1122: The Call of The Fool

It all started in 2017 when I started seeing the numbers 11 + 22 together all the time. I was seeing it on clocks (sure), but license plates, transit transfers, restaurant receipts, birthdays of people that I was coming into contact with, etc; “fuuuuck, ok ok Universe, I’m paying attention!”

So whenever I’m faced with a sign, I head to numerology, astrology, Tarot and whatever else will help me make sense of the message coming through.

I started with numerology, cause numbers lol. 11 is my Life Lesson Number in numerology — you find your Life Lesson Number when you add all of the numbers in your birthdate together ie. month + day + year = Life Lesson Number. Both 11 and 22 are Master numbers. Master number are double numbers that hold powerful energy connecting us to t he spiritual plane.

[Numerology is an ancient study that draws meaning from different numbers, number combinations, letters, and symbols in your life. This art can help us tap into the underlying patterns of the universe and reveal new truths about who we are.]

Master Number 11 is intuitive to the point of being psychic and meant to deliver cosmic truths to encourage humanity. Master Number 22 is also called the “Master Builder” who channels cosmic wisdom down to Earth and uses it to turn incredible dreams into reality.

Digging deeper I went to the Tarot and the 11 card in the major arcana is Justice, which is ruled by Libra [I’m a Libra]. Justice encourages a fair minded, just approach to situations. It invites us to weigh all of the evidence equally.

And then I discovered that The Fool card is actually the 22nd card in the major arcana. The Fool is about beginnings, trusting the Universe to take the leap and be held, no matter how ‘foolish’ people outside of you may think you are. It was then that The Fool pulled me deeper into its message, how it related to me and deepening my own Tarot practice.

Now, the song, I actually started writing while I was writing for RedBlack&Blue. It started out about giving up my hopes and wishes for my then present to be different than it was. It obviously never made it onto that album. I was fucking around with the verse and it never stuck, but the chorus, just kept haunting me. I’d regularly sit down at the piano and play it over and over, sometimes raw voice & tear-filled.

The numbers and the song are what opened up this new album making journey — and then came the idea to create my own Tarot. It was kind of a no brainer to me to make cards to go along with the album — so, my own Tarot, starring me. I actually had to sit with the idea of centering myself in this deck (go figure, it’s MY fucking Fool’s journey haha) I worked through that.

Now the vision for the cards, because of my love for collage, I wanted my cards to be collage. Over the course of making the album, I hired not one, but three different artists to make my vision a reality. I did the research, had a very clear idea of what style I wanted the art to look like, I made rough sketches of the cards along with a detailed framework for the symbols and messages that I envisioned for each card. I was clear what I wanted and for a number of different reasons differing between each artist (that I don’t really care to go into), it just didn’t work out with them. I will say that the last artist actually straight up ghosted me.

I felt like, what the fuck, now I have to look for another artist to make this come to life?! Ugh. Feeling deflated and a little bitter. My husband suggested I make the cards myself, but I had no fucking clue how to use Photoshop to make what I saw in my mind come to life. I contemplated doing this all as a cut and paste project, but I don’t know…but I saw that as a lot more work than I was ready to take on. So I got some basics from hubby, enrolled in an online course and…YouTube tutorials to fill in the gaps. And with years of my own Tarot practice, a Tarot course, a stack of books, decks and my detailed sketches, I set out on the journey to design my own cards. Holy shit. Cue the saboteur.

I’d been hearing whispers to share and in my personal tarot readings — ‘share yourself, share yourself” Share the dreams, share what lights me up, share what I do when I’m not “on” And art, collage art, actually was a final piece of my puzzle that I’ve never shared. Not really. Boooooy, fear is a mf when you sell yourself to that lie. MAN. I was fighting sharing myself, I still fight myself sometimes and literally the more scared I get, is when this force comes along and pushes me off the cliff. I tell you, The Fool permeates my existence, it’s my card. It pulls me to the edge to step into the places that I dream to live in. In the music, in the art, on the stage, on the screen, in the fullness of my life.