SPM staff writer Janice Vegas has her tarot cards read. Photo by Peter Lazaravich.
Let’s be clear about one thing: I do not believe in the supernatural. Not ghosts or ghouls, witches or wizards. No magic, voodoo or creepy-crawly purchases from Spirit: The Halloween Store. I have no fear of zombie attacks or hauntings brought on by old VHS tapes, evil houses or spooky ghost kids. (My fears are real, tangible things, like tornadoes and speeding cameras.)
Believe it or not, I’m the only person I know who subscribes to this very rational worldview. In an informal survey of my friends and family, even the most reasonable minds claimed to have at least one supernatural belief. Some said they believed in angels, one said mediums and more than a few said they believed in some kind of pre-destined universal fate.
My secret reaction to their beliefs? Puh-lease.
This unrelenting skepticism, I thought, made me the perfect person to try out a supernatural experiment. I decided to get my tarot card reads. If a psychic couldn’t crack me, no scary mockumentary ever could.
Cut to last Saturday evening, in a room hidden in the back of a bookstore. No candles or music, much to my surprise — just a fold-up table and two chairs. I introduce myself, and the psychic explains her methods. She will communicate with my “people” (that is, my guardian angels) and they will tell her how to interpret my tarot cards. She begins with a prayer. Midway through, she begins to smile. “You’re psychic,” she says.
“Oh. Uh…” I respond.
“You’re very, very intuitive,” she says. “Do you ever have dreams or just know what’s going to happen?”
Nope, can’t say I have, lady.
I shuffle the cards and divide the deck. I place my hands over the deck and she tells me to feel which deck has more energy. If I can’t feel it, she says I should pretend to feel it. (But I thought I was psychic?)
The sky is the limit, she tells me, when it comes to my job. I’m going to gain a mentor soon. Also, I might be pregnant. Or overcoming a bad addiction. One of the two. I should anticipate getting in a big fight with someone I care about, she says. But as long as I keep quiet, that person will stick around. Someone, maybe a girl friend, is awful and two-faced, but I don’t know about it yet. “Trust your intuition,” she says. (Because I’m psychic.)
In other words, I lead the life of an average, college-aged girl.
Maybe I’m blinded by my skepticism. Maybe everything she said was true, and I’m going to look like a fool in nine months, when I’ve got a baby on my hip and a knife in my back. Maybe she just cajoled 20 bucks out of me.
That’s why I brought fellow SPM staffer and non-skeptic Janice Vega with me, to give our psychic a fighting chance. Here’s what she had to say:
Walking into my first tarot reading, I realized that my expectations may have been somewhat skewed. I had this picture in my head of a frizzy-haired gypsy woman covered in jewelry and a flowing skirt, sitting behind a crystal ball. Well, I got the frizzy hair part right.
I walked into what looked like a storage or break room and saw the tarot reader sans crystal ball. I then proceeded to make a mistake: I introduced myself and explained that I was with a magazine. I should have waited until the end to ask, because I felt I had given her a key piece of information that revealed a lot about who I was and what I liked to do.
Throughout the reading, she asked me questions like “Are you in a relationship?”, “Do you and your father get along?” and “Will you be taking a trip soon?” All of which I answered honestly, but felt like her responses were somewhat general and not quite on target. When she told me that she didn’t see my relationship lasting very long, I must have not hid the disappointment very well because she then told me that my boyfriend would always be in my life somehow. Then she went on to tell me that in the future I would be doing something that influences a lot of people in a positive way and told me she saw a book or a magazine, something to do with writing. At that point I just couldn’t be convinced. I felt I had definitely influenced that prediction!
Now, I am not one to doubt the mystical right off the bat, but I didn’t walk out of that room enlightened nor fearful. More so I felt like I could have used the $20 on something more useful. That’s not to say I wouldn’t do it again. It was definitely a fun experience, and I am intrigued and willing to give tarot reading another shot, albeit with another reader.
Couldn’t have said it better myself, Janice.
Have you ever wanted to try something radical (no, we’re not talking cliff diving or speed racing), but didn’t have the time or were worried about the outcome? The SPM staff is here to try it for you, and write about it along the way. Email us with suggestions at spmstories@gmail.com
Contact the reporters at Jessica.Testa@asu.edu and Janice.Vega@asu.edu
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