Blogtrek

What's your playing card deck like?

Well first the Iraqi regime was defeated. And Saddam Hussein, Tariq Aziz, and all the others are killed, captured or something else happened to them. Then all at once the news takes a strange twist: we hear that the five of clubs is captured, that the King of clubs may have escaped to Syria and so forth. It's as though we were like Alice in Wonderland, when she challenges a whole card deck that has arisen around her. Well at least Saddam was dealing with a full deck, or so the military with their card deck issued to soldiers would have us believe. Maybe they should have left out the two of clubs.

But this is an interesting idea. Represent a collection of people by playing cards. How about the people in your life? Find four classifications of people and 13 types of people in each classification and you have yourself a card deck. So I tried that. I chose these four categories (determined partially by Maslow's hierarchy): Spades, the necessary and irksome, what has to be done. Hearts, the love in my life. Clubs, those who have helped me to success, and Diamonds, those who have inspired me the most.

For the ranks, I let the ace represent the top person in my life in that category. The King then represents the top man, unless he is the ace, in which case, the second top man. The Queen is then the top woman, unless she's the ace, in which case the second woman. The Jack or Jane then represents the most unusual, fool-like or trickster-like person in my life in that category. The 10 is the person who has enabled me the most in the category, and the 9 is the best teacher (unless they rank higher). I divide my life into 8 acts, so I let the 2-8 represent the top person in that category in that act of my life.

Some examples: the five of diamonds is the person who inspired me the most in my Fifth Act (i.e., when I was around 30). The Queen of Spades is the woman who most represented the necessary things in my life. The 9 of hearts is the woman who has given me the best teaching in love in my life, and so forth. I am not going to tell any of these here, except I will say that the Ace of Spades is my father, who died in 1999; he represents the necessary because he fought in World War II, which needed to be done but I hope it is never repeated again.

So what is your card deck like? Who in your life is part of your deck of living?