I"m taking s**t

My friend, Elena, is giving me s**t for not posting since Monday. Honestly, I've been too busy and haven't really had much to report. I told her it was raining outside and, since she lives in Southern California where it hasn't rained in what seems like forever, she told me to take a picture out of a window in my townhouse to remind her of what rain looked like.




So, this is my dog, Frankie - who thinks he's a bad-ass - looking out of our ghetto door and onto the street outside. He was growling at some unseen threat at the time.

While I'm here, I may as well at least talk about something.

Last night we went to a charity event, a Mardi Gras celebration to benefit S.A.F.E.. The charity's founder, Lisa Schmid, is a former employee of Lyon (the real estate company I worked for) and she had asked me to donate my time to design the event's logo, signage, ads, and printed materials, which of course I did willingly. For a first-time event it was awesome - lots of companies had donated their services and goods. There was jambalaya, gumbo, a chocolate tower, martinis, wine and lots more food... for the $45 admission fee you got all this for free, plus a live band, fortune-telling and the opportunity bid on one of 37 different silent-auction items.

I didn't know what to think of Lisa when I worked with her - she seemed a little skittish - but through working with her on this project and learning more about her in the process, I've found a lot to admire about her. She's smart, witty, and a go-getter. She thinks of something she wants to do and then figures out a way to do it; no pontificating, no letting the potential pitfalls deter her. I like people like that and try to consciously surround myself with plenty of them. I tend to be a "think of all the possible outcomes" kind of gal, which in some cases can leave you in action-gridlock. Having people around me who have the tendency to jump in at the deep-end without knowing how to swim yet, puts a fire up my ass. I like to think of myself as a risk-taker in training; I have the desire to take risks but not always the personality and so I'm figuring out, by watching those who do it naturally, how to ignore that pesky cautious streak and dive-in once in a while.

Anyway, this didn't start off about me. Getting back on track. OH THAT'S RIGHT - I had my Tarot Cards read! Ok, I had a few glasses of wine last night, so let's see what I remember of my 15 minutes of foresight. I remember I picked two cards that had "...of the world" in their title, which pleased my travel-lustiness no end. One was "Child of the World" and another was something else, I don't remember. It turns out that neither actually predicted a career as a foreign-travel-writer for me (bummer) but I think at some point I chose to reject whatever psychobabble the fortune teller was spouting and begin interpreting the cards for myself.

It's all a load of rubbish anyway. When I sat down she asked me if there was something on my mind or a question I needed answering and the truth was there wasn't. So I said "No, not at all. I'm just sort of 'up in the air'", meaning that I just didn't have any expectations. Immediately, she leaned in and said "That's interesting. You're feeling up in the air. Tell me about that," which clued me into the fact that she was looking for the hook that would help her interpret the cards to my situation. Phooey, thought I. You're a fortune-teller, not a psychologist. You're supposed to tell ME insightful stuff, not the other way around. So, of course, I clarified and gave her nothing. "Nah, what I meant was that I don't have any expectations, no questions, I'm just interested in what comes out of the cards."

HA! Take that!

I then spent the next 10 minutes enjoying watching her feel her way through the reading carefuly, searching for expressions on my face, verbal or non-verbal cues, SOMETHING to tell her if her words were 'resonating' with me on some level. I had heaps of fun smiling and saying nothing, giving her very little to work with. After three cards and a very general interpretation that could have applied to Osama bin Laden as well as to me, she asked ME to tell her what the cards meant to me. PUUURLEASE. Give me a break. I know this is a free reading but she could at least of taken a leap and tried to fob me off with something a little more concrete.

Anyway, as I said, I was reinterpreting the cards to what I wanted them to be anyway, so I just proceeded to tell her how fascinating it was that I pulled two "...of the world" cards and how this meant travel to me, and how I loved travel, and how this probably meant that I was meant to travel... blah, blah, blah. She loved it and I think I walked away having really made her feel as though she had done a good job.

Kind of a role-reversal there, but still.