The House With The Lights On
Interpretation & Meaning
The kids know the neighborhood like the back of their hand, yet Summer made it feel brand new. They chase each other speeding on their bikes, off their problems, out of the school routine – time is a box that never gets empty.
As the sun rappels down the sky, familiar voices break the joyful state of trance.
“Betsy!”
“Amir!”
“Giacomo!”
“Yul!”
The pack dissolves like oil into water – tiny ships floating towards their private harbors.
The house with the lights on opens its doors and everything looks in its place.
The empty hallway, the yellow walls, the mirror broken for way too long. The smell of their mother’s food fits their nostrils like a perfectly sized shoe and her wounds are so familiar that even the bleeding feels mundane.
As the kids wash their hands from the dirt, they won’t wash away the memory, the joy and the damage of everything they’re used to call “normal”.
When this card shows up in a reading, you need to look back in order to move forward.
Something from your past is going to either catch your attention or require your care. An old wound may be bleeding into your adult life and its healing cannot be postponed any longer.
It’s time to reconnect with your child- (or maybe teenage-) self and listen carefully to what they have to say. If they’re hurt, you should guide them through the healing process and give them permission to feel better. If they’re happy, maybe they want you to remember how pure you used to be, to ask yourself how you lost that innocence and if there’s any way to channel it again.
In a broader sense, the house with the lights on can be an invitation to celebrate tradition and connect to the history of your country, your family or your social group. Remembering past events might give you a new frame of reference to appreciate the present, question it or start healing collective wounds that were never truly closed.
This is also a card of nostalgia and reminiscence: someone or something from your past might resurface (old friend, ex lover, forgotten foe) and evoke significant memories or feelings.
Keywords: past • childhood • nostalgia • innocence • sentimental • purity • memory • tradition • loss of innocence • trauma • regression • wounded child • scars • childhood neglect • history
Practical References
| Places | Kindergarten, School, Antique Shop, Upholstery Shop, Repair Shop, Second Hand Store, Museum |
| Work | Housekeeper, Historian, School Teacher, Social Service Worker, Family Business, any job having to do with history, tradition or empowering the youth |
| Situations & Life Events | Anything connected to childhood |
| Activities | Genealogy, Collecting Antiques, Restoration |
| Archetypes | The Innocent, The Wounded Child, The Traditionalist |
| Things | Past, Childhood, School Years, Past Relationships, Ex-Lovers |
Homework & Practice
In order to embody the teachings this card, you can:
- Walk down memory lane by going through an old family album (whether physical or digital)
- Read your old journals or anything you wrote in your childhood or teenage years
- Study the history of your region, your family or your social group. If you dig deep enough, you’ll bring to the surface events and traumas that explain the world you inhabit today.
- Have an imaginary conversation with your teenage- or child-self. Are they mad at you? Do they recognize the person that you are today? Do they wish you’d done anything different? What would you like to tell them? What would you have liked them to know back then?
- Have an imaginary conversation with your parents as teenagers and then your age. Tell them everything you would have wanted them to know and try to acknowledge them as people
- Read about personal and generational trauma. Gather information about the ways it can affect your mood, brain and life without you being aware of it. Read about the ways to dismantle it in order to set yourself free.
Ready for your first reading?
