Live Blogging From SF BATS 2012

Yesterday was pretty intense and I was afraid I’d be beat today. But with a good night’s sleep and a hearty breakfast under my belt, I was ready for just about anything. And I needed to be – today had a few surprises and a lot of fun in store for me.

Day Two of SF BATS began with a hilarious performance, “The Revival” featuring Nancy Antenucci, Dan Pelletier and Rhonda Lund. The zany trio did a mock tarot evangelist skit that had the audience rolling with laughter. At one point, Nancy became a “tarot altar” for Dan’s preacher character! The energy was very up and light afterwards which set a nice tone as we went off to the day’s classes.

The Revival!

The first class I took today was “Seeing With Different Eyes” by Carrie Paris. I’ve heard good things about Carrie over the years and always wanted to take a class with her. I was very pleased to finally have the chance – and I was not disappointed. Carrie is a very polished and engaging speaker – plus her information is deep and different. We looked at tarot and non-tarot images and she discussed how we could work with clients to uncover deep insights using four levels of symbolic understanding. This was heady stuff and there was a lot to process. Carrie also handed around a tuning fork and encouraged us to tap it and then put it to our third eyes to activate a sound. When I did this, I heard “OM”. (No surprise since I am a yogi.)

Carrie Paris

We took a short lunch break and I headed out for some Italian with one of my favorite tarot people, Joanna Powell Colbert (Gaian Tarot). Over sangria and salads we began to talk a bit about the Lenormand deck. (For those not in the know, it’s an older deck that has become very popular as of late.) I was torn between a palmistry class with Kooch Daniels and a Lenormand class with Mary Greer. I was leaning towards Kooch’s class but Joanna piqued my interest so I decided I would attend Mary’s instead.

Mary Greer tempts us with the Lenormand

And I will earnestly say that it was the highlight of the conference for me. I have been very reluctant to get into the Lenormand craze – mainly because my tarot brain is already pretty full. When would I have time for another type of deck? But after listening to Mary’s talk, I was convinced that I HAD to get into it. Mary broke it down in a way that sold me. (And of course, I ran off to purchase Marcia McCord’s “Dust Bunny Lenormand” immediately once I saw the images on the slideshow. Mary needs to get a commission! LOL)

The last class I chose was Toni Gilbert’s “Archetypes and Developmental Psychology”. Toni presented her unique method to help understand where clients were in their developmental journey. This was a lot to take in – but she was wise to end on a nice meditation which was a way to experience some of the information she shared with us.

Toni Gilbert prepping for her lecture.

We headed into the main room for raffle giveaways (I didn’t win anything – bummer!) and another riotous performance with Nancy, Dan, Rhonda, Thalassa and Sue Wilhite as “The Amazing Traveling Tarot Medicine Show”. This little piece consisted of a tongue and cheek look at professional tarot dos and don’ts, zany predictions from the Rhinestone Priestess and Dan wiggling out of a straightjacket!

Dan Pelletier is fit to be tied!

Professional reader skit with Thalassa, Nancy and Rhonda.

Sue Wilhite in rhinestones and making predictions.

And then just like that, BATS was over and we were all saying our goodbyes. The hardest part is leaving my tarot friends – but I look forward to seeing them all again soon.