Gebo looks like a capital X and means generosity or giving.  It represents universal love and the willingness to help others.  Drawing this rune may imply that you are about to get a gift from someone.  It may also mean a lucky break or opportunity is about to arise.  One should also be willing to give if asked to do so.  If this is the case, one needs to ask what is right and how often they should give.  To refuse to help others may affect not only one’s future karma, but reputation as well.

In the healing interpretation of the runes, Gebo represents trust.  What is trust outside of a belief that good things can happen, that circumstances and others won’t let you down.  One needs to be able to trust one’s self and believe that the present situation is the right one at the moment.  This is hard to do.

For most of my life, I’d been very unhappy with my situation, always feeling like there’s so much more I could be doing if only given the chance.  It often felt like I’d been cursed, that the universe was intentionally ignoring my desires, just out of spite.  I’d always taken as much as I could out of any situation and not been very grateful.  What had I given in return?  Not much, fleeting moments of humor and compassion at the most. 

In the richest country in history, I lived like a pauper, terrified of taking financial risks, terrified of falling into debt, too full of doubt to ask anyone for help, only willing to help others in the short term, if at all.  What had that netted me?  Almost no friends.  No home.  No base.  No supporters.  No family.  No children.  No career.  Nothing but a few stories and songs, with virtually no one to share them with.  Talk about a lonely way to live.

By the time I got back to Cancun it was past eight o’clock.  I went to buy a ticket for Tulum the next day and the only time they had available was eight in the morning.  It didn’t feel like I was making good decisions.  Even though I’d kicked off my shoes on the bus, my toes were still swollen.  The arthritis had also spread to my right elbow and down to my wrist.  The pain, from out of nowhere, was infuriating and medicine didn’t help.

When I got back to my hotel, there a long line of black ants, probably ten thousand of them, raiding the trash can in the bathroom, and carrying the booty out the front door.  I went out of my way not to step on them.  From high enough, that’s what all of us at Chichen Itza would’ve looked like that day, filing in a procession to the pyramid, returning with souvenirs and selfies, voracious collectors, stocking up on ego.

The next morning, a few of the ants were crushed on the tile floor.  Were they traveling through the bardo now?  How can an ant be good or bad?  They would get what they deserved.