The Skeptic and the Tarot Deck

On certainty, mystery, and the stories we tell ourselves

Morning ritual: coffee, notebooks, and tarot— Photo by author

Editor’s Note: Before sharing readings from this publication, it seemed fair to explain how a skeptical, science-minded writer came to carry a tarot deck.

In my 20s, I was angry at the world. Aren’t we all at that age?

I realized it’s the prime decade for movements and protests. Our sights expand beyond our home and town, and suddenly we become aware of all the injustices that exist far beyond them.

But another realization crept in: how unjustly we were treated growing up.

First, we see far. Then we see up close and personal.

For me, it was anger toward my family and religion, which eventually extended to the community and society at large. I used science to make sense of reality. Any explanation that seemed too obscure, too wrapped in fairy-tale logic, I pushed away.

I followed the Four Horsemen of atheism in the 2010s, watching videos of their debates against religious figures. I took pleasure in watching them dismantle the opposition with reason and science. Their verbosity and elegant use of English also drew me in.

I like to say that my family is religious, though not necessarily pious. More traditional than devout, sometimes going along because the community said so. Within that community, there was no room for queerness.

So my anger came from there. An anger that made me anti-religious. It made me use science for every explanation. If science couldn’t explain it, then I didn’t want to think about it.

Then psychedelics came along about ten years ago.

Something that began recreationally quickly turned strange and mysterious.

The substances played with my perception of experience. Sometimes words felt inadequate. Not everything meaningful could be neatly explained or categorized.

Whatever rigidity or certainty I had carried over the years began to wane. I grew more open to the unknown and less suspicious of it.

Thinking in extremes softened. Resentment toward institutions and my family subsided. I felt empathy where anger had once been.

I got curiouser, more present, and even a bit more spiritual.

Psychedelics didn’t suddenly make me religious again. They just made me less arrogant about the limits of my perception. Less convinced that everything meaningful needs to pass a laboratory test.

But my skepticism lingers.

For example, horoscopes haven’t worked for me yet. Astrology feels too static. It makes sense. From our perspective, the stars seem frozen in place. Still, it all feels too predetermined.

Then there’s the matter of consistency. One magazine’s horoscope would differ from another’s in the same week. Which one was I supposed to believe?

Five years ago, during a road trip that eventually led me to Azzy — my childhood friend, now a magical faery in Las Vegas — I discovered tarot.

For most people, Las Vegas is Sin City. For her, it was the opposite. A strange little sanctuary of dancers, strippers, artists, and drifters gathering on the city’s outskirts for drum circles beneath the desert sky.

Vegas felt like a portal for them. Where there was darkness, there was also light. An intense collision of frequencies that pushed people inward.

During those two weeks of wandering through the city and the desert in all their colors, we had our first tarot reading with Azzy.

At first, every alarm in me went off. But I surrendered to the moment. We were in good hands. Azzy is an enchantress who seems to have lived several lives. She made the experience feel grounded rather than woo-woo.

Whatever preconceived notions I had about tarot dissolved almost immediately.

There was psychology in it, especially in the conversations about the questions we asked and the meanings drawn from the cards.

More than that, it wasn’t static.

Tarot carries movement, narrative, tension, and interpretation. It was story-driven.

And sometimes, unnervingly, the cards seem perfectly in sync with the question. When that happens, I’m gobsmacked. Part of me wants to dissect it, to find the mechanism behind it all.

Sometimes I wonder. But I haven’t delved deep enough into the research yet, and for now, I’m content to leave some mystery intact.

They say someone has to gift you your first deck. Before leaving Vegas, Azzy gifted us ours.

Since then, tarot has woven itself into my life. Sometimes monthly, sometimes weekly, and sometimes daily during rough stretches. It can be spontaneous or even ritualistic, with incense or candles lit.

It’s helped me more than I expected. Not always providing absolute answers, but it opens new angles of thought.

That’s part of why I started the publication All Hands on Deck. Primarily for myself, to keep track of my readings, but also for others. Some of the reflections may resonate with people facing similar questions or challenges. I’ll share some of my readings here, or perhaps my partner’s, or those of a friend sitting across the table, wanting their cards read.

Maybe that’s what this publication will slowly become: a place for reflections, stories, and conversations around tarot.

Also, it goes without saying that the publication welcomes anyone willing to share their tarot experiences.

Otherwise, sit back and enjoy this odd little voyage into tarot. It could get a little bumpy, so don’t forget to keep all hands on deck.