Zezina
So the question is do the cards lie?
Lorraine, I think it's your question that has missed the mark. The cards can't lie because, as Tarotbear says, they are only ink on cardboard. You have come to believe the cards can predict your future, and have now proved to yourself that they can't.
There are people who run their own lives, and influence the lives of other people, by consulting Tarot cards. Many believe passionately in the accuracy of what the cards tell them. Few are as stringent as you have been in examining the outcome, often because Tarot predictions are too amorphous for stringent examination.
I studied astrology for years, and when computer programs came established, I took a year of my astrologically unassailably accurate daily interpretations, cut them up into the 365 days and stapled those daily interpretations into each page for that year of a ring-bound diary.
Then I watched every day of that year. Many significant things happened to me that year, including the unexpected death of my best friend. My astrological chart missed everything significant that year, and instead indicated many significant events at periods of time that were totally bland in my life.
You've now done the same with Tarot, which is less measurable. Congratulations.
Tarot cards in many decks are very beautiful and fascinating works of art, and for that reason alone are intriguing, especially to artists like myself.
The history of Tarot is enthralling, and shows us that it wasn't until the 18th century that anyone thought to consult the cards about the future. Until then Tarot cards were used to play a card game. Etteilla was already a fortune-teller in France, who, like the gypsies, used regular playing cards to predict the future. When Etteilla saw a Tarot deck he got the idea to use them in his fortune-telling, and so emerged a huge business opportunity for many people.
That doesn't mean the cards 'tell the truth' or 'tell lies' Such actions are simply what you have been led to expect by those who tout the cards as being able to predict accurately.
Tarot is still a game, just a different one.
*Z*