You Make It So Easy For Us (Or Your Emotional Thinking Does)

 

“Hey look Sandra, a gypsy clairvoyant, I have always wanted to try one of these out.”

“Really?”

“Oh yes, I am interested in that kind of thing. Do you want to as well?”

“No thanks, you go ahead, I will go and get a drink, see you in a few minutes, I will be just over there.”

“Okay. Oh hang on, is that my phone,” you scrabble in your bag and pull your phone free, “It’s Graham, I will see you later,” you wave at your friend as you jab at the screen but you have missed the call. You consider calling back but you are too excited to learn what the Gypsy Rosie Lee has to say.

You push the curtain aside and enter.

“Hello?” you ask tentatively.

“Please come in,” says a low voice.

You move forward and as your eyes adjust from the bright sunshine outside which has blessed the fair to the dimmer interior of this tent you see a lady sat to one side of a table. She beckons you towards a seat opposite and you oblige, sitting down and opening your purse to place the required fee in her outstretched and wrinkled hand. Paper certainly seems to have trumped silver in terms of crossing her palm these days.

“Give me your hands child,” she says gently and you proffer your hands. She takes hold of them, her grip stronger than you would imagine. You look at her, a veil across the lower half of her face, headscarf wrapped about her head, only her aged forehead and gleaming dark eyes visible. She holds your hands for a moment as she remains silent. Eventually she lets go and then moves her hands, probably more for show than effectiveness, over the crystal ball between you.

“Let me confirm the present for you,” she begins. You nod, eyes wide with excitement and anticipation to ascertain if she is correct in what she sees.

“You are a professional lady, earning your own income,” she begins. You nod already impressed.

“You are very much in love, in fact, you are head over heels in love with a man. He is handsome, charming and he loves you unlike anything you have known before.”

“Yes, that’s right,” you say with a gasp of amazement.

“His name begins with a G”

You give another enthusiastic nod.

“He is called Graham and you adore him.”

“Wow, yes he is and I do, I love him so much.”

“You recently moved in together.”

“Yes, he has moved in to my house,” you confirm staggered at the accuracy of what she is telling you.

“You have many friends and they think highly of you, you are a popular and you want to start a family soon, in fact you want children very much.”

You continue to nod.

“I have a grounding of your present dear child, now, let me see what the future holds for you.” She waves her hands theatrically over the crystal ball and peers into it, staring intently into it depths. You watch and wait, hardly daring to breathe…….

A little time later you emerge into the warm sunshine again and walk over to Sandra who is sat drink in hand watching the world go by.

“Hi, how did it go?” she asks raising her hand above her eyes so she can see you against the bright sunlight.

“What a waste of money,” you reply part in anger and part in upset.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” laughs Sandra but she cuts her amusement short when she sees how wretched you look. You sit down beside her.

“What is it? What did she say?”

“Well, she started off so well. She took my hands and then told me that I was a professional lady with my own income. That I was head over heels in love. That I wanted children. She told me that I lived with Graham and she even knew his name, I was blown away at how much she knew.”

“Oh Elaine, you are too trusting you know. I have always said this about you.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Well, she can tell by the way you are dressed and your smooth soft hands that you are hardly a factory worker, so that was an educated desk. Professional lady can cover so much.”

“Hmm, maybe, but what about knowing that I am head over heels in love?”

Your friend taps your finger.

“You are wearing an expensive and modern engagement ring. Whoever is wearing one of those is bound to be caught up in the rush of love and from that there is a good chance you will be living with somebody.”

“Well yes I see your point, I guess, but what about wanting children?”

“Wow, breaking news, young woman in a relationship wants children. That’s never happened before has it?”

“Okay, okay, but answer this then, how did she know he is called Graham?”

“Honestly, I think I should set up as one of these fortune tellers, she heard you mention his name when he called. Chances are it was a partner otherwise you would have said “it’s dad” or “it’s my brother”. These people are skilled at recognising types and of course you want to believe what she has to say, they are conditioning you so that when they get the basics right, they can tell you any old bunkum about the future. They program you to hang on their every word and so you are brainwashed into thinking they know the future. Talking of which, what did she have to say about that?”

“Well, that is where I lost faith in here. I still think she knew about my present well enough, she got so much right, but she just went completely off at a tangent about the future.”

“How so?”

“Well she says that Graham is not all that he seems and his apparent love masks an empty heart. She warned me that within months he will, how did she say it, yes that is right, he will “show me the true meaning of hatred”. She said that he would kick me out of my home, my home! She told me that he is a con man and that he would rack up huge debts in my name, force me to do horrible things with him in bed and that he will have a string of affairs. Oh yes, she even said that he was bisexual, can you believe that?”

You friend lets out a hoot of laughter.

“See, I told you, it is a load of rubbish, I mean Graham is the loveliest man you could ever meet, he is so good to you.”

“I know, I told her she was wrong, but she just fixed me with this stare. It unnerved me actually. It was as if she was looking straight through me you know, there was no emotion, just these really dark eyes looking at me.”

“Did she say anything?”

“Yes, she said that the “devil always beats his handmaiden no matter how hard she tries to please him” and I wanted to laugh at that but do you know what I actually felt terrified. I asked her to stop then.”

“I must admit, you looked rather distraught when you reached me. Don’t worry about it.”

“Honestly, the things she was saying, that he would not be a good father, that he would ruin us through gambling and that I would think I was with two different people, even in the same minute. She made him sound like some kind of madman. To be honest, it sounded like the plot of some terrifying film.”

“Tell me about it. Don’t be concerned, Graham is wonderful and he makes you so happy, yes it has been a whirlwind romance so far but you cannot let such an opportunity as this slip through your fingers can you?”

“I’m so glad you agree with me. I know what she said is all nonsense, my Graham is not like that all, but it was the way she looked at me, it chilled me to the core.”

“Forget about it, you have satisfied your curiosity and you know not to waste your money on something like that again. Come on, there’s a wheel of fortune over there, that’s going to be more reliable than Gypsy Story Teller.”

You smile and stand pushing the prophesy of the gypsy to the back of your mind. Nobody behaves like that and certainly not the man you love.