I don’t find this interpretive, almost psychoanalytical, bent necessarily incongruous with Anya’s simultaneously held belief that there is an element of the numinous about the Tarot, or that inexplicable forces may really be at work here. I understand, maybe even envy, her desire to retain a sense of uncertainty and mystery in all of this.

All the same, Anya seems pleased when she tells me that many of the people she’s read for say she didn’t tell them anything they didn’t know -- she just helped them see things in a different light.

One of Anya’s favorite stories about the cards “not telling you anything you don’t know” is a rueful tale she says she heard from another, well-established, reader. Finding herself obsessed with an aloof romantic interest, the reader sought to obtain an answer to a single burning question: was there a future for the two of them, or not? Sitting on the floor amongst candles and incense, thinking thoughts of love, she examined the spread laid out before her and stared hard.

“And every single card,” Anya tells me, giggling, “was telling her to get off her butt and get a job!”

Was it really the cards speaking? Was it her subconscious? Was it the force of hundreds of years of human wisdom, some kind of deeply imprinted cultural memory we all share, simply working its way to the surface?

Turning each of these explanations over in my mind, I find that I don’t particularly care what proportion of the truth I ought to ascribe to each one. Instead, what’s intriguing is the realization that the messages we seem to receive from the Tarot, no matter their source, are so deeply romantic. “No matter what a mess your life is in right now, you can do better!” the cards seem to say. “Everything has a good side and a dark side,” they repeat over and over again. “Seek balance,” they urge. I think of my feminist therapist, whom I have not seen in over a year, and feel she would approve of this honest optimism.

My favorite Tarot idea is the lovely, and strangely comforting, notion that the cards in a deck represent the full potential journey of the Fool through the world. When numbered, they reveal a positive progression from a place of ignorance and frequent conflict towards a position of serenity, wisdom and fulfillment. It's a potent reminder that we are all at different points along that journey – as well as of the fact that at any given moment, it's always possible to travel both forwards and backwards.

And where am I right now? The thought makes me smile. I may not be interested in predicting the future, but I’ll sign up for the combination of romance and therapy any day.

“What are you doing next Saturday, Anya?”


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For more photographs from the shoot, go here.