Causality, Casualties

I was wandering around the east village Friday night with a good friend of mine and came across a tiny Chinese restuarant that was giving out pamplets titled "Causality." Scott handed it to me open to a page with a cartooned explanation Cause: you steal something of value from a neighbor. Outcome: you will be jealous and bitter in the next life. Cause: leave rice in your bowl. Outcome: you will have a husband with a pock-mark for each grain left behind.

I have always secretly (or not so much) been a Taoist. Or maybe a Confusionist. Or maybe just a wannabe-Chinese American Woman a la Amy Tan, Maxine Hong Kingston, and all the other Chinese American Women I used to read religiously. I dragged Scott twenty blocks for bubble tea, doesn't that count for anything? I took piano lessons for 10 years, my brother was in chess club. I had mooncakes this year. I've read my Chinese fortune (or a cheap impression of one on ivillage.com). I've aspired to play Mah Jong. Please!

So Sunday, on the other side of town, at Dragonfly with Ester, Nomi, and Ilana I carefully, reverently extracted my fortune from it's cookie and unwrapped it, wondering what deep message it would convey, what wisdom, what light it would shed on my life. Should I take an extra year off, should I play hooky on Friday and go home for Thanksgiving, should I keep the unnecessary tourquoise jacket from H&M, all the important questions in my life. My fortune reads: Courage comes from great suffering. I promptly burned it in the candle on the table. What did you think I would do with it?