The Confusion of Tongues
When communication is lost
It’s been a minute. It has been so hard, getting words on the paper screen, trying not to have my writing just be a hot personal mess of emptional outpouring. I’m putting these words down with trepidation, as I’m on new ground, new terrirotry, attached yet unattached, unmoored yet bound.
I’ve written about The Tower card here a few times, the card which provokes as much anxiety as any other in the deck (along with The Devil and Death). When The Tower card comes up, change is coming or has arrived, whether you like it or not. Something must change in order for new seeds to be planted, new ways of being to emerge. Although the representation in the Rider Waite Smith deck resonates back to the Tower of Babel story, I’ve only recently understood it more deeply in terms of the “Confusion of Tongues” Gustave Dore depicts above, the deep anguish which results from not being understood. The story goes that the people decided to build a tower so tall it would reach God in the heavens, so they could reduce the space between themselves and God. God didn’t like that and took them down a notch (or hundreds of feet) by making them speak in varied tongues. Where once they could all understand each other using one language, now there were many and the people were confused and humbled. They were unable to finish the building because they could not communicate with each other, scattered to new lands, and there we have the explanation for why there are different languages.
The Tower can also be a metaphor for people in relationship who have lost the ability to communicate with each other in healthy ways. Every conversation ends on a sour note. Each exchange is a misunderstanding. It’s exhausting and disheartening. Yet you keep coming back for more because you both believe there is something more to be said, confusion to clear, a desire for a happy ending. The Tower reminds us that sometimes you have to burn down the whole building, and try again. And what if you find you no longer have a common language? How do you build one? That is the fear and anguish in The Tower. The fear of what might not be possible.
I didn’t watch a single Oscar nominated movie before yesterday. After Anora received so many accolades I decided to give it a whirl. I’m glad I did. The desire for a common language is a central theme in the film, the desire to be able to communicate with ease in one’s mother tongue. In fact the event which sets the scene for the rest of the movie is a customer’s request for a girl (a stripper) who speaks Russian, his native language. This desire for easy communication, not fraught with misunderstanding is key to so many other themes in this film. The flip side of communicating with only those who know your language is key as well, shutting out those not in the know. I found it completely engaging.
I find myself wanting a new language. Not Italian or Japanese, but a language that can clearly communicate the alignment between my heart's desire and my mind's intention. Not easy stuff when I find it impossible to form the thoughts which lead to my speech, what it is I want to say but can’t. Sometimes it’s so much easier to speak what we don't want, how we don't want to live. What is untenable.
Right now I'm living alone with my three old pets: Freya the Newfoundland who is ten, Cadet the retired Lab guide dog, fifteen, and Junior, the eighteen year old “cat who won't die.” I'd be lying if I said it's not peaceful, quiet, alone with my thoughts as confusing as they themselves might be. I haven’t lived without another human since I was twenty-one years old. I'm going back to therapy in person on Monday, the first time since before the pandemic. Zoom is so easy and in some sense has made therapy too easy, but I think something is lost which I hope to find. I'm anxious about it though. It feels vulnerable. But I am brave.
What do I want? How do I want to live what’s left of my life? How is it possible these are my questions in 2025? That may be the hardest part, accepting the unmooring. Accepting that this must be happening for some cosmic reason I am not yet privy to. I’m studying with Heather Marie Morse right now, forty-two days of digging into the astrology of right now, the Venus and Mercury retrogrades, eclipse season, meditating on the alignment of desire (Venus) and communication (Mercury). Astrology is still so foreign to me, yet it is a container for faith, provides a reason why the unfolding is as it is, and this grounds me, as I learn to accept what is. This might sound glib or cliche but as a person who hasn’t spent a lot of time in faith or prayer, it is an opening for a practice of acceptance and not accepting the status quo all at once. I think confusion of tongues starts with a single solitary person alone, before I try to communicate with someone else. Untangling the confusion of tongues begins right here on this piece of screen paper. My dad says, just write. So here I am, untangling my confusion of tongues.
Love, Hanna xo
I feel the very same way about both Tarot and Astrology, it helps my analytical mind understand that unfolding, as you explain. I have nothing more than nods and an urge send you a hug and some motherwort tincture to help find a loving center. Thank you for taking the time to write, I am always better off on the other end of your essays. xo
Thanks for your update Hanna. Your words came through with clarity and a lot of strength. Both are so important when the Tower card presents itself. In my own journey, it is the vulnerability and surrender you describe embracing that was most helpful. I also found the mantra, "how is this good?" and sometimes "how the fuck is this good? to be so helpful, often making me laugh because I could see my resistance and a need to humbly be. Hugs.