Little minx - Page of Wands

Tarot of the Hidden Realm (Llewellyn 2013)

Page of Wands Tarot of the Hidden Realm (Llewellyn 2013)

Earth of Fire
What is the earthy part of fire? Earth and Fire have a neutral relationship. If Fire is passion, drive, vitality, inspiration, and so on, and Earth is the material, the solid, resources, and physicality...what is the Earth of Fire? Certainly Earth would slow down Fire. Earth would look at the Fiery passion and say, wait, we need to count up our pennies to see if we have the trainfare before we go bursting out of the house for an impromptu trip to wherever. But the Page of Wands isn't an Earth sign, he's just got an affinity for Earthiness. He's mostly the passion, tempered with a bit of sensibility. And his passions are going to be in the direction of material, physical things rather than abstract or emotional things. But he's still mostly going full tilt boogie. The Page of Wands is the kid with ADD who decides it's a good idea to see what dirt tastes like, or who might decide to try to make his mother some rose perfume by denuding all her rosebushes and stuffing the petals in an old milk jug and shaking it up with water. He likes to try new things in the material realm, but he's more about the trying than the planning or thinking. He's the kid who throws sand straight up in the air, or decides to find out what cat poo tastes like. Not always making the best choices, but always finding something new to mess around with. What does this button do? How hard do I have to kick this thing to break it? Will this thing bend the other way? Let's bang the pots and pans together until something else shiny catches our eye. Running around like a crazy thing until he finally falls over for a nap. Makes me tired just writing about him.

How can you release a bit of your inner Page of Wands today?

Raise your banner high - Page of Wands

Page of Wands - Daniloff Tarot 

All the Pages in Daniloff Tarot (2012) hold a banner like this, containing an emblem of the suit. This banner on the Page of Wands features the blossoming wand, a flaming torch and a salamander -- perfect, if you ask me. (Though the leafy wand reminds me a bit of broccoli.) The colours of the card a suitably fiery, with oranges and reds, and touches of green to denote the sprouting of life that is associated with Wands. Pages are the earth element and so this chap is Earth of Fire.

You've surely by now become aware that I like to associate characters from books, movies or TVs to courts to aid in understanding. The Page of Wands is Bart Simpson. True, he's not as popular as he used to be, but it's still a handy association. The Page of Wands, like Bart, is:



*mischievous
*playful
*energetic
*not inclined to consider consequences
*impulsive
*independent
*willful
*positive
*spontaneous
*risk taker

You can see the pros and cons of these traits straightaway! The energy of the Page of Wands must be balanced a bit or else, like Bart, you may find yourself constantly writing lines on the blackboard and wondering where it all went wrong. But you can't keep a Page of Wands down -- at least you will bounce back instantly from the consequences of your actions, and your spirit will not be one bit dampened. (Though unfortunately, you still may not have learned your lesson and will probably repeat this pattern over and over.). Oh well, eventually the Page learns -- and then he becomes the Knight.

Personally, I think it's asking a lot to want Page of Wands energy from a Queen of Swords on a Monday morning, but I'll give it a go.

The Page of Wands questions, and I question this Page of Wands

It's Sunday -- yay! Another day off work. I am going to find it easy to get used to having every Friday and Saturday off. And every bank holiday weekend, I'll get the full thing. That will be nice.

sample with full border

You may have noticed that I've trimmed some border from these cards from the Faerie Tarot (Nathalie Hertz, US Games 2008). I found that there were just too many borders on the deck and all the colours distracted me from the image. At left is a sample of the Ace of Pentacles, just so you can see. Originally there was an extra band of colour, picked up from some splash of colour in the image of the card (in the case of the example, hot pink) and used as a border, going paler at the bottom where the title is printed. I found these bands of colour drew my eye outward, away from the main image, and within the image, focused the eye on the colour detail. So in the Ace of Pentacles here, it drew too much attention to the pink mountains in the background. In the Page of Wands, too much attention to the yellow wings. (Although that's the only 'fiery' element I see in the image, so maybe in that instance it was a good thing).  Also they made the cards a less manageable size. So I cut the top and sides off the cards and left the titles at the bottom. I do like them both ways, but I enjoy looking at them more and they're easier to handle without that outside colour bit.

Anyway, today is Page of Wands. I like this chap, but he doesn't look very Page of Wandsy. He's standing on a leaf, and it appears to be autumn, which rather mucks up my theory that the suit of wands is summer and pentacles is autumn...it also doesn't have much in common with the element of fire, which I associate with wands. Maybe wands is the autumn suit, then, which makes even less sense than pentacles being autumn. But never mind, let's just go with it. He's standing on a floating leaf, about him drift other leaves. He's wearing what might be the top of an acorn as a hat, and blowing a horn. Turning to the LWB, I find it is not very helpful at all:

'This imp looks toward the horizon as he passionately plays his long horn. His melody brings an important message: inviting us to take the road, to analyze a course in life. Playing skilfully, he embodies the potential of know-how. His goals are clarity and objectivity. The soft notes of the long horn can be heard beyond the fog. They make the dead leaves dance and inspire all to live peacefully. Divinatory meaning: An intellectual, well-disposed person, communication in letters, new ideas, creativity, integrity, reflection. Small journeys, international concerns. A loving and sincere partner.'

The LWB goes on a bit more, but you get the idea. Here's why I find it useless. He's the Page of Wands, a traditional bringer of messages, that I can go along with. But when has the Page of Wands' goal ever been clarity and objectivity? When has he ever meant skill, or an intellectual, well-disposed person? And why is he surrounded by dead leaves? The Page of Wands is full of enthusiasm and strong views, true he's bright but he's more into arguing and debating and more about hubris and playing devil's advocate than 'inspiring to live peacefully.' He's the student who is always challenging the teachers with questions they can't answer and always asking 'Why?' or 'Why not?' He's not playing the pipes of peace in a freaking autumn fog.

Beginning to remember why I seldom use this deck.

And why is this thing called 'Faerie Tarot' and then throughout the LWB, every instance of the word is spelled 'fairy'?

Pfft.

Western Union calling?

CBD Tarot

I have quite ambivalent feelings about the Tarot de Marseilles. I know it's an important deck, historically, but I find it so strange and ugly that I rarely use it.

Here we have the Page of Wands (Valet de Baton) from the CBD (Conver-Ben Dov) Tarot de Marseilles. The first thing that catches my eye, after my usual squinting at the overly long back and short legs, spaced apart in a way that suggests no known structure of the human pelvis, is the arms. What the --? That arm in the blue sleeve is NOT coming from this dude's left shoulder. It seems to be growing out of his right rib cage. That's weird. Also, the 'batons' in the TdM are odd because they are bright green with red tips, like when the branch was cut from the tree it oozed blood. Plus, I can't help but saying, the red-tipped bits just remind me of penises. (Sorry!)

Anyway, ignoring the blue earth and yellow grass and white sky, the bleeding green penis tree and the Picasso arms, what does the Page of Wands mean for me today?

Mary K Greer's 'Tarot for Yourself' offers these questions to ponder: What new territories are you checking out? Who is calling you? Who is enthusiastic about your endeavors or looks up to you as a mature adult? What risky actions are you taking? What are you all fired up about?'

Well, I know the Page of Wands is traditionally seen as the bringer of messages, and is often interpreted as important phone calls or letters. In my mind, he's always been Bart Simpson, tearing about on his tricycle wreaking havoc, in a good-natured, high-spirited way. Freaky-arm dude here doesn't seem terribly high-spirited, but you never know, maybe that's how he dislocated his shoulder.

Maybe I'll get some sort of important communication today. Watching for it will keep the day interesting. :)

The Page of Wands wears a Wonder Bra

Roots of Asia, 2001

Our last card from the Roots of Asia Tarot (AGMuller, 2001) is Page of Wands. This is a lovely image, filled with symbolic objects. Unfortunately, the LWB doesn't explain all of them. We are told that the tiger represents clear perception, and fire indicates energy, passion and endurance. There are also irises all over this card, and I do not know what significance an iris has in Asian/Buddhist symbolism. In flower symbolism, it means faith, hope and wisdom. I really don't think this card is pointing to the Greek goddess, Iris, the goddess of the rainbow. But maybe it is...

The divinatory meaning given in the book is 'Following my heart.' So that is what I will do today.