Category: ancestors

Four of Fire

Four of Fire
Dark Goddess Tarot

First Impressions:  My initial impressions of this card were not positive as it seemed to be someone pulling the strings.  However, as I did the reading, I realize that the intent is to show her influencing her children.  Overall this is a card of contentment as it shows our ancestors looking out for us.

Book:  Family, ancestors, and gods meet at the hearth; heart is a portal; ancestors live in the home fire; judge of domestic affairs

Guidance:  Scry using fire to receive messages from gods or ancestors, clean and smudge your house, acknowledge the gift of life you’ve received from your ancestors, do not pollute your future through poor behavior in the future

Journaling

There are so many messages in this card.  I love the message of honoring the gift of the ancestors even if you can’t honor them.  The ancestors did give me gifts that I cherish.  I am strong and independent because of my Grandmother Babcock.  When I work to connect with her, I find someone who was trapped by the circumstances she grew up with.  she was poor and had few opportunities.  I also knew that she was mentally ill and did not get the help she truly needed.  It’s difficult to function when you have an untreated mental illness.

I also know how easy it is to become angry and mean when your emotional needs aren’t being met.  In some ways, John deciding to leave was a gift because I was becoming incredibly angry and bitter.  I felt as if I just gave and gave and gave and that I got nothing in return..  I still don’t feel as if I get a lot of emotional support from others, but I also don’t feel as if my emotional energy is being completely drained.

January 8, 2018

As I meditation on this card, the words that keep coming to mind are compassion, death, and perspective.  I need to learn to have compassion for myself and for others.  I’m being guided especially to have compassion for my mother.  I am still upset by the fact that I perceive her as choosing not to change, but what if she really can’t choose to change?  Would I be judging her so harshly if she wasn’t able to walk as fast as I can because she was handicapped?  I also have to remember that I’ve struggled to change even though I knew that changing was in my best interest.  I’m sure that there are people who think I was stubborn or was choosing not to change.

It’s funny, as I was talking to someone from work today who exhibits a lot of the behavior that I used to exhibit:  being stubborn, taking everything personally, etc.  I was able to just listen to him without judging or taking any of it personally.  Maybe that’s what I need to do with my mother.  Maybe I just need to realize that even though it feels personal, it isn’t personal.  Maybe she truly is incapable of changing.

I also need to have compassion for myself and accept that her behavior hurts me and that I did the most compassionate thing that I could when I walked away.

Ritual to Honor My Father

My father died the day after Thanksgiving in 2008.  I’d known it was coming as he had lung cancer that had metastasized through his body.  I was living 200 miles away and traveling even farther away for work every single week.  I made the trek to visit him as often as I could, but it never felt like enough.  I knew the end was coming when I visited him and he was a shell of the robust, loving man who had raised me.  This was also the start of a devastating period of changes in which I could only react and had no time to mourn.

The call that he was gone was devastating, but not shocking as I knew the call would be coming sooner rather than later.  However, there was no time for my own sadness as I had to drive the 200 miles through teary eyes to help my mother deal with her grief as she’d lost her mother less than a week before.  I had to become the supportive daughter and not allow myself to be the grieving child.

I was strong for my mother, I was strong for my children, and I was strong for my now ex-husband.  I was the one who provided the shoulder to cry on, who prevented my mother from buying a junky used car the day after my daddy died, and I was the one who gave the eulogy at my father’s funeral.  I was also the one in the year after my daddy’s death that counseled my mother, loaned her the money to bury my father, and was there for everyone else.  I never let myself mourn because there was no time.

Fast forward a little over a year and I got another call that rocked my world, my husband had had a massive coranary and I needed to be at the hospital immediately.  Once again, I was the one who dealt with the details. shored everyone up and never let anyone see my tears.  I sat by his side, cheered him up, bathed him, and did whatever else needed to be done. 

My payment for the days spent by his side was his pronouncement four months after his heart attack was that he wanted a divorce.  I was hurt, I was angry, I fell apart, but all too soon I had to pull myself together and be strong for my kids.  I had to figure out how to keep them in college, get them settled in off campus housing, and deal with all the other realities of life.

It was ten years before I finally felt strong enough to mourn my father.  I cried for my loss, I cried for my children’s loss and I started to remember the good as well as the bad.  My family has always done ritual on Halloween and remembered our beloved dead, but I was ready to go deeper and to truly grieve and comfort the lost little girl inside.  Around that time, I came across Lisa de St. Croix’s Ancestor Workshop and it resonated with me. 

I took some time to gather mementos and photos of my father, I meditated on his life and our relationship, and I found the cards that represented both him and me according to Lisa’s advice and I found cards I wanted to use to meditate on.  It was a little weird because my dad’s card was the lovers and that felt really uncomfortable.  I finally pulled the lovers from the Animal Totem Tarot and I used the Hermit from the Druid Craft Tarot for my birth card. 

As I reflected on the cards, the assignment was to write a message to my dad from the Hermit’s perspective and to me from my dad from the Lover’s perspective.

The Message from Me From My Dad

You are too much of a hermit and you withdraw too much.  You need to let people in.  People will disappoint you, but they will also bring you great joy.  Love is a choice!  Choose to open your heart and let people in.  You deserve Love!  Choose it.

My response as the Hermit

The world is too painful of a place to open my heart.  I’m much more comfortable in my own company.  Choosing love is scary.  However, I know I’ve already chosen love with my kids.  Loving Cam and Sean brings pure joy along with the heartache and I remember that, I remember love is worth it.

Interestingly enough, since I did this ritual, I have been seeing and finding turtles everywhere.  Turtle was my dad’s nickname and when I find those turtles, I’m reminded that he is looking out for me and that love never truly dies.