Tag: relationships

Chapter Thirty-Five – The King of Wands

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide, Finding Balance, Memoir, Personal Growth

The List Serve fundraising party was in full swing when we arrived.

I was surprised by how many people were there. Almost all of them were Pagan, too. I couldn’t help but notice how openly they wore their spiritualities. I had always been taught that my spiritual beliefs, which ran contrary to Christianity, were something to be ashamed of. I had kept my love of tarot or anything that went against the word of God a secret. It felt like hiding a large part of who I was in the shadows, yet one more thing I had to hide in order to fit in.

Here, there was no judgement. There was only a feeling of joy, clear and present. The air in the room was filled with a subtle hum and the light was bright and clear. I knew that I was entering a room where the majority of people here believed in magic, and that brought me so much comfort and joy. I felt like I was entering a part of my life that I was always going to find, even though I didn’t know I was looking for it. The joy in that moment made the walls that I always kept up around myself dissolve. I was safe here. I was nervous entering a gathering where I didn’t know who the people were, but my spirit recognized them as friends. That had never happened before.

Lisa brought me around to the people she knew and that included most of the room. I could tell that these people genuinely loved her. I was worried the first time that Lisa brought me up to someone she knew and introduced me, but by the third group of people, that nervousness was gone. I knew that it would take me some time to remember everyone’s names, but I knew that each one of them were exactly who they were. The warmth they gave me was honest and true and I knew that I had never been hugged so many times in the space of half an hour.

We headed to the bar and I got myself a beer. Lisa put her arm around my waist and pulled me over to a man that was standing at the bar talking to someone else, a woman with curly auburn hair. She was smoking a cigarette, and I remember the smoke seeming to curl around the sound of her laughter. Lisa tapped on the man’s shoulder, he turned and I felt my world stop for a moment that seemed like forever and an instant of time all at once.

He had dark brown hir that fell to his shoulders. It was spiky and curly all at once. He had blue eyes that looked like the ocean and lips that were drawn out in a smile. I felt self-conscious and wanted to be seen and hide all at the same time. I walked closer to him and the woman he had been speaking to raised her eyebrows at me as if to see what I was made of, and then she gave me a welcoming smile free of malice.

“This is my friend Francis, you know the one that I was telling you about?” Lisa said.

“This is my roommate and friend Stacey,” Francis said.

“Who is going to make herself scarce. Nice to meet you, Jamieson. I’ve heard nothing but good things about you.” She hooked her arm through one of Lisa’s. “Come on, you can buy me a glass of wine.”

I watched Lisa and Stacey walk away and felt a moment of panic mixed with the heady thrill of knowing. This moment was right, I would be okay. I had to trust in spirit. I moved closer to Francis and felt warmth, smelled something soft. Francis smiled at me and I noticed one of his eyetooth was crooked.

“Lisa tells me that you’re quite the writer.”

I felt the blush of warmth inside me and hoped that it didn’t show on my cheeks. “I write a little.” I said.

“More than just a little, I’m told. She’s showed me one of your poems.”

I was aghast to have been so laid bare before this man that I hardly knew but wanted to know so much more of. I reminded myself not to lay myself completely bare in front of him, but I thought that he could see me anyways, the true me that only a few people in my life could see. Francis could see that and he was still smiling. “She shouldn’t have done that.” I said.

“Nonsense,” he said, pulling the paper from his pocket. “It told me so much about you. I’ve read it quite a few times.”

He unfolded the paper, and I could see that it had been folded and unfolded countless times. The folds were starting to wear the paper clean through. I touched my poem, marvelling at the fact that someone had actually read it that many times.

I watched as he folded the poem again and then placed it back in his pocket. I followed the motion of his arm and watched as his shoulders relaxed. Though he was dressed in dark colours, he gave off a light and a warmth that I could feel from where I stood. I just wanted to bask in that fire he gave out. His presence was beyond his body and I could feel him even though we weren’t touching.

I knew that Lisa meant for the two of to talk about being raped in our pasts, that she felt that it would offer some kind of healing. I just didn’t want to talk about any of that. I wanted to learn all I could about Francis. It seemed like he had the same idea.

“Lisa says that you were hurt, too. That you carry a lot of scars. I do, too. I’m sorry that anyone ever hurt you.” He reached out and gently took my right hand, rubbed the pad of his thumb across my knuckles. “We can talk about that later, but tonight I just want to get to know you. Would that be okay?”

I nodded and felt the warmth emanating from him increase. “That would be lovely,” I said and when the blush came, filling up my cheeks with colour, I didn’t do anything to hide my face.

Chapter Thirty-Four – The Queen of Wands

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide, Finding Balance, Memoir

Lisa knew how much light she gave out into the world. She was utterly and completely aware that people fell under her spell. Man, woman, it didn’t matter. She always had a score of people willing to help her so that they could benefit from the brilliance that she gave out.

Which is probably why she was determined to help me.

What I’d come to realize was that light was a transactional thing with Lisa. If she loved you, you were golden and got her at full wattage. If she liked you, a little less so, but she still sparkled. If she didn’t like you, there was usually a reason, and you were shunned from her light. This wasn’t done willy nilly. She didn’t withhold her light to be cruel; I wasn’t sure she had it in her to do that. As I got to know her, I watched how she would interact with those around her. She looked like the sun surrounded by the orbit of people around her.

I didn’t know how to feel within the orbit around her. I was just grateful that I had found safety with someone that felt like my best friend and my mom at the same time. She would encourage me I little ways, trying to bring me out of my shell. I had retreated father and father into myself, and Lisa did what she could to bring me out of it. The talent competition was a perfect example of this

“I know you can do funny well, try and be funny. A serious monologue isn’t going to win the competition. Do it from the point of being Pagan and your parents don’t understand what you’re doing.”

“Yeah, like my parents asked me if I had gotten into sacrificing or blood in my rituals when I told them I was Pagan.”

Lisa let out a snort. “Oh, my Goddess, you have to lead with something like that. It’s perfect.”

She gently pulled me out of myself so that I could begin to see who I was. I performed bits and pieces of my monologue as I wrote, and she helped me to put the pieces in order. She was creative in her own ways, but she helped to make my creativity bloom into something real and tangible that I could feel taking hold of me. She was the spark that helped my flame to grow. As I continued to write on whatever I could find, random receipts, ruled paper pulled from a notebook, it felt as if she were my muse.

The idea of doing a monologue in front of a group of people was like any other day at the theatre. Out of all the areas of the dramatic arts that I had tried (acting, writing, filming, dramatic roles, etc.) the one that I loved the most was improv. I loved that a whole world could open up out of a handful of words and the mere suggestion of a place.

I loved that in drama, I would normally be able to lose myself in the life of someone else. The fact that this would be the first time talking about something that had actually happened was kind of a revelation for me. I didn’t like talking about myself. It was one of the ways that I was able to help others. I listened to other people and offered help when I could so that we didn’t have to talk about who I was.

I kept the details light, but the fact that there was even one iota of truth to the monologue was such a big step for me. I was too young to realize that every writer puts a part of themselves into everything that they write. I worried that no one would want to hear what I had written because of that truth. It was so long since I’d been on stage that I wasn’t sure I’d be any good. I knew that it wasn’t enough just to say the words, I had to be good. I practiced my delivery, and I knew that if I fucked up, I would just ad lib until I got back on track. I got the monologue down to two and a half minutes. I told myself that if I fucked up, I would just improv it. That’s all there was to it.

The night before the show, Lisa and I were out on the porch smoking a cigarette. I watched the curls of smoke against the dark blue background of the sky at dusk. I looked up to the stars that were shining above me and knew that if I wished hard enough, something great would happen.

Lisa made me feel like it was okay to make a wish for something better and believe in the possibilities. She let me know that it was okay to trust the Gods and that they would be there to help me along on the way as long as I had faith in myself.

She let me know that it was okay to be me.

Chapter Twenty-Eight – 7 of Wands

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide, Finding Balance, Memoir

I was overjoyed to get a phone in my room.

It felt like such an adult thing to have such a thing. A phone was an item from my past and

I was finally able to stay in touch with those I loved and even a few friends. Not that many people had my telephone number and felt special. I didn’t have a lot of money and would not use the phone very much except for local calls. That’s why it was odd to find it ringing when I got home from the garage. I had made myself a bowl of pasta in the kitchen of the rooming house and was having dinner while I read a book. The phone ringing was like a siren and my fork clattered to the desk.

A part of me didn’t want to answer it, but I ignored that part of me and picked up the receiver, the ring of the telephone loud in my room. “Hello?”

“So it is your number.” Shades said. His voice was dark and full of honey, the kind that could clog your throat and make it hard to breathe. “I wasn’t sure that Sunshine was pulling my leg or not when he gave me your number.”

It had been so long since I had heard his voice. I had come to know it well during our time together and I knew that this was his angry voice. It was how he liked to start most conversations. He had always been angry about something or angry at someone. I saw that with the gift of hindsight, but when I first knew him, I thought Shades being moody was just his way of being misunderstood. I was attracted to these parts of him that he was brave enough to share under the cover of night. I realized that I had been something to be kept hidden and kept from the prying eyes of others.

I knew that he had been ashamed of me. At that moment, I was ashamed of myself because when I heard his voice, my body reacted automatically. Even though my mind and body knew that Shades was bad for me, they still wanted him. I still wanted him.

“I need to see you,” he said. “I don’t know what you did to me. I was never fucking gay before you but now I can’t get you out of my head.”

The words came out in an angry torrent, and I felt each one of them pierce my skin. I wondered how much a person could bleed before they had given away all that they were to the needs of someone else. He had already taken so much from me, aside from the parts of myself that I had willingly given him.

“I didn’t make you gay.” I told him.

“Then what did you do?” I could hear the desperation in his voice, and it echoed my own when I realized that I was gay and prayed for someone, anyone to take it away. “You only think of yourself, that’s always been the way you do thing. You just took from me.”

“I didn’t take anything from you.”

“You took my manhood. You made me gay when you put it in your mouth.”

I let out a laugh. “It doesn’t work that way. It’s not like you can catch being gay like you can catch the flu.”

“Then what did you do to me?” He asked again. “I need to see you. Will you come to see me, please?”

I nodded even though he couldn’t see me doing it. “Sure, I’ll come see you. How do I get there and what’s the address?”

He told me and I told him that I would be there in about an hour. I sat in my room and thought only for a moment of what I wanted to do and wondering if I could do it. I knew that it would make him angry, but I just didn’t care anymore. I sat there at the desk and looked at myself in the mirror that looked back at me like an eye. I went to my purple bag and took out all of my make up and set it on the table in front of me.

I pushed my bowl of pasta aside and began applying my makeup. I started with a light powder to cover my skin and then eyeshadow. I chose a light purple colour, an almost lilac colour that made my eyes brighter. I applied a little bit of blush in a natural tone and a lipstick in a soft rose petal colour. All very neutral but I was clearly wearing make up.

With every strike of the brush against my skin, it felt like I was putting on war paint. I knew that by going to see him, I had put the ball in his court. I had to take my power back from him. I knew that this had to be done, even if it meant going to him. By the time I was made up completely, I was ready for the battle ahead of me. As I waited for the bus, I said mantra’s over and over in my head and tried to recall what I had learned from reading Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. As I got on the bus and it began to bring me closer to where he waited, I thought of the bus as a chariot heading into war and wondered if I would be victorious.

In truth, I was afraid. I didn’t know how he would react, and I had seen him rage before. He had made me hide inside a closet rather than be seen with me. At the time, I had thought it was because he wasn’t out of the closet yet. Later, after I had left him, I wondered if it was because he was ashamed of the feelings I brought out in him, so I had to be hidden.

I would not hide now.

He would not make me cower because of who I was and what I was. The makeup drew looks from my fellow bus passengers, but I thought “Let them look.” That was the point anyways. I didn’t want to hide anymore so that I could make Shades feel better about his shame. I had to stand up for myself once and for all with him and let him know that he could not intimidate me anymore.

He was waiting for me when the bus came. I got off the bus and could already see a storm brewing around him. Part of me wondered why this was so important to me and what I had to prove, but in that moment when I saw the anger in his eyes when he looked at me, I knew that this was important to me. Shades didn’t matter one iota to me. I would not hide myself so that he could feel comfortable with who and what he was.

“Do you have to look like such a faggot?”

I could see the air around him and it looked as if it had been supercharged with the energy he was putting out. I could smell the booze emanating from him and knowing how alcohol affected people, I knew to be wary and on my guard. Confronting him was about giving myself closure, but that didn’t mean I had to endanger myself.

“I’m not exactly sure what you mean, Shades.” I told him. “How exactly is a faggot supposed to look?”

He waved his hands at me. “Like this! Like you do!”

“I’m not sorry if the very sight of me offends you.”

“It’s not that! Do you have to be so fucking gay all the time?”

“It’s not like I can turn it off, you know.” I said. “It’s not like there’s a gay switch that I can flick on and off to blend better with society.”

“You could at least try!” He was yelling now. “Then we could be together.”

I looked at him, at this man I used to be so enraptured with, and I wondered why he had held so much power over me. I thought of Rainbow and how he had treated her, how he had treated both of us and the way we thought we were lucky to have drawn his gaze to ourselves. We felt like we had been blessed to have him in our lives. I would have done anything for Shades, and I think he knew that, too.

That stopped now.

I was not someone to be ashamed of or shoved into a box or a closet to remain hidden until you were ready for me. “I’m not going to be the reason that you’re pissed off. You’re angry at me because I’m braver than you are because I can live as I truly am.”

“Just come inside and we can talk about this, about what you’ve done to me and what you plan to do about it.”

That sounded less like an invitation and more like a threat. I was done being threatened and I was done hiding. I looked at Shades and finally saw him for what he was. When that happened, I realized he had no power over me.

I could see another bus coming and I turned my back on Shades and walked towards the bus stop. It didn’t matter what bus it was, only that it would take me away from him and back to the life which I was trying to live where he had no place in it.

“Where are you going?”

When I turned back to him, it was to find him looking at me with eyes so filled with fear. I knew what it was like to be afraid, and I hoped that Shades would find a way through it towards self acceptance. I knew that it wasn’t my place to take on someone else’s fears and try to make sense of them. I had enough to deal with on my own.

I turned away from him and when the bus door opened, I got on and let the doors close behind me. As I made my way to a seat, I could see Shades looking after the bus for a moment and then he was gone from my sight and my life.

Chapter Twenty-Four – 3 of Wands

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide, Finding Balance

I talked to Sunshine about it over the next few weeks. My dreams had been full of gods and monsters, goddesses and wonders, magical events that had taken place before my time or had never happened at all.

“I don’t know why you’re over thinking this.” Sunshine said, taking a drag from his Djarum cigarette.

He handed me one and I took in the scent of cloves. The smoke was harsh in my throat, but tasted of far-off lands that I imagined my muses would have come from. “What do you mean?”

“You always talk about Egypt. It’s pyramids this and pharaoh that. Why ware you looking anywhere else. You always overthink things so much.” He pointed his cigarette at me. “It’s what keeps you so grounded.”

I let out a snort. We were sitting in his apartment. “How has it been?” We didn’t see each other as much as we had before. We hung out when I found him in the square, but there was a bridge between us. “Are you still dating Shale?”

Sunshine shook his head. “Nah, he didn’t want to settle down. He wasn’t into anything long term.” He tried to keep a brave face on, but I could see the pain in his eyes. “We wanted different things.”

I butted out my clove cigarette and pulled Sunshine into a hug. “I’m sorry.”

“Fuck him, honey.” He waved his own cigarette like a baton. “I’m a free man. It will be nice to choose myself from now on. Like you are.”

I nodded. I understood what he was talking about. I could feel a shift within me. It was taking its time trying to show itself to me, but I could feel the new path beginning to grow in front of me. It felt like I was divided between what was and what I wanted. “I’m not sure if I want it.”

Sunshine let out a puff of clove scented smoke. “What do you mean, honey? What could be better than this?” He waved his hands around the room. “There are so many cockroaches here, they’re throwing a party every night. You have your own room, you’re learning about yourself.”

“There’s so much to learn.”

“Life can be like that. You can’t be afraid to go wherever the journey will take you, Jamie. You have to look at what is coming and not live in the past. Look at what you left behind you.”

The bridge between us had grown longer. I wanted to take Sunshine into an embrace and not let go of him. I wanted to take him with me, to keep him like a touchstone. I felt so far from my family that I had known for so long. “I don’t want to let go of you.”

“I’m not letting go of you. You can’t get rid of me that easily, honey. No, all I’m saying is that you’re changing. Isn’t it wonderful? You’re able to let go of Shades and his bullshit and Matt was a fucking drama queen. You’re starting out on your own. How amazing is that?”

“I just live in a room, Sunshine.”

“But it’s your room. It’s your space. You’re at the start of a new beginning; you just haven’t realized it yet.”

“I don’t know where I’m going.” I said, almost whispering the words because I was afraid to admit this.

“You didn’t no where you were going when you got here. Don’t fight where the world wants to take you.”

“I won’t.” I told him, knowing that there was fear there. I had known fear all my life, but this was different. It felt like a fear that was filled with possibility instead of full-on fear that promised hurt. Rather than make me want to turn away and stay with what was comfortable, I was looking down the road that led me away from the bridge and knew that I wanted to discover what was possible.

“Good, I’ll kick your ass if you muck this up.” He butted out his cigarette. “Want to go look at the guy across the alley jerking off?” Sunshine grinned. “For old time’s sake?”

“Just try and stop me.”

Chapter Sixteen – The Tower

by Jamieson Wolf, posted in A Tarot Guide

When I saw her, my first thought was of fire.

She had spiky red and gold hair, brown eyes and a smattering of freckles across her cheeks. She was always smiling, and I wondered how a person could be a never ending source of light instead of puzzle or some kind of maze. I wasn’t used to that. Everyone was a kind of puzzle if you thought about it; you had to figure your way through what they held dear and see if resembled yours. It took years to know a person completely.

Renee wasn’t like that. She loved everyone equally and it didn’t matter who they were. Even if you chose to live outside and shunned the shelters, she loved you. If you had an issue with drugs, that didn’t matter. She always talked to you like you mattered.

She saw everyone.

I knew that I always lit up when I saw her as I began to run into her with more frequency. I didn’t know much about where she had come from and how she had ended up on the streets, but from the moment I ran into her in the YSB, it was like were drawn to each other.

I was a moth to a flame when I saw her.

All of my walls would come down. It wasn’t a question of hiding anything or observing their actions so I knew if I could trust them. There was none of that. I was instantly open  with her as there wasn’t even an iota of fear. I had only met one other person like that in my life up to that point. Those kinds of people are rare in life.

To say I was enraptured would be an understatement.

“Honey, you sound like you’re in love with her.” Sunshine said. He had just read a page of one of his journals and had asked me what happened during my day. I had spent the last five minutes talking about everything that Renee and I had done that day.

“Yeah, like I love you,” I told him. “Like we’re friends.”

“Do you ever mention to other people how my hair looks when the sun hits it just right?” He asked, giving me a wide grin.

“No, I tell them how awesome you are.”

“I know you do, what’s not to love. But you’re talking like you are in love with her.”

“That’s not possible, I’m gay.” I told him. I sat there looking at him, a new blanket I had gotten draped around my shoulders. I had picked it up at the Mission earlier and I pulled it closer around me despite the relative heat of the evening.

I thought of everything that I had given up to be gay, all that I had left behind to finally claim who I really truly was. I had struggled so much to be true to who I was. I had tried committing suicide twice in my teens, I had survived an abusive homelife and I overcome the mountain of high school, the ledge that should have been a place of safety that would help me see my path in the future but instead was a place of judgement, hatred and isolation.

I had survived everything to be what I was. It had been a secret for so long that finally owing up to the truth of who I was often felt like a waterfall that had been in front of me all this time had finally parted to let me through so that I could see what was on the other side.

“There are all kinds of love, Jamie. You love who you love, it’s your business.” He gave my hand a rub and lit a cigarette. He took a drag and passed it to me. “It doesn’t mean you have to sleep with her, but you can get as close as you want to. There’s no judgement. The normal rules don’t apply here.”

I passed him back the cigarette and when I let the smoke go free from my mouth, I let the blanket loosen around me. Sunshine had gone back to writing and I pulled out my tarot cards to figure out what I should do. I shuffled pulled out the Tower and the Seven of Pentacles. I looked within the guidebook and tried to determine what my future would bring.