What’s in the cards

At one business I like to frequent, there are two sets of cards sitting on a counter.  These cards have virtues written on them like “patience” or “endurance”, “clarity” or “love”.  And every time I’m there, I like to pull a card from each set as a kind of augury – fortune-telling.  And the night I’m writing this, I pulled the cards “truth” and “desire”.

Well fuck me running.*

The moment I looked at them I felt a tingling in my belly, a feeling that tonight they were not just idle cards.  I felt that they carried a message, moreso** than normal.  But the problem is, I favor perspectives, and I could see multiple messages in those cards.

First, I could see the message of “a desire for truth”, and that fits me to a t.  I’ve always been the kind of person who preferred pursuing truth over happiness.***  I would ponder things until I was unhappy, simply because I wanted to know and understand and did not care how the search for truth affected me.  So in that way, the cards could have been calling me out, and saying my name.

But I also saw a message in the cards about “the truth of a desire”, and that did not sit well with me.  Because there’s someone I feel romantically attracted to these days, and I wondered if the message in the cards was a challenge or command:  “Tell her how you feel!”  Is that what the cards were trying to tell me?

Or is it more complicated still?  Is the message “a desire for the truth about a desire”?  Does that mean I want to tell her, and that’s what I’m seeing in the cards?  Does it mean I want to find out what she feels about me?  Again, should I tell her?  Because, historically, I don’t have a very good record with confessions.  And telling a woman that you’re asking her out because magic cards told you to do it…is crazy talk.  I acknowledge that.****  But I want to know what she’d say – God, do I want to know.

So I thought about it the hour or so I was there.  I tossed it around and around and around inside my head just trying to make sense of it.  What did I really want?  Did I really have a chance with her?  She’s beautiful and talented, and I feel worlds’ awkward with my ridiculous-feeling crush.

Stupid fucking cards – you can just go to hell.

I even spoke to the woman at the attendance desk about this – who handled it quite well because she already knows about my peculiarities with the cards.  But I was fishing for help wherever I could find it, and despite chatting about the cards for a few minutes, our conversation yielded no great revelations.*****  I had been hopeful, but not overly so.  No one else would give me the answer to my question – I had to decide for myself.

So I did not tell her how I felt.  I probably won’t, ever.  Why?  Because the truth of my desire is that I do not have a future with a woman who wears a ring on the fourth finger of her left hand.******  I do not have the right to go snooping around to find out whether or not that ring means what I think it means.  If I care about her, about anyone, I should wish them happiness, and not try to build my own by risking theirs.  I can be her friend, but nothing else.  It’s just not in the cards.*******

And what about my desire for truth?  Well, apparently I need to get laid.  And life seemed to enjoy slapping me in the face with that tonight.

Revelation!  Now let’s go drinking.********

 

* Yes, I do talk like that in real life.  This phrase means bad, bad things have happened or will happen very soon.  How bad?  It’s a you-open-a-door-and-see-the-polar-bear-from-“Lost” level of bad.  Just start running.

** Not correct, but I love this word-that-is-not-a-real-word.  Ain’t it just the best?

*** Also, I am an idiot.

**** I also acknowledge that this would still not top my worst date list.  I have mis-dated SPECTACULARLY.

***** Other than that the cards are a reflection of me, and in that regard they are a pretentious, know-it-all, son-of-a-bitch.  As am I, from time to time.

****** “Wait, are you saying you’re crushing on a married woman?!”  Wait, are you saying you didn’t read ***?

****** I am sure I am going to hell for something in this post, though I’m not sure if it’s Hell hell or pun hell.  I’ll settle for whichever is the lesser of two weevils.

******* Why do I keep using so many footnotes?  I blame that vodka I imbibed earlier.  I usually drink bourbon, but it’s a vodka kind of night.