Ted keeps us afloat with his lucky number seven. He trusts you unconditionally and has shown up to support you in trusting yourself, in trusting that you can manage the feelings that are bubbling up in you right now.

Shortly after my dad received his masters degree, our family moved from West Allis, Wisconsin to Springfield, Missouri in order for my dad to teach English at Southwest Missouri State. We lived in a little house on Cozy street (see card #3 to hear all about our neighbor Donna) and these three years were the happiest of my life. SMS had an olympic sized pool complete with platform diving boards. We swam there often, regularly stopping for banana soft serve ice cream afterwards.

In one of his early attempts to teach me to swim, my dad stood seven feet away from the pool wall, and I would make my way over to him, stroke at a time, until I reached the safety of his arms. One day instead of catching me, he, trusting I could go a bit further, took a big step back. I panicked, sure I would drown. I was so angry and felt betrayed. For many years I blamed my dad for that. I saw it as betrayal, not trust. 

If you have drawn this card, consider how trust plays into your current situation. Who do you trust implicitly? Who has betrayed your trust? Is it possible to shift your perspective just one degree and see either of these situations in a new light? Are you hanging onto a story that your body is ready to let go of? Do you need validation? Do you need to express fear? Do you simply need a soft serve banana ice cream to remind you of your favorite summer days?  

Kai is from the grandmother series of pocket angels and is the ultimate caretaker. She doesn’t say much. She just makes you a bowl of your favorite soup and feeds you apple pie. She is here for when you just need someone to collapse into. 

My grandma Lois (who our oldest son later named Lolo) used to make sauerkraut, pork, dumplings and potatoes. When my mom made it she added barbeque sauce to the sauerkraut. Even typing that makes my mouth water. That smell, for me, means home. It’s the meal my own children request when they are homesick and fly home in the middle of a snowy winter evening. The art of eating the meal is to squish the potatoes, baked orange from the barbeque sauce, with a fork until they are nice and flat, sitting right next to big fluffy dumplings that are covered in the kraut. Smothering it all with butter is mandatory. 

If you drew this card, you are in need of some caretaking. Maybe you have a cold and just are craving matzah ball soup from the deli down the street and wish some kind neighbor lady would bring it to you, massage vapor rub onto your feet, and play with your hair. Maybe you are recently heartbroken and don’t want to talk about it. Call in Kai. She will provide the comfort you are seeking. Allow yourself to be cared for. Don’t feel guilty for needing that, for wanting it. Are you in a place where you feel disappointed that nobody seems to be noticing your despair? Are you putting on your happy mask just because sharing the depression seems too heavy? Call in the ancestors. In fact, write down Kai’s phone number (you know you know it) in your journal and put her on speed dial. Do you smell that? The pie is in the oven. 

Rob is a pocket angel cheerleader, but not just any cheerleader. He is one of your guides from way, way back and you have drawn this card because right now you have been working really hard and are hungry for support and recognition. 

I was only a year old when my Grandpa Rob died. I know him though, in the stories my dad tells. Apparently Rob was full of fun catch phrases, like when something was extra fancy he would exclaim, “Just like downtown!” At basketball games, he would embarrass my dad each time my dad scored by shouting, “Atta boy, Gregory!” from the stands. This week my son’s teacher emailed me to report that my son Quinn had scored 100% on every single history summative this term. I screenshot the email, texted it to the family group chat and simultaneously, my son Will and my Dad texted back, “Atta boy, Quinn!” There is magic in knowing someone without ever having really known them. Our ancestors live through us, both the good and the ugly. 

So here you are, plugging away, but where is your Grandpa Rob? Who is sitting in the bleachers screaming your name with glee and pride? Close your eyes for a moment. Imagine you dressed to the nines (just like downtown). Imagine you are grounded and glowing and suddenly a spotlight shines down on you. Even if you never had a cheerleader in this lifetime, even if you have worked all of these years without a single gold star, keep your eyes closed and listen. Rob is there. He is shouting, “Atta ____” and he is smiling. You are supported, whether you know it or not. How does that feel? How can you cultivate more cheerleaders in your life? Are you frustrated that you desire praise? Does it make you feel selfish or excited? Are you embarrassed or uplifted? How do compliments sit with you (especially the ones that don’t need anything in return)?

My dad was 22 when he became my dad, just finishing up his senior year at St. Norbert College. The draft for the Vietnam war was in full swing. My mom changed her major from art to education in order to graduate early. My dad tried to quit the track team, of which he was the star, so that he could work more hours to support his young family. His track coach found a way to accommodate, my dad’s lottery number wasn’t called, and yet I imagine that time of his life felt very overwhelming and scary. If it did, he didn’t show it to me. He wrote me a poem that year. It starts, “We sat, not on rocks, but on concrete blocks, that lined the banks of the Fox river …” A few years later, in Springfield, we walked home from the wading pool and a sliver of the moon lit our way home. He asked me what the moon looked like and I said, “a banana.” My friend Giselle, who was along for the swim, said, “a fingernail.” He liked my answer. He loved Giselle’s. From that point on I have always sought the best metaphor. 

Greg is an expert on turning stress into stories. Where are you at in your creative process? Are the ideas flowing? Are you stuck? Are you mid-novel and cannot find your way out? Are you writing a song and the lyrics are falling flat? Wait, what’s that? You aren’t creative?! Not at all?! I don’t believe you. Greg doesn’t believe you. Go outside. Look at the moon. Tell me what it looks like. Go sit on the banks of the closest river, even if the entire world seems to be crashing around you and look for poetry. Imagine Greg sitting next to you, skipping stones. 

Being creative is a practiced skill. Have fun with it. Go to the grocery store and when you get back home, write down everything you noticed: the baby crying in the stroller, the man who smelled like cigars, the loaves of white bread stacked neatly in rows, and how the only donuts left were the plain ones. What you notice matters. What you pay attention to is telling you things about your thoughts. Buried in there somewhere is your most creative self.

I have my share of waiting room stories, but perhaps my favorite is born from trauma. At sixteen, I totaled my parents only car, a Honda Civic wagon. It was silver with a red pinstripe. I hit my head hard on the steering wheel (no airbags back then, but a seatbelt saved my life). I woke up to sounds of “I am a doctor, let me in,” and I was lifted into an ambulance on the freeway. Before being extracted I saw my face in the mirror. It, along with my friend Marc’s scarf, which was wrapped around the leather jacket I wore (I won it in a raffle) was covered in blood. The hospital called my parents, but could not discuss over the phone with them anything other than I had been in a bad accident. They did not know if I had made it, if I was paralyzed, if I was okay. They also didn’t have a car to come to me and Uber wasn’t a thing back then so they called my Grandma Jean who drove them to the ER at St. Joseph’s hospital. 
It took several hours for a plastic surgeon to sew my eyelid back on. I remember wanting to tell her that my contact lenses were still in, but I was too afraid to speak. I wanted to say, “Could someone please take my ponytail out? It’s digging into the back of my head,” but the words didn’t come. I imagined my parents in the waiting room, wringing their hands with worry, tears surely streaming down their faces as they prayed in a circle. But when I walked out into the waiting room, that was not the scene. They were having wheelchair races down the hallway. 

It wasn’t until I was a mother myself that I realized how my Grandma must have suggested that as a way to distract them. She must have understood that worry only generates worry and that waiting is often useless as it just generates more waiting. 

So Gene is here to wait with you, to distract you. Sometimes I find myself living far too often in a state of anticipation, wanting to know when the next good, big thing will happen. I forget to live in the present, especially when the present seems boring or slow or unfulfilling. Where in your life do you feel that? If you have drawn this card, what do you imagine is right on the other side of the horizon? Or…

Are you waiting for a baby to be born or a relationship to come or a promotion or a job interview or an important call? How can you fill your time until that comes? Call on Gene to live in the present. Walk over to the vending machine, choose any treat you like, read that old magazine from 2004, knit a sweater. Be still. Gene is right next to you, making you laugh, taking your mind off of things, fully confident that the next big thing will be here before you know it. 

Have you ever met someone and immediately known that you have known them before? I felt that way when I first met my husband. He walked into the painting studio at SVA with guys from his dorm and my first thought was, “Oh. We’ve done this before.” I felt the same way when Luke was born. He was three months early, and when I went to kiss him my lips were bigger than his entire face, but I KNEW that face. Hello again, I know you.

When my daughter came home from college freshman year for winter break, we rode to our friend’s house together. She was lamenting the fact that she had not made many friends yet and really wished for a boyfriend or at the very least, a date. As we drove we made a list of what her dream person would be like (years later she said, “I should have added reliability to that list” but that is a story for another time). As the list grew, it became more specific and I asked, “Where will you meet him?” to which she replied, “Biology class.” Sure enough, when the semester started and students filtered into their biology class, she texted me, “He is here and he looks just like we described.” Coincidence? I don’t know. It’s more fun to think of it as a fairytale created in the heart. For years she often ran into him in unexpected places, even after their friendship faded. Faded. Fated. Same, same. Even for those who don’t stay in our lives, sometimes the folks that show up as if by magic are important drivers in our destiny. Sometimes we match for moments or weeks or years, but the magic ones weave into our tapestry of identity and help us keep the parts of ourselves we like and shed the parts we no longer need. 

What are your thoughts about fate? If you drew this card you might be headed for a series of unexplainable, unimaginable coincidences. Or maybe you don’t believe in that sort of thing and you are more interested in making a list of your own. How do you want the fated friends to light your path? What will their voice be like? Will they have more of a giggle or a hearty guffaw? How will you feel, at the end of a long day, when they text you and ask if you are in the mood for thai? Fate never seems to work in isolation. You have to play back. Go ahead, ask for anything. John’s got your back.

If you have drawn this card, a time of endings is near. One of the hardest goodbyes I ever had was when our oldest son decided to go to college in Seattle, a four hour plane ride away from home. When he hugged his four year old little brother goodbye, I started to cry and I didn’t stop crying for the entire flight.

Goodbyes are hard, but often necessary. Sometimes friendships end, even when neither party really wants them to, but out of a sense of loyalty or circumstance, or distance, they simply do.

How can you ground yourself during this time of transition. What will you be saying hello to soon? There will always be something there to remind you of what once was. Which parts will you carry in your heart?