| UNDER THE SUN | ECOtarot from p 11 knew she owned a tarot deck. “I discovered that it shifted some relationships because some people didn’t want to hear what the cards had to say.” Six years ago, during an artist residency in Italy, the concept of ECOtarot occurred to her. “I was out walking and this whole idea of our climate futures came to me, fully formed. It took me two more years to make the ECOtarot deck, and in 2017 I be- gan offering public ECO-readings.” Jenik’s deck is based on the standard tarot, with the main symbols shifted to re- flect what she calls “our climate drama.” She made the deck herself, of agave paper and recycled cotton linen, at the ASU paper- mill, then showed it to the university’s cli- mate scientists. They approved the project. “It’s a mashup of climate science with traditional tarot meanings, so 22 of the cards are archetypal — The Lovers, Justice, The Empress, these kind of cards. But other cards I’ve shifted, so The Fool is The Artist, The Chariot is The Bicycle, The Wheel of the Future is The Life Cycle. In the other set of cards, I’ve changed out the typical suits, so the sword is air, the cup is water, the discs are earth.” Jenik’s deck creates new layers of meaning that reflect and comment on 21st- Courtesy Adriene Jenik You sure you want to know? century ecology. “It’s really a system that uses the tarot as a way to engage about the climate disruption we’re undergoing,” she said. “I see tarot as both an intuitive system and a guidance system, but also as a useful technology to shift our thinking, our grooves of thought.” She figured she’d done about 1,000 readings, at farmers’ markets and anywhere she could set up a little table and chairs. The pan- demic put an end to that. And do- ing ECOtarot readings via Zoom was quite different, Jenik said. At first, she wasn’t sure she even wanted to. “It just didn’t make sense to read tarot online,” she said. “Then I was listening to the wonderful eco- feminist Joanna Macy give a talk about what she called ‘the great turning.’ About all the uncertainty in the world right now, with the cli- mate, and politics, and now we have a health pandemic. And I thought, That’s what I want to do — help people through that process of living in uncertain times.” She found that online ECOtarot reading created what she calls “a certain kind of mindfulness.” Al- though she is able to concentrate while reading tarot in public, she said, she is al- ways aware of the line forming a few feet away. Online, she could focus more easily on clients with no distractions. Either way, you never know who’s going to show up. “I’ve had an air conditioning repairman sit down, followed by an engi- neer of the major solar grid in Australia, then a group of biker chicks get off their motorcycles and sit down, one by one.” Jenik has lately been thinking a lot about “ecological grief,” which she sees as a kind of anticipatory grief about our envi- ronment. “People see what they’re losing,” she said, “and they’re carrying a deep sad- ness about it. The coral reef is being bleached out, forests and deserts are being stricken by wildfire, there’s a loss of spe- cies. We’re learning how to live with that and not let it sink us.” Meanwhile, the pandemic continues to show up in Jenik’s tarot readings. “Always in air cards,” she pointed out, “because CO- VID is airborne. Readings have changed to reflect the racial reckoning we’ve been go- ing through this year, the issues with land reparations. People are carrying so much. Sometimes they sit down for a reading and just start weeping.” She expects to see more of that when she returns to in-person ECOtarot read- ings in the fall. “But that’s the beauty of this practice,” Jenik said. “I’m not just there to engage their minds or tell them what’s go- ing to happen next. Sometimes it’s just about being together while we talk about the world.” 13 phoenixnewtimes.com | CONTENTS | FEEDBACK | OPINION | NEWS | FEATURE | NIGHT+DAY | CULTURE | FILM | CAFE | MUSIC | PHOENIX NEW TIMES JUNE 24TH – JUNE 30TH, 2021
