The front of the curtain, the part we can see, is alive with green palm trees and crimson pomegranates. It represents our world and all the things we know about it.
Everything Else lies behind it, on the Other Side.
This is the realm of the subconscious, the hidden memories of things past, present, and future; dark secrets; dangerous knowledge; those umpteen other dimensions mathematicians keep talking about, and all the things that inhabit them and “go bump in the night.” The High Priestess guards the veil between this world and our everyday world. She has the power to give or withhold access to it and all the hidden wisdom it contains. The scroll in her hands suggests that this wisdom is at her fingertips.
Gimel is the Hebrew letter associated with The High Priestess card, and the camel is one of its meanings. To cultures in arid parts of Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, camel meat and milk are major sources of protein; and camel bone is carved into jewelry. Even our dim awareness of the High Priestess’s mysteries nourishes our souls and heightens our sense of beauty. The camel carries people and their belongings from place to place, just as The High Priestess transports knowledge from behind the veil into our everyday lives.
Hekate's torches light up even the darkest night, and her three faces see in all directions.I associate Hekate, the ancient Greek goddess of magic, witchcraft and death with the High Priestess. She is the bearer of hidden wisdom and secrets that whisper to us from across the veil as dreams and visions. She rules the magically potent spaces and times between this and that—shorelines, twilight, and timberlines. Like Hermes and Thoth, her torches guide souls to the underworld. But as the protector of women in labor, she also guides souls into this world. Her visions have the power to either heal or bring on madness. At first glance, these appear to be sets of contradictory traits. But to the mystic, birth and death are the same thing, and any healer will tell you that there is a thin line between health and madness. This dual nature echoes the number of the High Priestess—2, as do the black and white pillars and the equal armed cross at her breast.
The Moon is the ruler of this card, and Hekate is usually thought of as a Moon goddess, although she is just as comfortable on earth or in the underworld as she is in the heavens, hence her name, Hekate Trivia—Hekate of the three ways. In her Moon goddess persona, she controls both the ocean tides and the ebbs and flows of our emotions. The High Priestess’s watery blue cloak flows out of the lower right hand corner of the card and forms all the rivers, lakes, ponds and oceans in the rest of the Major Arcana cards.
The High Priestess is the yin to the Magician’s yang.
Other Goddesses that correlate to the High Priestess are Isis (in her veiled aspect), Selene, Artemis, Diana, and Brigid–any of the ever-virgin (translate: fiercely independent) and/or lunar goddesses.
When she appears in a Tarot reading, she signifies a wise, powerful woman; a diviner; or a beautiful, mysterious woman. The card can mean secrets, balance, inner wisdom, the option of stillness, or the suggestion that no decision is necessary at this time. It can also mean that the querent already has the knowledge he is seeking and should inquire within.
Glinda the Good making a dramatic exitIn the hero’s journey, The High Priestess is usually a threshold guardian and often has trickster, shapeshifter, or shadow qualities. She may be a mentor/ally, but never of the faithful sidekick sort. She usually appears out of nowhere at opportune times, delivers aid or advice, and then exits in a puff of smoke, or something equally dramatic.
So last week, while I was in the middle of writing The Magician blog, this voice in my head said, “You need to start looking for your kitten—right now!” There are a limited number of things that I know for sure, and one of them is that it is always a good idea to pay attention to the voices in my head. It was time to start “The Search” to replace the Siamese we lost last spring. This is the fourth time in my life I’ve had to do this and it’s almost as stressful for me as job hunting—because not just any kitten will do. We love seal-point Siamese and they are difficult to find.
So I googled “seal-point Siamese kittens, Portland, Oregon.” and checked out the local catteries. It looked like they might have a few kittens—if we were willing to pay $350-$600. Prices had gone up. I called one cattery and the phone was picked up and then immediately disconnected. Unusual etiquette for a business.
OHS Main EntranceI started to pull up Craig’s list, but the Oregon Humane Society listing caught my eye. We have never gotten a cat from the Humane Society. Some of my friends have found wonderful cats and kittens there, but just as many have come home with emotional wrecks. Pre-owned cats are frequently abused and confused. My life is complex enough with out having to deal with a neurotic feline. But again, the voice out of nowhere said, “Give ‘em a call.” The number was right there, so I called them. “Do you have a seal-point Siamese kitten?” I asked, certain that the answer would be, “Are you kidding!?”
“Hang on a munute,” the nice young man replied.
And then, “Yes, we do.”
“How old?”
“Two months.”
“Male or Female?”
“Male.” Perfect. It pays to listen to those voices. “When do you close?”
“The adoption service closes in twenty minutes.”
My husband and I scurried over to the Humane Society and into sur-reality. This did not look like an animal shelter, it looked like the lobby of a four star hotel. We told the young lady at the impressive front desk that we were here to see the seal-point Siamese kitten. She smiled, rolled her eyes, and said “Oh, you want Desi,” Then she turned to the young lady next to her and said, “Hasn’t he been adopted?”
“I don’t think so. He disappeared.” she replied.
Another young lady appeared from the depths of the cat section and led us over to a glassed in viewing room. Five or six cats and kittens of various sizes and shapes were snoozing on carpeted ledges, munching kibble, or batting at each other. None of them were Siamese.
A voice came over the PA system, “Adoption services are now closed.”
A woman with a slightly bemused expression materialized out of nowhere. Any kid would have been happy to call her grandma. “Are you looking for Desi? You’ll never guess where he is.” She unlocked the viewing room and pulled our guide in after her.”
“They won’t let you put a hold on kittens, you know.” I jumped slightly and looked to my left. If the woman standing there wasn’t a Lake Oswego matron, she should have been. She was blond and trim and decked out in elegant casual. She looked like she’d just turned away from the bar in some fashionable fern-filled bistro—right down to the glass in her hand that contained some ice-cubes and the remains of a drink. Her twelve year old look-alike was watching the two volunteers grope around in the viewing room wall. “We wanted that kitten,” she explained, “but they couldn’t find it and wouldn’t let us put a hold on it. My daughter found another one.”
By this time they’d located Desi. He’d crawled up into an electrical ductwork opening. They set him up on a ledge where we could see him. He was a beautiful seal-point. “You can put a hold on him and come and get him tomorrow,” the younger woman said. I looked for the blond, but she and her daughter had vanished.
Curiouser and couriouser.
“He’s really frightened,” the older woman said. “You’ll have to be patient with him.”
Rats, he was probably messed up. But he was so cute, we decided to come back and check him out.
When we arrived the next day, the same young lady was at the front desk. “Just fill out the paperwork and he’s yours.”
I told her we needed spend some time with the kitten before we decided to take him. The same older woman came trotting out with Desi. “I can’t believe it, he’s so much better than he was yesterday.” She handed over the kitten.
Clear blue eyes gazed up at me, and a marvelous purr rumbled through him as he relaxed into my arms. I was in love and my husband was headed quickly in that direction.
Then the theme from The Twilight Zone started playing in my head. “This is a blue-point Siamese,” I said.
“Yes, he is, and his points are perfect,” the woman said. “I used to have one.”
“But Desi is a seal-point.”
“No he’s definitely a blue-point. They must have gotten the paperwork wrong.” My husband started looking at the kitten’s collar, where they print the cat’s name, but before he could read it, the woman, whom I was now beginning to think of as The Magician whisked the kitten out of my arms and back in the viewing room. “We’ll bring him out to you and put him in your carrying case when you have the paperwork done.”
When we’d signed on several dotted lines and handed over the check, the efficient young lady who had helped us with the paperwork appeared with our kitten. “Is this the one you want?”
“Yes.”
“Well, this isn’t Desi.”
Oh good, I wasn’t going mad as a hatter. “So, can we see Desi? We really wanted a seal-point.”
The Magician put us in a small room and handed Desi over. His whole body was shaking like a vibrator and he flinched when anyone except my husband touched him. He started struggling, so I set him down on the floor and he ran to the farthest corner and looked back at us fearfully.”
“You could take both kittens. If you take two kittens the second one is half price,” said The Magician.
It didn’t take us long to figure out that we just wanted the blue-point. We didn’t have the patience for Desi.
She left to get the blue-point and reappeared in a panic a few minutes later. “He’s gone!” she said and turned and ran out the door.
Desi stared out at us from his corner and shook.
Minutes went by.
The Magician reappeared followed by the efficient young lady. “She knew you would want this one, so she put him in your carrier and switched the paperwork.” The young lady had our cat carrier in one hand and a sheaf of papers in the other.
We checked the paperwork and the cat carrier contents carefully.
Everything was in order.
We thanked the two women and practically ran out the door.
We’ve had the blue-point Siamese five days now. His name is Paris and he’s an absolute joy. Is he cute or what!?
Aleister Crowley was a wickedly brilliant early twentieth century magician. One of his less mentioned books, Magick in Theory and Practice, was first published, as far as I can tell, in 1929. As with all of Crowley’s work, it aims to shock and is a bit heavy handed for my taste. But the
Aleister Crowley (1875-1947)
introduction should be required reading for every magician. It defines magick as “the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will…..Every intentional act is a Magical Act.” By this definition, every time we cause change to occur we are doing magic. But notice that capital “W” in will. The Will that Crowley is talking about is not merely the act of wanting and acting on those desires, it is our True Will, the will of our higher self which is in touch with the power of the universe. He continues: “A Man whose conscious will is at odds with his True Will is wasting his strength. He cannot hope to influence his environment efficiently…… A man who is doing his True Will has the inertia of the Universe to assist him.”
Paul Signac protrait of Felix Feneon, 1890
Discovering her/his True Will, and connecting with the multidimensional universe that supports it, is the lifelong work of the magician. The method doesn’t matter, as long as this goal is achieved.
This is the meaning of The Magician, and Smith and Waite, the creators of the Rider, Waite, Smith deck, have done everything but jump up and down and spell it out in capitol letters on the card. The image shows the magician standing in a garden of red roses (desire) and white lilies (purity and innocence). Taken together, these are the qualities that make a successful life. On his altar are the symbols of the four elements of the material world. His right hand is holding aloft a double-ended wand and his left is pointing toward the earth, channeling his True Will, which has the power of the universe behind it, into his earthly garden.
Thoth as scribe and builder
The Magician is the card of practical magic, of manifestation. Its Hebrew letter is Beth, which means house. To manifest a house you must know basic geometry, how to measure distance, how to create a straight line, how to best take advantage of earth currents, etc. This is the realm of the Greek god Hermes and the Egyptian god Thoth, the gods associated with this card.
by Giovanni Da Bologna, 1580–No he’s not just a florist’s mascot!
The planet Mercury rules the Magician card; and Hermes (Romanized to Mercury) is the messenger of the gods. He is one of the few that has business in all three realms, the heavens, the earth, and the underworld. Both he and Thoth lead souls to the underworld and both are associated with communication, writing, speech, mathematics, and knowledge. All the things you need to bring together abstract theories, formulae and divine power to manifest your True Will.
But beware. Hermes, is also a trickster. Finding your True Will ain’t easy. You may think you have it figured out; and then again, you may have it all wrong. He laughs uproariously at pompous pedants, smug prudes, libelous libertines, and serious scholars. In fact, none of us are safe from his from his sneaky pranks that somehow twist our lives back on track.
In a reading, The Magician is the “It’s time to pull a rabbit out of your hat” card. Where he appears in the spread shows the querent where she needs to hunker down, tap into the divine universe, and make things happen; or that she is thinking about doing this. Or it may describe the querent herself, or someone in her life. Or it may be the place where Hermes is waiting to trick her into some sense.
In the hero’s journey, The Magician most typically appears as the mentor; the wise sage who gives the hero the advice and/or training she needs. He may be the hero herself, or even the person she is striving to become. The magician-mentor may assume the guise of trickster in his attempts to instruct the hero. He can also be any one or combination of the other archetypes. Sherlock Holmes’ nemesis, Moriarity, is a good example of The Magician as shadow-trickster. Aleister Crowley is The Magician as mentor-shadow-trickster.
We returned yesterday from our annual attitude adjustment and rejuvenation weekend at the Northwest Fall Equinox Festival, presented by The Nine Houses of Gaia. Yes, I know it’s not Fall Equinox yet, but they often move it forward because of both campground availability and the fact that no one wants to go camping in the rain. This year it was held at a Girl Scout camp in the eastern foothills of the Oregon Coast Range.
The theme was gratitude for the things we harvested in abundance this year. One thing the magical communities of this area have in abundance is talent, and they are willing to share it. There was a Healing Temple, a Meditation Temple, a Tantric Temple, and a Divination temple. My husband spent an afternoon in deep trance in the midst of an array of healing crystals and I gave tarot readings and did lots of networking and catching up on my friend’s lives. Some of them we only see at this festival.
I also received two encouraging and affirming readings. The upshot of both of them was that it was time to expand and use my magic to manifest the things that are important to me. When we live our lives with intent, the experiences and lessons come together when and where we need them. The next card in The Tarot and the Hero’s Journey series I’m doing for this blog is The Magician.
I met him once. I was doing a guided meditation on The Fool, and had just stepped into the card. I was high in the mountains at the edge of a cliff, and I wasn’t thrilled to be there—I don’t do well with heights. The Fool appeared out of nowhere, laughing maniacally. I gazed into his insane, Gene Wilder eyes, shivered, and turned to run. I wasn’t fast enough. He grabbed me up, and jumped off the cliff.
The Fool is the wild card, the Joker, and the divine androgyne. It’s number is zero. Paul Foster Case has this to say about zero: “An ellipse, representing the Cosmic Egg….Zero is a symbol of absence of quality, quantity, or mass. Thus it denotes absolute freedom from every limitation whatever. It is a sign of the infinite and eternal Conscious Energy, itself No-Thing, though manifested in everything…. Boundless, infinite potential, living light, it is the rootless root of all things…..”
It’s Hebrew letter is Aleph, which sounds and feels like an exhalation when pronounced, and is often associated with ruach, the Hebrew word meaning all pervading, cosmic life-breath.
Dionysos and supporting satyr
The feminine looking Dionysos, Greek god of wine, ecstasy, and primordial, undifferentiated energy is the perfect Fool. He even has horns!
When The Fool appears in a reading, you know things are going to get exciting. If it’s in a past position, you know the querent is dealing with the aftermath of a life-changing event. The Fool is beginnings and big changes, childlike enthusiasm and lack of inhibition, risk taking and total folly.
In the hero’s journey, The Fool portrays the shift from the Ordinary World to the Special World. His/her energy is the force that kicks off the story. Archetypally, The Fool is always the hero. If he/she also appears as an archetype other than the hero, he/she is frequently the Herald or the Trickster. But The Fool can be any of the other archetypes, or even the physical manifestation of the hero’s higher consciousness. Because The Fool’s number is zero, the number of ecstatic, unmanifested energy, he/she often appears suddenly at turning points in the story and bounces the narrative in a new direction.
The Shapeshifter, The Shadow, The Ally, The Trickster
The Shapeshifter Everyone “…contain(s) multitudes” as Walt Whitman said, and shapeshifter characters dramatize this. From a baffling lover that is constantly changing moods and convictions, to a villain who does something nice, to a wimpy guy who morphs into a superhero, the shapeshifter’s purpose is to provide excitement, tension, and suspense.
The Shadow
The dark side, things hidden or rejected, anything we don’t like about ourselves. The shadow lurks in every character, but it sings in the villain. And the villain is really the most important character in the story. Think about it, without the villain there wouldn’t even be a story. Therefore, the villain must be crafted as carefully as the hero. She can’t be just bad, she must be terribly, hauntingly, and soul searingly bad. She must resonate with the shadow in all of us.
The Ally Don Quixote’s Sancho Panza, The Lone Ranger’s Tonto, Bambi’s Thumper, Captain Kirk’s Spock, Frodo’s Sam. Dorothy’s Scarecrow, Tin Woodsman, and Cowardly Lion, the list goes on. Where would the story be without the faithful sidekick for comic relief , to listen to the hero’s fears and plans, to get him out of scrapes, and to keep him company. Allies come in all sizes and flavors. They may be ex-threshold guardians, mentors, heralds, shapeshifters, tricksters, or even shadows.
The Trickster
The trickster’s job is to subvert the status quo and usher in change. When things get too dark or too serious, the trickster makes us laugh. When the hero’s head swells, the trickster takes it down to size. When things get settled and predictable, the trickster shakes things up. Coyote, the Native American trickster, keeps us in stitches with his antics.
Tricksters can be any of Vogler’s archetypes, even the hero. Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Brer Rabbit, and Roadrunner are perfect examples of the trickster hero.
Each major arcana tarot card, or key, corresponds to one or more of Vogler’s archetypes and stages of the hero’s journey. In the next series of blogs, I’ll look at the meanings and correspondences of each key and show how it fits into the story arc.
Credit: The information in this blog came from Christopher Vogler’s book, The Writer’s Journey, Mythic Structure for Writers, highly recommended reading.
The Hero, the Mentor, the Herald, and the Threshold Guardian
The Hero This is the person that makes the most things happen. He may or may not change. He can be anyone, but he can’t be just a hero. He can be a trickster like Brer Rabbit,
Or a shapeshifter like Spiderman and Superman.
He may be thwarted in love or orphaned or both—Spiderman again.
Many are tormented by a shadow side of their nature.
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
The Mentor
Without a Mentor, many heroes would be dead before they even really get started. This is the person who teaches our hero what he needs to know to succeed in his quest and often provides essential equipment.
Athena
In Greek mythology, Mentor was a friend of Odysseus and advisor to Telemachus. He often embodied Athena, the goddess of wisdom, who does lots of mentoring. Before he went off to kill Medusa, Athena gave Perseus a polished shield to catch the Gorgon’s reflection, because if he looked at her directly he’d turn to stone. She also told him how to go about assembling all the other stuff he’d need. The Hesperides gave him a knapsack to safely contain Medusa’s head, Zeus gave him an adamantine sword and Hades’ helm of invisibility, and Hermes loaned Perseus his winged sandals. James Bond, eat your heart out!
The mentor might be a shapeshifter, like Athena, who offered Odysseus advice in many disguises; a shadow—the drill sergeant in An Officer and a Gentleman, for example; or a trickster. A story often has more than one mentor.
The Herald
I always think of the White Rabbit with his pocket watch scampering by Alice and leading her down the rabbit hole. He actually became a herald at the Queen of Hearts’ garden party. The herald delivers the call or shocking news that gets the hero up off his butt and into the action. In Field of Dreams it’s the mysterious voice at the beginning that says, “If you build it they will come.” Hermes is the herald for the Greek gods and is constantly flitting about getting things started and stirring up trouble—he’s also a trickster.
The Threshold Guardian
As she leaves the Ordinary World and goes through the gateway to the Other World, our hero encounters powerful beings intent on keeping her out.They come in many forms and, must be properly appeased if the hero wants to continue. Not surprising, this is true of most borders. Travelers to a new country must appease a customs agent, and travelers on the astral
Cerberus and Hercules
must appease the often terrifying guardians of that plane. Cerberus, the vicious three-headed dog, guards the gates to the Greek underworld, but he can be bought with honey cakes and songs.
The guardian doesn’t have to be a person. It can be a test the hero must pass or simply all the stuff and psychological baggage she needs to process before she can actually begin.
A threshold guardian often looks like a powerful enemy, but is really, upon closer examination, a friend. These Shinto Shrine fox guardians say it all. The one on the right is growling, but the one on the left is holding a key.
Archetypes are, according to Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung, innate universal psychic dispositions that form the substrate from which the basic themes of human life emerge. Each (life) stage is mediated through a new set of archetypal imperatives, which seek fulfillment in action. …
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jungian_archetype
“Archetypes are universal, and, in subtle or extravagant ways, interchangeable.”
Tanith Lee
“While archetypes may emanate through us for short periods of time, in what we call numinous experience, no woman can emanate an archetype continuously. Only the archetype itself can withstand such projections such as ever-able, all giving, eternally energetic. We may try to emulate these, but they are ideals, not achievable by humans, and not meant to be. Yet the trap requires that women exhaust themselves trying to achieve these unrealistic levels. To avoid the trap, one has to learn to say ‘Halt’ and ‘Stop the music,’ and of course mean it.”
Clarissa Pinkola Estés (Women Who Run with the Wolves)
The above authorities have done everything but jump up and down and wave red flags at the storyteller. Characters that jump off the page and into the reader’s dreams never emanate just one archetype. During the course of the story, the main characters must flip through at least a few archetypal emanations and also spend a bit of time being totally non-archetypal—but not too much, it gets boring. Why? Because that’s what we do. None of us can be the wise mentor, faithful ally, guardian of the threshold, or trickster all the time. A successful human being manages to embody the archetypes or combination of archetypes she needs at the precise times in her life that she needs them.
In my next blog, I’ll look at Christoper Vogler’s list of the archetypes that drive the story of the hero’s journey and show how they morph into each other to become potent characters that the reader remembers.
The Hero’s Journey always begins in the ORDINARY WORLD. Even if the tale begins in the midst of things, back-story must be added to let the reader know where the hero came from and what motivated her. And that motivation has got to be a big deal—at least to her. Being a hero is hard, dangerous work, not something one does on a whim.
Then comes THE CALL TO ADVENTURE. Obi Wan Kenobi shows Luke Skywalker Princess Leia’s desperate plea for help. All he has to do is defeat Darth Vader and a few hundred storm troopers. “You’ve got to be kidding!” Luke says. This is the REFUSAL OF THE CALL. It doesn’t always happen, but if our hero has any sense or choice in the matter it usually does. Luke changes his mind when he returns home to find that the Empire has barbecued his Aunt and Uncle. With no home and no family and a belly full of anger, Luke chooses the path of the hero and CROSSES THE FIRST THRESHOLD. This is when the story takes off, the die is cast, the hero sets forth on his adventure, the romance begins, the detective takes the case, etc., etc.
The MEETING WITH THE MENTOR usually occurs somewhere in the above paragraph. In Star Wars Luke’s first Mentor, Obe Wan Kenobi, delivers the Call to Adventure. A Mentor is someone who gives the hero advice or special equipment to help him on his way. Mentors can be wise or old or beautiful or tricky. They may not always have the hero’s best interest at heart.
Before she can hope to accomplish her goal the hero must learn the skills she needs, assemble a group of friends to help her along the way, and find out who her enemies are—the TESTS, ALLIES AND ENEMIES part. Now she is ready to APPROACH THE INMOST CAVE, the lair of her archenemy. This is when Luke, et al, get sucked into the Death Star and Dorothy and her friends arrive at the Wicked Witch’s castle. This is where THE ORDEAL happens, the nadir of the story, the blackest hour. The hero dies, is reborn, and somehow transformed. Luke is grabbed by the octopus monster in the sewage system of the Death Star and held under for so long that we are sure he’s dead, The Wicked Witch is about to flambé the Scarecrow.
But wait! All is not lost! Listen! That’s the theme song from Raiders of the Lost Ark crescendoing up in the background. DA DA DUT DA! Luke bursts up to the surface of the sewage and they escape the Death Star with the princess; Dorothy kills the Wicked Witch and takes her broomstick. THE REWARD.
But the enemy is unwilling to part with its treasure—this is where the big chase scenes happen. Or perhaps there are one or two things that must be done or decisions that must be made before the hero can return home. This is THE ROAD BACK.
And then there is one last ordeal that the hero must face. He has been to the “Otherworld” and must be purified by one final death and RESURRECTION. This is the biggie. It often involves a revelation of some sort about what the journey was really about or a test to see if the hero learned his lessons.
The final ordeal passed, the weary hero, RETURNS WITH THE ELIXIR (or whatever it was she set out to get/achieve), and lives happily ever after in the ORDINARY WORLD. If she doesn’t make it back, or if she doesn’t return with the reward, the writer better have a heck of a good reason why not; and he better have foreshadowed the failure a few times during the journey. The reader needs to be able to look back and say, “Of course! It had to happen that way. How could I have missed it?” As Bill Johnsonsays, A Story is a Promise, and the writer must fulfil that promise.
Credit: The information in this blog came from Christopher Vogler’s book, The Writer’s Journey, Mythic Structure for Writers, highly recommended reading.
Gimel is the Hebrew letter associated with The High Priestess card, and the camel is one of its meanings. To cultures in arid parts of Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, camel meat and milk are major sources of protein; and camel bone is carved into jewelry. Even our dim awareness of the High Priestess’s mysteries nourishes our souls and heightens our sense of beauty. The camel carries people and their belongings from place to place, just as The High Priestess transports knowledge from behind the veil into our everyday lives.
underworld as she is in the heavens, hence her name, Hekate Trivia—Hekate of the three ways. In her Moon goddess persona, she controls both the ocean tides and the ebbs and flows of our emotions. The High Priestess’s watery blue cloak flows out of the lower right hand corner of the card and forms all the rivers, lakes, ponds and oceans in the rest of the Major Arcana cards.
