(no subject)
Last Friday night Teat and I were riding the trolley and at one stop this heavyset man with a hardhat fastened to his backpack sat down across from us. Then a middle-aged woman came up next to him and asked, “May I?” and he made some chivalrous remark and scooted over towards the window so she could sit down. She was drinking out of a plastic cup with a lid on it, like one of those souvenir cups they give kids at restaurants. After a few seconds, she said to me, “I just saw something on you that tells me you’re gonna be in control in your relationships. You’re a strong woman, and there might be some men that hurt you, and you might not die with a man by your side, but you’ll always overcome it and you’ll be in control.”
She then added some other predictions; the only one I can remember is that I would be a good grandmother. The man next to her was rolling his eyes at this point, and a woman across the aisle from us pointed to her teenage daughter and asked if the lady who read me could do the same for her daughter. The woman said she couldn’t read everyone, but she had just noticed something about me that she knew to interpret this way. After the man with the hardhat got off the trolley in a huff, the woman across from me said, “Now I can tell you what it is… your second toe is longer than your first.”
She said a wise old woman taught her that a long second toe symbolized a woman of control and independence. It’s so weird that I cross paths with a stranger who shares something like that with me given what’s going on in my life right now. Shit’s hurting, but I made a decision because I know where I’m at and what I need. I took control, and I don’t think I’ve given myself enough credit for that. Still, maintaining that control is what’s most difficult. Remembering why I made that decision and not faltering. This might mean being alone, but it means integrity.
And I wanna get back to that place.