Fortune Teller

Although part of me feels there are forces in the universe beyond rational explanation, I never fully believed in the supernatural. Just like my position on the existence of God, my take on the supernatural is that anything is possible, however improbable it might be. A few times in my life, something seemingly supernatural and has made me tilt the scales of doubt towards the side of belief. I once saw a shadow person walk into the room where I was sleeping, stop next to my futon on the floor, then vanish just before it attacked me. I have heard the most hideously demonic laughter in my mind and felt the intense sensation of falling after I had allowed sleep paralysis to take over instead of fighting it like I usually did. My mom told us the story of how she saved her friend Rose from being slowly poisoned to death by seeing it happen to her in a dream that turned into a daytime hallucination. Once, while lying on my bed as a boy, I had a sudden and very realistic vision of myself standing on stage in front of tens of thousands of people. Later the vision came true. On the day that I found the house I live in now, I was filled with an overwhelming sense of having been there before. It felt like I was returning home. Each of these incidents has made me question the existence of the supernatural. Of course, I know that all of them could have simply been a trick of the mind since our minds are very good at making up reality. There is no way to know for sure.

Yesterday, I met a fortune-teller who reads the state of existence and possible futures of people by using tarot cards. She said she has been doing it for 15 years. I was skeptical because fortune telling tends to be full of generalizations that could apply to anyone. Any clever observer of people can pick up details that reveal personality traits that inform the fortune-telling process. So, when she dealt the cards, I was skeptical. I fully expected some mumbo jumbo that I could dismiss as nonsense. I was wrong.

Every card she picked up told a story of me. What’s fascinating is her reading wasn’t a chronological recollection of historical and future events. It was more like a description of my life condition. Since I haven’t lived the future yet, I don’t know how accurate her predictions will be, but if they are as informed as her readings of my present, then I have a few things to look forward to.