Queer Tarot Porject - Two Of Cups

Lee Harrington - Two of CupsFor the Queer Tarot Project - http://queertarot.com/our-stories/When I heard about self-marriage, I couldn’t shake the idea from my mind. I’d been divorced from a man I loved, with one of the final straws between us being the fact that I had decided to transition in the world at large, not just behind closed doors. I do not begrudge him for the difference between bisensuality and walking in the world holding hands with a man. But the idea for why I wanted to marry myself was not just be about trauma. This was different. After all, I can’t get divorced from me, and I have to live with me the rest of my life.The reality was that I didn’t actually like myself very much. My self-relationship was an abusive one – behaviors and words flung at myself that if anyone else had said or done them to me, I would not have stayed. One could even argue that for windows of time I did not stay, dissolving into activities and flights of fancy that took me away from me. Love seemed a long way off. To like me, to love me.It began with dates. Going out to the movies. Heading to the museum. Taking myself out for a meal.Will anyone be joining you m’am, er, sir?No, I’m quite happy in this moment right now by myself.Slowly I meant it. Slowly I became part of me. Finally, I decided to ask me/him to marry me.A gold wedding band, so simple, with five words inscribed inside. Love. Honor. Beauty. Passion. Soul. A gold wedding band… and it sat there on my computer desk for months. Because I thought I might say no. An existential crisis of self-love.I brought the ring with me to San Francisco on a trip for work. I carried it in my purse/satchel/man-bag/non-gendered thing for carrying my stuff in. I/we went down to the ferry building, wandering the little shops. I/we took in the view, the water and soft breeze, the blue skies, the birds flying by. Down by the statue of Mahatma Ghandi, I proposed, and I said yes.That fall I got married out in the woods at an event that I knew lots of friends would be attending. I went alone out into the woods with a mirror, a camera, wine and bread, candles and an audio recorder. I vowed myself to be my spouse, by beloved self. To move myself. I cried. I let the sun stream down through the trees onto my face clutching white spider chrysanthemums to my chest.Leaving the woods, I hosted my own reception with cake for everyone in attendance. A married man.I am bride and groom. Groom and groom. Bride and bride. Spouse and spouse. Lover and beloved.In loving myself, I make room to love others more deeply. The two of cups speaks of love between individuals, but of love within the self as well… and that if we do not love ourselves, we cannot love others to the fullest of capacity. That love begets love.It is not a perfect relationship, and I/we have hard times. Like any relationship. But with a glittering gold ring on my finger, I close my eyes and breathe deep. I/we can do this. I/we are love.