Ace of Cups
If the cups in this deck are pearls, then this Ace is the source of them, closest to the pure, rawly-tapped energy of this suit.
This oyster reef sits right in the heart of the flow, right where it needs, to get the most out of the water. Oysters, along with other mollusks like clams and mussels, are bivalves, meaning they take in water, filter it, and spit it back out for their food.
It's positioned for the water to carry food and nutrients in the form of silt, microorganisms, All over the world, from New York to Hong Kong, large coastal cities are rediscovering the importance of oysters for rebuilding the marine ecosystem. These tiny creatures are incredibly powerful!!! I can't overstate just how much! If you've ever watched an oyster filter the debris and dirt from a tank of water in real time, you will understand. Historical amounts of oysters in some metropolitan areas (back 100 years ago, in less developed and polluted times, and before detrimental amounts of overfishing) were enough to completely filter the entire body of water in a matter of days. Imagine what that could mean for some of today's murkiest and most taxed bays and rivers!
The most popular depiction of the ace of cups is a something like a fountain, a springing-up of emotion and energy, waters of life and renewal. The flowing waters around the oyster partly take on this role in this deck. The waters might not be pure spring waters, and they might be murky and full of surprises... but this is exactly what I wanted to highlight. The same water that carries the food to the oysters also carries the irritant which becomes a pearl.
I wanted to explore how we interact with deeply emotional experience and energy, how it shapes us as much as we participate in shaping it. To a large extent, we can't control what comes toward us, both the good and the bad. This is not to suggest we are powerless in our own lives; we should always strive to live with intention and in recognition of our personal sovereignty, but there is an element of unpredictability ever at play. Unexpected feelings and experiences come to us as part of our journey, on the waters of life, and we grow where we're fed, and make pearls out of the things which are foreign or abrasive to us. We put a part of our essence around it, trying to form to it, understand why it has come to us, and in trying to preserve the rest of ourselves.
I also like that the oyster reefs form on top of themselves, growing out of what came before. It seems parallel to the way all of our art is in conversation with what has come before, all of our language for what we experience in the present is built upon structures coined by our ancestors, and all spiritual experience is a bit timeless, connected to the past and future.
