The night before I went to see the psychic in Longfellow Square, Cowboy was sure she was going to tell me that he was all wrong for me.
The truth is that, I, too, was nervous. Only I was afraid that she was going to tell me I was dying of cancer. I stayed up all night convinced my recent headaches were a tumor and that I’d have to live with the foreknowledge of my death dispatched to me by some woman in a turban reading tea leaves, cards, and who knows what in my aura.
Lately I’m feeling off. Like months lately. I’m tired. All I want to do is plan my wedding and my engagement party and make save-the-date cards. And even these I don’t want to do with much ambition. In short, my ambition chip got a virus. Work is mounting up, piles of papers flood my office. I’m late with everything and everyone is mad at me. Is it depression? Maybe. It wouldn’t be the first time my life came to a grinding halt because I was depressed. But I think it’s something else. Like ambition hangover. Or a life shift of some kind. Or maybe I’ve taken the wheels off for the first time in years and suddenly I’m collapsing.
So, I called the psychic. I was anxious about the death scenarios playing in Technicolor in my head but I made it through the front door. She had no turban; her hair was bleach-blond. She explained to me that reading my aura or my horoscope would be extra, but that $40 would get my cards read. She did tell me first off, however, that she would not predict death because that was “God’s will.” I guess I somehow thought this was going to be more impressive than a deck of cards and some faith in the guy upstairs for that much money, but I was there wasn’t I? Outside it was dark already and it was only 4 pm. Her dimly lit office picked up the shadows in her face.
I wanted her to tell me something that would click and make perfect sense, that would change the course of my life with such clarity and conviction that I would feel like a new person.
The truth is that maybe psychic’s “reading” can be vague enough that it can relate to anyone’s life, and when I think about it now, I see that everything she said might have been right for the next girl coming in, too. But how did she know I was planning an engagement party? How did she know I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to have kids?
When I got home Cowboy pointed out to me that she posed these theories as questions, like “I see you’re planning a big celebration, right?” Or “You’re afraid you can’t have kids, aren’t you?” She could say that to any woman, he said. And all of them would be afraid they couldn’t have kids if they never had before. So maybe she was just intuitive, which itself is more time than most of the world spends on a single individual narrative. Earlier when her little daughter had come in the room she’d asked me if I had kids and I said no and gave a wry chuckle. Maybe she read my mind in that moment, or, more simply, just read my translucent face.
When I left she said to learn more about me she would need to make candles of me and Cowboy to read our past lives, which would cost $500 — just for materials. Beeswax must be really pricey these days! Or at the very least, she suggested, my horoscope would need to be done for $65.
Nah. I think I’ll stick with wedding planning and naps. Plus, I have an engagement party to worry about!
Email the author
Caitlin Shetterly: bramhallsquare@yahoo.com.
Topics:
Lifestyle Features
, Astrology and Horoscopes
