Watch your back

Weekends come and go, and I find that time is passing quickly during this recovery period. In the coming week, I’ll be meeting with the consultant to get their view on my journey of sorts.

It’s been a slightly bumpy road this past week with the skin healing faster than my body can shed old skin. Those little memes of bears up against trees or elephants bathing in mud have popped into my mind from time to time. Along with the itch, has been a nagging sciatic ache in my right-hand side. Not what I had surgery for and not very welcome. As always I have tried as many methods of distraction as I can to avoid focussing on the pain.

Time passing is a key theme of the week. In prepping for a meet-up with a group of fellow third-age travellers, I was pulled back to a reflection I carry out yearly between Christmas Day and New Year. It comes out of the work of Caitlin Matthews and her use of the 12 Omen days, a way to use the tarot and nature to think ahead to the coming year.

How does this work?

Well each morning before anyone is up, I pull a tarot card and write down what I think it might mean for the coming month starting with January. I then focus on what meets my eye in terms of nature. I think of a few questions I might ask myself that month and add a mantra taken from the book Tarot for Self by Bonnie Greer.

So what came up for June? I pulled the ten of swords on the 31st of December and remember fully how frustrated I was when it came into my hands.

For those non-tarot card people out there who might be reading this, I use the Rider Waite Deck which is the most well-known. The ten of swords is the card that represents the air and completion. However, I didn’t think that when I picked it up as it also has a lot of swords on it and it looks like someone has been stabbed in the back.

This is what I wrote at that point –

Why am I picking all of these challenging cards? I truly believe the pain in my body is doing this pick, which makes me want to pick again each time.

June is usually a time of happiness, a lot of hard work as I find June gets squashed before the summer.

Back problems may be, new dawn -hope?

My concern as I pick these cards is do I have 6 months of pain ahead of me?

My mantra for this month – I let go of these things I cannot accomplish to free me to do things I can.

Question for the month – What is being sacrificed?

The element that I noticed today is wind.

There was a little more about the accumulation of stuff in my study which I have left out. I recall writing this, the frustration of picking the ten of swords for this beautiful month of June, the very messy writing, and almost not wanting to put pen to paper. Writing about loss in a time of plenty, flowers, colour, birds, trees, green. A month that I love even though it is usually very busy.

And yet, now that I am here, so much is true. The pain is here, not like January when I was at my worst, different, coming and going, but still making itself felt, almost like a challenge, you cannot get rid of me that easily Sam. Cutting out the pain doesn’t work.

Reframing my mantra – I let go of these things, I cannot accomplish.

I am letting go of getting rid of pain. It’s a task similar to Sisyphus I have written about in the past. It only makes me sad and very tired, so in letting go of pain, I am letting go of sadness. I do think it will continue to be a Sisyphean task in the coming months.

The second bit is to free me to do things I can. Well, that is writing, I have also since May, reinvigorated this substack page, writing 7 posts already on my Pilgrimage of Sorts.

It is also sitting and observing the beauty of June. What has happened so far this year has led me to have time to pause, time to ponder, time to percolate and also time to promenade to new places. I deliberately use the word promenade, it fits June so well. A gentle stroll through June with my eye taking in the wonders of the world around me. Promenade, as I have to be mindful of my pace. Not too fast, not too slow, just right.

So back to Ten of Swords I picked for June – let’s look for the good bits as I am sure there are some. James Rickler in his tarot blog ends with

Finally, all those swords in the man’s back may indicate being stabbed in the back, but a creative interpretation is to see this as “the acupuncture card,” which presents a therapeutic suggestion when taken literally. Taken metaphorically, this may suggest the strategic application of minimal force to correct the flow of vital energy in a system.

I particularly like the last line, correcting the flow of vital energy. That’s exactly what the surgery was for.

Littlerabbittarot talks of the sun seen in the Rider Waite card.

A popular interpretation of this card is that it is a sunrise. A dawn of a new day just beginning to peak over the horizon. A sign of hope in the storm, that not all is lost, and not all is over. That this ending begets a new start. Something to reach for and hold on to.. Letting go and surrendering to the end of a difficult period. Getting the chance to rest or sleep.

As we hurtle towards Midsummer, the sun is what I am taking with me. The sun shines so brightly every day without fail, the longest day is just around the corner. A day when I fully intend to look for hope, let go of sadness and pain and keep hold of acceptance and joy.

And the wind I mentioned? As I write this with the window open, the curtains are billowing in the wind that has been present this week. A southerly wind that links with the fire element of summer. A southerly wind that reminds of direction and change.