The Self-Kin · The Standing Thirds

The Riverbed

Drawn as a Barnsley fern. Change the odds on four rules and the whole fern changes.

The Local Rule. Shaping conditions so one action is easiest. This is a Self-Kin figure: one person, repeating one thing. Everything further out in the catalogue is built by fusing figures like this one together.

Tending. The setup makes one action easier and easier, so it happens more often with less thought..

Fraying. The setup steers less, so the action takes more effort and happens less often without thought..

Its Turning. Plant. What it builds: environment takes over work willpower was doing.

Catalogued in The Self-Kin, alongside every other figure at this scale.

In a Weaving

Tending

Your setup makes one action easier each time, so it happens more, with less thought.

Fraying

Your setup steers you less, and that action takes more effort and comes less often.

Tending is not good news, and Fraying is not bad news — a card describes a pattern already present, never an outcome. How to read the two.

Or follow a thread instead

A Standing Third

The Arrangement

Each person shaping the other's surroundings instead of asking directly. The right thing made easy, or two people quietly managing each other.

Part Five — The Standing Thirds

Twelve patterns one person generates alone, each with its Local Rule and both of its poles. Nothing sits underneath them, and every larger figure is built by fusing these.

Part Seven — The Turnings

The Twelve Private Turnings — Self

One per month, kept alone or with whoever's nearest — twelve small occasions, each built to make one Self-Kin's failure mode visible before it hardens.

Part Six — Weavings

The full working deck: fifty-two drawable figures across five kinships, each carrying two readings — plus one figure that's never drawn at all.

Part Five — The Standing Thirds

Nineteen two-person patterns, each one two Self-Kin meeting. Know any two of the three and the third follows, which means changing your own leg changes what the two of you make.