Anastasia Kashian and The Marginal Lenormand

Anastasia Kashian and The Marginal Lenormand

Welcome back to the Mystery Channel. This was from one of our Youtube lives! Today we’re stepping into the strange, playful, and delightfully unruly world of medieval marginalia with artist and oracle‑maker Anastasia Kashian.

Anastasia joins us to talk about her newest creation, The Marginal Lenormand: An Irreverent Oracle of Medieval Marginalia  a deck that refuses to behave, in the best possible way. Built from the oddities scribbled in the edges of illuminated manuscripts, this deck is full of mischief: anxious rabbits, suggestive fruit trees, saints making questionable choices, and flowers sprouting from places they absolutely shouldn’t. It’s Lenormand reimagined with a wink, a nudge, and a scholar’s eye for symbolism.

In this episode, we wander with Anastasia through the history, humor, and hidden wisdom of marginalia; how she transformed these strange medieval creatures into a living oracle

We also talk about an upcoming event with her deck you won't want to miss !!

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Transcript

0:11

Oh, here we go. Yay! All right, there we go. Oh, oh, oh yeah. And of course, oh that's funny. Yep, it cut us cut us. Okay. Hey, we are live. Welcome, welcome everyone. And we have Anastasia back with her amazing deck. So if you watched last week, the funny conversation that started off the live was specifically from that deck. There is a surprise card. I can just give you that's the one. That's the one. That's the one. And yeah, yeah, go ahead and talk however because I already love I love this guy. I love this guy, you know. It's a bit of a chick head. So I I am wondering, and in this beautiful deck, is there something yeah, uh around genitalia? Well, why is that? Come on, we all still find funny, we all still find them funny, and I guess monks did as well. Oh yeah. Because they did draw a lot of genitalia, a lot of buttocks, and um yeah, a lot of that sort of stuff going on. I guess I I guess we we we we just find that funny and it uh it sort of uh gives us gives us a bit of a shock and a bit of a laugh and knocks us off centre a bit when we see something like that. So it's it's it's it's it's very good for yeah, I suppose sort of nudge nudging nudging people out of an awkward formality. Kind of an icebreaker. Uh yeah, that would be very uncomfortable, but you know what I mean. So I think I think there is there is there is a reason. There is a reason for that because you're saying all kinds of things. We're saying all kinds of things in the Le Normand and we want to to get to the truth to people's genuine feelings and thoughts. Not just the the the face you put on, the the serious face that that that never never laughs at toilets or willies or what what what whatever. So we so we're just going to give people a little a little shove and knock them right out of that sort of formal connaissance. I like that. I like that. It's uh it's a good use of humour, and it's also I think useful when we want to talk about more serious things which might also be controversial. Yes, we we uh we are having a go at people's sex about how we so yeah, I I I think it's um it's uh kind of a valuable tool in that way, and um I would be far from being the only person ever to use that in that way over the course of history. And also it's funny, and um why should we why should we not have a laugh? I think I said in I gave I gave a little talk with um with uh Tabby at the midwinter conference that I talked a little bit about the character of Jorge de Burgos in the name of the rose, and you know Jorge de Burgos is this the old monkey turns out spoiler alert, he is actually the one poisoning everybody so that they will not be able to read and pass on the missing text of Aristotle's poetics, which is about comedy and about humour, because Jorge de Burgos does not want to laugh, because there was there was a strand in the church that felt that laughter was a bad thing because it made people less afraid, and you're supposed to be afraid, you're supposed to be afraid of God, you're supposed to be afraid of the devil, you're supposed to be afraid of everything and do as you're told. And anything which encourages to laugh at stuff is really, really a bad, really a bad thing. We don't want people laughing, we do not want people mocking fear. We want we want we want them to be shaking in their boots. Thank you very much. So we should all always and forever be battling against the the Jorge de Burgos of this. That's I feel that very strong. No, down with Jorge de Burgos. Boom. Yeah, but that there what what you say as as very thought you, you know, we laugh and we like to have a laugh, but it's like serious talk, and also you know, as a therapist, there is some really uh great value to switch stones towards misery, and from the moment that you are able to laugh with your misery, you're like cured. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, I like that. Not cured, but it's as good as it gets, I reckon. You know, it you have to you do have laugh, you do have to laugh, I think. You have to um and it's it's true that it does it does help to banish fear, and unlike Jorge de Burgos and some some very senior thinkers of that time in the church, I feel that fear is actually a bad thing, and that probably most of the evils of the world, if you look at them really closely, come down to fear of some sort. You know, whether it's like fear of failure, fear of disapproval, fear of hunger, fear of loss, fear of things that are different and unknown. Most of the horrible things people do end up being rooted in fear. So anything which diminishes the amount of fear in the world and just looks at things, you can look at things really straight on and really truthfully and laugh. Um and that to me is a good thing. And yeah, it helps us to look at the scare as well. You can laugh at it a little, you can you can um look at it without flinching, without wanting to put it away, without wanting to run away. So yeah, I think I think that's um why I just fell in love with these the these um medieval illuminations, the the the lit the the comic little figures and the little story stories. Um they uh they are funny, they're funny and sometimes very clever and sometimes just really rude. And lifting up in a way, you you do not feel you do not feel depressed or well you can feel you can feel the you can feel depressed, but somehow that depression and fear and um an over-serious approach to life because life happens, you can't do much about it there. Yes, I think it's supposed to be true. I think Andrea said something similar. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Oh, so yeah, so these images, sorry, on said something and I missed that. Yeah, so so the beauty of these images where you created your deck with, I also find you know, they come from an era where people were illiterate. So, in order to exchange information and to uh especially to to exchange concepts where we now write about, they had to make the ultimate use of symbolism, allegory, and play. So these images they are so rich in communication. You know, we have to understand that only for our communication, we are like talking now, but the the only so words are only like 10% of all the communication. So this has so much recession in order to play with, so and it would be rude to just laugh at because they are funny, but they are these are so rich of imagery, but they speak to a deep. But there is also there is also a lot of meaning in there, yeah. Yeah, because of course they uh they they they read imagery a lot better than we we do, they which is surprising considering that we are we are absolutely bombarded with imagery from all sides in every aspect of our life now, and yet we don't read that imagery as well as as a medieval peasant, we don't understand it, which I think makes us a bit more prone to being manipulated by it because we we don't consciously know what we're responding to, but but your medieval peasants spent a lot of time looking at looking at pictures and understanding what was behind them and what the what the meaning of gestures and expressions and colours and forms were i in one particular context it's true, but uh but they really had far better visual literacy than it do. And um the other thing that I thought what you said then about about about how most people were illiterate, there was another another level to that, which I I I actually sort of thought of thought about later, is that not only were people illiterate, but people generally didn't travel, so they didn't speak other languages either. They didn't even understand the language that their religion was transmitted in. They did they didn't speak Latin, they listened to it and understood nothing. And uh and because people didn't travel so much, you had you you you would travel 50 miles and the people in that village in that place would be speaking a different dialect, travel a hundred miles of speaking another language, and you didn't know it. But these pictures travels from country to country, from place to place. Often, often you see the same images over and over again, and very little changed. I mean, the individual artists would would um alter things or they would they would copy from an another artist thought, oh that's that's a funny one, I'm going to use that. But they didn't in everyday life speak the same languages, so this sort of cut through a language barrier in allowing people over the the known world to communicate with each other. Um I I think that's kind of fantastic because although officially all your monks and churchmen would know some Latin and they'd be able to communicate with each other through that, I think in practice a lot of them were a lot less educated than people at the highest levels. And the people the other people who who are sort of having books made for for them for home use they didn't necessarily speak that many languages. Obviously the the the wealthy the wealthy travels from place to place and uh were a bit more learned. But most people most people spoke only one dialect of one language, and yet they could understand this imagery and stories told through this imagery from from all over Europe. So so that that that I found quite as well is that it was a common language, it was uh it was a common and a universal yeah, similarly, always, and so they they could communicate things things that were approved and things that weren't approved too. And that's that's where it gets really interesting when you s when people start passing on information and thoughts that uh that are not the abbird, and they're doing it with drawing. Yes, yeah, it speaks a lot like deeper truth. We can carry on doing this sort of stuff, and do you know, and nobody will know what we're saying because they'll just see a lot of people sticking their bums in the air and go, Oh, that's not very interesting. And now that we've got rid of them, we can we can talk about the revolution. Yeah, definitely. That's why I like those, and it I know because they're like you're saying that, yeah, those things being censored or seeing it, but those pictures were in a time where like the church was like in heat the bank control, they didn't want those kind of pictures, they didn't want people like doing those things, but the fact that it was there, I think was amazing, you know. It was happening right in the heart of the church in their own monasteries. Yes. People were uh they were drawing, they were telling stories, they were telling very unsanctioned stories. And it was just sort of seeping through, and uh I I think I think we need to pick going. That that's uh a strand of the culture of the Middle Ages, which I I I think very revisit now. Oh and uh yeah, we don't want to lose that. No, it's uh such such an interesting era, you know, and especially also where paganism meets new Christianity. So uh in Europe, this is something really, really, really interesting, especially also what we do with Caldemasi and Tarot and all that, because that's what I will uh be talking about in my next work on tarot. So, what what did those people have? Some sort of full theater in order to teach morals and all that. See, but they they also use these imageries at cathedrals, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you sort of green men and little monsters and dragons and mermaids. Oh, all kinds of all kinds of things which carry on living and existing, you know, right in the heart of the beasts. Yes, amazing. Yes, absolutely. I think a really beautiful thing. And yeah, yeah, they did have the stories. So I was going to talk a little bit. I just wanted because I've just been thinking a little bit about about about this guy. Yes. This guy, right? Raynard, Raynard the Fox. And yeah, here he is again. He's not really dead. We know that story. They should have nailed the lid on the box. What should have happened? But do people ever learn? But Reynard is he's one of the old older stories that just remains really popular. In fact, it's so popular that the I that I believe that the French word for fox is now Reynard, but it that wasn't the original French name fox. They adopted it from the name of the character. I think it was Reinhardt or Rein in in the German Germanic version of uh of Reynard's stories. Um but he I think he's he's so much older than that. It he I was um thinking about another sort of cycle of tales, and it's an Arab one, Kalila and Dimna, and it's uh the main character, these two jackals. Oh nice, and they're one of them is a lot like Reynard, and one is like the straight man. Yeah. And at a time when in in the Muslim word, visual representation of human and animal figures was variously scribed, like um at some points it was just the prophet and the saints who couldn't be represented, and at some times it was any human figure couldn't be represented, and some went as far as not to allow animals as well, but that was rare. So animal fables were very popular because you know it's all about these funny animals. You can we can have pictures of them and hear about these funny animals doing funny animal stuff, and hey, nobody has to get offended or no, no, it's fine, arrested or anything, and and those and all around um southern Europe, of course, and uh was one of the first texts during the era of the Frankish King, Christian King had translated to Spanish. Um Persia, and a lot of the stories were derived from uh from an extremely old um Hindu text. So so these jackals and I think they just became the jackals became foxes in in in northern Europe. There are more foxes there, so I think that they are connected, like they are all connected, these stories. You even get in in in the Americas, you get the coyote stories, and I wonder whether whether coyote actually does come from the same source as as Khalila and Dimler and Raynard the the fox, because it could be that old, the the the telling of fox stories. I mean, if you look in Aesop, in Aesop's fables, it's um pre-common era Greek going back, you know, maybe maybe as far as 3,000 years. And I think there are about a hundred and eight stories in Aesop concerning foxes, so wow all of whom have pretty much the same character. Yeah. So he's a very, very important, very important guy. And we see him being really popular in the Middle Ages because I think because he really appeals to that bit of us that wants to break rules, and you're living in a very rule-bound society. You have to be extremely careful about what you do, where, what you say, and to whom. And the appeal of a character who is a trickster character who basically doesn't obey any rules. He breaks all the rules, he does what he likes, he just behaves awfully. And what an appealing character he must be to people who had to be extremely careful not to sin, not to break laws, not to cause offense. I think that's why he's remained so loved. Him and him and his um many cousins around the world. You've got I mean you've got fox characters in Japanese folklore, um Korean Chinese folklore, and yes, they they're all they're all around the world. Yes, yeah, break breaking. Yeah, they can even break your story. I can even add a little bit of information for you in order to substantiate your story because at those times where uh Reynolds became like famous, like the trickster ID was also an overall ID, also seen in like Commedia Dalactic from that time, you know, where somehow, and this I wrote in an essay recently. So they have like the switch of the devil figure going in a new hybrid form of the trickster, you know, and then like in Europe, it's like the the the blackface mask with those guilt costumes performing straight acts and all that. So that goes alongside with uh with Reynard the Fox. So that's like an overall ID, which you also see like in the art of legends, an overall ID of uh a system of morality, but that is somehow expressed in different forms. So and so Reinhardt is somehow the same ID of the Ardequino. So because he's so clever, so he can somehow fuck us all, but he is a very much used, we can also make use of some sort of a Loki, a Loki figure. Yes, like that. Yeah, yeah, that's right. I think he's just one of the oldest characters in human story, and I think that he is very, very closely associated with the foxel and the jackal, whatever this is um this is an animal which is clever, clever and amusing, but not useful. And just maintains that status to the day, to this day. I one one interesting thing I sort of found in my research about that, and and and I'm actually using this in the next making is that when you when you when you get into the the Slavic countries, to Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Poland, Mr. Fox becomes Mrs. Fox. Mr. Fox is always a girl fox in in Slavic stories. It's just as greedy and wicked and naughty as as as as Raynard. Reynard is, but but but but but now she's a girl. I think I know in Russian Lisa Ivanovna, because all the animals of Ivanovor Ivanovna, you know, they're like Jones. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In in in in the in the Russian world. Any any anyway, but but all her stories are are the same. She's trying to she's trying to trick people and con generally eat all the chickens. The very important, very important theme that just carries wherever these stories go that chickens are going to have a hard time. But chickens. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Always why he sees like the theme, the mascot and the the heart of my deck, I think, is is Raynard and his um his um rule-breaking, mischievous trickster uh character turning everything upside down, like the the the world turned upside down, the carnivor. Yeah. Like uh that sort of led into the Commedia dell'arte characters as well. Yeah, because the everyday world was not such a great place to be living in in the Middle Ages, more than it is now, I imagine. Yeah. So an escape carnival world where everything's turned upside down, and you've got a a character, an anti-hero character who can break all the rules, it's always, always going to be enjoyed. Yes, oh my gosh, absolutely. I love that, especially since Lenorman does mirror the real life, you know, symbols like and the fox is definitely in all the stories, the meaning of that little naughty, naughty fox breaking the rules, bringing out our rebellious side. We shouldn't like him. He does terrible things, he is not a great friend. Everything he does is is naughty. Something which you really should dissolve, uh and yet he's just funnier than everyone else, and we secretly love him. Yeah, yeah. And I think that's why it's like he is he is sort of acting as our proxy for all the things that we cannot do, all the things we've ever thought but didn't dare say. Yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And like showing the putting himself first. Oh yeah, yes, very, very much so, very much so. There's nothing selfless about old Reynard. Nope, nope. I find it interesting that he's often in in uh a lot of normal tree use. Uh the work card, like has in your sort of your job your livelihood and I wonder like what that says about an attitude to work is that it's a hustle uh putting one over on other people a sort of a sort of battle of trickery that's interesting isn't it that's interesting I don't you would use uh reinard for that yeah and then I think I was talking about that in the in the in the book and how does that work out for him usually in the end I mean how many how many times does Reynard truly come out on top because he doesn't you know he messes up his cunning plans come to nothing I mean he he is he escapes coffin sure but it's it it's very much an up and down sort of situation so maybe maybe we should we we we should we might find him amusing but I'm not sure we should emulate really no no that's what I was thinking yeah that's why it's weird for the work card because like you said nothing works out for him in the end so what does that say about you and your work and like you're no you know your job if nothing's going to work out yeah so I'm I'm like I'm I'm questioning questioning this um sort of like allocation of a of a particular area to this card I'm not sure about the fox as the word because yeah there there is there is no nowhere there is no I mean not just in my deck but there is I don't think there's culture on earth that won't look at the fox and see well that's maybe that's that that looks like some bad life choices actually don't do that I know I know the source where this comes from this is from a French author is she's like Colette Sylvestre and she was like uh one of the first authors in French she somehow brought that ID into trying to trying to get ahead through trickery and then watching it all collapse well i don't I don't know the explanation but I think that's some something like that you know but yeah in the end that's what I also say there is no explicit work card in the petite Lanamar so a lot of people tend to use the moon as I do there are a lot of people who use the anchor which I also can resonate with but yeah that it's a matter of taste but the fox yeah that that that's a thing within within France within France yeah that's interesting because yeah yeah so there's maybe a French attitude towards work I don't know I shall ask the question and then I shall run away fast what I get but um I heard that the anchor the anchorism is very popularly used as the work hard in in the in the German tradition and I I can see that I I can see that there's there is a there is a thing in German culture that your work is extremely serious. Immable object is work and it must be respected and it's what sort of ties everything down. So yeah yeah you can see different cultural attitudes to areas of life according to who they pick us the work card I think that's quite quite interesting. I think that there is a big blind spot in this because you have to understand also maybe like the earliest authors in on the system of Petit was some antiers of the 1980s you see then they came like in Dutch in France and in Germany you know and there is something that's my critique that people somehow think there are some fixed schools but those schools they are somehow the result of an author very and late in the tradition who somehow had like an interpretation of of the old method and then somehow give her own personal interpretation and there you get some slight differences like the anchor comes from Iristebner you know the moon comes from Anna Druschbek she's from Belgium where I am and then the collector vestry somehow did something with the fox. So but then there is this overall idea there's like a cultural difference which is definitely not the case because I did this investigation with old readers and then you see that you have like in Germany people use the word the moon card as word card and just as well in Belgium or in France who use the anchor as a word card. Right okay so this was sort of less um less geographically determined yeah yeah I'm definitely but but now in hindsight there was always like this school so there was people talking about Belgian school about French school you know but did in a tradition never exist really I'm pretty much sure on that you see but but you see it so all of a sudden is that something that's been sort of developed over the last I suppose over the last 40 years as there's more yeah that that's a very modern idea. Yeah and that's because there was a there was a Belgian author a German author and a French author who had like a different take on what they read they could only have read the method of distance because that's the only traditional pamphlet or textbook how it is made somehow in in the 18th 19th century and then all of a sudden there are written books in the 1980s almost 90s you see there's such a discrepancy between that but people had like their own takes and if you do the investigation with all these old readers you can see that they somehow made their own takes on the method of distance but that could just mean the same be in Berlin as in Paris as in Brussels at the same time but also as diverse as possible. That's my thing I suppose also you go you go but you go back two hundred two hundred two hundred years and not all the countries are in the same places or the borders and you don't have like for example a unified Italy you've got lots of little German kingdoms and there are areas between France Belgium and wherever that um aren't where they are today. So and language too like you were saying supposed to talk talk of a unified unified tradition in a world that did have like unified nations the way now is probably um yeah yeah I can see issues with that. Yeah that's uh that's interesting I suppose I hadn't thought uh thought about that because I hadn't um really looked into the history of the of different traditions or or looked to see how far back that actually went. And you're saying that it's actually doesn't go I I really investigated this because you you can also know that there are no different LVPs. There is this method of distance as the first particular source and they were like the same in Germany Switzerland France or whatever so we had like always like the same pamphlet and the same instruction. Yeah yeah people have added over time I suppose yeah it's now see what we now see as schools is dependent on those first late 1980s authors and who had somehow like a different stance especially on the work card and then they were thinking okay these are like different schools which is not the case these are like different takes yeah yeah which can be schools after all but not a tradition yeah so so we've got the the the anchor I love that uh she makes quite a good work card and I safety at work card I yeah that's what I was gonna say the the like what not to do with heavy machinery at work that's definitely saying saying that there I say all caution throw into the wind and just have fun right we've we've got Reynolds uh work card he's running a scam yeah that's what I was gonna say yeah looks like he's the snake oil sales to sell his wares and get out of town might maybe work early and let's uh switch we'll try and find the moon card oh yeah that's yeah which is uh would you want preferred work card and I've got a couple of other push yeah I like them all I really do yeah that's yeah I'd love to see the moon card I was just where is where's that card to never find the one right away here we are here we are uh I saw this detail on the coffin card with with Reinhardt laying uh oh yeah oh I like the moon card that I like it well I mean the moon card here looks a bit playful but actually I suppose I suppose when when when when God set the celestial bodies into the heavens the the first construction project that ever was so so I guess yeah yeah for the work card he's just um he's just sort of being a bit more lighthearted about it today exactly being a bit more playful in his I feel like that's what work should be anyway work should be fun not work yeah that should should be more fun picking something you enjoy that well we've got we've got we've got the example of the creator here yeah work should work should be more fun oh have a little fun with it I like that too the creation card we've got we got and we've got another health one oh we've got size we cut off because size stands on professions and in all of them professions where I probably need to be a bit more careful. Oh especially the medieval times what's the other one I thought I thought of um was now I know that some people do use this one but it's for work in the sense of something repetitive and not um particularly enjoyable so particularly positive but hard and that'd be uh whips or rods here that's a badge but like you hate your jobs rods up yeah so oh my goodness yeah that reminds me of like a whips that could work hard in it oh no yeah just sort of something repeat re repetitive something goes on and on and then and then and then this this this guy the this this animal with the butt trumpet comes and um tramples all your grain and start eating your stores yes and maybe he's in you know it's sort of a a bit like the tax office only more fun yes exactly like that yeah oh my goodness this and if it's garden cards i I have a question this this man from the garden card with a tree okay is this uh somehow inspired by the Schembach law for in Germany wow no it was not not directly he's um he's the wild man the the Woodwose in English yeah um in the Bass countries the Bassadown and and I think he's got versions all over Europe and he's the the the wild man carrying his tree and he also shares a lot of his I can rock you with the um sort of ancient Romano Celtic deity who is one of the most popular Roman deities who never has but he he does he doesn't have any temples or any particular formal setup to Sylvanus who is kind of the god of he's not a god of boundaries but specifically boundaries nature civilization it's like he's he's the one who you paid you to protect your flocks from the wolves but he's also has an interest in protecting the wolves from you. I like him very much he's a he's he's a he's a very interesting character in fact he was so popular particularly amongst uh Roman and Roman Empire plebeian in towns actually was like worshipping Sylvanus was kind of their way of touching grass keeping in contact with something something real but he's he's not one of the big three on Patoline Hill he doesn't have big temples or anything but he he lasts and lasts he can he actually I think he appears in Evan Spencer's The Fairy Queen much much in the same guise that you see him in the in the garden card here where as the wild man carrying the tree over his shoulder and he wanna show the guard rescues some some prince being get lost in the forest is getting attacked by other less friendly forest days but Sylvan is always the the safe person who says you know come on I'll save you from these like really annoying satires. Someone in the comments didn't see the card if you want to show it let's just have a oh he shuffled it back in because someone in the comments didn't see the card but if you already shuffled it back in I can just post it later for that oh okay right there. Yeah because someone in the comments was saying they couldn't really see it but yeah okay all right perfect thank you outside the garden and the green and the green green man is inside the garden and I suppose it's just talking about the the those boundaries spec wild and the cultivated and uh the proper balance and he remains such a popular figure he's another one that you often see in the corners of churches and and there is yet another link another hairy the hairy wild man but he's he's he's quite he's always quite a friendly character. Yeah yeah definitely I like that he's like he's he's not he's not quite he's not quite civilized but he's not antipathetic civilization either so so he's uh he's a concept that I like very much and then of course we have um the the man the green knight and the green lady and Gowen and the green knight yes Arthur all those all those stories Arthur yeah yeah the green knight the green knight at home tending his garden and oh that okay yeah and the lady is telling the it looks like she's telling the woodwaves don't you bring that in that bring that in here you know this cultivated garden yes there there are even more links to to the Arthurian legend because your wild man here is also interchangeable with the jester and you can also see this in iconography that they are like interchangeable so the wild man's so the prima materia and after a while so the jester became also like this uh a fixed costume also like the trickster so the are the queen of figure and yet always like these diamonds so these diamonds also allude yeah so they allude to the wild man and that's also why the fool like uh and and tarot is wearing this thing but here we go so and also the one with no number because he is he has known he has no number but he is before the hierarchy is outside the hierarchy I think and yeah but also looking at um some of the early very earliest uh taras you're right in the the but the fool does he come in in two varieties one is the innocent wild man the second one is the is the is the trickler yeah and you can obviously there's a lot of imagination who is sorry but who is who is further into the trickster mold as far as I can see is um find the lady and uh now you see it now you don't he is he is in that in that mold. But yeah the the fool can can be both of those characters the innocent and the um and the and the and the tricky sort of like like like the um sort of African traditional religions in in America have um in the Caribbean have um Eshu. Eshu is the trickster character in in that tradition and there's a story about he wears a hat of two different colours. It's black on one side and red on the other and he likes to walk between the farms of two farmers wearing this hat and one of them later swears that he was wearing a black hat and the other one later swears that he's wearing a red hat trying to take some equal case against him. I don't remember the the the entire story completely offhand but but the but the idea was that they couldn't agree colour hat wearing so the case is thrown out but he's fooled them both for he is wearing both at once yes I like that so yeah the fool being both both the innocent and the clever one the that the fool is wearing the two hats yeah yeah so he's he is he is he is Mr Fox and he is the wild woodwise in the garden. Nature and civilization oh yeah yeah I like that it's like the more free like more fun attitude to just always being in nature no worries but uh I mean nature's all very nature's all nature's all very well but we have to adapt our bit of it to live to to live in it otherwise um get a bit uncomfortable I can't remember where this phrase comes from from a that I read as a child and it was like yeah the wild's okay for a visit but I wouldn't want to live there we have that we have that structure in in the Lenormand cards in the terror yeah yeah the the the balance the necessary relationship with what is natural what is cultivated so oh yeah I wanted in the garden card here. Yeah um because I I I I often see the garden card being portrayed as a very a very formal garden like a public heart that works very well with some of the meanings like a place for gatherings and meeting people and the and things like that. I just also felt that it needed a little bit so a little a bit more a bit more garden and a bit less heart I guess. Anyway that was no I like that no I like that they'll argue with me if they like no no no I like that I like the wildness of the garden more than like you said because a park is very much different than the garden the garden's wild and like flowers and all that stuff and a park is too manicured. Too many rules now we're back to like yeah I was a very common I know I like that I can't wait to get the deck it's like I said I'm waiting. Oh it comes too soon I fingers crossed it should be on its way yeah I'm forever waiting for for these fun things I actually funnily enough I sent one to my friend and she got hers before me so I should have put mine first but letting other people enjoy it. I but I like how you use those stories though because I always like the decks with those stories because they mirror the cards. You know Lenormand always mirrors nature like you're saying what's going on in the world and seeing it then through the symbolism of the card especially for that time medieval times where the picture spoke a million different words especially um yeah how they had to oh here's here's what here's one I've just been thinking about late lately and I think that is because oh yeah oh my gosh the Magia Aesop story um we had elections here in the UK and I keep hearing this phrase of the people want change people want change and when I was doing the stork card and I was I kept thinking about the Aesop story about the stork and the frogs and the frogs who wanted a king. Yes. The frogs wanted a king so God sent them a log to be their king. They were quite happy for a while and they realized that their king didn't really do very much he just lay around floating in the creek um being big lump wood and and then the frogs started calling on their god I don't know whether it was god in a a a a universal god in general or a particular frog god but he seems to have got a bit teased off with them pestering him because they wanted a king who did something and he sent them a stork and the stork started eating all the frogs. Well they wanted a king who did something and they stalk. Yeah so here's here's the storks and the frogs and of course the stalk is about um change and transformation and travel and new births new beginnings and all kinds of things I just for some reason I felt like I wanted to remember that change for the sake of it isn't always thing that we should be rushing into many people complaining because we had a we had a general election like about a year ago or something and now everyone's not happy that things that they want to see changed have changed. The people want change which generally means voting for the loudest and most obnoxious party and the one that promises to throw all the foreigners into the sea and stuff like that. And and nobody looks at their other policies and I think about this the the frog wanted a king and the stalk and um yeah go about shouting for chain you might change you don't like change for the sake of think about exactly what you want to change and what really affects you personally. So yeah so so so yeah this card has been very much mine lately. I I guess I guess you have the same you had a a lot of frogs who wanted a king did something and maybe not that something it's it's it's it's a general human weakness um we're we're we're very very frog like especially this one this one I think we should probably be more like this frog. Yeah there you go the yeah and the I think the the mic in the store yeah I like that out of the eye line oh well it wasn't there yeah so yeah that that was another story that has to my mind and I I I wondered about whether I had maybe portrayed a little negatively in the deck because it's it's not always a a negative card because change change can be good. It's very often seen as a very positive heart. I just felt that that aspect hadn't been I felt at the time that that aspect hadn't been examined sufficiently and it was worth reminding about about that about uh change being changing something which is not always good. Newer isn't always better. Different always fun No, absolutely. And even when you're wanting to change something, getting to the heart of actually what you want to change, because a lot of people are like, I need change so they get a haircut and immediately regret it. But like, what were you really wanting to change? Oh, I was changed. Now I look like a mushroom. No. And I have to live with it for the next however long until it grows out. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. But instead of going to the heart. Really, really uh marking those words. I think I think that is uh and that's that's my my take on course, as with all the cards, there are so many aspects. You can't include every possibility. I've tried to give give enough connections to stories to I suppose a sort of collective lore that we all have stored away, at least if we you know if we um read fairy tales when we were children or had them read to us or even watch the Disney versions. Like there are there are some things which most people kind of know, and you can just sort of trigger that knowledge and those memories with with uh with the the stories and then they're sort of alive through the deck, just waking up waking up what you what you probably already knew but might have forgotten. I like that as uh an idea of uh yeah using using using Harrow or Lunar Normand as whatever to just sort of wake up what you do already know. It doesn't have to be all absolutely new, just recovering what's already there and yeah, yeah, no, I like it to a new complex. Yeah, I like that. So there's just comments. Oh, sorry. Well, somebody was saying the quote about the woods. I'm not saying that I'm oh yeah, I have to go to a completely different screen to see any of the comments, but somebody just said that quote was from To Kill a Mockingbird. So that was you know, but I put in there if anyone wanted to see a specific card or anything. So okay, well thank you, thank you. Yeah, yeah, it took took me a long time to navigate the comments on lives. Yes, and that is a very fine, a very fine, a very fine book by an author who really does know the traditional stories. So yes, yes, definitely. I like that. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I know, that's why, yeah, hopefully I did put the the link to in there as well. So everyone should get the deck because it speaks like it makes you think about the Lenorman cards more. It makes you see that, like thinking outside the box, not change for change, but even like the change, you know, how are you gonna change? Is it change you want? Or like if you got the child, you know, it's a pregnancy, and oh it's change, but like don't think about the draining bank account or the late nights, you know what I mean? Because that's change too, you know. And then and then of course you can set them, you can set them all out in uh in a in line. Oh, see, that's perfect. Because then you start to you can start weave stories together and see how they make you move the elements around. I see the boxes. Oh, see, another layer. I like that because they all fit together. Oh my gosh, that's amazing. Oh, that is amazing. See, Bjorn, you should do that. You actually have the deck. I will when I get it, hopefully this week. Yeah. Because I will do that. You have to guide me how to do that. Yeah, that yes, I will. We'll have fun. Well yeah, we'll do it. You can you can make make up make a whole page, uh you can make a whole book with with each each element as as part of the session. Yes. Then you can you can then you shuffle it up and you change it again, and and now now you have all the same elements different stories. So yeah. Yeah, uh we can we could we could have an uh we could have an it using that in context, and I'd probably have to get get a camera set up so that you could actually see them played out because we're we're we're all talking heads here. It's a bit difficult to uh actually show a spread with that. Yeah, I will get round to that set so that I can show people. I'm trying to to learn to work my video equipment um a bit at a time because I am an old dynamic. Oh no, no, yeah, no, you're good, you're good. Well, yeah, we'll do that when I finally get the deck. We could do something like that. Like, I'll set up Tableau for the because now like I'm about to lose a whole day just to dive into the elements and what the cards are and the meanings. Like, I can just see a whole day of mine gone from just exploring that. Like clear up my schedule that day. We could tell stories between each other. We could like I could write a line with with this with this deck, and then you can carry it on. Like you can when you were talking to Andrea on on Sunday, and his uh latest um deck is uh inspired by the Italy Calvinos Castle of Cross destiny where where all the people are trapped in the cast, they can only talk with the tarot cards. But I think they could have had quite a lot of fun with a Lenorman deck like this. They could have they could have that. Yes, no, yeah, because I'm starting to like now I'm like I need that deck because I can just like notebook. I yeah, we should do that when I finally get the deck. We should do a good unveil and like play with the cards. Andrea's one is a Miriarama deck as well, that you can fit it together in any order and it makes a coherent line. So it's uh it's a sort of theme that's yeah, it's been popping up quite lately. Yes. Oh, that's amazing. We can we can do that. We could have a storytelling session. Yes, that would be quite fun. Oh no, we're definitely doing that. I'll send you some days that we can definitely do that. And everyone who's listening by the deck so then they can play along too and like in the comments write what they get. Oh yeah, yeah. And uh yeah, we could we could read because we could we could we could we could outscrip and read each other's stories and see how how close you got to the intended communication. I am we'll see if the if the if that if that medieval visual language still works. I think that far. Oh no, I am so excited. Like, yes, we're doing it. I will definitely, yeah, send some dates and then we'll put it on the calendar. I know, me too. Oh this is gonna be fun. Yes, we're definitely doing it, everybody. I'm getting it as soon as the deck goes. But yeah, I'll send I'll send some dates and then we'll let everyone know because everyone needs to get the deck. Just buy it today, because if you have male issues like me, I don't know when anything's coming. It's like back in the day, medieval times, waiting for the guy. Yeah, yeah. You have to you have to sort of go out there and club your messenger over the head and take his parts, you know. Yes, exactly. And our mailman's terrible. I was waiting for a book from an interviewer and like he delivered it to the neighbor's house. He decided to hold it for like five days longer than necessary. So I did have one delivery guy who came like last year or something. I was and he actually parked outside my house. I wasn't expecting the delivery until the next day, as a matter of fact. So I didn't actually go out and challenge him. I just wondered who he was looking for. Yeah, he parked outside my house and then he walked like like uh many yards around the entire neighborhood and up different streets in order to then go and deliver my parcel to a completely wrong address about 400 yards away. Oh my gosh. Then he came and got back into his van outside my actual house, which has the name of the house in very big letters by the front door and drove away. Oh my goodness. And later we got a photograph saying, Oh, your parcel has been delivered to us like whose front door is that was that that guy earlier? These messengers can get can get um get very imaginative in their piteous um oh yeah behavior. Yes, oh yeah, definitely. There's no way we do not sit at home plotting this stuff anyway. Yeah, yeah, no, I know. It's true. I'm just gonna try and find the letter in um Oh okay, yeah, no worries. Yeah, we've got a m just a moment because oh yeah, it's right. Yeah, no worries, like then we'll yeah, we'll definitely because like but for everyone listening, we'll definitely before we you know sign, find some fun. If anyone wants to see a card before we sign off or anything like that, and then we'll uh we're definitely coming back to play the game. Ah one last card. The dragon is not the dragon is not signing for that. Oh no, yeah, no. Yes, I like that. Yes, I like it. Oh, and and of course Ryder. Yeah. Oh, there we go. Oh yeah, see, they come in loud but still get the mail wrong. Your parcel will be delivered in whatever time is least convenient for you. Yeah, exactly. Um just not being left now. Exactly. Hopefully they will they will get to you safely, and even those two guys are on your post around at the moment. Yeah, no, definitely not. And like I said, because this will be exciting. So for everyone listening, we are definitely doing that as soon as we get the decks. We are gonna and you order your own decks. I'm gonna challenge everyone or because then you can play along too, and you can do that, and we can it'll be a whole fun thing. I'm excited. Okay, yeah. Yeah, no, he's uh no, he's he'll he'll I'm not gonna I lost I lost the the the kill or some kind of reason it must be being delivered by one of our postal services. We have lost your image, sorry. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No. I know, so it's like, well, yeah, it's all that fun. Yeah. That happens sometimes, but yeah, no, you're fine. We're just it's we're at the hour anyway, but no, no worries. Just make sure nobody questions. But yeah, no, and I was gonna say, do you want to yeah, before we come off, I'll share this everywhere, of course, and everyone make sure to get the deck because first of all, not only is it amazing, you know, it you can play the game when we first come out with it. Yes, exactly. I love it. Oh my gosh. Oh, there's that's like the guy in the window. Yeah, back at a party. You know, look at the guy downstairs so in love with his horse that he delighted. Yeah, yeah. I love it. They lots of laughs. You know, it could it could be a more difficult journey there. Oh yeah, yeah. But even yeah, I think I think it's the route that my postman pretends that he takes every morning. And I had to climb this morning, and there were lions! I could not deliver your parcel because of lions. Oh my gosh, yeah, I like that. I think I have the tree underneath the thorn too. Yeah, so see, I know. See, it's just such a fun deck that everyone should just have it because it's like you know, it sparks the imagination to really bring out different things in your readings, to bring out different things like from the natural world into that's symbolism. Yeah. Sorry. It's pretty fun. I mean, it's it's it's it's making me laugh when I made it. So I just laugh at my own jokes. It's it's it's still it's still entertaining me all this time later. So oh yeah, that's the sign of a very, very good deck that you will love it and keep laughing with it, seeing new things, and really bringing that out after, like you said, you created it, you know everything, but it's still showing you different things. That's an amazing deck. I'm just looking at it and thinking, I forgot that I put that there. Oh, yeah. I have this I love this goat going under the mountain. Oh, I know. Because she's a goat. Yes, yeah. I love that. Yeah. Yes. No, but that's good. You want to be part of all that there's this lion in your cave. That's so sad. Yeah, time to run. Enemy in the thing. But there you go, another Lenorman's, like, you know, another way Lenorman's read. I like how you got I like how you captured all the nuances and everything that the card that the meanings are in the card. Sorry, I can't talk now. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Sort of help me to remember what what were the possibilities are with the with the card, because you can have just like a lot of people do really just like just to have the symbol by itself, very plain and simple. I think somebody said that the best of them deck write the the name, the title of the of the card on it and and use that to have anything to distract you. But human human beings, I think human beings often need what you might call distractions in order to in order to learn and to get to and and to get to grips with things. We've got those lines that do go off at all kinds of different tangents, and if you make something too too objective, we can't deal with it. It's yeah, loses loses our um famous sleep of imagination. Yeah, yeah. I I think some people some people will love it, and some people will think that's not for me, that's that's not for me, that's not the way I read, and that's but that's okay, that's okay. You're all wrong, but it's okay. Yes, that's what I was gonna say. Bringing out the adventurous and everybody. This is the best deck that you could possibly get to read with. So there's yeah. Oh my gosh, I agree. And and it is fun. It is not boring. Yeah, no, I agree just from what I've seen, because like I'm going to get the deck, and I'll have way more to say once I get it. But I can see that because, like, with the Normand, you have to think well, you've got two cards, and you have to think of all the symbols that encompasses and these stories that you did, and the way it is makes it playful, makes it help, expands your mind, lets your intuition soar. So I definitely think it's an amazing deck to have because it's gonna make you really dive into the cards in a way that you're gonna give the best interpretation, the best responses. So, yeah, I absolutely love it. I'm really, I'm really, I'm really glad you're liking it. And I hope you get your actual deck very soon. Yeah. Lots of fun with that. Yeah, yeah, we and we need to do a re a revisit, a revisit uh talk through the medium of the cards. That would be a really fun thing. Oh, yeah. So every yeah, that's why everyone grab your decks. We're gonna come up with the date. Yeah, we're gonna come up with a date, and then everyone can mark your calendars with your deck, and it's gonna be so much fun to dive into your deck to really see everyone's views of it as well, like how they're seeing the card. I love always hearing how people are you know connected to the deck as well. It'd be really nice if we could uh if if we were able to let people join, join kind of join in. Oh, yeah, we can do a zoom. Yeah, yeah. Anyone who's already got that, um, just play along. So yeah, so we'll have to well we'll have yeah, we'll have to talk then, like yeah, exactly how we're gonna do it. But I have a couple of ideas, so everyone just be excited to hear the announcement in a couple days once we work through it. All right, yay everyone. Yeah, yes, no, yay, so I was gonna say, yeah, thanks everyone. And yeah, keep keep watching this post, keep watching the newsletters, because I will definitely post the date and how we're gonna do this in a couple days, so everyone's prepared. Okay. Yay! We should work on that then. Yes, I'm excited. Well, thanks for having me on the on the on the broadcast again. It's been it's been great. Always, always, it's always amazing to have you. Yeah. I feel like you know, we've talked we've talked about loads of loads of stuff today, and there's just still loads more. That's why we're doing round two. Yeah, so that's probably best for the sanity of everyone watching, chop it up into manageable, manageable people. Oh, because then get definitely get more, definitely. Yay! Oh, all right, yeah, thanks everyone. Well, I'll put post this. Oh, sorry, go ahead. Like there's a delay. Thank you. Uh thank you.