Component materials for cards and storage... some reflections.

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 19 Jun 2003, and now archived in the Forum Library.

jmd	19 Jun 2003
The recent thread on Tarot bags and storage, and the links to other threads mentioned therein, certainly raise considerations about not only materials as to what and how to store Tarot decks, but also, presumably, of the cards themselves. As someone else has so elegantly expressed it, 'that question of storage goes much deeper than just what kind of bag people should use'. It certainly evokes in me reflections on the whole manufactoring processes for all kinds of things. If I invest using Ethical Investments, buy, whenever I can, recycled paper, avoid wood from virgin rainforests, prefer to buy cotton, silk, hemp and other natural fibres, are there not questions I maybe should also consider when I look at Tarot decks? With the question of silk versus cotton in storage, I mentioned in the thread Between Readings? that the material was used for electrical insulation many years ago. Its insular properties are not merely psychological. But what of the cards themselves? Apart from very few decks in my possession, they are certainly already plastic coated. Also, I'm pretty certain, given printing techniques and the longevity aimed for, that the tints are pretty synthetic. As for the cardboard used... I certainly wouldn't want to eat it! ____________ But let's also reflect on some of what happens in the whole process. Here we have wood pulped for the base cardboard, a living plant offering its life for our needs, and the elementals residing there (for those of us who accept the existence of such) released from the care of the former plant. Within the Earth, various minerals are also extracted - mining was in times past certainly considered very much a sacred profession, in which a deep respect for what the Earth had to offer was appreciated. From those extracts - including the extracts from the petro-chemical/oil industry - comes all the raw materials, which are then transformed into yet others through dissolution and coagulation. From these alchemical and vast transmutation, utilising gifts born and borne from and by vast intelligence, a deck may now be formed... and here other questions about what images, and their details, are to be included... And so I pause on these reflections :)

The Component materials for cards and storage... some reflections. thread was originally posted on 19 Jun 2003 in the Talking Tarot board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Talking Tarot, or read more archived threads.