Daily Draw - The Devil, Six of Chalices and Ten of Wands

This morning I drew the Devil, Six of Chalices and Ten of Wands. I'll tell you what I saw in these cards. My main focus was on the camel in the center. I noticed the carpet he is sitting on, along with the vase beside him. It reminded me of the genie's lamp and magic carpet. He's wearing glasses and his wise manner made me think of a professor. The watch hanging from his garment tied it all together. Suddenly I saw him as a time traveler. This professor has managed a way to travel on his magic carpet and travel back in time.

He is facing the Devil. He has gone back in time (marked by the difference of the phases of the moon in both cards), and is disguised as a frog (still in green) as he revisits his past when he was a devilish goat-man. This part of his past is a time when he was doing all sorts of things that were really bad for him. I immediately thought of drugs. The camel in the center card is smoking a pipe, which made me think of those old commercial ads with Joe Camel, so I am getting an addiction-vibe here.

Looking at the camel's hump, I wonder what he is carrying around. I look to the card on the right and see him, again disguised, at some other point in time. Again, he is wearing his trademark green, and as a moose he carries the same walking stick that he holds as a camel. There is a hard road he is walking, and it is a difficult and heavy journey. The load the moose carries on his back has stayed with him as a camel, becoming a part of who his is.

My impression, looking at these cards, is of a very smart person, who has had a past with addiction, and the road out of it has been difficult. It seems to me as though he is reflecting on the whole thing, perhaps wondering if it's worth the effort of being sober.

Once I had all that (which took a lot longer to type out than it did to develop in my mind), I realized who these cards were referring to. There is someone from my past who I lost contact with for a long while. During that time, he turned to drugs. This was shocking to me, because he is so intelligent. It just didn't make sense to me. Now that he is clean, he is studying to become a professor, just like I saw in the camel!

He wrote to me a few days ago, so I will have to make time to write back to him today. I don't have any idea what it feels like to be addicted to drugs, or to have to live without it once having been addicted... so I can't relate to his personal journey. But I can be a friend. I really hope that these cards are simply a message for me to reach out to him today, and not that he is contemplating a backslide. I hope that he finds meaning in his life, enough so that he finds sufficient happiness in being sober that will outweight the escapism of drugs.

Deck: Tarot of the Animal Lords by Lo Scarabeo