Welcome to the forty-ninth card pull for the Mundane Magic project!
This subscription is for anyone who may be interested in how the creative writing process works, finding magical aspects about their everyday life, learning more about tarot card meanings, reading new short stories, or creating their own short stories.
I’ve been pulling a card every week (with one exception), and creating a short story within that week as well. We’re just under 50 stories. That’s almost a year of writing for you! That’s pretty exciting for me!
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Every Monday, I pull a card from an old Rider Waite tarot card deck I purchased years ago in Salem, Massachusetts. Once a card is chosen, it will not return to the deck. The goal: 78 cards, 78 stories.
If you are subscribing for FREE, you will get to see a card pull post like this every Monday. You may choose to use it for your own entertainment or inspiration for creating a short story of your own! FREE posts will remain free for you to access for a month, and then they head to the archive.
If you are a PAID subscriber, you will get to see the Monday card pull posts, AND have access to my podcast, recorded live as I pull the card.
PAID subscribers will also get the exciting pleasure of reading the story that is created during the week. It will be posted the following Saturday morning.
PAID subscribers will have the ability to post comments and add to discussion around all of the posts, and will have full access to the archives.
Founding Members receive additional perks, like meetings with me!
On to today’s tarot card pull!
The card pulled today was the Two of Wands.
For my initial reaction to the card, check out the podcast, Episode 49.
First impressions from the image: This is an especially interesting card for me to pull! I had a friend who was creating her own tarot card deck images, and I was invited to pose for this particular card using, instead of the globe you see in the man’s hand, one of my own crystal balls! It was soooo heavy! It was a lot of fun to get dressed up and pose for those cards.
Focus! So, the image, as I mentioned, is dominated by a man holding a globe in his hand. Instead of it being a globe similar to one you might be used to seeing, with large blue portions of ocean and brown or green land masses, this one is green where the oceans would be, and reddish in color where the continents are.
The man is dressed richly. He has a tunic and capes in shades of brown, and wears a red hat upon his head. He’s standing on a parapet, overlooking a valley. There are other domiciles in front of him, rolling hills, lush greenery, mountains in the background, all sitting at the edge of a bay of water. The illustration drops off, so it technically could be a lake, but the image’s inclusion of the globe in the man’s hand makes me think of longer voyages, so it definitely has the feel of an inlet from the ocean of some sort.
There is an architectural feature next to the man on the parapet that has impressed on it an image of a black cross. It’s very ornate, with a red rose on each end of one of the crossbars, and a white lily on each end of the other crossbar.
In the man’s right hand, as I’ve mentioned, he’s holding up a globe of some sort. In his left hand, he has a wand, or staff, resting on top of the architectural feature mentioned before, a sort of block. Behind him, or to the side, there is another wand, locked into place by a bracket on the inside of the parapet wall.
The Rider Waite interpretation of the Two of Wands is as follows: A tall man looks from a battlemented roof over sea and shore. He holds a globe in his right hand and a staff in his left rests on the battlement, another is fixed in a ring. The Rose and Cross and Lily should also be noticed on the left side. Divinatory Meanings: Between the alternative readings there is no marriage possible, on the one hand, riches, fortune, magnificence. And on the other, physical suffering, disease, chagrin, sadness, mortification. The design gives one suggestion—here is a lord overlooking his dominion and alternately contemplating a globe. It looks like the malady, the mortification, the sadness of Alexander amidst the grandeur of this world’s wealth. Reversed: Surprise, wonder, enchantment, emotion, trouble, fear.
The immediate impression I’m getting from this is someone who has the world at their feet, but still is just not completely satisfied. The way this interpretation is written, though, we could also go one route or the other. We could just focus on the riches, fortune, and magnificence, or just on the suffering and sadness.
There’s a lot to think about here. This great illustration could also lend itself to a simple, straightforward story on its own. This little village looks like it’s very prosperous, tucked into the hills right on the edge of the ocean.
Tell me what you think!
Now what?
Our forty-ninth card has now been drawn! I’ll be working on an original story during the week. I can’t wait to see what develops!
If you are a PAID subscriber, you’ll be able to view my final story on Saturday. If you like what we’re doing here, please consider sharing. Whether you are a free or paid subscriber, you will earn rewards for doing so, and it is the best form of advertisement, which helps me keep this project going!
Until next time, let’s make some magic!