This Spring Equinox March 21st 2022, I gave birth to the Foragers RuneTarot Deck. 84 cards, pictures, plant names and family descriptions and a little information booklet to help get every card reader started.
This time last year (2021) Me and ChrisTall (Tall Chris) were doing a lot of walking, and talking.
We were talking about how we were getting older, talking about Authentic Anarchy, we were talking about Sustainability and how to grow our Community whilst at the same time growing our Food, growing our Medicines and growing Ourselves.
“The trouble is Fairy, I’ve made this game and it doesn’t work properly. I’m not very good at games”
That’s what ChrisTall said, then he got out his Foragers Snap and we tried to have a play.
Yeah, not really enough cards to be snappable, so I said,
“Well, we could just make them into a deck of cards, that means we could have more pictures of plants, so the foraging tool would be more comprehensive.”
We chatted for a bit, thinking about if we could separate the different plant families into card suits, then thought, well maybe we could make the card suits into actual elemental suits, relating to the plant families, so the elemental and alchemical aspects of the plants (one of ChrisTall’s favourite subjects) were also shown.
As the thought came into my head I said out loud,
“But if we’re going to make a deck of cards, we could make a Tarot deck of cards, cos they’re just the same as playing cards really, that’s what Nanna Ivy ( Stockbridge, nee Garner, nee Tooley) taught me anyway.”
So that’s how the idea first started, ChrisTall raised his eyebrows in agreement, nodded his head and didn’t diss the idea, and you know, being an Aquarian, ChrisTall is always really really good at stating his displeasure if an idea doesn’t come up to his exacting standards!
We planted seeds and created a Medicinal Herbal Fairy garden in our local allotments in Wolvercote (Nice One T!!!). We had a pretty good time, gardening, cooking, eating, writing, celebrating being alive, glad that we were alive, working together to create something that would last after we were gone.
I didn’t realise at the time but we were doing ChrisTalls bucket list, cos in June he got ill and by mid-July, he was dead. His death was a massive shock and I was left with the garden to tend the plants to grow and a mission to complete.
We were going to make the cards after ChrisTall had finished working in September, pooling our savings from our Summer work. After Chris died, it was obvious that there wasn’t going to be any money from him any more. so I had to work out how to fund the Foragers Rune Tarot myself.
After I’d put all of their plants in the ground growing them to self sustainable healthy levels I made a book detailing all of the plants, their actions and their uses and put it in the greenhouse as a Community reference book to go with the Fairy Garden.
The garden mission was done for the Summer, so now at the end of September I knew it was time for me to activate the next bit of the plan.
Grieving, Healing and Fundraising!
I made a poster, ‘Ipsophyto and Fairy Love Isle of Wight Fundraiser!’ detailing the plan, and sent it to all the people who knew me and Chris. I had been sending out daily messages when he was in the hospital in a coma. I had hoped that together, our combined energy we would see him through his illness. For a while it was working, but finally he succumbed.
I had almost 200 people on our group friends list , I knew if I could raise £1500, I could definitely produce the cards so I sent the fundraising poster with a donate link to my PayPal to these 200 people.
I figured that I could ask people for a fiver/tenner each and all would be well! Then I thought seeing as we were all still in quite a dark time, that I could also send them a little song or a little story or meditation that might just help them through and it would also help me through too!
Grieving, Doing, Being. Telling the Story. Singing the Song.
So I created a new YouTube channel Lara Fairy Love 2021 and as I set off off to walk around the Isle of Wight in sections I pledged to put up a new video of a song or a story or a meditation each day and send it to the group of people hoping that over the 2 months I was walking I would begin to heal myself from the shock and the grief of Chris’s death but I would also help alleviate the shock and grief of his friends and family and out of it together we could make his dream a reality.
By the end of October I had made many videos and had raised £1500!!!! I was tired but happy!
After the walk I visited with friends on my way to Oxford, Chloe at Moorlands , another place where ChrisTall had created a community garden and Jane ( Captain Walker) in Coxley, writer of the Sustainability Handbook!
They both helped me witness that actually working with the cards to create the pack was going to be emotional and mentally challenging, like growing a new human ( which I have done before 4 times!)
So, like when I was pregnant before, I was gentle with myself. I worked diligently but slowly and calmly. Bringing our dream out through the dark Winter. When the memory of him was too much, I put the cards down and did something else.
With the the awesome skills of all the lovelies at the Minuteman Press in Oxford, together we have managed to create this pack.
In this same week 2014 March, that’s 8 years ago, I gave birth to Angel Benjamin, my stillborn son.
This Spring Equinox March 2022, I have given Birth to these new cards, so out of the darkness I have brought forth this Light and in them is the Spirit and the vision of our friend and Bruvva, ChrisTall ‘IpsoPhyto’ Hope Jerram.
I intend to sell cards through my website
larafairylove.co.uk for £32 per pack + P&P – to order please contact me and let me know how many decks you need! And thank you, for supporting this project. ♥
These first 20 copies I have printed, I hope will go to people who knew and really loved ChrisTall, so they have a little bit of him too! ( They will probably still have at least 3 mistakes! So all edits gladly appreciated for the next printing!!!)
For the next 20, I vision that they will spread out across the World to publishers and printers inspiring someone to make the Foragers RuneTarot into a global positive energy phenomenon action which will be a fitting tribute to our Friend and Bruvva and his Love for the beautiful Plants of this awesome Planet that We live on!
Peace, within and without. Love and goodwill to all beings! Xxxloveloveloveyouxxx xxxlovelaraxxx See less
