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The Fool, Reluctantly Starting... Again
His countenance is full of intelligence and expectant dream...
Arthur Edward Waite, The Pictorial Key to The Tarot
Once again, it's the Cosmic's favorite tragicomedy! And guess what? You're UP!
For me, this is one of the most emotionally charged images in the Tarot. Today, I see the fool card as the saddest card in the deck. What's interesting is that when I wrote this article in June I had another reaction completely: seeing him angered me, I saw stupidity and arrogance, vanity.
Today I see a young, naive, sheltered, innocent, young lad who has the most earnest intentions of doing well. Yet fate has other plans for him: the worst plans, actually. He has it all and he is about to lose it all but at this moment, he doesn't even know it.
And so it goes.
Les terreurs de la mort sont filles de notre ignorance, et la mort elle-même n’est si affreuse que par les débris dont elle se couvre et les couleurs sombres dont on entoure ses images.
Éliphas Lévi, Dogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie, Tome Second
Translation: The terrors of death are the children of our ignorance and death is only so awful only by the reminents in which we dress it and with the somber colors in which we paint it.
This is starting to feel a bit too vulnerable...
So whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my life or whether I shall just die of mortification, these pages will tell…
We all have our fears and doubts when it comes to starting something new. I know I’m not alone in this.
Having fallen for the first time, the fool is foolish no longer, he starts to be more aware of his surroundings and avoids walking in dangerous places.
After a long period of time where no incident was cited and the fool had not come to any bodily harm he was proud to solemnly recite his first spiritual lesson, "Fool me once, shame on you, Fool me twice, shame on me."