Decan Walk in UE5: Cancer and Leo (Failing Harder)
I fell off the wagon for Cancer. And scrambled back on for Leo.
In Decan Walk — Aries I, I broke down my plan: perform a Decan Walk (following along with Susan T. Chang’s 36 Secrets) as a 365-day-long game jam, creating a new “platform” for each Decan every ten days.
See the other essays here: Aries II and III, Taurus I, II, and III, Gemini I, II, and III, and herein begins the sorry-ass tale of Cancer I, II, III, and Leo I, II, and III.
Cancer I
This is one where the image of the minor arcana, the two of cups so perfectly encapsulates my understanding of the card itself, that I had a hard time thinking of more to ‘say’ about it (especially since I was wrapping up my summer class and needed to focus on Unity Engine a little more.)
But I started thinking about the Caduceus-Lion as the “magical child” of the couple in the image and their cups, that it isn’t the two individuals together that is significant, but the third ineffable thing that their coming together creates. This third thing, this alchemical child, requires them to remain separate, even as they are joined in a toast, and this is deeply beautiful and profound to me.
It was sort of an impulse to ‘dress’ the scene more, but I added Isis and Osiris to the entrance, and a small Horus over the open gateway where the viewer can walk through to the other side. The arches are both a “wall” and “window”, the necessary separation of two things even as it joins them.
I really wish I’d spent more time on this scene, because I feel like there are details I could have tucked into that would have made it richer. I finished it this morning (6/30/23) and cooked and built the game in the afternoon.
But in between my husband and I went on a hike to a nearby tower (we’re on Lake Como, Italy, on an honest-to-god vacation). Our son was sleeping in (teenagers, doncha know) and my partner and I have been navigating the awareness that our relationship is necessarily shifting as our son gets closer to adulthood and my husband approaches retirement. My interest in magic and the occult is almost all-consuming — but it’s an interest he doesn’t share and this has been a point of discomfort for us for several years. But we are both aware that change is the natural state of everything in the universe, and that we, too, must change and adapt to the shifting circumstances around us. So we’ve been trying to remember how we travel together and are learning that it’s both the same and completely different.
Anyway, my husband loves hiking mountains. For him, the reward is the vista. I, on the other hand, could really skip it! I love hiking in the woods, don’t get me wrong. Adore it. But the equivalent of 150 flights of stairs before noon is just a lot more than my inefficient girl hips and legs really wanted.
Like any couple that’s been together for a hot minute, we’re figuring out our compromises. Jeff will find less grueling hikes. And I’m going along and muscling through because it makes him happy to have company.
Nothing is certain. Mutual compromise might not be good enough. But we’ll cross that bridge if we have to — it’s just one activity, not the entirety of our relationship. And we’re both complex people with complex inner and outer lives. Hiking up mountains? It will only ever be just one very small facet of the whole.
Anyway, we hiked up this mountain, which wasn't as high as Jeff would have liked, and much steeper than I would have liked (and, like a nerd, I had to pick up trash as I went, including some used condom wrappers. Gross. That felt appropriate to what the two of cups is not about.)
When we got to the top, the old stone tower was locked up and closed for renovation. Jeff, lover of climbing to the tops of towers and photographing vistas, was crestfallen and miffed. We sat on a step, shared a granola bar, and I listened as he vented, both of us knowing it was a small thing. But sharing the time alone together, being on this mountain in another country, and sharing a granola bar — it was both ordinary and extraordinary.
Suddenly we heard the shrill complaints of raptor babies. Looking up, we saw a European Kestrel beating her wings as she left a scrape, high in a small window in the tower. She glided out, almost stooped a moment as she tucked razor-sharp wings, and then glided to the edge of the mountain, coasting kite-like on the strong breeze before wheeling out beyond the sight, out to catch more lizards for her hungry babies.
I was thrilled (I’m a licensed falconer) and excitedly confirmed the bird ID on my phone. Jeff was excited for me. Falconry isn’t his thing, just as hiking up mountains isn’t mine. But he rambled around the hillcrest to try and catch another glimpse of the falcon.
Who doesn’t love a murder bird? And this was our Red Lion, our Horus.
There we were, not sharing one cup, but sharing two. We each had our own — but we also had them together.
An hour later we were having beers at a patio restaurant on the bottom of the mountain. As is our habit, we said cheers, and then each took a sip. Then we exchanged beers, to share together the diversity of beer in the world, to share the cup of the other. And then we switched back, each finishing our own beers.
The two of cups is more, it is the mysterious, brilliant, changeable third thing that hovers over the table between us. It is both of us and not us. It is a third thing, and a thing that simply wouldn’t be if the two of us weren’t two.
Cancer II, Cancer III, Leo I, and Leo II
[Watch Cancer II through Leo II here.]
Whelp. It was bound to happen. I fell off the wagon. Between summer travel, birthdays, anniversaries, and work on my next podcast series starting, this Decan Walk officially fell off the rails. I went back and added empty platforms and the astrological signs and degrees, but that’s it.
Leo III
[Watch Leo III here (starting around 0:50)]
I’m a firm believer in taking up when you can, when you can.
Leo III got short shrift: a NASA rocket, and an audio track, both quick nods to the Tower and Strength, but that’s it. I’m giving myself permission to be subpar.
It’s a little hard to say how the future decans will look, and I’m sure I’ll fall off the wagon again. Budgeting a few hours every Sunday may have to be “good enough” for the next few months. Barring complications, I hope to come back to this project next year, fill in the gaps and improve on it.
But for now I’ll look to Virgo I in a few days.
