My First Deck
“Your first deck has to be gifted to you”
I’m sure we’ve all heard it: Some refer to it as gatekeeping others think it’s to help keep the craft pure. I have no doubt of the special bond formed between a gifted deck and it’s reader, but I also know that a reader can form a unique bond with their first deck even if they chose it themselves.
The spread shown is Interview Your Deck by Noble Lion Tarot
When I first started broadening my reach into the occult and witchcraft I spent a lot of time on tumblr surfing aesthetically pleasing posts, reading “witch tips”, jotting down dozens of book titles, most of which I will probably never get around to reading. Anything I found remotely fascinated was stored for later access and this is how I first stumbled across the tarot.
Tarot tips started showing up in the mixed bag of witch tips the algorithms chose for me and I found the concept of ‘fortune telling’ to be utterly fascinating. It didn’t take more than a couple of “tarot” Google searches to come across that very discouraging requirement of being gifted your first deck. The unfortunate reality set in from there: I may never get an opportunity to become a reader because of this.
At this point I did the most reasonable thing I could think of: drop hints and hope that someone picks up on them - unfortunately no one did. Because of this, I settled into the notion that perhaps this curiosity just wasn’t for me and if it was, it would happen on it’s own time.
In 2018 I traveled to Texas with one of my best friends to see Taylor Swift (which was even more magical than I thought it would be) but Taylor wasn’t the only magical experience on that trip. On our way to the airport, we passed a Goodwill and at this point we still had about 2.5 hours until we absolutely needed to be at the airport so I turned to my friend Shane and asked if he was cool to stop at the thrift shop for some last minute shopping and he of course agreed.
As we walked through the automatic doors, months since my last thought about the tarot, I wondered out loud if I would find a deck here. Of course, since it’s a Goodwill in Texas, I did not. Walking out of the store I was disappointed because not only did I not find a tarot deck, I didn’t find anything I thought to be worth purchasing. When we got back in the car, as a last ditch effort I opened my Maps App and searched “metaphysical store” and there it was, a mere mile and a half down the road.
Botanica de la Luz is a small shop located at 1335 N Belt Line Road in Irving, TX. (Prior to writing this blog post, I didn’t know the address of the shop. Since doing the research for this post, I am shocked to find that their street number 1335 is the same as my own home. How is that for coincidence?!)
Shane and I walked the shop giving our full attention to each bit of merchandise the store had to offer. When I finally came across the glass case that held the tarot decks, I wondered which I should choose. There were a variety of Waite-Smith decks, a few decks that seemed to be a bit more numerology based and one copy of Patrick Valenza’s The Deviant Moon: Borderless edition, which I excitedly chose.
Once we got situated on the plane I took them out, explored the unique art of each card, eventually gave them a good shuffle and drew my first card. I pulled the Four of Wands, flipped through the booklet and was surprised to read the word “divorce” in my card’s definition. My boyfriend and I at the time, had only been dating 2 months but on this same day we had our very first fight - and oh was it a big one. Shane’s card, I wish I could recall but sadly can not. The woman who happened to share the row with us also drew a card and pulled the Nine of Pentacles reversed. I again flipped through the booklet and told her “your property will be lost or stolen” she laughed out loud before responding with “Yup! The airline lost my luggage!”
I was immediately hooked and filled with that same fascination I first had when discovering the tarot online almost a year prior. I was, and still am completely enthralled with the tarot. It’s amazing to see over and over again how the cards pick up on the energy surrounding and within a person and how to speak with such clarity and provide such profound wisdom.
Since making that initial purchase I now own a combination of 27 divination tools: 17 tarot decks, one set of tarot dice, two pendulums, four oracle decks, a set of Phoenix cards, a set of “Tea Leaf” fortune telling cards, and one Box of Emotions (which are also cards, similar to an oracle deck). I’m proud of my ever-growing collection as well as my choice to forge my own spiritual path and encourage everyone to simply do what feels right to them.
With love,
Alysha
