November continues our journey through the 10/1 Universal Year and the 11 Universal Triad, but the monthly current changes again.

November is a 21/3 Universal Month, corresponding with The World and The Empress—a combination that brings themes of expression, creation, connection, visibility, growth, and bringing something i…

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I haven’t done one of these in ages, but I feel like writing something today. So here goes!

I. There is a new feral/abandoned kitten living under the stairs of the building attached to my favourite coffee shop. The owner has been taking care of a small population of feral cats for several years, and I think people are starting to abandon cats and kittens here because they know she will feed them. This is one fluffy little grey, very spicy kitten. He’s got a wee grey tiger tail and white boots. Every day I show up and just sit near the steps for a few minutes and talk to him. Today he didn’t run, but he did stay under the old wooden steps. I suspect he’s abandoned. He reminded me so much of my cat Smokey, who died in 2015, that it just popped out of my mouth when I sat down this afternoon: “Hello, Smokey.” He stopped dead in his tracks and just stared at me long and hard for a few minutes. I think we have a Smokey hiding under the stairs. My next move is to bring an old scarf that smells like me to slip under the staircase. I’ll keep you updated.

II. I was originally going to use Substack as a blog for 78Numbers, but Google AdSense doesn’t acknowledge it when it crawls the site and has deemed my web app “low quality” because it doesn’t have a bunch of pages to read. So, I built a lightweight blog inside the site and loaded it with a few evergreen articles that have good SEO, as well as some links to free things. It is my plan to run this like I did my 2007 crochet blog and turn it into something passive. So far, so good. Not a day goes by that at least one person doesn’t spend the $3 on the PDF offer.

III. I will have to figure out what to use Substack for if it isn’t going to be the blog space for 78Numbers. I suppose I could always use it as a space to talk about the growing list of differences I am noticing about the New Age vs Witchcraft spaces, along with the occasional piece about numbers.

IIII. I haven’t done any shit-disturbing Tarot reads on any current events lately — not that there isn’t a delightfully horrifying plethora of terrible things to shitpost through the lens of Tarot. The province of Alberta votes on leaving confederation this week, tomorrow, to be exact. I might do a shit-disturbing Tarot reading about that tonight. We shall see. Scratch that. I was invited to my SiL’s for homemade ravioli. I am forsaking mocking the Alberta separatist movement for a free meal.

V. I’m on Phase 2, Part U of switching 78Numbers over from a Pythagorean letter-number key to a Chaldean key and there is no light at the end of the tunnel yet. Version 98 is still not published but I’ve done almost 700 checks and there are two more phases to go and I don’t know how many damned parts are in those phases because I never know until I discover one more little fire that needs to be put out. This is interesting because building what is essentially becoming a “living” ecosystem with AI is absolutely in no way like throwing up a Wordpress site, playing with CSS, and feeling like a god when you get the subscription pop-up to work. It’s also tremendously frustrating, too, because I know just enough JSON and Python to be infuriatingly annoying to those who do know what they’re doing. I have stepped way the hell out of my comfort zone and I feel like I have flown too close to the sun on a daily basis.

I’ll live, I just need to whine about it a little bit.

VI. Speaking of stepping out of my comfort zone, I have been working psychic fairs and outdoor markets this fall. This most recent one was at the Norwich Legion and it was their first time trying this sort of Saturday event. They were the nicest market people ever, although I will admit I freaked out a little on the inside when I realized I couldn’t use my normal set up. They had readers at round dinner tables, sandwiched between the ends of the billiard tables. It was a little strange, I know they were working with what they had, and I have made notes on next year so I can be better set up for them because I am going back. Full transparency, when I set up I thought “Well….hmmmm….maybe?” I wasn’t sure I would do well but I did. I really, really did. I didn’t have time to track it because I was BUSY (an excellent sign!) as the day wore on but when I sat down with my sign-up sheet and Stripe at home that evening, it was a very good day, indeed.

VII. And continuing the theme of stepping out of my comfort zone, a conversation about some of those New Age vs Witchcraft differences I mentioned back up there ^^^ has resulted in me opening my mouth and “I should teach a beginner Witchcraft class every week here.” Here, being The Alchemist. That was followed with, “I should do an 8 part weekly course.” What the hell is coming out of my mouth?! Then followed by, “Maybe I should stream it, too” Shut up Icarusina!! At any rate, my calendar is now filling up with things because I am inventing things to fill it up with and apparently other people think those things are good ideas.

VIII. And because apparently I really like pushing the red button, my friend Robin, Third Space owner extraordinaire is talking to Ron Klopfanstein about me doing his reading when he does his weekly live podcast at The Tram. He’s an investigative journalist in this area and his podcast is widely listened to in CNY. Someone reel me in, my introvert heart is starting to palpitate. This one is not confirmed yet.

VIIII. I finally got to have a follow up with the cardiologist regarding my cardiac study in August. I can get back into kettle bell training again and my primary care can stop holding my old dose of thyroid meds hostage. I was on a particular dose for seventeen years in Canada and then I was taken off it in 2020 right before I immigrated. Everything worked worked properly until I was taken off of it. “Oh you're fine blah blah the science has changed blah” I spent five years fighting to get back on it and my doctor put me on half the dose. Then when that became not enough a few months later, I had to spend from January to July jumping through hoops playing the blood work game until my TSH was sky high. Then they said “Oh no, you're having palpitations” — well no shit Sherlock. They went away when you gave me back my damned meds. “Oh but you might have something else. Here, more hoops for you.” I have to wait until my appointment with primary care at the end of this month. I hate doctors right now, but I scored 120% on my stress test, so blaaaah to everyone who saw the fat chick walking through the door that day and had their thoughts.

X. I have bangs now. My hair was almost down to my elbows and I told my stylist to cut it off. I showed her my Pinterest board, closed my eyes, and trusted the universe. I have Carol Pope’s hair now. After years of having about 10lbs of wild witch hair I just don't know how to be.

Again, I'll be fine. I just need to drink some wine and bitch about it.

Over ravioli.

Later!

Today's story is brought to you by the Two of Coins, at the bottom of the deck, and by the Five of Wands, the Nine of Coins, and the Two of Swords.

Starring:

The Three of Cups, who is trying to buy back her grandmother's house, and maybe a little of her own childhood with it

The Six of Wands, who really loves red and tells the truth whenever she feels like it.

The Two of Wands, who starts everything first and never reads the instructions

With Death, who turns one thing into another thing, whether you like it or not; La Maison Dieu, the Sheriff, who always arrives right as things fall down; as well as appearances by Justice, the old-school marm who sits on the town council with The Emperor,  as well as The Magician, The Star, and Four of Coins.

A shout-out to the folks on Patreon, whose paid subscriptions allow this to happen! This wouldn't be possible without my paid Patrons and reading clients, whose financial support covers the cost of things like Canva and Grammarly Pro, the existence of 78numbers.com, the entrance fees for the markets I've been able to participate in, the medical bills and groceries that don't pay for themselves, and the dark roast coffee that helps to keep my motor humming.

The house on Elm Street had been empty for six years, and in that time Tarot Town had developed a deep and affectionate relationship with it, the way you can love a thing best when you don't have to maintain it. Everyone had a story about the Three of Cups' grandmother's kitchen. After she passed during the COVID lockdowns, the house remained unoccupied. People just couldn't bring themselves to do anything. It stood as a symbol of both happy homespun memories AND a time in collective history that no one wanted to revisit. As a result, nobody had paid the property taxes or done the necessary maintenance. By autumn of this year, the county had run out of patience and grace periods, and the choice was plain: someone buys the house, signs a loan the size of a small mountain, and fixes it, or Death buys it at auction and turns it into something else.

Nobody in Tarot Town likes it when Death shows up with a clipboard, though everybody hires him eventually. He buys what's finished and turns it into what's next: the old mill became apartments, the bowling alley became the library annex, and nobody has ever once thanked him at the time. He would tell you, if you asked, that the house was going to change either way. The only question was who got to decide into what.

The town council meeting on Tuesday night was about as civil as a dogfight in a phone booth. Justice, who has taught most of the town to read and behave, sat at the Emperor's right hand with her glasses on a chain, and she did not need a gavel. The Three of Cups, who had barely slept, stood up to say the house still felt important to her and the rest of the Cups family. Death, in the back row, said that family was lovely, but the roof was collapsing. Somebody's cousin said everybody wanted the lilacs saved, but nobody wanted to be the one holding the shovel.

And the Six of Wands, wearing red leather to match her mood, rose from the third row and said what everyone had been politely not saying: that Tarot Town loved that house the way it loved a funeral, loudly and for one afternoon.

The room went quiet.

From the side wall, the Two of Wands announced that if somebody handed him a key he'd start pulling up the rotten porch at dawn, and he did not appear to have thought about who owned the porch or why that might matter.

The Sheriff, who was leaning in the doorway with his hat in his hand, smiled at the Six of Wands and said mildly, as he glanced toward the Two of Wands, that nobody was pulling up anything until somebody had a key, and the Two of Wands stopped short and nodded as if he'd agreed with him.

The Emperor, who runs the town and dislikes watching a room get away from him, made a snap call on instinct: sixty days, and the Three of Cups gets first claim. Justice peered at him over her glasses and informed him, in the voice she once used on third-graders, that he could not do that.

Then, after a pause, she found a way that he could.

By morning, someone's hasty text had gone to the wrong group chat, and the Sheriff had read three very rude messages about Death's methods.

What followed was sixty days of the least glamorous work in the world.

The Three of Cups sat in the bank and at the county office, learning the system the hard way. There was a long-term plan to write, and then a longer one under it. She learned what the taxes actually were, rather than what everybody remembered them being. She learned what a roof cost, what insurance wanted, what the bank meant by reserves, and exactly how much sentiment a loan officer was prepared to accept as collateral.

The Two of Wands, who had heard "nobody's pulling up anything" as more of a suggestion, went at the porch on day four without a key, and the porch, which had been held together by the laws of physics and happy thoughts for many years, simply gave up the ghost when he pulled that one magic board holding it all together. It went all at once, with him on it.

The Sheriff, who has spent his career being the person who arrives right after things fall down, pulled up with his lights on and no siren, out of respect for the neighbours. He wrote the Two of Wands a citation for trespassing, hauled him out of the hole by the belt, strung yellow tape around the wreckage, and observed that whatever the Two of Wands had been planning to say about that porch, the porch had said it first.

Death, to everyone's surprise, was not bothered at all.

He turned up with his tape measure and an offer: his demolition crew was not coming; he'd take the contractor's job, and everything the house no longer needed would go to his salvage yard. The rotten beams, the mildewed wallpaper, and the splintered porch boards were hauled away without ceremony and without sentiment, and the house, to its own surprise, felt lighter.

The Magician came to supervise, mostly because the Two of Wands had now hit his thumb with a hammer, burned his hand on a torch, and gone through a porch, and was clearly on his way to a fourth accident. The Magician put a plane in his hands, showed him the grain of a board, and said that most things worth building start with knowing how to use the tools in front of you.

The Six of Wands showed up on day six to "help with the design" and spent forty minutes arguing with the Two of Wands about whether the front door should be red. He is family, and therefore the only person alive allowed to tell her no.

He said red was a lot.

She said that was the point.

They shouted, then shouted louder, then went quiet in the way that is not quiet at all, which is how family does it. That was when the Sheriff came by to check on his yellow tape. The Six of Wands, still flushed from the argument, looked at him, looked at the tape, and announced in the middle of Elm Street that she was crazy about him and he could deal with it.

"I'm standing right here," said the Two of Wands.

The Sheriff took off his hat, thought it over for exactly one second, and dealt with it instantly. It was a kiss that would go down in Tarot Town history for generations to come, and for once the Sheriff arrived before something fell down.

The Three of Cups, meanwhile, spent a lot of time alone in her grandmother's empty kitchen with a venti pumpkin spice and a lot of old feelings, and somewhere in the third week she stopped crying about the house and started planning it.

There were things she wanted to keep because they mattered, and things she discovered she only wanted to keep because they had always been there. Death made her choose.

The lilacs could stay.

The floors could stay.

But certain walls, supporting beams, and the back stairs could not.

For two days she was furious with him, especially about the stairs. On the third, he showed her the rot that was developing and asked whether she wanted the structures within the house or the wood itself.

That was a different question.

It was grit and not luck that got her through the sixty days, and she knew it, and the whole town knew it too. By the final week, she could tell you what the mortgage payment would be, when the county bill came due, what had been spent on lumber, and which repairs could wait until spring. Everybody else remembered her grandmother's house.

She knew what it would take to keep it standing.

On the last day, Justice read the contract aloud, every clause, as is her habit.

The Three of Cups followed along with a folder open in front of her. When Justice reached the tax schedule, she already had the page marked. When she reached the financing terms, the Three of Cups quietly corrected a figure that had been carried over from an earlier draft.

Justice stopped and looked over her glasses, checked twice, and then nodded once and continued reading.

The Three of Cups would own the house. Death would renovate it. The lilacs would stay, and the kitchen would stay, and the salvaged wood from the old back stairs and support beams inside the house would come back as the legs and top of a very long table, contracted by Death to the Seven and Eight of Coins.

The Three of Cups signed, then Death, then Justice stamped it with a flourish that made the whole room straighten up.

The Four of Coins, acting as the representative of the bank handed the Three of Cups the keys.

Then he handed her the mortgage schedule.

The county clerk handed her the property-tax dates.

Death, apparently unwilling to let a moment become too ceremonial, reminded her that the gutters would need looking at again in five years.

The Three of Cups put all three things into her folder.

"Fine," she said.

And meant it.

Before the ink dried, the Six of Wands announced that she and the Sheriff would be having dinner on Friday, which surprised absolutely nobody except possibly the Sheriff, who put his hat back on and said that sounded fine.

The Star brought paintings for the front hall, and the open house that came a few months later felt like a gallery opening and a family reunion rolled into one, with the long table set in the brand new dining room beside the kitchen she'd been able to keep…with a few modifications from Death’s crew that brought it up to code. The front door, for the record, was still red.

The only real crisis came at dinner, when the guests stood in a clump over the seating chart, each one waiting for someone else to choose, desperate to please everyone and therefore unable to please anyone.

The Three of Cups finally laughed and told them to sit anywhere.

They did.

Death took the chair at the end, looked around at the house he had changed, and for once, everyone thanked him. "Don't get used to that," the Sheriff said, as he and Death laughed a little.

There’s a particular kind of tired that sleep doesn’t fix. It’s the tired of someone who is holding too many things at once. It isn’t one big weight. It’s a hundred small ones: the favour you agreed to, the project you couldn’t let slide, the message you’ll answer tonight, the thing you promised yourself you’d finally get to. None of them is heavy on its own, but put together, they’ve quietly taken over your life.

And the strange part is that when the next request comes in, you say yes anyway, no matter how much is already on your plate.

This isn’t a failure of discipline

If you’re overstretched, you’ve probably been told to “set boundaries” or “just say no,” as if you hadn’t thought of that already. But the knot isn’t that you don’t know how to say no. It’s that somewhere along the way, saying yes became how you prove you’re worth keeping around.

Being needed feels safe. Being busy feels like being useful. And being useful can start to feel like the price of being loved, liked, or paid. So stopping, even for an afternoon, doesn’t feel like rest. It feels like risk.

That’s why “do less” rarely works as advice. The overstretched person isn’t doing too much by accident. They’re doing it because, at some level, it’s working. It’s keeping a fear quiet.

When the numbers carry the load

Some of us are more prone to this knot than others, and numerology can show where it tends to live.

People with strong 6 energy often overextend through care. The 6 is Venus’s number, the one who makes sure everyone is fed, comfortable, and looked after. The trouble is that the 6 rarely puts themselves on that list.

People with strong 8 energy overextend through building. The 8 sees what could be made and feels responsible for making it bigger, better, and more. Rest can feel like falling behind.

And people with strong 1 energy often carry things alone, because asking for help feels slower than just doing it themselves.

If you see yourself in one of these, it’s not a flaw. These are gifts: devotion, ambition, capability. They’re just running without an off switch.

The Knight’s problem

In the Tarot, the Knights are always in motion. They’re riding out, chasing the quest, answering the call. That’s their beauty. But a Knight who never dismounts never actually arrives anywhere. He just keeps riding, further from home, wondering why he’s so tired.

Being overstretched is often a Knight’s exhaustion. We’re so busy going that we’ve lost track of where we were headed in the first place.

A gentler question

Instead of asking “What can I cut?”, which can feel like losing a limb, try asking:

‘What would I keep if I were allowed to keep only what I love?”

Not what you should keep. Not what would disappoint someone if you dropped it. What you love. You’ll probably notice two things. The list is shorter than your current life. And almost nobody would notice if some of the other things quietly stopped.

That’s the relief hiding inside this knot: most of what’s stretching you thin isn’t holding anything up. It’s just held up by you.

You’re allowed to put something down

Rest isn’t something you earn after everything is finished. My Capricorn placements are clutching their pearls at this statement, but it is true. Everything is never finished. Rest is how you stay able to show up for the things that truly matter.

So this week, put one thing down. Just one. See what happens. My guess is the world keeps turning, and you get a little bit of yourself back.

If this knot feels familiar and you’d like to untangle it together, I’d love to work through it with you in a Tarot coaching session. Book here.

October unfolds inside the 10/1 Universal Year and the 11 Universal Triad, while introducing a 20/2 Universal Month of its own.

That means several layers of numerical energy are operating at the same time—and these journal pages are designed to help you actually see them working.

Rather than simply reading a forecast at…

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There’s a large empty lot on Main Street, right next door to Temperance’s little credit counselling office. If you’ve driven through Tarot Town, you’ve seen it. It’s the yellow ground between the office and the bakery, dry as toast, rocky as a riverbed, and completely bare except for one small green plant that pokes up near the sidewalk like it didn’t get the memo.

Last spring, the town council voted to let someone build something on that lot for the whole community to enjoy. They posted a notice. They waited. For months, nobody applied.

Then, on the very same Monday morning, two applications landed on Temperance’s desk at the town offices within ten minutes of each other.

The first came from the Knight of Wands, who strode into the office in a jacket bright enough to be seen from space and a hat with a little infinity loop stitched into the brim. His application was a sketch on the back of a diner napkin. “An outdoor stage,” he announced, tapping it. “Lights. Music. Big enough for the whole town. I can have it up by Hallowe’en.”

Temperance was still reading the sketch through what appeared to be a dry smear of duck sauce when the Knight of Swords arrived, carrying a cardboard tube under one arm. Out came forty-two pages of plans for a pavilion, with elevations, drainage diagrams, a seating chart and three pages of footnotes on acoustics. “It has to be done properly,” he said, glancing sideways at the napkin. “Some of us think things through.”

“Some of us actually build things,” said the Knight of Wands.

And that, as they say, was that.

Now, here’s the thing about these two. They’re both builders. They both love making beautiful things, and they’re both genuinely talented. But the Knight of Wands is all fire, and the Knight of Swords is all air, and if you’ve ever blown on a campfire, you know what happens when you put those two together. Every time the Knight of Wands made his stage bigger, the Knight of Swords made his pavilion better. Every time the Knight of Swords added a page to his plans, the Knight of Wands added a spotlight to his. Neither one would withdraw, and neither one would give an inch.

By October, the permit file on Temperance’s desk was three inches thick. Revisions were stuffed in on top of revisions, and appeals were stapled to amendments. Nothing could move forward because every new idea was jammed into the file backwards, tangled up with the one before it. Both knights still showed up every morning to defend their plans, but the shine was starting to wear off. The Knight of Wands’ jacket was rumpled. The Knight of Swords had stopped bringing the tube and was showing up with wrinkled, scribbled, out-of-order papers. They both looked, frankly, exhausted.

Meanwhile, something else was happening on Main Street.

The Eight of Coins walks past that empty lot every morning on her way to her workshop, and one day she stopped, set down her toolbox, and picked up a rock. Then another. She stacked them neatly along the edge of the lot and went to work. The next morning, she did it again. On the third morning, she brought a watering can for the little green plant by the sidewalk. She didn’t ask anybody, and she didn’t file anything. She just came by every day, did a little, and left.

It was Temperance who noticed first, from her window in the permit office across the street at town hall.

That Friday, she invited both knights to her business on Main Street, the credit counselling company, not the town office. She made them each a cup of tea, sat them down, and slid the enormous permit file across the desk.

“I’ve read every page,” she said. “And I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that the bylaw is very clear. No structure can be built on town land until the ground has been cleared and prepared.” She smiled. “The good news is that somebody’s already doing it.”

She took them to a window in the waiting area, overlooking the empty lot. It was hardly recognizable. The rocks were gone, stacked into a low wall along the edge. There were neat rows of turned soil, and the little green plant had become a proper vine, climbing a stake the Eight of Coins had put in for it.

The knights stared.

“You know what I do in this office?” Temperance asked. “People come in here who have spent more than they had. Nobody meant to. They just kept pushing, one more purchase, one more bill, until they were worn out and stuck. And what I tell them is what I’m going to tell you. You don’t fix it by pushing harder. You step back, you look at what you’ve got, and you put it back in balance a little at a time.”

The Knight of Wands looked at his tea. The Knight of Swords looked at his. Then, for the first time since Monday back in the spring, they looked at each other.

“Your stage is a good idea,” said the Knight of Swords, slowly. “It would need better footings.”

“Your plans are good too,” said the Knight of Wands. “They just need someone to actually start.”

It didn’t take long after that. By the end of the afternoon, they had one plan instead of two: a community garden, with the Eight of Coins in charge of the beds and the stone paths. In the rear of the large lot was a small public green space with seats and tables, and a small, sturdy stage for unplugged music on summer nights. The Knight of Swords drew it up in four pages instead of forty-two. The Knight of Wands promised to have the lights hung by next June, not Hallowe’en. They clinked their teacups together over the desk, and Temperance stamped the permit before either of them could change his mind.

That evening, she made a note in her ledger: Main Street lot. Balance restored. Account in good standing.

The lesson: Sometimes standing your ground is exactly the right thing to do, and sometimes you’ve been holding it so long that the holding is what’s wearing you out. When two people with big energy keep feeding each other’s fire, it can feel like progress, but nothing actually gets built. The way forward is often to step back, tend the ground you’ve got, and find a plan that uses the best of both.

Today's side quest is brought to you by the Knight of Wands, the Ten of Swords, and the Two of Cups, with the Seven of Wands holding things up from the bottom of the deck.

Starring: the Eight of Coins, the Knight of Swords, and Temperance. (And, since he flipped across the table from his original pile and refused to stay out of it, the Knight of Wands. Of course, he wanted more spotlight.)

There's a large empty lot on Main Street, right next door to Temperance's little credit counselling office. If you've driven through Tarot Town, you've seen it. It's the yellow ground between the office and the bakery, dry as toast, rocky as a riverbed, and completely bare except for one small green plant that pokes up near the sidewalk like it didn't get the memo.

Last spring, the town council voted to let someone build something on that lot for the whole community to enjoy. They posted a notice. They waited. For months, nobody applied.

Then, on the very same Monday morning, two applications landed on Temperance's desk at the town offices within ten minutes of each other.

The first came from the Knight of Wands, who strode into the office in a jacket bright enough to be seen from space and a hat with a little infinity loop stitched into the brim. His application was a sketch on the back of a diner napkin. "An outdoor stage," he announced, tapping it. "Lights. Music. Big enough for the whole town. I can have it up by Hallowe'en."

Temperance was still reading the sketch through what appeared to be a dry smear of duck sauce when the Knight of Swords arrived, carrying a cardboard tube under one arm. Out came forty-two pages of plans for a pavilion, with elevations, drainage diagrams, a seating chart and three pages of footnotes on acoustics. "It has to be done properly," he said, glancing sideways at the napkin. "Some of us think things through."

"Some of us actually build things," said the Knight of Wands.

And that, as they say, was that.

Now, here's the thing about these two. They're both builders. They both love making beautiful things, and they're both genuinely talented. But the Knight of Wands is all fire, and the Knight of Swords is all air, and if you've ever blown on a campfire, you know what happens when you put those two together. Every time the Knight of Wands made his stage bigger, the Knight of Swords made his pavilion better. Every time the Knight of Swords added a page to his plans, the Knight of Wands added a spotlight to his. Neither one would withdraw, and neither one would give an inch.

By October, the permit file on Temperance's desk was three inches thick. Revisions were stuffed in on top of revisions, and appeals were stapled to amendments. Nothing could move forward because every new idea was jammed into the file backwards, tangled up with the one before it. Both knights still showed up every morning to defend their plans, but the shine was starting to wear off. The Knight of Wands' jacket was rumpled. The Knight of Swords had stopped bringing the tube and was showing up with wrinkled, scribbled, out-of-order papers. They both looked, frankly, exhausted.

Meanwhile, something else was happening on Main Street.

The Eight of Coins walks past that empty lot every morning on her way to her workshop, and one day she stopped, set down her toolbox, and picked up a rock. Then another. She stacked them neatly along the edge of the lot and went to work. The next morning, she did it again. On the third morning, she brought a watering can for the little green plant by the sidewalk. She didn't ask anybody, and she didn't file anything. She just came by every day, did a little, and left.

It was Temperance who noticed first, from her window in the permit office across the street at town hall.

That Friday, she invited both knights to her business on Main Street, the credit counselling company, not the town office. She made them each a cup of tea, sat them down, and slid the enormous permit file across the desk.

"I've read every page," she said. "And I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that the bylaw is very clear. No structure can be built on town land until the ground has been cleared and prepared." She smiled. "The good news is that somebody's already doing it."

She took them to a window in the waiting area, overlooking the empty lot. It was hardly recognizable. The rocks were gone, stacked into a low wall along the edge. There were neat rows of turned soil, and the little green plant had become a proper vine, climbing a stake the Eight of Coins had put in for it.

The knights stared.

"You know what I do in this office?" Temperance asked. "People come in here who have spent more than they had. Nobody meant to. They just kept pushing, one more purchase, one more bill, until they were worn out and stuck. And what I tell them is what I'm going to tell you. You don't fix it by pushing harder. You step back, you look at what you've got, and you put it back in balance a little at a time."

The Knight of Wands looked at his tea. The Knight of Swords looked at his. Then, for the first time since Monday back in the spring, they looked at each other.

"Your stage is a good idea," said the Knight of Swords, slowly. "It would need better footings."

"Your plans are good too," said the Knight of Wands. "They just need someone to actually start."

It didn't take long after that. By the end of the afternoon, they had one plan instead of two: a community garden, with the Eight of Coins in charge of the beds and the stone paths. In the rear of the large lot was a small public green space with seats and tables, and a small, sturdy stage for unplugged music on summer nights. The Knight of Swords drew it up in four pages instead of forty-two. The Knight of Wands promised to have the lights hung by next June, not Hallowe'en. They clinked their teacups together over the desk, and Temperance stamped the permit before either of them could change his mind.

That evening, she made a note in her ledger: Main Street lot. Balance restored. Account in good standing.

Seriously, stop scrolling for a second and think about it. Where were you living? Who were you with? What were you starting, quitting, or stressing about?

Astrologers do this all the time. "What were you doing in (insert year here)?" they ask, because (insert planet here) is about to go retrograde in (insert sign here) again. Well, numerology has its own version, and it's built right into the system. Everything moves in nine-year cycles, which means we can always look back nine years and find ourselves standing in the same energy.

2017 was a 10/1 Universal Year. So is 2026.

2 + 0 + 1 + 7 = 10, and 1 + 0 = 1

2 + 0 + 2 + 6 = 10, and 1 + 0 = 1

One is the number of beginnings, of planting seeds, of "okay, I guess I'm doing this now." And it goes deeper. September 2017 was a 19/1 karmic month, just like this September. Same number, same flavour, same 11 triad transit, same lesson coming back around for another look.

And we're walking into a pressure point right now.

September 30/October 1 is the ¾ mark of the year: the action point. Action points behave a lot like squares in astrology. Things get cagey, fast, a little stressed. Whatever has been simmering or left unattended suddenly shows up and demands to be dealt with.

Because it's one point in a year-long timespan, I give it an active period of about three days on either side. That puts us in the zone from today, September 27, through October 4.

So if this week feels like it's moving at 100 miles an hour, or like everyone got up on the wrong (or weird) side of the bed, it's not just you.

Here's why looking back helps.

Whatever you were planting or pushing through in late September 2017 is a clue. It doesn't mean the same thing will happen, but the theme tends to return. Maybe you started a job, left a relationship, moved, or finally said "enough." That's the seed energy you're working with again, just nine years wiser.

Want to go back further? 2008 was a 1 year too. So was 1999 (28/1), and so was 1990, which was a 19/1, the same karmic number as this month. Facebook is great for this, because it will cheerfully show you every moment you ever recorded there.

Tell me in the comments 👇

What's ONE word for what you were doing in September 2017?

(Mine's will be in the comments.)

Most of us write our birthdate dozens of times a year. On forms, at the doctor’s office, when a website asks us to prove we’re old enough to enter. We say it so often that it stops meaning anything after a while.

But the day you arrived is not a random date.

In numerology, your birthdate holds your Life Path, the number that describes the road you walk in this lifetime. It’s not a prediction or a cage. It’s more like the terrain. Some of us are born onto a road that asks us to lead. Some onto one that asks us to love, or to question, or to build something that lasts. When you know your terrain, a lot of old confusion starts to make sense. Why certain lessons keep circling back. Why some things come easily, and others feel like walking uphill in the rain.

I’ve watched this happen in readings for years. Someone learns their Life Path and their shoulders drop. “Oh,” they say. “That’s why.”

That moment is why I made this course.

The Life Path Chart: Level I walks you through opening up the first three placements derived from the day you were born, step by step, so you can learn about what underpins your Life Path and start to understand what it’s asking of you. You’ll learn how to open this date up, take a peek inside it, and see what’s going on underneath that 1, 3 or 6. It also includes lessons on the planetary rulership of the numbers, Tarot card correspondences, and just a huge amount of downloadable information to load into your reading books, Book of Shadows, or growth journals.

This is also an excellent chart to cast if you are reading cards for a client. By understanding the energy they are working with in this lifetime, you can better interpret their cards. A Tarot spread telling someone to just go for it and put themselves out there feels different to someone working through 2 energy as opposed to working through 9 energy.

It’s $27, and it’s here: https://schoolofarythmancy.com/b/SUQrJ

If you’ve ever wondered why your road looks the way it does, blow your birthdate wide open and start digging around.

(Yes, it’s now out of season, but bear with me as I move some posts over from Patreon….I can’t backdate them here on Substack)

The Four Great Family Barbecues

Summer has arrived in Tarot Town, which means the grills are out, the folding chairs have been dragged up from the basement, and every family in town is arguing about who makes the best potato salad.

The four oldest families of Tarot Town: the Wands, Cups, Swords, and Pentacles, each host a barbecue during the summer. On the surface, these gatherings appear to have much in common. There is grilled meat, an assortment of salads, a cooler full of drinks, and at least one person complaining about the mosquitoes.

Look a little closer, however, and you’ll see that each family approaches the sacred tradition of the family summer cookout in an entirely different way:

• The Wands turn it into a festival.

• The Cups make it a family reunion.

• The Swords organize it with military precision and then argue about everything.

• The Pentacles quietly feed half the county.

A gathering like this also gives us a chance to see how the numbered cards develop. In every family, the Ace shows a beginning with possibilities. The Two gives this energy a direction. The Threes of the suits make a plan. By the Four, the barbecue has become real, and then the Five arrives to make sure nothing goes exactly as intended.

After that, the family adapts, experiments, reorganizes, and eventually reaches the Ten: the moment when the entire experience has developed as far as it can, and everyone must decide what happens next.

So grab a paper plate and something cold to drink. We’re going people-watching again.

The Wands Family Barbecue

Loud, ambitious, competitive, and very much on fire

Nobody receives a formal invitation to the Wands barbecue.

You hear about it from someone who knows someone. Then a cousin adds you to a group chat called WANDS FAMILY BBQ—LET’S GOOOOOO, which immediately generates 147 notifications.

On the day of the event:

• The King of Wands is at the grill, naturally. He has purchased a smoker large enough to require its own parking space and has been explaining the science of brisket to anyone who foolishly makes eye contact.

• The Queen is directing traffic, greeting guests, finding extension cords, and somehow organizing at least five other activities simultaneously.

• The Knight has been sent into town for ice. He returns with fireworks, water balloons, two cases of energy drinks, and, of course, absolutely no ice.

• The Page is running around the yard livestreaming everything on TikTok.

Ace of Wands: The Big Idea

The barbecue begins when one member of the family says:

“We should have people over this weekend.”

It is an innocent suggestion. A small spark. Within minutes, the idea has grown into a barbecue, bonfire, neighbourhood block party, cornhole tournament, talent show, and fireworks display.

Nobody has checked whether any of this requires permits or town permission. The Ace does not concern itself with practical details. It simply creates the desire to begin. The possibility is alive now, and the Wands family is already running with it.

Two of Wands: How Big Are We Making This?

• Someone has to choose what kind of gathering this will be:

• Immediate family only?

• The entire extended family?

• The whole street?

• Why stop there? Let’s just put out an open invitation. The King of Wands knows a band.

The Two of Wands finds the family standing in the backyard, looking over the available space and imagining what could happen there. The original idea is being measured against its possibilities.

A decision is made, and they are going to go big.

Naturally.

Three of Wands: The Planning Committee

The Queen of Wands creates several committees, and although no one remembers volunteering for any of them, they find themselves being volun-told.

One cousin handles food. Another manages music. Someone is assigned to activities. The Page designs an online invitation featuring animated flames. They’ve used Canva to turn an image of the King’s smoker into a dumpster fire for the Facebook group banner. Everyone thinks it’s hilarious.

There is now a plan, although the plan changes every twenty minutes as new ideas arrive.

The Three allows the family to step back and see the larger picture. The spark of the Ace and the direction chosen at the Two are becoming something that could actually work.

They hope.

Four of Wands — The Party Begins

By four o’clock, the yard has been transformed.

There are picnic tables, coolers, lawn games, strings of coloured lights, and a homemade banner hanging between two trees. Music is playing. Food is cooking. Children are running through the sprinkler.

For one shining moment, everything is working.

The barbecue has moved out of the imagination and taken solid form. The family is gathered. The gate is open. Everyone is celebrating.

Even the Mayor stops by and admits that it looks impressive. He does, however, have questions about the electrical wiring and permits. The King lets him sample some of the bark off the brisket. All is well. They’ll meet at the diner on Monday morning for breakfast.

Five of Wands — The Cornhole Incident

It begins as a friendly tournament, and then someone disputes a score.

A cousin insists that his foot did not cross the line. Another accuses him of distracting the opposing team. The Knight of Wands introduces a complicated trick-shot rule that nobody agreed to.

Within minutes, six people are shouting over one another while the Page provides live commentary to their TikTok followers.

Nobody is genuinely angry. Not yet, but every Wands gathering contains a point at which enthusiasm becomes competition and competition becomes chaos.

Behind them, the grill flares up.

This does not improve matters.

Six of Wands — A Champion Is Crowned

Eventually, a winner emerges.

The family cheers as though someone has just returned from war. The champion is presented with a plastic trophy left over from when the King coached Little League ten years ago. It is carried around the yard on the shoulders of two cousins.

The disagreement is forgotten because the Wands family respects victory more than it resents conflict. The momentum of the event has been restored. The gathering finds its rhythm again.

The Sheriff arrives in response to a call about “smoke and shouting,” but after receiving a plate of ribs, he decides everything appears to be under control.

It is not.

Seven of Wands — Defending the Grill

By early evening, every adult male at the barbecue has developed an opinion about the smoker. The King of Wands has spent twelve hours tending the brisket. He will not be taking suggestions. Ever.

One person recommends lowering the temperature. Another thinks the meat should be wrapped. The Town Doctor claims this is not how his father did it. The Local Entrepreneur has watched several YouTube videos and would like everyone to know that he owns a meat thermometer.

The King plants himself in front of the smoker with his tongs crossed over his chest.

This is his fire.

He will defend it.

Eight of Wands — Everything Happens at Once

At sunset, the gathering reaches maximum velocity.

The food comes off the grill. The band starts playing. Someone begins the water-balloon fight. Children streak across the yard. A dog escapes with a sausage. The Fool arrives in his purple camper van with The Star and three people nobody recognizes.

Text messages fly through the family group chat even though everyone is standing within fifty feet of one another. For a while, Tarot Town seems to revolve completely around the Wands family yard.

There is no time to think.

Only enjoyment. Pure, unfettered enjoyment of the moment.

Nine of Wands — Still Standing

By ten o’clock, the host is exhausted.

His shirt is stained. One eyebrow may be slightly singed. He has broken up a few arguments, rescued the Page from the roof of the garage, and prevented the Knight from lighting a Roman candle in the driveway.

He stands beside the smoker with a drink in one hand and barbecue tongs in the other, watching the remaining guests carefully. He has survived the evening, but he is also fully prepared for at least one more thing to go wrong.

Someone asks when the fireworks are starting.

Aaaah… there it is, the fuckening. He saunters across the yard and gets the hose ready.

Ten of Wands — Who Is Cleaning This Up?

The final guests leave sometime after midnight.

The yard is covered with paper plates, empty cans, abandoned lawn games, wet towels, folding chairs, and several items that no one remembers bringing. The Queen brings out the lost-and-found box, which is already half full, and adds to it, smiling.

The original spark has reached its fullest expression. The Wands family wanted an unforgettable party, and they created one. Now they must carry the consequences. As the family surveys the wreckage, someone says:

“We should make this an annual thing.”

Everyone groans, but no one says no.

The Cups Family Barbecue

Tender, nostalgic, beautiful, and emotionally complicated

The Cups invitation arrives in the mail.

It is printed on heavy kraft paper with a homespun font and includes a family photograph from a barbecue held twenty years ago. Several people in the picture are no longer alive, three are no longer speaking, and one has since married the person standing behind the camera.

• The Queen of Cups hosts the gathering in a garden filled with flowers and strings of tiny fairy lights.

• The King tends the drinks and quietly checks on anyone who appears overwhelmed.

• The Knight has made a romantic summer playlist.

• The Page is catching fireflies in a jar and asking questions that make all of the adults uncomfortable.

Ace of Cups — An Invitation from the Heart

The barbecue begins because someone misses everyone.

The Queen of Cups has been looking through old photographs. She remembers long summer afternoons when the family gathered around picnic tables, and nobody seemed to be in a hurry to leave. When she knows the invitations have reached their destination, she sends a group message:

“We really should all get together.”

The Ace arrives as an emotional opening. It is the wish to reconnect, welcome, celebrate, and fill the family cup again. Before long, people are replying with heart emojis and promises to attend. Even the cousin who never replies to anything says maybe.

Two of Cups — We’ll Do It Together

Hosting the gathering is too much for one person, so the Queen asks another family member to help.

They sit at the kitchen table and decide what kind of barbecue they want to create. Not something enormous. Not something flashy, but something meaningful, something from the heart.

They agree on the date, divide the responsibilities, and promise not to let the rest of the family turn it into a circus.

The Two of Cups gives the original feeling a partner. The desire to reconnect is no longer private; it has been recognized and reciprocated. The gathering now belongs to both of them.

Three of Cups — Everyone Brings Something

Planning quickly becomes a group effort.

One aunt volunteers to bring pasta salad. A cousin offers dessert. Someone else promises to make lemonade. Three relatives begin a separate chat devoted entirely to recreating Grandmother Cups’s potato salad. The Cups family believes food should carry memories.

By the time the menu is complete, there are seven salads, four desserts, two punches, and no firm commitment from anyone to bring hamburger buns.

The Three brings everyone into the process. The celebration is taking shape through friendship, cooperation, and shared anticipation.

Four of Cups — The One Beneath the Tree

Oh my goodness, the gathering is lovely. The aunts have probably shopped Michaels empty. The tables are nestled in a space near a grove of young trees strung with fairy lights. The drinks are cold. Everyone has arrived dressed slightly better than necessary. Every table has a gingham tablecloth. The centrepieces are lacy mason jars with just a touch of glitter, holding rose-scented tea light candles. The napkins have messages printed on them in a handwritten font, from the classic “Live, Laugh, Love” to “Smile more, worry less” to “Eat, drink, and be cozy”. The teenagers are reading them as they stack them beside the plates, rolling their eyes and laughing.

Almost everyone is enjoying themselves.

One member of the family sits apart from the crowd, beneath the old maple tree, poking at a plate of food and staring toward the driveway. The person they hoped would attend has not come.

Other relatives offer drinks, conversation, and slices of pie, but none of it is what they wanted. Sometimes abundance surrounds us while our attention remains fixed on the presence of absence.

At a Cups barbecue, someone always feels this more deeply than everyone else.

Five of Cups — The Missing Recipe

The potato salad does not taste right.

Everyone agrees on this, although they do try to be tactful. No one wants to hurt anyone’s feelings.

Someone added too much mustard. Someone else insists Grandmother used pickle juice. An aunt is certain there should be chopped eggs. Another remembers that Grandmother hated eggs.

The debate begins playfully but soon touches something tender: it is not really about the salad.

It is about the people who are missing, the traditions that cannot be perfectly recreated, and the painful realization that memory changes each time it is revisited.

For a few minutes, the mood sinks. Then someone notices that three other bowls of salad remain untouched.

Six of Cups — The Old Photographs Come Out

After dinner, the children ask what their parents were like when they were young. This is all the encouragement the older relatives need.

Boxes of photographs appear from out of nowhere. Seriously, where did they just come from? Stories are told. Teenagers learn far more than they wanted to know about their parents’ haircuts, clothing, and romantic histories.

The Town Librarian stops by, and while she visits and enjoys a slice of apple pie, supplies the full story behind a family photograph taken at the lake in 1986.

The Cups gathering settles into a familiar rhythm. The past is not restored exactly as it was, but it is welcomed into the present. Old affection passes between generations, softened by time.

Seven of Cups — Too Many Possibilities

By dusk, the drink table has become rather ambitious.

There are fruit punches, sparkling lemonades, iced teas, sangrias, mocktails, and something blue made by the Knight of Cups that he calls Moonlight on the Water. No one knows what is in it, including the Knight.

The desserts are equally excessive. Guests wander between pies, cakes, trifles, cookies, and frozen treats, unable to decide what they want.

Conversations also drift into possibility.

Someone discusses moving home. Another talks about renewing vows. A cousin has new career ideas and shares them with the table. Two relatives begin planning a family vacation that will probably never happen.

For a while, every dream seems available.

Commitment can wait until morning.

Eight of Cups — Leaving Before Dessert

One person quietly gathers their things.

They have attended these gatherings for years, hoping that an old relationship would become different. Tonight, they finally understand that it will not.

There is no scene in their departure.

They hug the host, decline another drink, and walk down the garden path while the others continue talking beneath the lights.

The Cups family notices emotional departures, even when nobody speaks of them.

The gathering continues, but something has shifted. One family pattern has been closed out.

Nine of Cups — This Is What She Hoped For

Later, the Queen of Cups sits back and looks around the garden. People are laughing. The children are sleepy, curled up in lawn chairs or stretched out on a picnic blanket someone carefully laid out for them. Someone has started singing along with the playlist. The person beneath the tree has long since joined the others.

The evening is not perfect. The recipe was wrong. Someone left early. A few old feelings surfaced. Still, the gathering has become what she hoped it would be: warm, abundant, affectionate, and alive.

She lifts her glass to the crowd, breathes deeply while she smiles, and allows herself to enjoy it.

Ten of Cups — Beneath the String Lights

Before anyone leaves, someone insists on taking a family photograph.

People complain while arranging themselves, but they gather anyway. Children sit in front. Older relatives take the good chairs. Couples stand together, arms around shoulders and waists, beaming and happy as they soak up the energy. Someone calls the absent cousin on video and holds up the phone so they can be included.

For one moment, the family appears whole.

Not flawless. Not free of grief, conflict, or change, but whole and genuine.

The Cups have created a small universe this evening, a safe space for everyone’s shared story. The old memories remain, but new ones have joined them.

Next year, when the invitation arrives, this is the photograph that will be on it.

The Swords Family Barbecue

Efficient, intelligent, opinionated, and not arguing

The Swords invitation arrives by email.

It contains the date, start time, end time, parking instructions, weather contingency plan, dietary questionnaire, and a link to a shared spreadsheet.

Guests are asked to indicate whether they are bringing a side dish, dessert, beverage, or “other.” Anyone selecting “other” must provide further details.

The King of Swords created the schedule. The Queen edited it for clarity. The Knight has already replied-all twice. The Page is fact-checking the invitation.

Ace of Swords — A Better Way to Do This

The barbecue begins with an observation:

“Last year’s gathering was badly organized.”

The speaker does not intend to insult anyone. They are simply stating a fact. A new plan is proposed. This year, the family will eliminate confusion, duplication, food waste, parking problems, and unnecessary delays.

The Ace of Swords cuts directly to the issue. It introduces a clear idea and the possibility of a more rational approach.

Several family members agree, while several others immediately feel criticized.

Two of Swords — The Sauce Stalemate

Before planning can proceed, the family must choose the barbecue sauce.

Half prefer the traditional vinegar-based recipe. The others want the sweeter sauce introduced by an in-law several years ago. Neither side is willing to concede.

A blind taste test is proposed, then rejected because one faction questions the methodology. The Queen of Swords suggests serving both sauces.

No one likes this solution because it avoids determining who is correct. The family reaches an impasse, and for several days, no decision is made.

Three of Swords — The Reply-All Incident

Eventually, someone sends a private message about the sauce dispute. Unfortunately, it is not private. The message goes to the entire family.

Feelings are hurt. Screenshots circulate. One aunt announces that she will not attend if her cooking is considered “an impediment to progress.”

The King of Swords intervenes, reminding everyone that the purpose of the gathering is family unity. The Page replies with a dictionary definition of unity.

This does not help.

Still, the conflict clarifies several things that needed to be said. The planning resumes with fewer illusions and a more accurate understanding of who is angry with whom.

Four of Swords — A Temporary Ceasefire

A rule is established: No further discussion of barbecue sauce until the day of the event.

The group chat goes quiet. Everyone retreats to consider their position, nurse their grievances, and prepare supporting evidence.

For a brief period, peace descends over the Swords family.

It is not a resolution. This is only an intermission.

Five of Swords — Someone Has to Win

The barbecue begins on schedule.

Both sauces are placed on the table, but one relative has printed anonymous scorecards so guests can vote.

What follows is no longer a tasting.

It is a campaign.

Family members lobby undecided guests. Accusations of ballot tampering circulate. Someone moves the sauce bottles to make one more accessible than the other. When the votes are counted, the traditional sauce wins by two.

The victor celebrates.

Everyone else makes a private note never to participate in this nonsense again.

Six of Swords — Moving to Safer Ground

After the sauce vote, the Queen of Swords redirects the conversation.

She asks about travel plans. Someone discusses a new book. Another relative begins telling a story about an unusual bird seen near the river. The family slowly moves away from the conflict.

A few people take their plates to the far end of the yard, where the conversation is calmer. Two cousins leave early and drive home together, analyzing everything that happened.

The barbecue continues.

The waters are not entirely smooth, but at least the family is no longer sinking the boat.

Seven of Swords — The Store-Bought Pie

One guest has claimed for years to make an award-winning blueberry pie.

The Page of Swords becomes suspicious.

The crust is too uniform. The foil plate bears traces of a commercial label. The guest was also seen entering the yard without carrying anything and returning to the car fifteen minutes later.

An investigation begins.

Photographs are enlarged. Receipts are examined. Someone quietly remembers seeing the same pie at the supermarket. By dessert, the truth is undeniable.

The pie is store-bought.

The family does not confront the culprit immediately. They feign ignorance because they would like to see how long the lie continues. They are enjoying this immensely.

Eight of Swords — Trapped by the Rules

The carefully designed system begins to work against everyone.

The person assigned to the grill refuses to cook the vegetarian food because it is not listed in his section of the schedule. Guests cannot move the lawn chairs because the seating chart accounts for shade patterns.

A child is told that the water balloons are scheduled for 4:30. It is currently 4:12.

People begin asking whether they are allowed to eat dessert. The Queen consults the timeline.

What was meant to create clarity has become a cage made of instructions.

Eventually, someone moves a chair without permission. The Knight sneaks the water balloons to the children, and they begin playing on the Slip N Slide ahead of schedule. Nothing terrible happens.

Nine of Swords — The Host Replays Everything

That night, the hosts are still awake reviewing the barbecue:

• Should the sauce vote have been eliminated?

• Did the vegetarian burgers remain at a safe temperature?

• Was the comment about the parking arrangement sarcastic?

• Why did Aunt Margaret leave without saying goodbye?

At 2:00 a.m., the King remembers that no one collected the dietary questionnaires.

At 2:17, he slips away to his home office and begins drafting a follow-up email.

At 2:25, the Queen texts him: “Do not send that, come to bed”

Ten of Swords — The End of the Group Chat

The next morning, the Knight of Swords posts a twelve-paragraph assessment of the barbecue.

The Page corrects several factual errors. Someone brings up the pie. The sauce dispute resumes.

Then, without warning, Grandmother Swords leaves the group chat.

Everyone stops typing.

A family institution has fallen.

The gathering has reached its logical conclusion. Every disagreement has been analyzed, sharpened, and carried as far as it can go. The family must now decide whether to continue communicating this way or create something new.

A second group chat appears later that afternoon.

It is called SWORDS FAMILY: NO POLITICS, NO SAUCE.

Grandmother joins.

The Pentacles Family Barbecue

Abundant, traditional, well-supplied, and prepared for weather

The Pentacles barbecue has been held on the family property for as long as anyone can remember.

The trees are mature. The picnic tables were built by hand. The grill has been repaired so many times that only one original part remains.

The King of Pentacles supervises the smoker from a comfortable chair. The Queen has been cooking for three days. The Knight is hauling coolers, tables, and propane tanks.

The Page is in the garden picking tomatoes and being reminded not to eat all the strawberries.

Ace of Pentacles — What We Already Have

The idea begins with the land.

The garden is producing more vegetables than the family can use. The freezer is full. The weather forecast looks good. There is enough room beneath the old maple trees for everyone.

The Queen of Pentacles looks at this abundance and says:

“We should feed people.”

The Ace appears as a practical opportunity. The resources are present. Something tangible can be created from them.

The family does not need to imagine the barbecue.

They already have everything required to begin.

Two of Pentacles — Making the Numbers Work

Feeding the entire family requires calculation.

How many people are coming? How much meat will they need? Can the old refrigerator hold everything? Who will pick up ice? Should they buy another folding table or borrow one from the church hall?

The Pentacles family knows that abundance must be managed.

The Knight makes three trips into town. The Queen shifts trays between refrigerators. The King tries “tweaking” the budget. Everything is juggled until the gathering becomes possible.

Three of Pentacles — Everyone Has a Job

The family operates like a well-trained crew.

One person tends the meat. Another makes bread. Someone washes vegetables. The teenagers set up tables while the younger children carry napkins and cutlery.

Nobody attempts to do everything alone.

Skill is respected here. The cousin who understands smokers handles the smoker. The aunt known for pies makes the pies. The relative who cannot cook is assigned to parking.

The Three of Pentacles brings different forms of competence together. By working collectively, the family creates something none of them could produce alone.

Four of Pentacles — Don’t Use the Good Chairs

The yard is ready.

The coolers are stocked. The tables are covered. The food is protected beneath carefully clipped covers.

The King has also placed several chairs aside and announced that they are reserved. For whom? That part is unclear.

He has locked the shed, hidden the expensive grilling tools, and counted the beverages twice. The Pentacles family values security. They take care of what they own because they worked hard to acquire it.

Sometimes, however, protecting the barbecue begins to look suspiciously like preventing anyone from enjoying it.

The Queen quietly puts the good chairs back so that they can be used.

Five of Pentacles — The Family at the Gate

A recently divorced cousin arrives with two children.

They are late, uncomfortable, and unsure whether they are still welcome. They’ve been out of the loop since the divorce, feeling wounded. They have not brought a dish because money is tight.

For a moment, they stand at the edge of the gathering while everyone else appears busy.

Then the Queen of Pentacles sees them. Within minutes, the children have plates. Someone finds them chairs. A relative slips leftovers into a cooler for them to take home later.

The Five reveals where material security is missing and where someone has been left outside the circle. The family’s abundance means little unless the door is opened.

Six of Pentacles — Take Some Home

The meal is served generously.

The older relatives are helped first. Children receive manageable portions. Someone quietly prepares a plate for the Old Man on the Hill, who refused to attend but will complain if nobody remembers him.

Food circulates in every direction.

Guests bring dishes, receive meals, exchange recipes, and leave with containers of leftovers. The family garden has produced enough to share, and sharing ensures that none of it is wasted.

The balance is not perfectly equal.

It does not need to be.

Today, those who have more give more.

Seven of Pentacles — Waiting on the Brisket

Everything is ready except the brisket.

The King opens the smoker, examines it, and closes the lid.

“How much longer?” someone asks.

“As long as it takes.”

The family has already invested hours of labour. Now they must wait for the result.

People wander through the garden, inspect the fruit trees, and discuss what worked this season. The tomatoes did well. The beans struggled. The new apple tree may produce next year.

The Pentacles understand that worthwhile things develop according to their own timetable.

You cannot rush a brisket. You can, however, eat another devilled egg while you wait.

Eight of Pentacles — The Work Continues

While everyone else relaxes, several family members remain busy.

Corn must be shucked. Plates need replenishing. The grill requires attention. Containers must be labelled. Someone is teaching the Page how to slice tomatoes properly.

The work is repetitive, but it is done with care. This is how the family maintains its traditions: not through grand declarations, but through hundreds of small tasks performed correctly.

The Page watches closely.

Next year, they will know how to do it.

Nine of Pentacles — The Garden Tour

After dinner, the Queen walks through the garden with a glass of iced tea, taking the Old School Marm and Casserole Queen with her.

Together, they admire the herbs, flowers, fruit trees, and neat rows of vegetables. She points out the trellis she built, the berries she planted, and the corner where she plans to add lavender.

She is proud of what she has cultivated. Not because it impresses anyone, although it does.

She is proud because it is hers: the result of knowledge, patience, labour, and the ability to enjoy her own company. For a quiet moment, she sits beneath the grape arbor and surveys everything she has created.

Ten of Pentacles — The Family Table

As evening settles over the property, several generations gather around the long table.

The older relatives tell familiar stories. The children play beneath the trees. Someone asks who will host the barbecue when the King and Queen no longer want to manage it.

The Knight glances toward the Page.

Traditions do not continue automatically. Property must be maintained. Recipes must be taught. Skills, stories, and responsibilities must be handed from one generation to another.

The Pentacles barbecue is larger than one meal. It is part of a family tradition, an inheritance that involves taking care of everyone around them and sharing in their abundance.

Before everyone leaves, the Queen distributes vegetables from the garden and reminds people to return the containers.

They won’t.

She already knows this.

Four Families, Four Ways of Moving Through the Cards

By the end of summer, each family has created the gathering that reflects its deepest nature.

• The Wands transformed one spark into a glorious, exhausting spectacle.

• The Cups turned a longing for connection into a new family memory.

• The Swords attempted to create order through clarity and discovered that even the best system cannot save people from themselves.

• The Pentacles used the resources already in their hands to nourish the present and prepare for the future.

In each family, the numbers followed the same developmental rhythm:

The Ace opened the door.

The Two chose a direction.

The Three developed the plan.

The Four gave it solid form.

The Five tested what had been created.

The Six established a workable rhythm.

The Seven expanded the possibilities.

The Eight sorted and organized them.

The Nine brought the suit into mature expression.

The Ten revealed what had been built and asked what would happen next.

That is the secret of the Minor Arcana. The numbers provide the pattern, but the suit determines how the story is lived.

And in Tarot Town, every family tells that story differently.

If you’ve ever lived in a small town, then you know that they are full of characters. The people everyone knows. The ones who quietly keep the town running and the ones who make life interesting. Let’s do some people watching through the lens of Tarot. Who said small towns are boring?

Le Mat (The Fool) — The New Arrival

Nobody knows where this person came from. He showed up one morning with his little dog and announced he was “just passing through.” Six months later, he’s still here, living in a purple camper van, good-natured and sunny, a little eccentric and strange, working odd jobs and somehow becoming friends with everyone.

Le Bateleur (The Magician) — The Market Stall Vendor

This fellow runs a mysterious little table at the weekend market, selling handmade things, strange books, and objects no one quite understands. He has no visible means of income, doesn’t seem to sell a lot, and yet he’s doing well. Everyone agrees he’s extremely smart and talented, but no one is entirely sure what his job is. Rumours abound that he’s a tech dropout who did well during the dotcom bubble.

La Papesse (The High Priestess) — The Town Librarian

She lives right beside the library. Quite possibly, she’s smuggled a sleeping bag into the restricted section. She knows everything about everyone, including things that happened long before most residents were born. She’s a living repository of all the stories for at least three counties. If you need the truth about the town’s history, she’s the one you ask.

L’Impératrice (The Empress) — The Casserole Queen

She runs the community garden, helps to organize festivals, and somehow feeds half the town. She is at every church supper, apron on, peeling the foil back on the many casseroles she brought. Her backyard produces impossible amounts of vegetables and fruit, and she has a never-ending supply of chow and homemade jam. Her living room and stairwell are plastered with photos of every relative and every event in this town. Everything about her home is cozy, and you hate to leave.

L’Empereur (The Emperor) — The Mayor

He’s practical, organized, and deeply invested in how the town functions. He has strong opinions about zoning laws, sidewalks, and the proper placement of benches; don’t bother trying to argue loopholes with him. In the local diner every morning, he sits in “his booth” and starts his paperwork. People drift over to say hello and grab his ear before the day is in full swing.

Le Pape (The Hierophant) — The Town Doctor

This is the person people go to when they need advice and stitches. He has delivered just about every person in Tarot Town since he arrived to take over a practice in 1978. He’s involved with the Elks, Little League, Sunday School, and well — everything! Like La Papesse, he is a font of knowledge concerning this town. He manages to draw a crowd and hold court wherever he goes. If you’re new in town, you’ll be seeing him. He’ll fix you up while he kindly explains how things really work around here.

L’Amoureux (The Lovers) — That Couple

This is the town’s most talked-about relationship. Or entanglement. You be the judge. They’re either deeply devoted to one another and so over the top cute it’s nauseating, or she’s throwing plates out the door while he jumps over the porch rails and gun-boots it into town as fast as his pick-up can carry him. Everyone secretly speculates and loves the drama.

Le Chariot (The Chariot) — The Busy Local Entrepreneur

He owns a garage, general store, and a used car lot and somehow still trains for marathons. He’s good friends with Le Pape and Le Bateleur. They’re always planning something in the community. This is the person who helps keep the town moving forward. If you need something done, you’ll be talking to Le Chariot sooner or later because he either knows a guy or he is the guy!

La Justice (Justice) — The Old School Marm

Unflappable, plain-spoken, and impossible to manipulate, no one knows exactly how old she is. She retired decades ago, but every few years she resurfaces in the classroom to cover a maternity leave, and thus she is able to frighten a new batch of kids. A good three generations of residents are scared to death of her. The children dare each other to run past her house. Fueled by a red pen and spite, she might just be immortal.

L’Hermite (The Hermit) — The Old Man on the Hill

He lives in the ramshackle old farmhouse outside of town. Like La Papesse and Le Pape, he has stories. He’s a curmudgeon, though, and if you show up unannounced, you’re just as likely to be staring down the business end of a .22 as you are to get a handshake. It all depends on how the wind is blowing. For someone who only ventures into town when he has to, he sure seems to know everything about everyone.

La Roue de Fortune (Wheel of Fortune) — The Town Event Organizer

Everything changes whenever she’s involved. She blew into town ten years ago with a flat tire and never left. She’s put her big city knowledge to use and has carved out a special place in Tarot Town. She’s spearheaded local music festivals, carnivals, and a historical reenactment. She’s brought change to Tarot Town in a good way, and everyone agrees that even though she’s not from there (in fact, no one really knows exactly where she’s from!), she is a true-blue Tarot Townie.

La Force (Strength) — The Animal Rescue Volunteer

She’s the local vet and helps to run the animal shelter. Somehow, she manages to calm the most difficult animals. When she’s not rescuing pitbulls, she’s up at one of the farms taking care of the livestock. Her veterinary clinic is “supervised” by a one-eyed, three-legged cat she saved shortly after arriving in Tarot Town. The animals and the people all love her.

Le Pendu (The Hanged Man) — The Artist

He’s often seen sitting by the river, sketching or painting. One time, the Old Man caught him hanging upside down from a tree branch on his property, trying to take a photograph of fish in the creek. You know what happened next! Folks think he’s a little strange, and they’re not wrong—but then he creates something beautiful that makes everyone see the town differently.

L’Arcane Sans Nom (Death) — The Developer

This guy buys up the old buildings in the area and transforms them into something new. This doesn’t always sit well with the folks in town. Not everyone likes change. People used to get upset when they saw him roll in with his trucks and equipment. For the most part, though, everyone understands: when he shows up, something old is about to make way for something better.

Tempérance (Temperance) — The Town Counsellor

When folks get to arguing, this is the person who calmly resolves the conflict. Like the Mayor, Temperance knows all the loopholes and workarounds. When she’s not keeping hours in the town office, she has a credit counselling business on Main St. Her ability to manage the worst snafus is untouched.

Le Diable (The Devil) — The Owner of the Late-Night Bar

He runs the town’s most questionable establishment. Everyone swears they’ve only ever been there “just that one time,” yet he is still open and as busy as ever. There’s a tiny old bathroom at the end of the back hallway that’s been “out of order” for 20 years. Everyone knows that the door to the illegal gambling room is through the “bathroom.” Many have tried to shut him down, but he’s got more dirt on the folks of Tarot Town than we have time to discuss. He and the Hermit give each other the side-eye whenever they cross paths in the general store.

La Maison Dieu (The Tower) — The Sheriff

Everyone gets quiet for a second when he walks into the diner. It’s as if he can sense disturbances in The Force and see right through everyone’s soul. This is his town, and if something upsets the balance, he’s putting things right, and he wants you to know it. No stranger to drama, he knows that his presence sets people on edge, and not only is he OK with that, but he’ll also toy with you. In fact, edgy is just how he likes it.

L’Étoile (The Star) — The Town Healer

She came from California twenty years ago. She bought an old house, fixed it up, and started up a reflexology and Reiki business in the old parlour on the main floor. She introduced everyone to aromatherapy and crystals. She sells herbal tea and incense in the market on Saturdays. The whole town still remembers that time she brought the Tofurkey and hummus to the church supper. Folks are still trying to figure her out, but she’s harmless, smells like patchouli, and gives a good foot rub.

La Lune (The Moon) — The Town Witch

She’s often seen gathering dirt and leaving coins in the cemetery late at night or out in her yard when there’s a full moon. Anyone who gives her trouble suddenly finds themselves with a car that won’t start or a mountain of unpaid bills showing up at once. She has a way of getting what she wants when she walks into a room. Those who know go quietly to her house for readings and spells. The Devil has been trying to get with her for years, but she just gives his jar a shake, and he simmers right down.

Le Soleil (The Sun) — The Hot Youth Pastor

Children adore him. All of the women, old and young, married and single, curl their hair around their fingers when he talks to them. He lights up the room with happiness and more than a little va-va-voom. He showed up for a summer internship at the local church and tripled the attendance at Youth Bible Camp. He sweet-talks the church ladies into filling the collection plate. The minister and his wife are trying to figure out how they can get him there for good once he graduates from school.

Le Jugement (Judgement) — The Town Awakener & Activist

This person has seen things online. Too many things. Unhinged and loud, they need to wake everyone up. The world is a horrible, terrible place. All the world leaders have formed a secret one-world government to carry out mass surveillance, and they’re going to chip everyone like dogs. Human traffickers exist behind every bush. Do you know what the factory up the river is dumping? They frequently start their Facebook posts with “I’m not suicidal, and I don’t do drugs”, and they run through town like Paul Revere. The folks at Tarot Town are used to it, though, after all these years.

Le Monde (The World) — The One Who Brings It All Together

She runs the annual tri-county harvest festival that brings everyone together for miles around and helps to keep the gene pool fresh. She is friends with just about everyone and has a soft spot for The Fool and The Hanged Man. Occasionally sparring with The Emperor over how things are run in Tarot Town, this is the person who breathes change into everything. She is often seen in the company of The Community Queen and The Local Entrepreneur, hatching new plans that keep everyone guessing. There was that time she dated The Sheriff, but people are polite, and they don’t bring it up.

The Four Great Families of Tarot Town

If you stay in Tarot Town long enough, you’ll notice something interesting: certain last names appear everywhere. That’s because one way or another most of the town belongs to four old families who have lived here for generations. Each family has its own personality, strengths, and reputation.

The Wands Family

(The Movers and Shakers)

If something exciting is happening in Tarot Town, chances are a member of the Wands family is behind it.

They are energetic, bold, and constantly starting new projects.

Some people say they have too many ideas and not enough patience—but no one denies that they bring life to the town.

You’ll find Wands family members running things like:

• The local theatre troupe

• The summer festival committee

• The new restaurant that opened last month

• The town’s entrepreneurial ventures

Their family motto might as well be:

“Why not try it?”

They thrive on passion, inspiration, and the thrill of creation.

The Cups Family

(The Heart of the Town)

If you need kindness, comfort, or emotional wisdom, the Cups family is who you turn to.

They’re known for their warmth, creativity, and deep sensitivity.

Many of them are artists, counsellors, musicians, or healers.

In Tarot Town, the Cups family members often run:

• The café where everyone gathers

• The art studio by the river

• The music school

• The town’s counselling and support groups

They’re the people who remember birthdays, hold space during difficult times, and bring the emotional richness that makes a town feel like home.

The Swords Family

(The Thinkers and Truth-Tellers)

The Swords family has a reputation for being sharp—sometimes literally.

They value truth, logic, and clear thinking above all else.

You’ll find them working in fields where intellect and communication matter:

• Law

• Journalism

• Teaching

• Debate and public discussion

They’re the people who ask difficult questions at town meetings and write the editorials in the local paper. Sometimes they stir up conflict, but more often, they keep the town honest.

The Pentacles Family

(The Builders of Tarot Town)

The Pentacles family built the town.

Quite literally.

They are practical, reliable, and deeply connected to the material world. Many of them work with land, business, finance, and craftsmanship. If you look around Tarot Town, you’ll find Pentacles family members running:

• The farms and orchards

• The local quarry

• The town bank

• The hardware store

They believe in steady work, long-term planning, and building something that lasts. Without them, the town simply wouldn’t function

You can miss a life you were glad to leave.

The apartment with the terrible heating. The job that wore you thin. The relationship you knew, even then, wasn’t right. You would never move back, and yet one afternoon a song drifts through the grocery store, and you are homesick for a place that was never good for you.

Earlier this summer, a song caught my ear, “Hey There Delilah,” and I suddenly found myself remembering my living room in Winnipeg. I loved that house. It was built in the early 1940s and had beautiful hardwood floors and the kind of touches that just don’t happen anymore: tall, bevelled wooden baseboards, chair rails, an arched entry into the living room, plaster on the walls. I had grown up in military housing and lived in contractor-white boxy apartments as an adult, so that house felt otherworldly. I filled it with enough colourful crochet blankets to conjure up Mrs. Weasley herself.

The moment that surfaced was from 2008, when I was actively blogging about sock crochet and even earning an income from AdSense. Late afternoon, light spilling through the curtains, the cats curled up with me, a new pattern nearly finished. My son came through the door, home from basketball. I was so content.

It sounds perfect, and it was, when Lord Voldemort wasn’t home. He was overseas in Afghanistan then, and I did what I always did when he left: I blossomed into the person I should be, and I stood out. Then he would come home. The noose would tighten. The surveillance would start. I would have to start hiding my tips and lying about what I got that day. “Oh, he’s so devoted!” my coworkers at the salon would say, and the cage door would shut. The manipulation followed, and later on... you know.

It’s hard on the head to remember things like that.

For a moment, I had forgotten about that part. I reached for one warm afternoon, and everything came with it.

If this feels confusing, it may help to know how common it is. Nostalgia is rarely about the life itself. It’s about what the life held: the person you were in it, the sense that everything was still ahead of you, the light in a particular room, the certainty of a routine that no longer exists. We don’t miss the situation. We miss the feeling that certain moments wrapped around us.

Tarot has a card for this. The Six of Cups is the card of memory and sweetness, the past remembered through a warm filter. It reminds us that the filter is part of the picture. Memory keeps the sweetness and sets aside the rest, though sometimes the filter slips, and the memory arrives with its shadow attached.

If your chart leans on the 2 or the 6, you may know this feeling especially well. The 2, ruled by the Moon, remembers with the body: the tides of emotion, the attachment, the way a scent can carry you years back in a breath. The 6, ruled by Venus, treasures home, beauty, and being loved, so it mourns the warmth even when the walls were cracked. If that’s you, this isn’t a flaw. It’s how you’re wired to hold on to what mattered. Not sure where your 2s and 6s live? You can find them by casting your own numeroscope at 78Numbers.com.

So instead of asking, “Why am I like this?”, try asking, “What exactly am I missing?”

For me, it wasn’t the house, though I still love it. It certainly wasn’t him. It was the woman in that late-afternoon light: creative, succeeding, unhurried, blossoming. I wasn’t homesick for the cage. I was homesick for her.

Longing can hold a happy afternoon and a locked door at the same time. It isn’t asking me to go back to either one. It’s showing me what to build.

Yours might be different. Being needed? Being young? Having no answers yet, and no one expecting any? Feeling chosen? Name it plainly. The longing usually points at something you value, not something you must go back to.

Missing a life is not a vote to return to it. It’s information. It shows you what you want more of, and most of that can be rebuilt, in smaller and kinder forms, in the life you have now.

You don’t have to go back to get it back.

If this one stirred something, your numbers may be able to tell you why. Cast your own numeroscope at 78Numbers.com and see your chart laid out with the Tarot cards that correspond to it. Or, if you’d rather talk it through with a person, you can book a reading with me.

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The Paradox of Restlessness

Some people spend years trying to create stability. Then, when they finally get it, they become restless. Nothing is actually wrong: the job is fine, the relationship is fine, the bills are paid, and the routine works. There is no emergency to solve, no crisis demanding attention, and no obvious reason to change anything.

And yet, suddenly, there is an almost irresistible urge to blow a hole through the whole thing. Quit the job. Move somewhere else. Start over, change direction, end something, or begin something enormous. You find yourself wanting to do anything that creates movement.

At first glance, this can look like self-sabotage—and sometimes it probably is. But I think there is a much more interesting question to consider: What if stability itself has become uncomfortable?

The Core Distinction

Stability is not experienced the same way by everyone. For one person, stability feels like safety; for another, it feels like stagnation.

For someone who has spent a great deal of life adapting, solving problems, moving, rebuilding, improvising, or responding to changing circumstances, stability can create a very peculiar silence. There is nothing to fix, nothing to outrun, and nothing demanding immediate reinvention. In that silence, you may discover that you have become extraordinarily good at navigating change without ever learning what to do when change stops.

That is where the itch begins. You start looking around at a perfectly functional life and wondering whether this is all there is. The mind starts generating possibilities: Maybe I should move. Maybe I need a completely different career. Maybe this relationship has run its course. Maybe I need a new project, or maybe I need to reinvent everything.

Sometimes those impulses are correct, but often they are not really about the thing you are considering destroying. They are about needing to feel movement again.

That distinction matters deeply, because there is a world of difference between two very different internal states:

• “This life no longer fits me.”

• “I don’t know how to feel alive when things aren’t constantly changing.”

Though they can feel almost identical from the inside, recognizing which one is driving you changes how you respond.

Looking Through the Numerological Lens

This is one of the places where I find numerology particularly useful. Some people genuinely carry a lot of movement in their pattern—there may be strong 5/Mercury energy, or other combinations that show that the client thrives on variety, experimentation, curiosity, travel, communication, reinvention, or new experiences. There may be a repeated tension between freedom and structure.

For someone like that, stability cannot simply mean repetition; it has to contain room to move. Otherwise, they eventually start trying to create movement by destroying the container. That does not mean they are incapable of commitment, but it does mean their definition of commitment needs to be different.

Reframing What It Means to Be Stable

We sometimes imagine stability as maintaining the same arrangement indefinitely: the same job, the same role, the same routines, the same expectations, the same version of ourselves. But living systems don’t stay healthy by never changing.

A tree is stable, but it also grows. A relationship can be stable and still evolve. A career can be stable while still challenging you. A home can be rooted without becoming a cage.

The question isn’t whether you need more stability; you may simply need a form of stability that includes expansion. When there is no legitimate pathway for movement, movement tends to find an illegitimate one. You pick a fight, become fascinated by an escape route, decide everything is suddenly intolerable, fantasize about another life, or create urgency where there wasn’t any.

Something in you says, “I need something to happen.” And if nothing is happening naturally, you may be tempted to become the event.

Self-Inquiry & Practical Alternatives

That is where I would stop before striking the match; not to automatically talk yourself out of changing anything, but to ask a better question: What am I actually hungry for?

• Novelty or Autonomy?

• Challenge or Creative Expression?

• Recognition, Travel, or Learning?

• Risk or a Larger Playing Field?

• More interesting people?

• Something that is yours rather than something you maintain for everyone else?

Because “I need to leave” is often just the first available language for a need that hasn’t been properly identified. You may not need to destroy your life; you may just need to put movement back into it.

There is also another layer: for some people, instability has been present for so long that calm feels unfamiliar, and unfamiliar does not always register as pleasant. Sometimes it registers as suspicious. You become accustomed to scanning ahead, preparing, responding, managing, and problem-solving. Then one day things are simply fine, and the absence of pressure leaves an enormous amount of unused energy that has to go somewhere. So the mind starts searching for the next problem.

Instead of viewing every urge to “burn it all down” as wisdom or dysfunction, treat it as information. Energy needs movement, but the question is what kind.

Maybe the answer really is to leave; sometimes a structure has become too small, and no amount of rearranging the furniture will change that. But before you burn down the house, it is worth checking whether you simply need to open a door:

• Take the trip or start the project.

• Apply for the thing or learn something difficult.

• Change your role or create a new revenue stream.

• Meet different people or alter the routine.

Give yourself a challenge that has nothing to do with manufacturing a crisis. Let one part of your life become wild without requiring every other part to become unstable.

Finding Balance in Your Pattern

This is why I prefer reading a chart as a system rather than turning one number into a simple personality label. A person can simultaneously need security and movement, structure and freedom, commitment and novelty. The interesting question is not which side is the “real” you; it is how those needs are supposed to coexist.

So the next time everything is finally going well, and some part of you starts quietly reaching for the matches, ask yourself:

“Do I actually want to destroy this, or is some part of me asking for somewhere new to go?”

Because those are not the same thing. Sometimes the answer to “I want to burn everything down” is not another dramatic ending; it is simply giving the fire somewhere useful to burn.

If this pattern sounds familiar, you can run your chart at 78 Numbers and start by looking for where your pattern shows movement, independence, structure, and change. The interesting part is rarely one number by itself; it is what happens when all of those needs have to live in the same person.

Tarot Spread: Giving the Fire Somewhere to Burn

This 5-card spread is designed to help you navigate the restlessness that can arise within stability, distinguish between self-sabotage and genuine expansion, and channel your inner fire into a constructive outlet.

Card Positions:

1. Card 1: The Container (Current Stability)

What area of my life currently provides structure or stability, and what purpose is it serving for me?

2. Card 2: The Itch (The Hidden Hunger)

What core need (e.g., novelty, autonomy, creative challenge, learning) is driving my restlessness right now?

3. Card 3: The Mirror (Distinction & Insight)

Is this urge stemming from a structure that no longer fits, or from unfamiliarity with calm and unused energy?

4. Card 4: Opening the Door (Healthy Expansion)

Where or how can I introduce movement, novelty, or wildness without destroying my container?

5. Card 5: The Fuel (Directing the Fire)

What specific outlet, project, or direction is the best place to channel my creative energy right now?

Reflection Prompt:

Before making any drastic decisions, pull these cards and ask yourself the article’s central question: “Do I actually want to destroy this, or is some part of me asking for somewhere new to go?”

Sometimes the hardest thing to leave behind is not what hurt you, but what once saved you. We often build our lives around structures that offered refuge during hardship: the job that provided stability when everything else fell apart, the relationship that brought safety after chaos, or the routines that restored order. We adapt by cultivating specific identities — becoming quieter, stronger, more independent, or endlessly responsible — because our survival demanded it. At the time, these choices worked brilliantly. They carried us through the storm, and in return, we developed an enduring attachment to them.

However, a disconnect arises when the very life that once felt like a rescue begins to feel like a cage. This shift does not mean your past choices were wrong; it simply means you have changed. A structure can be perfectly suited to one chapter of your life while proving completely inadequate for the next. The fundamental problem is that we so easily confuse gratitude with permanence. We tell ourselves that because something saved us, we must stay; because it granted us security, wanting more would be selfish or ungrateful. We assume that if a proven solution no longer fits, the flaw must lie within us.

Yet safety, usefulness, and survival identities all have deliberate seasons. The strategies we erect in crisis are not meant to become our permanent architecture. Over time, hyper-independence can curdle into isolation, keeping you from receiving the support you need. A stable job can become the place where your ambition quietly goes to sleep, while maintaining the persona of “the reliable one” keeps everyone else comfortable at the cost of your own visibility. A protective relationship may eventually require you to remain frozen as the person you were when you entered it. Recognizing these shifts does not invalidate your history; it simply acknowledges that a choice can be both historically right and currently restrictive.

When evaluating life patterns or working with personal charts, the most essential questions are not whether a particular trait is inherently good or bad, but rather: What was this pattern originally helping you do, and do you still need it to do that? As our circumstances evolve, the same underlying energy inevitably shifts expression. Discipline hardens into rigidity, caregiving expands into self-erasure, adaptability degrades into chronic instability, and patience turns into outright postponement. The structure itself may remain identical, but your internal relationship to it transforms entirely.

This dynamic makes outgrowing a life particularly difficult to diagnose because it rarely presents as a dramatic crisis. There is often no clear villain or catastrophe. The work still pays, the routine functions, and from the outside, everything appears enviable. Yet inside, an undeniable restlessness presses against the walls. It is easy to dismiss this quiet discomfort, chiding yourself to be grateful or comparing your situation to those with fewer options. But feeling constrained in a functional life is rarely evidence of unreasonableness; it is often the quiet realization that you have outgrown your hard-won solution.

Acknowledging this reality carries a unique form of grief, as stepping away from an old structure can feel like betraying the version of yourself who fought so hard to build it. We remember the desperation of wanting security and the profound relief when it arrived. Yet growth turns former destinations into new starting points. The essential question shifts from asking whether a life was worth building to asking: Am I staying because this path still actively supports me, or because I feel indebted to the person I was when I chose it?

Answering that question does not always demand dismantling your entire existence. Outgrowing a structure can mean changing how you participate within it: setting new boundaries, relinquishing an outmoded role, renegotiating commitments, or allowing your identity to expand. Some structures can adapt alongside you, while others cannot. However, you can only discover what is possible once you stop treating past survival mechanisms as sacred obligations. We are dynamic beings, and the qualities required to establish a foundation are rarely the ones needed to lead us forward.

When your life feels strangely restrictive despite being functional, clarity comes from asking two distinct questions: What part of this life was built for a version of me who no longer exists, and what would I actively choose again today? These prompts quickly untangle genuine gratitude from heavy obligation. You are fully allowed to honour the structures that once carried you without forcing them to carry you forever. The most respectful homage you can pay to an old survival mechanism is simply to acknowledge that it worked, it kept you safe, and now you are ready for what comes next.

Tarot Spread: Outgrowing Survival Structures

1. Card 1: The Sanctuary (The Past Refuge)

What structure, identity, or strategy served as your refuge during a past storm, and what essential function did it serve?

2. Card 2: The Cage (The Current Restriction)

Where has this past protection quietly curdled into limitation, rigidity, or self-erasure in your present life?

3. Card 3: The Debt (Untangling Gratitude from Obligation)

What unspoken fear or sense of obligation makes you feel like stepping away from this structure is a betrayal?

4. Card 4: The Release (Relinquishing the Survival Persona)

What boundary, commitment, or outmoded role are you being invited to let go of to honour who you are now?

5. Card 5: The Next Horizon (Active Choice)

What path, identity, or support would you actively choose today for the version of yourself that exists right now?

Halloween Weekend 2026 10/31 - 11/1 from 10am to 4pm

Celebrate Samhain with Central New York’s Artisans, Craftspeople, Spiritual Workers, Psychic Readers, Reiki Practitioners, & Musicians

Shop Local Art
LIVE Music
Food Truck
Raffle & Door Prize

• Tarot Readings

• Numerology Reports

• Reiki Practitioners

• Psychic Mediums

• Aura Paintings

• Hat Bar to Design your way!

• Hand-Carved Treasures Stone & Glass Artwork

• Crystal Vendors

• Divination Tools

• Home Decor

• NY Authors Book Signing!

The Alchemy & Arts Market is in its first year, but we’re hoping to make it one of the most memorable events for families, women, and all those seeking a little rooted connection during this shift in seasons

We hope to see you there!

For more details and a full vendor list, visit us at
www.thealchemistgiftshop.com/alchemyandarts

There are times when waiting is wise.

Those are the times when you genuinely need more information, more preparation, more money, more support, or more hours in the day.

And then there are times when “I’m waiting for the right moment” means something else entirely. It means:

I want the change. I just don’t want the disruption that comes with it.

I want the opportunity, but not the scheduling problem that the opportunity creates.

I want the expansion and growth, but not the favours I’ll have to call in to make this happen.

I want the new chapter to open, but preferably after every loose end has been tied up, the calendar has cleared itself, and I feel 150% completely ready.

September is not especially interested in that sort of arrangement. We are moving through a 10/1 universal year, inside an 11 triad, and September itself carries a karmic 19/1 Universal Month.

That is a lot of 1/Sun energy moving through the collective, and 1 does not tend to sit politely in the waiting room. The 1 vibration initiates, pushes, separates, and demands decisive action.

The 10/1 year already carries the atmosphere of beginning again, taking the lead, moving into new territory and acting on what has been gathering momentum. The 0 bumps that 1 vibration up another octave. Typically, the tens bring conflict and things coming out of left field that we have to deal with. The 11 triad intensifies all of that.

Things become much more difficult to ignore, especially in the realm of standing on one’s own and making the choices required to stand in our power.

Master 11 can have a strange electrical quality: more awareness, more pressure, more visibility, and more moments when something suddenly becomes obvious and can no longer be comfortably stuffed back into the cupboard.

Then September brings in 19/1 and the month grows teeth. The 19/1 is not merely about starting something. It’s a karmic number and contains challenges around independence, taking action or responsibility, and the consequences of these things. The overlapping universal transits can expose the places where we want freedom without inconvenience or discomfort. That can look like:

• Autonomy without risk.

• Expansion without rearrangement.

• A new life without disturbing the old one.

That is where the tension carried within these cycles enters the chat.

Sometimes that tension looks like somebody making a smart remark that hits exactly the nerve you were trying not to examine. Sometimes it can look like being backed into a corner because the comfortable option disappears. Sometimes it looks like a decision being made necessary because circumstances no longer allow you to remain neutral.

And sometimes something drops directly into your lap that you would be a fool to reject, even though accepting it means rearranging your schedule, calling in favours, inconveniencing somebody, asking for help, moving faster than you planned, or figuring things out as you go.

That last one is especially interesting because we often imagine “right timing” as the moment when everything becomes easy, and all the pieces fall into place. The clouds part, light comes streaming down from the heavens, and our spirit guides cheer.

We think the right opportunity will arrive when we are fully prepared for it.

• When the money is there.

• When the schedule is clear.

• When we have enough energy.

• When everyone around us is supportive.

• When we feel certain.

• When the logistics make sense.

But sometimes the timing announces itself in a completely different way.

The opportunity arrives first, and then your life has to move around it. I know because I am living this right now. I recorded my September forecast before the month really got underway. I talked about this exact kind of energy.

And then it started happening to me.

Opportunities began appearing that required immediate adjustment.

Good opportunities.

The kind where saying no simply because the timing was inconvenient would have been ridiculous. The kind of opportunity that makes you look at the calendar and think, Well. Apparently we are doing this.

And suddenly the question was no longer:

Is this the right time?

It became:

How do I make this work?

That is a very different question.

One keeps you standing outside the door studying the hinges and waiting for life to bring you a written invitation. The other assumes you are going through it. I think this is one of the more important lessons inside a 19/1 month, particularly one underpinned by such transformative and “here for a good time, not a long time” opportunities.

Sometimes being “ready” is not the prerequisite; sometimes the thing itself creates the readiness.

So you call in the favour.

You rearrange your day.

You start asking for help.

You throw together a bag of tricks quickly, breathe your way through the temporary chaos, and learn something on the fly, while feeling completely exposed.

Ultimately, there is a greater chance that you become more capable because the situation requires a new level of capability from you. Your survival brain may try to convince you otherwise.

That does not mean every opportunity should be accepted or every hesitation ignored. It simply means that inconvenience or not feeling “OH HELL YES” is not automatically evidence that the timing or opportunity is wrong.

Neither is nervousness. Feeling bad is not a bad omen. If you’re feeling out of place or a little tied up in your gut, congratulations — you’re leaving your comfort zone.

Having to scramble a little and cobble some things together when opportunity knocks is not a bad problem to have, either, although in the moment it can certainly feel wrong.

Neither is the realization that your decision will affect other people.

Real change has consequences, and that is part of what makes it change.

And sometimes what we call “waiting for the right time” is actually an attempt to engineer a version of change in which nothing uncomfortable has to happen.

• No one will be disappointed.

• Nothing has to be rearranged.

• No identity has to be released.

• No risk has to be taken.

• No favours have to be requested.

• No awkward conversation has to occur.

• No existing structure has to move.

But then we are not really asking for change. We are asking for the new thing to fit perfectly inside the old life. September’s energy is making that increasingly difficult for everyone I know. So if something keeps presenting itself this month, especially something that feels both compelling and wildly inconvenient, it may be useful to ask a different question.

Not:

Is this the perfect time?

But:

What consequence am I trying to avoid by continuing to wait?

And perhaps:

If I already knew I was going to do this, what would I start rearranging today?

That question can reveal a surprising amount because sometimes the door does not open just because you are ready; sometimes opening the door is what makes you ready.

October has always felt like the perfect month for Tarot.

The days shorten. The light changes. Everything becomes a little more liminal, a little more theatrical, and a little easier to imagine as a doorway.

So this year, instead of simply doing a collection of Halloween-themed prompts, I’m turning the whole month into the Countdown to Halloween Tarot Challenge.

Every day throughout October, I’ll be posting a new Tarot prompt on Patreon.

The idea is simple: one prompt, one pull, one small piece of the path toward Halloween.

These prompts are meant to help us work with Tarot as an interpretive practice: shadow, memory, curiosity, the uncanny, and all the odd little things that tend to surface at this time of year.

I’ll be working with the Halloween Tarot because ‘tis the season, but there is no required deck. Bring the one you actually enjoy reading with.

You can participate every day, dip in when a prompt catches your attention, or save the whole series and work through it at your own pace.

By the time we reach October 31, we’ll have built a full month of readings together.

31 days. 31 Tarot prompts. One long countdown to Halloween.

The daily prompts will be shared on Patreon:

https://patreon.78numbers.com

There are some Tarot cards that suffer terribly from keywords, and the Seven of Cups is one of them. If you pick up enough modern Tarot books, you will eventually meet the usual collection:

confusion, fantasy, illusion, too many choices, daydreaming, wishful thinking.

None of those meanings is necessarily wrong.

The problem is that they describe what the card can look like without telling us very much about why it behaves that way. This is one of the reasons I work with compound numbers. In the numerical sequence I use with Tarot, the Seven of Cups is 47/11.

47/11 tells a much more interesting story.

Don’t throw away the 47

Modern numerology has a habit of reducing numbers very quickly.

Forty-seven becomes:

4 + 7 = 11

and, depending on the system, 11 may then become 2.

By the time we are finished, the 47 that got us there has vanished without a trace. If we apply the basic keywords of the 2 vibration, the 7 of Cups would make absolutely no sense at all.

The single-digit root matters, but so does that two-digit compound.

A 47/11 is not interchangeable with every other 11 or even every other 2, because the 4 and the 7 tell us how we arrived at 11.

In my planetary framework:

4 belongs to Rahu/North Node.
7 belongs to Ketu/South Node.
11 belongs to Pluto.

That immediately changes the energy of this particular number and the card that represents it.

Rahu and Ketu in the same number

Rahu and Ketu are the two ends of the lunar nodal axis of astrology. They are opposing polarities that behave very differently.

Rahu reaches. It wants experience. The North Node amplifies appetite, fascination, hunger, possibility, attraction and the feeling that something out there might contain what we are looking for.

Ketu does almost the opposite. The South Node separates. It withdraws. It cuts away. It can detach from something almost as quickly as Rahu becomes fascinated by it.

When we put those two forces together, you get something far more complicated than indecision. You get simultaneous attraction and disconnection:

Something catches our eye. Then something in us backs away from it. Another possibility appears. That one becomes absolutely fascinating. Then its limitations become visible, and another possibility replaces it. The mind, imagination, and desires can move rapidly from one vessel to another because the mechanism contains both hunger and detachment.

Now let’s put that inside the suit of Cups.

When the 7 of Cups presents itself in a reading, we are not simply sorting through practical options on a spreadsheet. Cups bring the process into the territory of emotions; of longing, attachment, imagination, projection, and desire.

Suddenly the Seven of Cups begins to make considerably more sense.

Maybe the problem isn’t too many choices

“Too many choices” is one possible manifestation, but sometimes there aren’t actually too many choices at all. There may be two. There may only be one option. What makes the situation feel confusing is that our relationship to the possibilities keeps changing.

Rahu says: “That. I want that.”

Ketu says: “No. Not that after all.”

Rahu spots another possibility. Ketu finds the hole in it.

And around we go.

This can produce fantasy, certainly. Rahu is very good at enlarging what attracts us. This can also produce disillusionment, because Ketu is very good at showing us what doesn’t satisfy. That creates the peculiar emotional instability of the Seven of Cups. It isn’t simply that the seeker cannot choose. Sometimes the seeker cannot determine which desire is trustworthy or safe.

That is a very different read on things.

Then we arrive at 11

Forty-seven reduces to 11. I do not reduce multiples of 11 further when I work with numbers. It remains 11. I like to keep master numbers unreduced unless a charting method requires single digits, like Ank Jyotish.

Eleven is ruled by Pluto. This emphasizes the upheaval and pressure found within the 11 vibration. Pluto doesn’t generally leave things on the surface. It intensifies, exposes and draws attention toward what is hidden underneath an apparently ordinary problem. The 11 vibration can also be thought of as two 1s. The 1 vibration is ruled by the Sun. Within Master 11 is drama, independence, upheaval, and extreme transformation. Each emanation of 11 contains this energy, but they all go about producing it in different ways. So 38/11 is not the same as 56/11, which is not the same as 47/11, and so on.

But back to 47/11 and the Seven of Cups. This card may appear to be asking:

Which option should I choose?

But 47/11 may be asking something more uncomfortable:

What is doing the choosing?

• Is this genuine desire?

• Fear?

• Projection?

• Old hunger?

• Avoidance?

• The fantasy of becoming somebody different if we obtain the right person, opportunity, identity, spiritual practice, job or future?

Now the card is no longer merely about being overwhelmed by seven shiny cups. Instead, it becomes a card about the psychology of desire itself.

This is why I prefer pip decks

This is especially important when working with the Tarot de Marseille. There is no scenic illustration giving us a person staring at cups filled with tempting visions. We have to read the card in other ways.

For those who think that it’s just seven cups printed on cardstock that don’t mean anything, they need to rethink that assumption. Now, the TdM does not refer to one specific deck, but to a category of decks created in one recognizable style. It was a term coined by antiquarian booksellers in the late 1800s because even back then there were a lot of Tarot decks being created, and they needed a way to communicate to people what styles they had in stock. So each deck within the category of TdM has some differences.

In the deck I use for client readings, the Noblet Marseille, featured in the image above, there are two rows, top and bottom, of three cups each on the card. A seventh cup is in the middle. Two vines emerge from the middle cup of the bottom row. Their lower leaves touch the cups on either side of the central cup. The vines flow upward to the top row, the leaves resting on either side of the central cup on the top row. It appears that the seventh cup is being somewhat contained and separated by the vines, and yet it is not completely cut off from the top row because the vines envelope both it and the base of the central cup in the top row.

All of the cups are half full. When you work with a deck from the TdM, you need to pay attention to the little things. Medieval and Renaissance card makers couldn’t just put the goodies out on public display. Even in our modern age, divination is illegal in many parts of the world, including the West.

At this point in the Cups sequence, energy has been spent. In fact, they become half full at the point of the Five and stay that way for the rest of the suit, but Ace through Four are full. Ace through Four also have lighter liquid with diagonal lines. Lines going up to the left show concern with the material. Lines going up to the right show concern with the spiritual. The liquid is dark and murky now, though, and half full. Disruption has occurred at the point of the Five, and the management of said disruption, along with what it brings, continues throughout the rest of the suit. Your TdM may show a slightly different progression. I’ll be examining the whole suit in greater detail using the CBD, which is the deck I teach with, when I start releasing video lessons.

Depending on your point of view, the seventh cup is a thing being considered, an option or result being integrated, or even something being rejected.

The number gives us a mechanism. It tells us what stage of the game we’re at, and this is quite helpful. At the point of the 7 vibration, disruption has already occured (the 5 vibration) followed by a restoration of order (the 6 vibration). Now, we are stepping off the train and sequestering ourselves for a period of time to consider our options. True space to breathe came at the point of the 6 vibration, and now our imaginations run wild, wanting to know or experience all of the things, and this is expressed across the four Sevens.

The Cups tell us where that mechanism is operating. In this card, the environment is the element of Water. In my system of classifying the cards, the Cups operate within the realm of Cancer. This is a cardinal sign of initiation and leadership, protection, and proactive care. The Moon governs Cancer, controlling inner tides, deep intuition, dreams, and shifting moods. Cancer brings home, family, and sanctuary themes into the emotional landscape of the Cups.

The compound tells us much more than the reduced value alone. With 47/11, 4/Rahu and 7/Ketu create a push-pull between attraction and separation, while Pluto questions what lies beneath the entire cycle. While that can certainly feel like confusion, that confusion itself is the symptom. The deeper question is:

Why does one possibility become irresistible and then suddenly lose its power?

The Seven of Cups at its best

There is a healthy side to this card. Too often, we focus on one thing in certain cards, flattening them into a one-dimensional interpretation.

The ability to imagine multiple realities, alternatives, endings, universes, choices, etc is not a defect.

Neither is the ability to recognize that something we wanted does not actually suit us. Rahu opens us up to the myriad of possibilities, Ketu seeks answers, reaches through the fog or din of everyday existence, and discriminates, while Pluto strips away what is false and makes us question everything we thought we knew to be true.

Used well, the energy encapsulated within the 47/11 vibration that is symbolized visually by the Seven of Cups can become a powerful process of refinement or — and I cringe a bit to use this word, but my vocabulary is limited with only one cup of coffee in me — manifestation.

We explore, imagine, and notice what attracts us. Then we begin the process of integration and discover what doesn’t hold up. Eventually we begin to understand the difference between wanting an image and wanting the thing itself. That is considerably more useful than simply being told, “Oh, you’re confused/trying to escape reality/daydreaming.”

The number beneath the keyword

This is one of the reasons I resist flattening Tarot cards into a handful of memorized meanings and keywords.

“Confusion” can be useful shorthand, but shorthand is not interpretation.

When I see the Seven of Cups as 47/11, I see desire as it encounters detachment, possibility as it encounters discernment, and ultimately the Plutonian demand to discover what actually drives the yearning. Sometimes this card is asking us to choose; sometimes it is asking us to step back and wait on the fringes of a situation until the fog clears on its own — and sometimes it is asking us to do the uncomfortable work of integrating one or more new realizations so that we can experience which one works.

I have stopped counting the number of numerologists who tell me I am wrong. They have the right key, the true key, the one and only key that will decipher the mysteries of ALL THE WORDS.

**Sigh**

The key they refer to is the “Pythagorean” key, which doesn’t come from Pythagoras. It comes from Aso Neith Cochran, who most likely adapted it from Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa’s letter-number key. It was made popular by author Sarah Balliett and her friend, Dr. Julia Seton, MD, in the early 1900s. Across the ocean, occultists Cheiro and Sepharial were busy hanging out in the British Museum, getting high off dusty old scrolls, and concocting their own versions of numerological word analysis, each using keys that were, again, different. I’ve written about that already, here.

After nearly 40 years of study and practice, I have come to the conclusion that they are all correct. They will all tell you something about yourself or the word you are investigating. I have linked a document below. I will share it on the Free Resources page also.

The Pythagorean key is the one that we are all familiar with. It is sequential, making it easy to learn. The Chaldean key is not sequential, but it isn’t difficult to follow. I do prefer results using this key, but the main site uses the Pythagorean key strictly for now, simply because it is the best-known one. I have also included the sound key I use. You do not use it for spelling letter by letter, but by how a word is spoken, and that can be different for every person who speaks. It is my favourite key to use when I have the privilege of hearing a client speak their name to me.

Letter Keys

Well, it’s September, and with the falling leaves and the pumpkin spice comes the time when I start shuffling things around — don’t ask why. I don’t have a good reason for doing this every fall; just know that if there is going to be a shift in direction around here, it will happen close to Mabon. That just seems to be my way.

I have spent the last couple of years having a very public karmic shift in direction. It’s probably all that transit Pluto tap-dancing on my North Node. Earlier this summer, I experienced my Mars return and, with it, a huge surge of energy (I laughed when I had a look back at my chart). The Mercury retrograde in Cancer did a big number on me as well, although it was a VERY GOOD TIME for me; lots of things that I thought I would never see again (mostly books that I had to leave behind when I left a miserable and manipulative relationship in 2016) came back to me. This made my heart happy and, in part, greatly helped push this shift.

Since that retrograde, I have found myself returning to the things I used to do in my practice that I put down when they seemed too simple and I wanted to advance. One of those things is going back to my old chart style. Another is the Pythagorean letter-number key. We parted ways in the 90s when I discovered Chaldean and Vedic numerology, but lately we have been meeting for quiet dates. I think we’re officially seeing each other again because I created 78numbers.com, and in order to keep it simple, I went with the Pythagorean key. Chaldean and I still see each other on the side, and one day we may all be a throuple, but for now, the site just contains the one alphabet key.

78numbers was born out of the ashes of Codex Numerorum, which, while it suited me greatly, was terribly overwhelming for beginners. Since beginners are most of the online spiritual community and 99.9% of the numerology online revolves around the (Western) Pythagorean key, it was pointless to keep moving forward with the colossus of a web app that Codex Numerorum had become. 78numbers is an actual website and, at present, does not have a membership option. It is 100% free to use. You only pay a small fee if you want to keep the chart that you cast.

I used this site to speed up my chart calculations at the fair over the weekend before it got too hot to use my phone, and I had to stick it in the cooler for the rest of the day. The response was very good! Those that I couldn’t read for due to time constraints were referred to the site. I haven’t done a full and proper roll-out…..is this my roll-out? Naaah. Maybe? I’ll do a big splashy over on Patreon once I’ve got my dusty old podcast rebranded.

Anyway, that’s all I’ve got for now. It’s time to go to the gym and shake some o’ the lard off me arse! Everyone, as you were!