(Don’t Get Behind) The Wheel of Fortune

I've been lying to my friends and family for eight years. It's time to come clean.

I first published this essay on November 6, 2018, almost a year to the day after a rollover crash that should have taken my life. What I didn’t make public, and what I hid from my family, is that I was blackout drunk.

This reworked essay appears 347 days into my recovery from alcohol. To my family, I am so sorry for not telling you what really happened. I was so afraid that you would be angry, and I just couldn’t face that. As time went on, coming clean seemed pointless as I felt it would only cause more pain. Now that I’ve been sober from alcohol for nearly a year and have started taking stock of all that it has taken from me, I am ready to tell my story. Please forgive me.

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I am not a medical professional, licensed counselor, or addiction specialist. I am simply someone who has found that Tarot cards help me with recovery. I dedicate this post to

Leah Welborn

whose recovery journey inspires thousands, and whose positive and engaging message helps me keep going.

This post contains references to alcohol use and dermatillomania (skin picking disorder).

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On November 7, 2017, an off-year election day, I was in a rollover crash. Physically, I was incredible lucky: I escaped with seat belt rash and few bruises. The next morning, I experienced the worst hangover of my life. I felt terrible, and yet I knew logically that I needed to get back to my car, my beloved Zippy, to retrieve my belongings. A couple of grad school classmates drove from an hour away to take me to the impound lot. I audibly gasped when I spotted my car. The windshield and body were smashed all to hell. We salvaged as much as we could manage, took a few pictures (including a silly one because survival thrives on humor), and then my friends took me out for lunch, Parkside Café, my favorite.

Within four days I had a new car and new glasses. (The impact of the airbag had broken my frames in half.) I returned to full-time work and full-time school. Like the crash never happened.

But it did.

I had let a “Wheel of Fortune” moment lure me down a dark path. I knew I wasn’t personally responsible for the outcome of the election, and I convinced myself that I deserved to get wasted because I didn’t like the results. I dimmed my disappointment with three double G&Ts, a decision entirely on me. I stumbled out of the bar, hungry. I just wanted to grab something from Kroger. Needless to say I went the wrong way.

I opened my eyes just in time to see a median coming at me, followed by what looked like rain against a pitch black sky just outside my window. I later learned this was the glass smashing. It looked like a blunted fireworks display, ashen and cold and gray. I could smell it, taste it. All of my senses fired in rapid overtime.

The paramedics found me in front of the downtown casino. A sudden flashlight in my face, then the relief of being lifted into an ambulance on a stretcher, the fluorescent hospital lights and endless faces and chatter, the bright, mechanized feel of the CAT scan, the neck brace, the kind emergency room staff, and snip snip there goes my favorite blue sweater—

Remorse. The weight of it killed my buzz. Then the tears came. Why didn’t anyone die? Why wasn’t I in prison, where surely I belonged? Where was my punishment?

A couple of days after my wreck, I purchased a new car, Rosie. (The Riveter, obviously.) Processing the enormity of what had happened, I drove to the auction house where Zippy awaited sale. A rush of grief washed over me as I walked to his driver’s side door and clasped the handle, like holding someone’s hand. I leaned against his side and sobbed. Oh, Zippy! I’m so sorry. Zippy, you saved my life. You gave your life for mine. Thank you. I love you. I’m so sorry. I took a few pictures, including a tearful selfie, then walked back to Rosie. I looked back and forth at the two, the old and beloved, the new and neutral. The circle of life and death. The wheel in motion.

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One of the earliest examples of the wheel as we know it today (that is, a circle mounted on an axle) is a set of drinking mugs—how fitting—each mounted on tiny wheels, dating to around 3900 BCE and found in what we now call Hungary. These wagon-like vessels, one wonders which spirits people drank from them and why? Who was the first hominid to face a wicked hangover?

Copper Age wagon model/drinking vessel unearthed in modern-day Hungary. Drawing by László Gucsi appeared in an book chapter by Mária Bondár.

The wheel is merely an object: a slab of stone or wood, given meaning and life by the careful carving of its material into a perfect circle. The wheel’s power comes from its ability to simplify and enrich our lives by making possible otherwise inaccessible or insurmountable tasks. To quote the late, great comic book writer, Stan Lee, “With great power comes great responsibility.”

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Whether or not fortune favors us, choosing to love ourselves is always on the table.

“Wheel of Fortune” by Pamela Colman Smith, 1909 (Public Domain).

The Wheel of Fortune is the 10th card in the Tarot’s Major Arcana, the 22 special cards that make a Tarot deck something much more than a standard pack of 52 poker cards. The Wheel—the halfway point in the majors and a mascot for the notion that change is the only constant—turns without end. While Death, Judgment, and the Tower often indicate great shifts in our life paths, the Wheel is the buzziness of normalcy, routine, doldrum.

We can’t control everything that happens outside of our own lives, and it is up to each of us to learn to recognize what triggers our unhealthy behaviors. Whether it’s getting bad news on social media, running into an abusive ex, or ending up next to an open bottle, we need to be ready to defend ourselves from slipping back into addiction or compulsion.

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The Wheeled Mug of Protection Spread

This Tarot spread is for anyone who need to create or strengthen a circle of protection around their healthy choices. Once you know your triggers, you can learn to neutralize their power before they ever cross your path.

Grab a tarot deck. If you own multiple decks, choose one that includes a Wheel card you particularly like. (For some fantastic deck recs, please visit my Secular Tarot Witch Bookshop.) Flip through the cards until you find the Wheel. Set it aside.

While you shuffle the cards, visualize yourself free from the unhealthy behavior you want to interrupt. What feels most calming about this vision? Does anything about this vision fill you with fear or excitement?

Now I want you to close your eyes and picture a wheel. It can be from a bicycle, a wagon, even a suitcase. Around that wheel, imagine at least two things that trigger your unhealthy behavior. Are these triggers people in your life, topics of conversation, a specific place, a song?

Open your eyes and look at your Wheel card. Choose a part of the Wheel that corresponds with each trigger you identified.

Using any method you like, pick a card and place it near one of your trigger points. Repeat this process until you’ve picked a card for each trigger. If the cards overlap or look uneven, that’s okay! We love a little chaos in our magic.

Some questions to consider:

• What kinds of cards did you pull? Are they mostly majors, number cards, court cards, or a fairly even mixture?

• What shape does your card layout make? Does this shape bring to mind anything significant about your recovery process?

  • Bonus magic: Sketch a rough outline of the shape on a sticky note. Use this sketch as a sigil to protect you from relapse. Draw it in the margins of notebooks. Draw it in the air with your finger. Draw it on your heart.

• Thinking of the specific triggers you identified, what message does each card bring about what that trigger looks like when it appears? What it feels like? Does this trigger have a motive, or is it something you can experience as neutral?

• If you look at your triggers as a cycle, does the order they appear in tell a story? If so, does the story suggest any further strategies for honoring your recovery?

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A Wheeled Mug of Protection Spread for Dermatillomania

For this reading, I’m working with Chris-Anne’s Light Seer’s Tarot.

When I imagine my life free from skin picking, I feel a sense of relief. Being completely honest, I’m not convinced I will get there, and I recognize that the many scars that cover my hands, legs, and other parts of my body didn’t have to be there. Dermatillomania is self-harm, and I want to stop.

My favorite kind of wheel is a suitcase wheel. I love the act of traveling. Not just arriving at my destination, though there is great comfort in that moment, but the active part: watching the world go by from the window of a passenger train, shuffling past fellow travelers in a bus station. I love every minute of it.

At the bottom of the wheel, underfoot if you will, is the panic that sets in when I experience executive dysfunction. I stare at a spreadsheet, unable to recall which row I was just looking at and why. I have two master’s degrees, for goodness’ sake. Nothing so simple should feel so hard. At least I can pull off a scab without too much mental effort.

Then there’s the voice in my head reminding me that I’m only support staff, not a real librarian. Never mind that I have an incredibly supportive director and team, or that I get to do as much professional development as I know I can handle. The word “librarian” isn’t in my job title, never has been, and that bothers me. I scratch a spot behind my ear until it bleeds. Oh boy.

“The Wheel” by Chris-Anne.

My executive dysfunction feels like the symbols on Chris-Anne’s wheel appear to me: they are so simple, and yet I don’t understand them. My imposter syndrome is the figure balancing atop the Wheel. Is her ankle stable enough to keep her balanced? Does she smile because she’s “faking it until she makes it”?

Executive dysfunction: The World

Imposter syndrome: High Priestess

• All three cards are majors, and all three depict women. The collective color scheme is jade with splashes of warmth. Every card features at least one circle, oval, or crescent. This trio has a watery, dreamy, slightly fiery energy.

• The layout forms a single, diagonal line.

  

  Proof that a) you don’t have to be a skilled artist to create a sigil, and b) there is no wrong way to create a sigil.

• The World reminds me that my moments of neural overload are quite small in the grand scheme of things. When I feel overwhelmed, I can visualize my body dropping into the center of the Wheel, where I can experience greater wisdom. The Empress (oops, the card you see above is clearly the High Priestess, see my footnote for more info)¹ is an embodiment of my professional experience. I’ve birthed and nourished two degrees, a book, community outreach and Library of Congress initiatives, and so much more. When I feel imposter syndrome tapping on my shoulder, I have receipts (read: I can show her my resume). While brain freeze and feeling shitty about my “accomplishments” aren’t great sensations, I can diffuse them by reminding myself that I am not alone in experiencing them. Rather than reaching for that hangnail that has grown to the size of a dime, I can reach out to friends and coworkers for empathy and support.

• I definitely see this pair of triggers as related. Executive dysfunction has a habit of making me feel unqualified, and feelings of not belonging in my job make me spiral through dysfunction and end up in a skin picking cycle. Recognizing this cycle empowers me to take a deep breath, hop aboard the Wheel, and know that I’m ready for anything the life chooses to hand to me.

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1. Thank you to the lovely

Leah Welborn

for pointing out the, while I drew the High Priestess, I did my spread analysis on the Empress. Since my readings for this book aren’t contrived, I’m going to leave it as-is for now. I’ll definitely be fixing this error in the final manuscript!