Advice Part 59- Fortune Tellers

I like to think of myself as being a fairly open-minded person. So when a friend suggested going to see a tarot card reader, I thought "Sure, why not?" and gave it a go.

However, my advice to young players is that whilst clairvoyants may provide some rather interesting predictions, it's best to retain a HIGH degree of sceptism when consulting one.....

How do I know this? Read on.....

Five years ago, I was in a "difficult situation." I had decided to apply to do my PhD at Oxford, assuming I had a snowflake's chance in hell of getting accepted. Hence, I almost died of shock when a letter arrived, offering me a place.

"Great!" you may think. "Why was this situation "difficult"?" The answer is that because I didn't get a scholarship, I would have to pay full fees. And let me assure you, the fees at Oxford AREN'T cheap. My parents would have had to lend me the money, and I would have had to work for the rest of my life to pay them back.

But it was OXFORD, for god's sake! My mind was awash with fantasies of scarves, bicycles, old buildings, and gallant gentlemen named Rupert Humphrey-Wittingstall, or some such.....

I mulled for months and months about whether to go or not. And COULD NOT decide.

So, in desperation, I decided to go and see a clairvoyant, who had been recommended by a friend. Yes, I was a bit cynical, but hell, I had one week left to decide, and this was about the only option left.

When I arrived at the clairvoyant's lair, I realised I had made a BIG mistake. For a start, she wasn't in, as she "didn't believe in the concept of time." And when she did finally materialise, in a haze of blue eyeshadow and an aroma of patchouli, she was munching on her lunch, which she proceeded to eat throughout the duration of our session.

 Hmm.

In the course of the session, she hatched two predictions of note (and let me assure you, in an hour long session, two predictions is hardly extraordinary):

• One, that "in the next month, (I) would be undertaking a journey to a foreign land" (which I assumed meant that I would go to Oxford) AND
• Two, that I would meet and marry a "dark man in a long black coat"

Needless to say, she was TOTALLY wrong on the first count- I decided NOT to go to Oxford, and instead stayed in Sydney.

The second prediction is more intriguing. I haven't met any men in long black coats yet, and, judging from the clairvoyant's first prediction, I probably shouldn't get my hopes up. But I'm not going to deny that EVERY TIME I see a man in a black coat go past, I do tend to study him closely....Just in case.