The Awful Vista of the Year - the Fantod Pack of Edward Gorey

'Close your eyes,' said Davina.  'And hold out your hands.'
I'd only popped into Number Seven to buy a sympathy card.  It was the first time I'd been out the house (apart from going to the gym) for a week.  But my little halogen heater had broken (this one has lasted all of three months) and it was warmer out than in.
Anyhow. I duly held out my chillblained, frostbitten paws, and felt something being laid onto them. Well, a vague sensation approaching feeling.
Something rectangular, a slim box the size of a large playing card.  As my eyes focused, I recognised the drawing and yelped with excitement.

The Fantod Pack by Edward Gorey.

'Oh my God!' I squeaked.
'It's a present,' said Davina.  Yay! I love presents. Having a birthday at the fag-end of Christmas means I don't score high in the present-receiving stakes and, if I do, I tend to get fobbed off with everyone else's unwanted Christmas gifts.  So unexpected, unusual and hugely welcome ones like this are triply appreciated.

I love Edward Gorey. As in, ever so slightly obsessed.  Have been so ever since my brother gave me a desk diary with his illustrations way back in the 80s.

How could anyone not love them, I wonder?  Lugubrious, with a humour the shade of bruises.
Anyhow.  The Fantod Pack is Gorey's legendary (piss)take on tarot.  First published in a limited edition in 1995 and long out of print - it consists of 20 cards with odd arcana such as The Limb, The Effigy, The Insects, The Bundle and The Burning Head.
'Don't you want to know what dreadful things lie in wait for you?' it asks.  Of course!

Instructions for use:  'To read your fortune, first shuffle the pack and take it in your left hand. Stand in the centre of a sparsely furnished room and close your eyes.  Fling the pack into the air.  Keep your eyes closed. Pick up five cards from the floor, keeping them in order.'  And so on, and so forth. Okay, let's do it...

Right.  So it seems I have thwarted ambitions and foot trouble in my past (so true). My inner self is a waltzing mouse (morbid cravings, brawls, involuntary seclusion, vertigo and shrivelling) - scary true.  My outer world involves unstable furniture, paranoia and loss of money (aaagh, stop it, Gorey!).  And my future involves a forged letter, false arrest, anemia and loss of teeth.  Now how cheeering is that?

Want me to read your future?  Just say the word (Yes!) and I'll pluck a card for you from my floor.


Pics from lioninthesunps.com - apart from the one of my diary, obviously.