The Tower

( Large image beneath the cut )

The card of tumultuous change and loss, the Tower describes challenges strong enough to crack the very foundations of identity. Anything we build is fragile; there are forces beyond our control which can take away anything we hold dear. Such destruction is always painful but not necessarily final-- the Ikon calls change down upon us, but we can survive it if we also change.

The random number generator that made me start this card during October must have known something I didn't, because I can't think of a more appropriate theme for the foreseeable future.  I'm so very afraid that everything is coming to a shatter point--if it already hasn't--and I admit that I am a coward who doesn't want to live through that.  I want, most of all, humans to survive the next century without either blowing ourselves up or making the atmosphere entirely uninhabitable. 

It's been very difficult to set those fears aside and get to work.  I think if my religion didn't now viscerally repel me, I would be taking solace there.  In the absence of that, I have to turn to my more fundamental belief in Beauty and Creation, and it's hard to see the point of making things right now.  It also feels like a cop-out, that I should be out in the streets protesting or being a clinic escort or donating my time to some cause, somewhere, that might actually make a difference.  Otherwise how could I possibly be adding to the world instead of taking away?