The Portmanteau

Some words cannot stand the distance from one another.

They flirt when in the same chapter of a book, touch when their dictionary pages brush up against each other and if you find them both in the speech you’re giving, it’s like fireworks popping out of your mouth.

Most of these terms don’t get to live their feelings in the open, but some of them do. Picked up by some linguistic god, they’re welded together so strongly that you don’t know where one starts and the other ends. The combination of the two is often bigger and louder than the sum of its parts.

In the book Through the Looking Glass, Humtey Dumpty explains to Alice how slithy means “slimy and lithe” and mimsy is “miserable and flimsy”.

“You see it’s like a portmanteau—there are two meanings packed up into one word.”

From there, the bizarre practice of merging words snowballed into a vehicle for creative association, cultural connection and romantic pairing.

When this card shows up in a reading, it’s time to trust an attraction that feels powerful, inescapable. Whether romantic, spiritual or work-related, there’s a partnership brewing which will be more successful than its individual parts.

You may have to give up a slice of what you call “yourself” in order to embrace it, but the payoff will be worth it. In some cases, the card may symbolize reaching the next level in an existing relationship: achieving intimacy, a stronger connection, a deeper understanding.