October 1 - 7, 2011 ~ Ship of Fools

Ship of Fools
Brian Williams
Llewellyn, 2002

At SF BATS, there is a cauldron of loose cards at the door.  Each day, one draws a card of the day.  On my second day, I drew the 8 of Staves from the Ship of Fools.  My interpretation based solely on first impressions of the images was that I would have some difficulty with TSA on my flight home.

And I did.  Nothing serious.  But after BATS, I was coming home with many more decks than I had left with.  And I had taken such care to pack them.  Unfortunately, they looked like suspicious bundles of either C4 or cocaine.   I was pulled aside and my bag unpacked.  When they reached the carefully packed tarot cards, I could see their faces.  He showed them to a supervisor.  I guess I shouldn’t have brought the Wormweird...

Anyway, they were finally convinced that I was not going to use the tarot decks for ill and gave me my stuff back.  What a mess.  Took 20 minutes to pack it all up! 

Earlier in the day, I was talking to an member at Aeclectic Tarot who goes by the moniker of “Asher.”  Asher is a shameless enabler and told me that this deck was available at New Age Discount Books for ten bucks!  Ten Bucks! Woot!  I bought it (and a few others, of course). 

So that is how I ended up with the deck.  And in retrospect,  the 8 of Staves really doesn’t have anything to do with travel and whatnot, but that Fool jumping out at the innocent woman &child really made me think of TSA....

The deck is one of those short, squat types.  Rather think card stock and heavy laminated with essentially the same stuff used to grease greased hogs.   The cards are SLIPPERY!! Because of their larger girth, I had a hard time holding on to them.  But then again, it just seemed to follow.   Every shuffle ended up being a game of 78 Card Pick Up.  And I could hear the cackle of a Fool in the background!

The book, being by Brian Williams, is well written and informative.  I am not sure if he ever wrote a book that wasn’t. 

As a reading deck it is a wonderful deck.   I got off to a rough start, got better acquainted and then finished off nicely.  It is important to note that a deck full of Fools is going to have a different style!   Alot of the times when there was a "negative" card, it was the Fool who was essentially doing it to himself, whether it be ineptitude, carelessness, or just willful ignorance. 

I was trying to be all serious and studious with this deck because I misread it from the beginning.  My first reading with the deck was the deck interview. First impressions are not always right!  I had to throw out some preconceived notions during the week!

This is a high quality deck, as all decks by Brian Williams.  It is well thought out and intelligent.  This one just has the added bonus of having a wicked sense of humour. 


Rating: Keeper+