He sits on a stone throne, and grasps a single coin in both hands, clutches it even as if his life depended on it. Two coins rest at his feet, and the fourth is etched into the chair above his head. He wears a serious expression. His chair elevates him off the ground, as if it were a pedestal; his foundation is the coins beneath his feet. A city is behind him; he’s not in it, yet it’s there. He’s associated with it, yet apart. Is he storing his wealth? Protecting or safeguarding it? Clutching it greedily? Does he wait for the right time to use it? His clothes are worn and faded, once a brilliant red now paled; his passion has meagered, he’s miserly. He did not choose to spend his savings on clothes, which may be a wise decision depending on circumstances, but he doesn’t look healthy exactly either. The coin that hovers over his head tells me all his thoughts are on his possessions, and his feet rest on them too. He clutches a coin to his chest, as if to protect his very heart with it. His stone throne has no embellishments, no scrollwork or refinement in the way a King or Queen’s throne relishes in riches. Maybe he’s a little stingy.
On this first day of advent (or *gwa/*gwem, to go, come, which I like because it means both), I am prodded to ask: What do I spend time thinking about? What are my dearest possessions? Do I let my thoughts and possessions control me? Am I so worried about safeguarding them that I become miserly? What is my life built upon? I can have a healthy relationship with the things I surround myself with, or I can let them control me. It’s a question the Devil card asks, in a way, for the Devil represents materiality: what are you chained to? (And I don’t think that question is conditional.)
Advent can be a practice of waiting as manifested through stewardship, saving, guarding one’s resources in a balanced way. A shepherdess guards her flock. It’s foolish to not care for them; their lives depend on her attention. Yet she separates herself from the city in this act. She leaves the city with her flock, just as the man in the card is seated outside his own city. But I imagine the shepherdess who loves and cares for her flock is not like the man with the worn coat who hordes his coins. He could be a Scrooge, to make reference to a Christmas tale. His possessions control him, while the shepherdess rhizomatically interacts with her flock, is part of them and works with them rather than being possessed singularly by them. And by having a healthy relationship with her flock, she contributes to her community with wool and meat. But the man who hordes his coins? He stagnates, or is on the brink of it.
Waiting is not about stagnation, nor about passivity, but is a participatory act. And although this act of waiting is waiting for the miracle of light, I cannot but help to rest and revel in the womb-like dark of December; I jealously clutch the dark to my breast, for I cannot drink in enough of it.
(My Tarot deck is Llewellyn’s Classic Tarot by Barbara Moore and illustrated by Eugene Smith.)
(Etymonline for discussion of *gwa/*gwem: https://www.etymonline.com/word/*gwa-#etymonline_v_52558)