the magic of a virgin deck...

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 18 Sep 2003, and now archived in the Forum Library.

firemaiden	18 Sep 2003
You peel back the wrapper. It crackes. Ah... that fresh new card smell. You splay the cards out in your hand, smelling and caressing the shiny virgin cards, slippery still, almost wet. You lay out a few to do a sample reading. The cards speak! What amazing new insights come up! Things you have never thought or seen before, jump out at you from these fresh images... What if... what if... all our study grouping, and journalling, our entering the cards, and researching, comparing, analysing meanings, is actually counterproductive. What if... "learning" the cards itself, actually defeats our purpose? I mean- isn't it that the longer we work with each card, and the more we deepen our personal relationship with each one -- the more the cards will speak to us ...specifically of our own history with them? I wonder if we grow farther also from being able to see the cards clearly, and from being able to receive their messages. Just a nice little heretical thought to start the day off fresh. :)

Inana	18 Sep 2003
I want a new deck... This post is like when watching food tv commercials at the hour of lunch!! Mmmmmmh... A new deck uses to open new understandings on the cards. I dont think studying them defeats the purpouse, but is true when you get used to a deck it seems to lost a bit of magick because it has lost the hability to surprise you, seems like nothing new is left to discover on it. But... and im afraid to write this cause it sounds hard... but is just the same with people or everything else. When you know something a lot it loses the magick of the novelty and the undiscovered, and its turned on affection and complicity. Or... well maybe its just me.

Marion	18 Sep 2003
I don't know. Sort of like comparing the magic and surprise of new love to the depth and understanding of a long marriage I guess. Both have their virtues.

leto	18 Sep 2003
I think a new deck can open your eyes to new possibilites and new understandings, but for your old decks as well as your new. I fell like I have each card in my head as a kind of collective wisdom from all the versions in all the decks. A new deck adds to that wisdom and therefore influences the readings I do with any of the decks.

Macavity	18 Sep 2003
Perhaps once you have read even one book or spoken to even one other Tarot reader about meanings, you are now infected with a pernicious and incurable "virus"... On the other hand this may even be beneficial? }) The breakthrough in memetics is in extending Darwinian evolution to culture. There are several exciting conclusions from doing that, one of which is the ability to predict that ideas will spread not because they are "good ideas", but because they contain "good memes" such as danger, food and sex that push our evolutionary buttons and force us to pay attention to them. For more: http://www.memecentral.com/ Macavity

Le_Corsair	18 Sep 2003
I am highly suspicious of anything that smells as good as a new deck of cards. It's only a matter of time before some research group determines that the coatings are carcinogenic, with the result, in the US, of this: [font=geneva] [size=medium] WARNING: THE SURGEON GENERAL HAS DETERMINED THAT SNORTING TAROT DECKS MAY BE HAZARDOUS TO YOUR HEALTH.[/font][/size] Bob :THERM

baba-prague	18 Sep 2003
"Sort of like comparing the magic and surprise of new love to the depth and understanding of a long marriage I guess. Both have their virtues." Nicely put Marion! I LOVE getting new decks - though I'm just as happy if they are just new to me, and have been used before - I really kind of like some well-used decks. I've just got Tarot for Cats (well, it popped up on Abebooks and it was actually affordable - and my cat NEEDS a reading right now - she is about to find out about Winter in Prague, and it is going to be one big shock to her I think - she spends all day running around the old roofs here and it is NOT going to work once they are thick with ice) and I don't think it gave me any new insights whatsoever - but it was fun to go through and made me and Alex smile. But - I like just as much using the same deck again and again. The particular slants that can cross over from one reading into another are something I really find useful right now. So, Bob, I have a suggestion for you. Why not get one of those little cello-wrapping machines and after each reading, you can spray your deck with some scent (do it at random, so you will never be sure which scent you used) and re-wrap it! That way you get the best of both worlds LOL!!

raeanne	18 Sep 2003
Hi all, Ah yes, the new card smell! Love it! "Make new friends But keep the old One is silver And the other, gold"

Umbrae	18 Sep 2003
Hmmmm… The longer you spend in the realm of the Magician, the more difficult it is to be fully in the realm of the High Priestess. Comes a point a person can “how and why” themselves to death. Journaling is one thing. But study grouping and researching and learning and analyzing is all the left-brain magician justified quantified qualified Ayn Randed learning bovine fecal material that holds us back in the first place. I remember many years ago, Tom Snyder had a late night talk show, and he interviewed the Dali Lama. What a hoot. Tom Snyder was his usual in your face tear you to shreds self, and the Dali Lama giggled. Tom Snyder at one point asked the Dali Lama if he missed having a normal childhood, and what growing up was like. The Dali Lama giggled and said, “Of course I wanted to play with other children, but I always knew – I was the Dali Lama.” What a beautiful thought…

Kiama	18 Sep 2003
Now you know why I like getting so many new decks! ;)

firemaiden	18 Sep 2003
Quote: Originally posted by Marion I don't know. Sort of like comparing the magic and surprise of new love to the depth and understanding of a long marriage I guess. Both have their virtues. LOL Marion, ROFLAO, hahahah. yes. indeed. That must be it exactly. :) Plus then, once the deck is opened, I am not too good at delayed gratification. I have to go through it all and feast voraciously on every image, kind of like what happens after I unwrap a chocolate bar. But then, there are some decks are too too rich, like chocolate mousse cake, I can only take the MP deck one or two cards at a time, and it takes a long long time peering into the depths of the card before I see anything there.

lunaperse	18 Sep 2003
new decks dazzle me and i love them all i see is the shiny newness of it (ooh just like a new lover - nothing compares to the sweetness of a first kiss?) but i can't see past the dazzle a lot of the time i miss the details - the rapport hasn't been built up... but then sometimes when i've read and i've learnt and garnered all this new information i feel swamped with learning and it takes time for me to feel i won the knowledge, i own it and it doesn't own me... darn now i want to go play with my new thoth deck ... (now all i need is for my grimaud to arrive and to find a wirth and i will be Utterly Confused and Loving It)

lunaperse	18 Sep 2003
Macavity says: Perhaps once you have read even one book or spoken to even one other Tarot reader about meanings, you are now infected with a pernicious and incurable "virus"... On the other hand this may even be beneficial? ***** just like a woman gets "infected" by sperm - without the infection (and come to think of it gestation period and Pain!) no new life

wolfen045	18 Sep 2003
I am on a small fixed income, so I cannot get new decks often but I love the excitment of getting one. I love pulling the cellophane off etc, but its the first look through thats so much fun. I recently got the Da Vinci tarot and the newness hasn't worn off yet! blessings, wolfen Yes I am a Tarotholic !!

Logiatrix	19 Sep 2003
[tauni stands in front of a bookstore shelf of brand-new tarots; smiles toothily at the camera] :D "I love the scent of a new tarot deck..." [takes a sweeping whiff of the top shelf; shifts to a compassionate gaze] "But times are tough these days, and the luxury of a new deck is often rare..." :( [moves gracefully away from deck display] "One thing that helps me overcome the thin times between new cards is..." [holds up aerosol can] "New-Deck-Smell in a can!" :D [tauni deftly sprays a rider-waite deck, ca. 1971] "Ahhh, there it is, that wonderful scent of fresh ink on cardboard!" [camera closes in on tattered cards] "So get a can today...New-Deck-Smell makes scents out of your old deck!" ;)

smallcrow	19 Sep 2003
I dunno old well-loved decks are pretty amazing too. When you know straight away what they're saying. When the cards are so clear it's almost like the deck is speaking to you. Sort of like my best friend and I when we play that game called Taboo. (The one where you get your team to guess a word without saying a list of taboo words). Playing with strangers is okay but when you play with friends, it verges on telepathy . Your long relationship allows you to use these amazing tangents and only a word or two is needed. It's like flying.

Wildchild	23 Sep 2003
Quote: Originally posted by Marion I don't know. Sort of like comparing the magic and surprise of new love to the depth and understanding of a long marriage I guess. Both have their virtues. So true...but how many times we've noticed that we take what we have for granted over time? I know myself when I pick up a deck that I haven't used in a while, it's like running into an old friend that you haven't seen lately. You catch up with each other's lives. Same friend but with new experiences.

krysia322	23 Sep 2003
Quote: Plus then, once the deck is opened, I am not too good at delayed gratification. I have to go through it all and feast voraciously on every image, kind of like what happens after I unwrap a chocolate bar. But then, there are some decks are too too rich, like chocolate mousse cake, I can only take the MP deck one or two cards at a time, and it takes a long long time peering into the depths of the card before I see anything there. LOL! That's it exactly... Of course now I'm like Homer Simpson: Mmmmm.... chocolate mousse cake!... Mmmmmm, LOL! It's also nice to understand my obsession/compulsion? (whichever) for collecting decks... Probably if I had the money, I'd collect cars too. New deck and new car smells... Ahhhhh... Somone quick package it. :D

The the magic of a virgin deck... thread was originally posted on 18 Sep 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.