Chateau De Charras, France Tarot

When people ask: How did you end up in an old Castle in the Charente region of France?

My short answer is “Amor Fati: Amor fati is a phrase that may be translated as "love of fate or love of one's fate.” Used to describe an attitude in which one sees everything that happens in one's life, including suffering and loss as good, or at the very least, necessary. I've always been a “psychogeographer”. A term coined by Alan de Bord, a clever Frenchman, to describe a sensualist who likes to ferret out nooks and crannies, secret passageways in a landscape.

That is me...walking down the narrow ancient roads here, "whistling down the wind", slipping around the corners of buildings as well as my own psyche. Amor Fati is also associated with “eternal recurrence” - the idea that, over an infinite period of time, everything recurs infinitely.

Years before we landed here, a channel told us we had a lifetime together in la belle France, "married with many children"--a happy life, but a busy one in which we had only scraps of time for each other. He said we'd come back to continue the nocturnal conversation of marriage, and so we did.

We were “Guardiennes de Maison” (house sitters) for several years in various regions in France. The series of events leading us to “The Tower” at the Chateau de Charras could fill a Penguin Pocket Book!

I had been searching for a “Tarot Tower” from the moment our feet touched onto French soil. Ultimately, we chose an apartment in Le Chatelard (the Chateau, a co-propriete) contains 23 renovated apartments – many used as holiday rentals). Built in the 18th c. (1722) its history, held within the stone walls, is rich and multilayered. I'm always learning more. When I leaned out the window of the apartment we were considering for purchase, I heard the church bells ringing, and saw a Murmuration of Starlings (a symbol of unity and communication) – the birds having learned, as I was learning, we are always stronger together than alone.

Later, while walking the grounds, before signing the final papers, I found a tattered Marseille Tarot card (The Magician – Le Bateleur) near the pond which leads to a hidden corridor connecting the Chateau to the Eglise Saint-Vivien, the fortified 12th c. church. The first of many divine interventions.

The Chateau Orchard's siren song drew me in with its bountiful 300-year-old fruit trees, Cherry, Apple, Pear, Quince, along with the avenues of Lyme Trees, buckets of Elderflowers, Lavendar and old Roses.

I named many of the Trees after the Tarot cards: The Emperor, the Empress, the Hierophant. I kept hearing this phrase: “Learn my heart what any tree can tell you.” I knew then I had found my “forever” home. I've made Rosehip's tea, Elderflower cordial, Cherry Brandy, Apple tarts till the cows come home.

I love the simple village life - the Artisan statue down the road embodying the Old-World traditions & the timeless connections to the earth. I grew up on a farm in the middle of a corn field in Illinois with chickens, horses, fruit trees & a similar farming ethic, so I'm right at home.

And the MAGIQUE has never ceased! nor have the Tarot readings...I've been Summoning the Muse to the Stone table, to the Orchard, the Garden (the Faeries meeting place) and my apartment for over 14 years...(as well as reading for the local Brocantes, Markets and Fetes).

The Tarot cards have been luminous and healing for me and for those who enter the front gates. In this grand old Chateau, ripe with history and mystery, I am fulfilling my destiny and helping others to fulfill theirs.