THE TAROT READER
The Ancient Kingdom of Fife in Scotland was the last stronghold of the Picts, the warring and fearsome tribe that gave the Romans such a hard time and who later became displaced by the Scots.
The last two Pictish tribes were the Tribe of Orc, the Orcs and the tribe of Caat.
In other words there were some unique ancestral ties in Fife that went all the way back to ancient times and the Old ways.
Indeed Dunfermline Cathedral’s proud boast is that it is the Spiritual heart of Scotland, somewhat in conflict with the chimes that emanate from the bell tower every few minutes … from the song Jerusalem .. ‘and was Jerusalem builded here in England’s green and pleasant land ..’
All grist to the cultural mill were the legends and stories of Queen and Saint Margaret, and the stories of the pearls of great price, the souls at the bottom of the stormy sea that were a part of her journey and voyage.
It seemed like a good opportunity therefore for Angus the Tarot reader to develop his business away from the competition in the nearby Capital city Edinburgh.
Placing an advert in the local paper, the work started to slowly come in, as mainly Tarot parties.
There were offers to introduce Angus to the demon who had made a previous tarot reader get up and leave quickly at a séance they had held last week. Apparently it was the resident party entertainment.
There were complaints that a gypsy at a funfair had been reading the ladies mind and was shape-shifting.
Obviously someone with a frustrated talent for stock market sales.
There was even some nightclub work coming along in Edinburgh for a couple of forward thinking establishments, though it was pretty hard to justify subjecting both himself and his spiritual workers to a cocktail of worldly party goers all revved up for the liberation of their passions.
It was also a bit of a problem delivering a Tarot reading in front of two 2000 Watt speakers at full throttle in the small room. The equivalent of gentle background music was like having ones head inside the engine of a Lothian Bus.
One night, a young lady sat down at Angus’s table in the nightclub and smiled and said, ‘we’re watching you .. !’, which wasn’t good news really because he had been hired to replace the previous resident tarot reader who had met a grisly and very unfortunate end.
The horror story had apparently been all over the local newspapers.
Getting home and putting the kettle on to make a cup of Tetley tea he went over to his answer phone and played back his messages …
‘hello … I believe your name is Angus, I’m Mario and I’m from Edinburgh … I’ve got a bad … vibe coming through … don’t ….. drive your car … at least not fast ..’
Angus realised that perhaps this was the garage imparting some technical advice about his brakes and wheels after a mechanics MOT inspection, but then as he hadn’t been to any garage with his relatively new vehicle it did seem like there were some issues emerging in Edinburgh.
One night however, Angus realised that he wasn’t cut out for that job when the music was so loud that he had to write down his Tarot reading on paper for people to see … the decibels being beyond the possibilities of his human vocal chords and lungs.
Angus the Tarot reader also quit his other Nightclub in Edinburgh when a manager suggested that he wasn’t worth the money.
For Angus though, his ancient Gift of second sight from his Mother’s blueblood ancestry was part of a long Tradition of the Seer in Scotland, so he shook off the dust from his sandals determined that in Dunfermline, a town claiming to be the ‘spiritual heart of Scotland’ he would be able to continue to put bread on his table. For as the Templar mysteries do declare ‘this mystery is not for profit’ and thus the healing skills of Angus might be better employed elsewhere where they were needed and where the spirit moved.
The phone rang on the wednesday afternoon and it was a Tarot party booking in Dunfermline on the Friday night.
The party comprised of somewhere between eight and ten ladies which although a lot to go into meaningful depth with it was possible that his skills could be more than superficially employed in the allotted time.
Having been involved in relocating from Edinburgh, there were one or two heavy things to take to the local landfill depot at Wellwood on the outskirts of Dunfermline.
Having loaded the van with hundredweights of turf on the Friday morning, Angus was planning to dispose of the turf at the dump, return home and have a bath before setting off to his party at eight.
The drive out to the dump was uneventful and he rolled his van into line to be allocated his skip.
For whatever reason, he was asked to use the skip that required three metal steps up to the lip … a bit of aerobic activity and some more stretching on the day … but he was big and tough and if he took his time, he could manoeuvre the heavy bags up the steps then lift them over the lip of the skip.
He went into his van to get his keys so that he could unlock the back compartment and left his drivers side door open whilst he unlocked the back.
Overhead, the gulls were swooping and wailing, and there was sound of heavy diesel motors in the distance bulldozing acres of landfill.
It was an eerie desolation – all our abandoned yesterdays in an endless sea of garbage.
Angus went in to the van for his first bag of turf and slowly carried it over to the metal stairs. The three steps up seemed endless but he did the extra heave to dump the first of nine bags.
He stood there relieved.
Realising that the whole exercise was do-able he turned gently around with his hand on the railing and suddenly he stiffened and was flying through the air.
He sailed beyond the stairs stiff as a board and landed flat, pancake style on his straight body, then bounced all in one action like a superball off the concrete fully upright, still stiff and straight onto his feet and by some force was propelled face first towards the very sharp corner of his open van door.
To his horror he realised that there wasn’t anything he could do as he couldn’t move his arms and it looked like his ribcage and heart was going to get cut into by the force of this vile evil. It was beyond his physical capacity to change his direction and momentum.
Then as if by a miracle, though it was with a feeling of great love, another power, another force, his lifelong Guardian Angel braked him suddenly in mid air and stopped him at the very point of this heartbreaking corner of his van door.
All his forward momentum had been removed as if by some antigravity force that had placed a cushion of hard air in front of him.
Angus stood there, his heart gently resting on the point of his van door and realised that something incredible had just taken place.
He was still processing the idea that he had just been flying through the air and whilst his rational mind was being appeased he was able to see that the whole event that had just gone down was extraordinary in many ways from a rational perspective.
He was yards away from the skip and the stairs … this couldn’t be dismissed as an accident.
Some great evil and some great good had called him into service for some reason.
Feeling a little shaken but not injured or stirred, he offloaded the other bags uneventfully and drove away from that alien landscape.
He realised that some wonderful Angel was looking after him and that no matter what kind of life might follow that everything was going to be ok.
He got home mid afternoon realising that God did not abandon us to the world. To have everything in the world as the Tarot system implies we aspire to, to have fortune, self-made with powers of mind and magik was perhaps not really the path that was going to reflect the divine truth in his life.
Surely the Angel that had always been with him and who helped him choose his life in Scotland was there to see him through. Such love went beyond mere considerations of the world’s garbage whether it was old or new.
Getting his gear together for the Tarot party that night he headed off knowing that it was good to be doing something important even in a small way.
Arriving into an area full of modern, new housing he located the address and parked up. Waiting a few minutes to get the timing right.
Then he went to the door, kit bag in hand to open the proceedings.
The hostess for the evening was charming, and there were several other ladies already there who were unpacking their party food.
After some brief introductions, Angus was shown upstairs to the room he would be using.
From the large amount of dolls on the shelves, it was the daughters room, though the children had apparently gone round to their grandmothers for the evening.
His eye was drawn to the pyramid-like arrangement of the dolls on the shelves which terminated with a pink faerie Barbie doll like the faerie on top of a Christmas tree.
He set up the table with my usual display of cards and crystals and décor and focussed on the night ahead.
The ladies came in one by one, each reading taking over half an hour and dealing with various issues within the human condition.
Angus used the cards, which contained every social archetype not to tell fortunes but to develop archetypal social issues that arise from the consequences of the cards that the client chooses.
That way appropriate issues and consequences could be rehearsed ‘as if’ they were taking place in a positive way. This therapeutic strategy plugged into a real life rational explanation in terms of the Psychologist Alfred Adler. Ie. One approached life ‘as if’ the best options were possible despite evidence to the contrary .. !!’
Usually though the cards and their alleged consequences were really rather accurate as if there were also Angelic powers at work.
The ladies were generally very happy with their readings, but from time to time there was some sort of distraction breaking in to the wavelength of the readings coming from the general direction of the pyramid of dolls. Angus would look left and catch a shimmer of something displacing the light in the air in front of the dolls display.
Finally, the hostess for the evening arrived.
She sat down, and then the real reason for this tarot party started to unfold.
Her young daughter aged ten had a friend she explained.
It was her invisible friend and would follow her around and at some point it had taken possession of her doll.
This doll had become her very favourite doll and usually she would not be parted from it or would often refer to it.
Angus looked to his left and without being told said, that’s it there isn’t it – the slightly bigger baby doll.
Yes said the Mother .. that’s it.
At that point a dirty grey blob of energy about the size of a piece of burnt toast emerged from the doll.
He immediately realised that he should not touch this doll at all because it was drawing energy from this room and everything in it, and seemed to have been getting the daughter to wind up the Mother by relaying and translating bizarre kinds of conversation to her.
This then wasn’t really a job for Angus as such … but it was his job to make sure that the Mother would undertake to get rid of the doll, because if she didn’t then this spirit would come back.
It had a hold on and was feeding from the Mother.
He started to engage the Mother with the reality of the situation and told her that the doll had to go.
To his immediate surprise the Mother said that her daughters life and happiness depended on the doll.
Then he pointed out that if the doll was disposed of with prayer with the help of God and his Angels in a meaningful and sincere way that the Forces of Light would help her close the door on it.
Then she said that she couldn’t buy another doll as good as that one.
Angus realised that this demonic entity was forcing her to come up with anything out of fear of being thwarted.
Suddenly it came to Angus what it was that must be done.
He said, slowly, ‘Take that doll to Wellwood landfill depot and dump it in a skip’.
Give it back to the junk that it came from.
No, no, said the Mother.
If you do this said Angus, it will be earthed and cannot come back to your daughter.
But my daughter will miss her doll suggested the Mother.
You can always buy her another one said Angus.
There is a great wrong and sickness in that doll and you do not want that to harm your daughter or your family do you ?
At that the Mother seemed to come round …
Angus repeated his missive … ‘take it to Wellwood !’ and then silently said a prayer for her.
The Mother got up and thanked Angus for his efforts then went downstairs to rejoin her friends.
Angus had a look at the doll again without touching it … he realised that he had met that earlier this afternoon.
He realised that time travelling Demons that could jump up and down timelines to get you before you knew to get them were slightly out of his league at this point.
His Angelic guide though, assured him that everything was going to be ok here as well as he was folding up his tablecloth and packing away his little ornaments.
There were obviously lives and souls at stake here and nothing that could be done that was credible could be done with some coloured paper and a nice waistcoat.
The one obvious consolation though, was that he knew for certain that he was called to do very important work.
But that was the very last time he did it as a tarot Reader.