Day Fourteen. October 28th. King of Pentacles.
Definition: The traditional interpretation is stability, abundance, wealth, and security.
Detail: What is the Elsewhere Tarot presenting?
Ah, geez. It’s a dude with a sketchy/shadow head, but wearing clothes, and sitting on the display shelving in a shop. And there’s another, smaller sketchy/shadow entity with an animal-like vibe clambering at nearby shelving. What’s the stuff for sale on the shelves? It’s bric-a-brac. Maybe a clock? Maybe a snow globe? Is the dude the shop proprietor? Who else would sit on the shelves at a shop like this? He sits like he owns it. No shop chain that sells new housewares displays their stuff like this – a mix-and-match of items all on the same shelf, and no two of the same thing. This feels like a resale shop, or…the consignment shop from the Seven of Pentacles. I think it is that same shop. And is the dude sitting on the shelf one of the shoppers from that card, except he’s wearing clothes? He got them from the shop? Added commodified aspects of others’ past lives to who he is? It’s what the sketchy shadow dudes on the Seven were there to do. But I’m not getting a vibe from this guy that the clothes are fulfilling/enlivening/activating of him. Look at that swirly thing over his had, whirling. It’s like he’s disoriented. I’ve always loved halos as symbols of spiritual insight and purpose. But this is like an anti-halo. He’s sitting like he owns the place, but he’s still a sketchy/shadow dude, and he’s disoriented. Hmm. The King of Pentacles. He fronts like he’s made of the spirit of life, but his thoughts that inform his actions don’t make any sense. He goes through his days in the company of scary shadow animals. Hmm. What are those dark cone shapes along the top of shelving on the right? Traffic cones? The bases of trees? Light fixtures? Is the shadow/animal trying to get at them? And what’s the shape in the background behind the shadow/dude/king? It’s pretty vulval looking. Or is it a flame? Is the shadow/dude/king’s head on fire? Is that a box of matches on the shelf next to him? What does it mean for the human embodiment of the commodification of life to light his own head on fire? Does lighting his head on fire kill him? Self-immolation is a shocking and intense form of protest. But I don’t get that vibe from him. Remember when there were all those stories about spontaneous human combustion? The phoenix bursts into flames as part of its cycle of rebirth. You know what…you know how the Access Hollywood tape didn’t tank Trump’s run for President? You know how his crimes never ended his power in the world? You know how toxic comedians disappear for a bit and then reconstitute their careers? Things that would kill you or I don’t kill them. That’s the King of Pentacles. Trump lights himself on fire on a daily basis. Musk lights himself on fire constantly. The King of Pentacles is the unkillable embodiment of money before all else, Pluto with Cerberus among us, with a head full of nonsense.
Day: Same feelings of this card’s correspondence to the current U.S. political landscape, and to the workings of a world contrived from the commodification of life.
Discovery: What a smug dude we have from Pamela on her King of Pentacles. He’s Jonathan Groff’s King George from Hamilton, except he can’t sing. He’s showing us his gold pentacle and not looking us in the eye. I once Photoshopped this card to put horns on him to make him represent the Devil as an illustration for a game I was working on. His clothes are adorned with printed or embroidered grapes. His throne is carved with sheep and flowers. It’s like a business owner wearing the branded shirt of his business, because this dude didn’t tend the sheep, or farm the grapes that made him wealthy. He wears them as symbols of his position at the top of the order that funnels the commodification of them up to him. And in this way he’s just like the dude on the shelves in the consignment shop, wearing clothes that present him as something he’s not. You know how Adam Levine wears a $400 t-shirt that’s all distressed and torn at the collar, and other stars wear ratty, distressed clothing, as if they can’t afford better and wore their clothes out themselves? That’s the King in the consignment shop. He’s wearing jeans with patches on them, but they’re crisp and pressed by his non-white housekeeper. Everyone who’s around him knows he’s bullshit. The world is a consignment shop with undying billionaires in it who front like they own the place, think they’re regular and approachable, but who everyone knows are bullshit, and who don’t look us in the eye because they’re afraid of what they might see reflected back.