bank down the street from her place. Could I betray her kindness?

I was constantly going back and forth about this. Darnelle noticed on one of her visits that I wasn’t myself. She waited until Lisa had gone back inside to get a fresh pack of cigarettes and more coffee to ask me what was wrong.

“What’s bothering you, kid?” she asked

“Nothing,” I told her, wanting to keep it to myself.

“See, that’s where you’re wrong. You can’t bullshit a bullshitter, Jamieson. I can see right into you, and I know there is something bothering you. My son is the same way” She handed me a cigarette. “How about a trade? I give you a cigarette and you can tell me what’s bothering you.”

“You don’t need to bribe me. You and I both know that I’ll tell you eventually.”

“Sure, but this way it’s an exchange so it’s a balance. I know what it’s like to hold on to everything and have no one to tell.”

I shook my head. “I don’t want to bother you.”

She let out a laugh and lit the cigarette before passing it to me. “Tough. You have to change, Jamieson. You just can’t accept that people want to care about you so you do what they can to keep them out before something can happen.”

“Wow, that’s quite the mom talk.” I said with a laugh.

“Right? It doesn’t work on my son; I thought I’d try it on you.” Taking a sip of coffee, she pointed at me with her cigarette. “Go on, spill. I know you want to hold on, but it will feel better letting go. Go on, before she gets back.”

I took a deep breath. I didn’t want to mince words and she was right. I needed to change my habits. I had to be able to adapt to a new path if I went looking for one. I needed to start somewhere.  “I want more.” It felt like a release saying the words out loud. “I want more than this. I want my own place.” I took a drag of my cigarette to give me strength. When I blew the out the air I held, I could see the words that I was about to speak in the within the smoke. “I want more. I know that I need a job, but I have no idea about how to go about applying for one. I had planned on waiting until Lisa had her baby, but it’s becoming harder and harder to hold on to that light. Literally, as I’m sleeping on the fucking floor.”

There was a moment of silence between us, then Darnelle let out a laugh and stood to hug me tightly, careful of our cigarettes. “I am so happy. You make me so fucking happy, Jamieson. Thank the gods.”

I had expected shock but had not been prepared for the sheer joy. “You’re not upset?”

“Jamieson, you’re so young. It pained me to see you throwing your life away like Lisa has.” She saw the look of shock on my face. “Don’t misunderstand me, I love Lisa, she’s my friend and I’ve known her for a long time, but she gave up trying a long time ago. She’s content to stay on welfare when she is perfectly capable of working. She just doesn’t want to.”

“I don’t feel young. How am I supposed to find a job that I can do? I haven’t worked since university.”

“You and I will work on this. Come to my place tomorrow and we can work on your resume. I can make anyone sound good on paper and you can sell yourself, too. You’re good at talking to people, Jamieson, even if you have difficulty letting people in. You’re a gifted writer, too. You’re wasted here.” She gave me a strong look and looking into her eyes, I wondered how her son could deny her anything.

“Won’t Lisa be upset that I’m trying to better myself?” One of her constant refrains was the grind of the people, working for the man instead of living for the sake of living.

Darnelle waved a hand. “Who the fuck cares what she thinks. This is about you. You have to choose this for you.

Looking at Dar, I knew that I would make that choice. We both heard the sound of Lisa’s voice. She came out, carrying a cup of coffee in one hand, a pack of cigarettes in the other with a lit cigarette in her lips

Giving me a look, Lisa said “What’s about you? Did you write another story?”

“I’m going to give Jamieson help.” Darnelle said slowly. I could tell that she was choosing her words carefully. “He needs to work on his resume, and I wanted do some spirit work with him, introduce him to the Medicine Wheel Cards.” I hoped that Lisa would focus on the Medicine Wheel Cards and that she had not heard the other words.

“Resume? For what?”

I sighted. There were two ways that I could play this. I knew that I could lie to her, but Lisa had given me room in her home and food from her cupboards. I owed her the truth. I had planned to keep it a secret but changed my mind. “For a job.” I told her. “I want to find a job.”

She looked at me with wide shocked eyes for a moment. Then she let out a loud laugh. “Good one! Who would want to hire you?” She grinned at me as if she had made a big joke, but I knew that she had spoken her truth.

I looked at her and felt the earth begin to shake and crack beneath me, throwing me off balance. Lisa didn’t see or feel anything, but Dar and I looked at each other. I knew that she could see the shift within me.

I turned to Dar. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” I said with conviction.

Chapter Sixty-Two – King of Swords

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

I was once again by the fire.

This was one of the last nights at the Kaleidoscope gathering. I had attended more rituals and gotten to know so many people, more than I thought that my world could hold. As I sat there watching the fire, a thought occurred to me. I knew why I had been holding myself back. I had assumed that everyone would hate me after what had happened with Francis. He was an elder in the Ottawa Pagan community. I had thought that when he had ended things, my connection to this world would also be over.

I had felt like an imposter here, as if people were staring at me all the time. Over the week that I’d been living on this small island, I had come to realize that people weren’t staring at me, but genuinely happy to see me. I had put myself in kind of a self-exile. I had placed so much value on what Francis thought of me that I had thought that the magic would be gone when he left.

I hadn’t realized that it was just beginning.

The fire was bright as the sky began to darken. We were all around the fire, waiting for the darkness so that we could be truly free from our bodies and minds so that we could let our spirits dance freely. It was as I was looking for the stars that I saw him.

Francis had come to the circle.

I had spent almost the whole week without seeing him. The sight of him was enough to make my heart stop, but only for a moment. A million word ran through my head, speeches that I thought I would say to him if I ever saw him again, conversations that I had imagined, the words as real as if they had truly happened. Scenes that I had imagined went through my mind, bringing up all the thoughts that I had been carrying within me. I wanted to rage at him, scream at him for the weight he had left me with. I was angry with the fierceness of young love when it is still bright and true.

When a spark from the fire landed near my foot, I had an idea.

I got up from the log I was sitting on and instead of heading towards Francis so that we could have one of the conversations that I had imagined in my mind, I turned towards the fire. I had left my things safely hidden in my tent, so I didn’t have my journal with me. Instead, I turned to face the fire, and I plucked what I had wanted to say to him out of my mind, imagining the words writing themselves in a loopy cursive script:

I will always be hurt by what you have done to me.

You have shaped what I think of men.

You showed me that love hurts more than it helps.

You took everything and it still wasn’t good enough.

I will never be able to love again.

One by one, I plucked those phrases from my mind, the pieces of paper brown with age, and tossed them in the fire so that they were no longer true. With each scrap of paper I threw into the fire, I reclaimed a little more of myself each time, gathering up the light and leaving the shadow on the page. As the flames took the words, my mind became clearer as I watched each piece turn to smoke.

When I turned back, Francis was gone.

The fire was so bright when the darkness finally came that I was blinded for a moment. All I could see were shadows dancing with the flames and hear the call of the drum song. I let the music pull me forward and the fire pull me inward. I let go and danced, gave up any reason that was left in my mind and lost myself to magic.

I was free.

Chapter Fifty-Three – 5 of Swords

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide, Memoir, Someone Else’s Life, Tarot, Tarot Writing

I was so angry.

I was also surprised at the thoughts that were going through my head. Every memory of Francis was now tainted and dulled in my head because of what he had done. The fact that he had talked to everyone but me saddened me; the fact that he wouldn’t let me talk to him at all, that he wouldn’t talk to me at all, infuriated me.

I had been sad for days, but gradually, the sadness passed into anger. The water that had surrounded me slowly evaporated as the anger took over. There was a storm in my mind filled with hot shadows made from my fears come to life. Every time I closed my eyes, I could see Francis and his form wavered as if I were seeing him through the film of heat from a fire.

As much as I loved him, I was so angry. I couldn’t bring myself to hate him, for who could hate their first true love? Lisa had told me it was okay to hate someone, but I took offense to that. My love for Francis still ran so deeply in me. I couldn’t stop the flow of my thoughts and emotions, even if there had been a dam put in place in front of the emotions. I had used my mind to place a barrier around my heart and the memories that I had of Francis. I made sure that the metal barrier in my mind was sharp and pointy so that it would hurt every time I tried to look at the time I had spent with him. It was easier for me to go keep my head up afterward and didn’t hurt so much to go on without Francis.

And yet, I would find myself taking out those memories and looking at them, even though I knew that I was hurting myself each time I plucked a memory from that metal box. I would try to look at the memories through a thin red haze. I knew that it was hurting me to keep looking in, but I wanted to see what I had done wrong. When did he stop loving me? I was so lost within myself that even though I kept going, I was stuck. I said this much to Lisa one night.

She’d brought home a rare treat. She pulled open her pack of cigarettes and presented me with a rolled joint. “You look like you really need to loosen up.”

“Why, I’m not uptight.”

“You are so fucking controlled, Jamieson. When was the last time you did something for fun? And you’ve been mired in the dark forest; I don’t mind telling you that. Francis isn’t everything, Jamieson. You need to stop beating yourself up and thinking of him that way. You’re everything.”

Lighting the joint, Lisa took a few puffs and passed it to me. I gladly took in a few puffs of smoke, hopeful that it would at least lessen the pain that I was in and soften the edges of the steel knives. I passed the joint back to her, and she took a few more puffs of her own. Soon, the joint half gone, we were both giggling like school children. My face hurt from laughing, having been kept in a frown for so long. 

The moment made me realize how long I had been hurting myself. I shook my head and looked at Lisa, her eyes large with mirth. “He really was a dickhead.” I couldn’t bring myself to call him an asshole like Lisa did on a regular basis since he had broken up with me. Dickhead was as far as I was willing to go. I still loved him. It hurt to admit this to myself, but I knew that my love for him would take a while to fade.

Letting out a laugh, Lisa said “Well, he does like dick, so it’s an appropriate nickname! I’ll call him that next time I see him.”

I didn’t think anything of it until a few days later. My pager went off, and I saw Francis’ number flash on the screen. My whole world seemed to pause and go still. I couldn’t hear the sounds of Lisa in the next room, or the sounds of traffic from the freeway near by. I stared at the number and wondered if I wanted to talk to him or hear anything that he had to say.

I was still wondering this as I walked out the door, lit a cigarette, and found myself at the payphone across the street. I put a quarter in and dialed his number and when the phone clicked and he said hello, the sound returned to the world around me. His voice could make me believe in any kind of possibility and I wondered which one I would find here.

“Hello, Francis?” I said.

“Hello,” I was surprised to hear the coldness in his voice. “Don’t you mean dickhead?” he asked. “That’s what you’ve been calling me.”

The volume of the noise around me went even louder. Francis’ words seemed too loud and his words felt like a slap. “I mean, I could have called you worse things. You’re lucky that it was just dickhead.”

“That’s what I am to you? I loved you, Jamieson. You don’t talk about people you love like that.”

“You do when they are being mean. You hurt me, Francis.” Even saying his name hurt me and I felt the pain in my chest, the swords clanking together. “I have a right to be upset after you did what you did.”

“I set you free, Jamieson.” I heard the click of a lighter and Francis took in a breath of smoke. “You should be thanking me. I’m not a dickhead.”

Louder than any other sound was the loud beating of my heart. I could hear it in my ears and the noise of it seemed to fill my mind completely. I thought of every other man I had been with, and I didn’t use my voice. My heart wanted me to know that I had one. I closed my eyes and watched as I took hold of one of the swords that surrounded my heart. In my minds eye, I held it out towards Francis.

Letting my eyes slide open, I took in my own breath of smoke. “You’re right, Francis. You’re not a dickhead. I believe that asshole fits you a lot better. You don’t get to break my heart and then tell me how I feel. This is on you.”

I hung up the phone before he could start talking again because I realized that what he said no longer mattered. I could grieve now, finally seeing Francis for what he was. It seemed that he had given me a gift in the end, the clarity that can only come from pain.

I held on to the sword like a dowsing rod and let it lead me back home.