My Rider-Waite's Story

Back when I was 14... we won't discuss how long ago that was lol... but let's just say it was during the HEIGHT of big hair (see what I did there?)... I got my very first tarot deck. My mum, for all her denial of ghosts and the supernatural (pitiful attempts though they may have been because I knew full well she DID believe)... she made sure I had a tarot deck!

So I got this deck, the Rider-Waite, which is almost a staple for first tarot decks, at least back then, and I immediately connected with it. I hand-sewed (this was a feat, back in sewing class I had to rip out pleats 9 times until the teacher finally just told me to forget it) this dark purple, cotton drawstring bag and put some (hideous to me now that I have actual crystal beads) plastic beads on it to symbolise Earth, Air, Fire, Water, and Spirit.

I did SO MANY readings with that deck!

Then, one day, ten years later, I left. I fled an abusive marriage with literally my last paycheck, whatever was in my purse, and the clothes I had on. He trashed my stuff. I am not sure how the deck was saved... I thought it was lost because my parents mailed me what they had been able to salvage from my apartment... a baja jacket, a photo album, two pairs of pants, some small odds and ends, that was it. I thought my deck had been lost with the rest of my stuff.

I bought a replacement Rider-Waite deck. I never connected with it like I did my original. I always felt bad when I used it too, as if I were betraying my first deck. Fast forward to 2017. My mum had passed two years before and my sister was putting the house on the market. A mutual friend was helping her clean out the little attic closets in what used to be my room (before I moved out at age 20). Inside one of the little knee high closets was a purple drawstring bag, with my cards inside!

Now, by this time, the deck itself was 30 years old, I hadn't laid eyes on it for at least 19 years. Yet there it was, as if waiting for me. My friend posted it to me and it was once again in my hands. I guess the Universe really wanted me to have that deck, goodness knows where it was when or how it got anywhere, it almost seems impossible for it to have ended up in that closet, I certainly have no clue how and I don't care. What matters is that I have it now.

Thanks for reading my cards' epic journey story! Return to the Divination page by clicking the link at the top of the page.

Oh, as for the replacement deck... I gifted it to my second-born son.