Reclining behind Elena, our bodies lying opposite one another, I could feel the warmth from the back of her calf through my socks as I sipped my wine and grew more comfortable with my surroundings. She noticed what I’d always assumed was social anxiety–at least that’s what my ex-wife labeled it–as something different. According to the books, some people possessing fragile nervous systems hold a condition labeled Highly Sensitive by psychologists, and she thought that its description suited me better. Of course, I disagreed, citing my ability to survive rigorous schooling at the U.S. Naval Academy and thirty years battling it out in the financial arena as proof negative. Overcompensation was her one-word response to that. I dismissed all of this, but it got me thinking about all the times I’d left parties early or sought refuge from crowds, loud sounds, and anything that annoyed me–lots of things! Even if she were mistaken, I began to appreciate her giving me the freedom and space to warm up to new information or suggest quieter places to go without hassle.
About an hour into the party, I noticed an old woman slide in through the front door wearing a burgundy gown that looked as old as her. Maybe she’d forgotten to wear a costume or maybe that was her costume–hard to tell. Her dark eyes were like those of a falcon, set back far into her skull, and it felt as though they were locking on to mine. I glanced away. I had long tuned out Elena’s conversation into a muffle, but I wasn’t in the mood to leave or to meet anyone new. I was happy with the bottle of wine that I kept tilting into my glass, with the slow aim of getting drunk. Elena glanced over at me a few times to make sure I was still there, and I would wink or do something else to acknowledge her presence. I heard lots of laughing inside the kitchen where the Fairy Godmother and a few others were standing behind a screen that separated it from the main room.
Before I knew it the woman in the burgundy dress was upon us. She knew Elena, of course, and came over to embrace her. I stood up as well, setting my glass down in a free spot on the bookshelf next to us. Earlier, I perused it looking for books that might catch my interest. They were all titled The Power of Now, The Way of the Peaceful Warrior and other ones that seemed like psycho-babble self-help books. Elena introduced the woman as Agatha, and I felt those eyes sink into mine like gigantic hooks. Her hand felt very cold to the touch, and it was so bony that it conjured up images of ghost stories about witches and other women that haunt little boy’s dreams. Yet, she had a tenderness to her, and gave me an inquisitive nod while searching my face with curiosity. I was courteous to her, but did my best to sit back down and hide out in my little corner behind Elena. My instincts were correct about her–she was a witch. Had I not gotten drunk I could have easily avoided what happened later.
It was about three hours in, when most of us were either giddy or tired as the party hit that inevitable juncture where enough people went home to make the few who stayed more devoted to squeezing the last bit of fun out of it. I yearned to be on the list of those leaving, feeling my attraction to Elena swell and a desire to get her alone. Of course, she suffers from FOMO: Fear of Missing Out, and I was stuck there with the Fairy Godmother, Agatha, and somebody dressed as a Crash Dummy who had a mask painted on so thick I couldn’t see the real person. He didn’t say much, anyway, and the three of them were busy kneeling at a small table where Agatha had been turning over cards for the past hour. I’d been just out of earshot from the whispers of the people coming up to the table, but I could tell she’d been giving them important information while discussing the cards. Sometimes I’d see a face light up in joy, while at other times they were bathed in sadness or some other emotion that seemed extreme. Elena and I drifted over to them, and I asked what was going on. Elena whispered that she was a psychic working with a tarot deck. Agatha looked up at us, and I assumed Elena was going to sit down across from her. She nudged me over and after declining a few times, I felt myself slide down across from Agatha, a little amused at what might happen.
Agatha made sure my eyes stayed with hers, remaining very still and attentive. She then took a long, slow deep breath and asked to see the palms of my hands. I set my drink down and indulged her, casting a glance up at Elena and rolling my eyes in slight embarrassment. I made a crack about not believing in this sort of thing, and Agatha dismissed it with grace, telling me that believing was not a prerequisite: “only a willingness to be read.” Her voice sounded distant when she said this, and I felt a tingling in my hands when she touched them. Hers were still cold and I wondered why that was–maybe she was half dead already. She appeared to be in a trance or something. The creepiness sent shivers up my spine.
“Now, I’m going to turn over three cards. The first is where you’ve been. The second is where you are now. The third, of course, is where you are headed.” She shuffled the deck and flipped over a card faster than an Atlantic City dealer. It was of a man in robes and a flat crown sitting down, holding a circle, with another on top of his head and two below his feet. Each of them inscribed with a star. Behind him lay a small city. “The Four of Pentacles,” she muttered. “As you see, the man here is hoarding, making sure no one touches his coins–clutching them for dear life, fearing loss. He cannot move because his feet are too busy holding the coins down. He is tied to his possessions and cannot do anything else. As you can see from the eyes, they are tired. He is tired. Yet, he is also smiling, betraying self-satisfaction over his accomplishments.” I shot Elena a scornful look. She said nothing, just placing a warm hand on my shoulder as I turned back to Agatha, who took in a deep breath and began speaking again. “This is where you’ve been Harry. How you coped with the past, doing what was necessary for your survival.”
She turned over a second card with the words The Tower on it. It was a dark and ghastly image of a tower on fire with lightning bolts striking it, a golden crown tumbling off the top and people leaping to their deaths. Just great, I thought, already feeling swept up in the moment. For all my steadfastness in weighing risks at the bank and making prudent choices, I must admit that I could be gullible when it came to the occult. Even though part of me passed it off as rubbish, I still had another part that believed there to be some truth in it. When no one was looking I read my daily horoscope each morning, hoping for a five-star day. Anything less than four stars and I didn’t bother reading it. Deep down, all that stuff gave me the heebie-jeebies.
“This can’t be good!” I blurted out in a half-joke, downing the rest of my wine.
“I don’t place any judgment on the cards, Harry. Indeed, Mars has come to shake up your world. It is time. This card is one of transformation, which will come after the destruction of ambitions built on false premises. Remember, the Universe only brings about change when we are ready for that change–even if we don’t think we’re ready for it. Old towers need to be destroyed so new structures can be erected that fit our new selves, our transformed selves. The best thing to do is surrender to it. Just surrender.”
“My life is going fine, so I’d say you’re one for one at best on the cards, Agatha.”
“The cards don’t lie.” She gave me a pitying look and then turned over a third card. “Five of Cups… very interesting….”
“I’ve had at least four cups of wine, so maybe the card’s saying I need one more.”
“It wouldn’t hurt,” she teased and we both laughed. “But as you can see, three cups are overturned on the card. There are two yet to be filled. So, if you’re not driving, you could fill them both.” She paused and then her voice lost its playfulness, taking on a dark tone. “You know, Harry, you will need that humor to help you weather the storm. You see this figure in the black cloak? He is dealing with great loss and looking down in despair. If you look closely, he is focused on the three fallen cups and doesn’t see the two behind him waiting to be filled. So, no matter what happens, don’t forget to look around you. Off in the distance is the bridge that will take him back over the fast-moving river and home again. So, don’t forget the cups, and don’t forget the bridge.”
“OK, wi
ll do,” I said in a conciliatory tone. I made to stand up, but her hand motioned for me to stay where I was.
“But there is one more thing here. If you noticed, when I initially turned the card over, it was upside down.”
“It matters which side they come up?” I’m sure she detected the incredulity in my voice.
“Absolutely. Everything matters in this world. Not just in the cards. In everything. Everyone you meet is important. Every sign you pass is a marker on the path.”
“So what does it mean then? Being upside down?”
“Well, taken with the Tower card, it signifies that you have a chance of moving past loss and regret and to a better place of forgiveness and acceptance. Moving on, so to speak.”
“Who am I supposed to forgive?”
“Yourself, among other people, and the choice will be up to you.”
“Isn’t it always?”
“Yes. The divine is the great potter spinning the wheel of life, continually reshaping the world based on our choices, opening up new ways. So, do your best to make her job easier.”
“Her job? So, the divine is a woman now?”
“Of course. Always has been. Women give birth.”
“And what is the role of men?”
“Maybe it is to listen.” She pursed her lips in satisfaction, scooping up the cards and knocking them back into the deck.
“It’s my turn,” Elena said with zeal, faux kicking me until I rolled over onto a pillow to watch her reading. Of course, hers was filled with magic and pleasure–unlike mine. I wrote off the entire show as a sham and Agatha yet another feminist charlatan who took pleasure in mocking men in front of their dates to take them down a notch. I poured myself another glass of wine and then another until all the wine was gone, and I would have left the party with the same taste in my mouth if I hadn’t experienced something just before we left that to this day still makes the tiny hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
It must have been after midnight and I had just come out of the bathroom, exhausted and hoping Elena wouldn’t take too long so we could go back home on the other side of the bridge. Only Agatha and the Fairy Godmother remained, and they were in the kitchen talking about levitation when I broke in with a snide comment. With an arched eyebrow, Agatha asked me if I wanted to see it for real. Of course, after the wretched tarot reading I was more than happy to unmask her as a fake. Before I knew it, she’d hauled over a tall wooden four-legged barstool and asked me to place my hands atop the flat seat. I did as instructed, and then she overlaid her own hands on top of mine so we each stood hunched over the stool. She invited me to concentrate on a vision of the stool rising in the air, and I played along. She closed her eyes, but I kept mine open.
At first, nothing happened. Then, just as I was about to call bullshit, I felt the stool rumble. It rumbled a second time, reminding me of fish nibbling on a line, coming every few seconds and working up into a rapid crescendo. I looked around to see if Agatha was doing something with her feet or some other form of trickery. Perhaps she was gripping the flat seat in a way that allowed her to move it, but my hands were on it and hers on top of mine. We were pressing down on it while a force from below pushed against us. Then it happened; I felt something change in the room or my mind or something, like another presence filled the space around us. The pit of my stomach dropped as the stool rose up on its side and then three legs, still rumbling and shaking as if the force of my mind’s will struggled against it rising in the air. I was so astonished that I could concentrate on nothing else and my mind went clear as it envisioned the stool and tried to make sense of what was happening even while looking at it. The world slowed down, and I sensed that the last leg, though barely touching the floor, remained tethered to the earth. I could not let it happen, I thought, while another part of me danced with joy like a child experiencing his first magic act. Just as the final leg left the floor, I pulled my hands away from Agatha’s and let the stool tumble over on to its side. Noticing the terrified look on my face, Agatha gave me an empathic pat on my forearm like a mother would her small child.
I said very little after that, just a few goodbyes before stumbling to Elena’s car. I didn’t say much on the ride home either. Elena, no doubt sensing that the Newtonian world I thought I’d been living in had just been shattered to pieces, kept quiet for the most part. At one point as we were crossing back over the bridge she told of how the psychologist Carl Jung thought all this stuff bunk too until a few incidents changed his mind. I waited for her to elaborate, maybe described the incidents, but she remained quiet, driving me straight home and dropping me off with a sideways hug in the car.
Of course, I woke up the next morning wondering how much I’d experienced at the party was due to wine. A throbbing headache convinced me of this, allowing me to get through the day without having to adjust to some new world. I’ve thought about that stool a hundred different ways over the years. Sometimes I concoct an entire schema where everyone else was in on some grand joke involving hidden wires or something. I even researched illusionist acts to see how it might have been done. Maybe they set the cruel joke up beforehand as some dark magic to knock my belief system for a loop. On rare occasions, I believe it all happened as it did, feeling a wave of gratitude for having been shown another plane of existence that only a select few get to see. That’s usually when I’ve had a few drinks and my mind wanders back to that night. I guess I’ll never know, but one thing is for sure and that’s that I wish I had been sober that night.
CHAPTER 5 | MARK LEAPS
I already mentioned Mark, and I could count him as the second curveball thrown my way. At least in terms of how our relationship went from the occasional chat to a deepening friendship that inspired me to follow him. He was thirty years my junior, and like Elena, moved in a world of deliberate slowness that both attracted me and sometimes left me one step away from a contained rage. Of course, at work I donned a thoughtful persona to project leadership. I read all the Jack Welch books, and I knew the game. I played nice most of the time and cut a few throats when I had to, but it also went against my grain and sometimes I would come home exhausted from the effort. Mark’s way seemed effortless. His status as a contract employee gave him the luxury of staying above the fray. He didn’t have a stake in anything, and the heads-down technical work he performed was so far beyond the reach of our expertise that in a way he was in an ideal position to adopt a Zen monk style of relating to people. I often wondered if his steady and calm demeanor warped into something sinister when no one else was around.
I saw deeper into Mark one night after we were celebrating a big investment we’d received from an Asian bank, which would allow us to expand our mortgage lending portfolio. Don decided to throw a lavish party at the Tonga Room inside the Fairmont Hotel. He had just given a charismatic speech about the effect this influx of investment capital would have on our bottom line. We were about to become a major player in the Bay Area real estate market. The guffaws of excitement and congratulations spread through the room, infecting everyone. Well, just about everyone. I caught Mark standing in the corner trying his best to blend in with a palm tree, but he seemed down in the mouth.
“Well, it’s a whole new world, Mark.” He shrugged off my platitude, staring down in his drink with the look of a man so utterly bored with his surroundings. I thought it might be because he wasn’t a full-time employee and thus not reaping any of the potential rewards like the rest of us. “You don’t seem to be enjoying yourself. Are you?”
“Maybe that Max Weber guy was right. We are stuck in an iron cage of materialism.”
I stifled an uneasy laugh, and would have brushed this off, but I’d already had a few drinks and his comment triggered deep anger in me. I’d heard that line before, and I was sick of people living in one of the richest cities in the world blaming their troubles on avarice. I grabbed his elbow firmly, and he struggled to hold on to his drink. This startled Mark, and he gave me a surprised look, but he sensed t
he intensity in my eyes.
“Mark, I want you to come with me.” I didn’t give him a chance to respond, pulling him outside onto California Street. Once we caught our breath in the chilly evening air, I motioned to the posh hotel across the street. “You know what that is?”
“It’s a hotel, right?” Mark listened to me with strained patience.
“The Mark Hopkins. Have you heard of it?”
“The Top of the Mark? Who hasn’t heard of it?”
“Yes, with the famous glass-walled bar on top, serving overpriced drinks. You pay for the view. It’s been around for eons; has changed hands a few times. Big deals worth lots of money. It’s now part of the InterContinental chain of hotels. In fact, it’s the oldest of them. This hotel we’re in here, the Fairmont. It’s a landmark too. These were built by successful people who invested their money wisely. This is what we do. We help those people invest their money wisely and thus make the future happen so that our sons and daughters can enjoy the fruits of hard-working labor.”
Crossing Allenby Bridge Page 3