The Fool and the Magician: A Memoir of Love Told in Tarot Readings by Angela Lam ➱ Book Tour with Giveaway

  

 

The Fool and the Magician

A Memoir of Love Told in Tarot Readings

by Angela Lam

Genre: Midlife Memoir 

On the cusp of forty, Angela Lam consults with a tarot reader for career advice and receives the following prediction: she will find a new job and, while there, she will meet a man who will heal her heart. Already married with children, Angela tells her husband who is unconcerned about what the cards reveal. But when the prediction threatens to manifest, will Angela’s family fall apart?

This true story will inspire you to reexamine the definitions of midlife crisis and spiritual awakening as well as challenge the roles of fate and free will in your life.

Advance Praise for The Fool and the Magician:

Lam’s memoir uniquely blends an exploration of love, relationships, mental health, with the more mystical and magical original elements. Her vulnerability and nuanced emotional states allow readers to truly connect to her profound and intimate story.

—Publishers Weekly The BookLife Prize

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Fifty dollars. That’s all the money I have left. I scrounge around the bottom of my purse, searching for loose change and double check the inside zippered pocket in the event I stashed a couple of extra dollars when I was too much in a hurry to place the bills in my wallet. Nothing. 

I can’t sit here much longer. Without air conditioning, the inside of my twelve-year-old four-door sedan is an inferno. The heat plasters my bangs to my forehead and sweat streams in rivulets down my sides. 

Fifty dollars will either fill my tank for a month or buy groceries for a few days or pay for a half hour tarot reading.

I start the engine and back out of the parking space in the glass and steel business park where I work part-time for a private money lender whose business has dried up with the Great Recession. Although I do not want to leave the mom-and-pop enterprise, I am following the advice of the family law attorney I recently consulted—marriage counseling and a full-time job with health benefits. 

The counseling has been arranged through my current therapist who referred me to her friend in the same adobe office building on the corner of College and Beaver streets. 

The job search has led me on a wild goose chase from San Francisco to Ukiah without any offers. 

From what you told me last night, we have only one month’s income saved before we end up in the 90 day foreclosure process, possibly losing our home. After devoting ten years of saving for the down payment, I do not want our investment to be another casualty in the financial crisis. Even if one of us must surrender fifty percent to the other in a divorce, at least the children will have some place to call home. 

After a short drive, I pull into the parking lot of Crystal Channels to meet with Melanie, a tarot card reader. During my teens and twenties, whenever I faced an apparently insurmountable situation, Laura, my best friend at the time, would remove a set of tarot cards encased in a black velvet pouch and tell me to shuffle, silently asking my question and placing my energy into the deck. Through tarot readings, I decided to leave my first serious boyfriend to date you. Since then, whenever therapy, prayer, and logic fail to relieve stuck feelings, I turn to the tarot to unleash hidden wisdom. According to a 2009 study by Pew Research Center, roughly six-in-ten Americans engage in multiple religious practices, mixing elements of diverse traditions, including Christianity and the occult. By 2018, six-in-ten Americans regardless of their religious beliefs will hold at least one New Age belief such as reincarnation or astrology. By 2019, The New York Times will have an article about how alternative practices, such as tarot, factor into traditional psychotherapy. In 2021, The National Catholic Reporter will have an article centered on findings from Springtide Research Institute showing fifty-one percent of people between the ages of thirteen and twenty-five combining their traditional religious beliefs with the practice of tarot reading because of the widespread influence of the internet and social media. 

But this is the summer of 2010, and I am a thirty-nine-year-old Catholic woman seeking answers from God. I cannot find any reliable statistics about how many people believe in the divinatory powers of tarot. All I know is I want a glimpse into the future to discover if I find a job in time to save our house from foreclosure. Knowing what will happen is comforting. I can prepare for better or for worse. I do not have to go by faith alone into the unknown. I can walk confidently, armed for whatever the future will bring. 

I met Melanie a few years ago while searching for crystals to heal the shattered despondency I felt after losing James. I don’t remember what cards were drawn or what was spoken between us. I only remember the cloud of despair lifting from my spirit. Since then, I’ve respected Melanie’s talents. I am confident my appointment with her today will enlighten my fruitless job search. 

The tiny bell on the glass door announces my arrival. A chill from the air conditioning shimmies up my back. Seconds later, Melanie steps out of a curtained alcove smelling of sandalwood and amber incense. She reminds me of an older version of Laura’s mother, a former hippie artist-turned-elementary school teacher. Long white hair frames her cherubic face. A colorful caftan conceals her shapeless body. Leather sandals cover her broad feet. She smiles sweetly when she shakes my sweaty hand.

After taking a seat at the small round table, I clutch my purse in my lap and breathe in deeply. 

Melanie releases the curtain, shielding us from the foot traffic in the two room store, and sets out her garden tarot deck on the table. “What’s bothering you today?”

I exhale loudly, my shoulders slumping forward. “I’ve been searching for a new job the last few weeks, but I haven’t found anything.”

Nodding, she shuffles the cards and deals them into a circle. Turning the first card over, she touches the petals of a sunflower. “You’re looking for a job that will use your skills, something you’ll excel in, a job in which you will go far, much farther than you’ve been able to before.” She meets my gaze and smiles. “Aren’t we all looking for a job like that?” 

I nod in agreement. So far, so good.

She turns over the next card. “You’ve taken jobs to get by, and you’re not opposed to doing that again.” 

Fiddling with the straps of my purse, I recall all of the jobs I’ve applied for over the past 30 days, including jobs in which I am qualified for but do not want. I sigh. Even the last interview at a sandwich shop didn’t pan out when the owner took one look at my business suit and said, “You’re too good to scrub toilets.” I protested, claiming, “I clean my bathrooms at home.” But he shook his head and escorted me to my car, unconvinced.

Flipping over the next card, she strokes the petals of a pink daisy and frowns. “Two jobs are competing for your attention—one is close to home; the other is far away. You’ll do well in either position.” 

I lean closer, clutching the purse straps tighter. I have applied for a loan servicing position at an attorney-operated private money enterprise in San Rafael, a forty-five minute drive away, and a loan documentation administrator position at a community bank, five minutes from my house. 

She reveals the next card. “You’ll take the job close to home.” 

I smile, and relief washes over me. 

After turning over the final card, she hitches her breath. “When you’re there, you’ll meet a man who will heal your heart.”

Frowning, I lean forward. “What do you mean? I’m looking for a job, not a boyfriend.”

She sits back and chuckles. “My dear, this man is not a boyfriend.”

I glower at the card of a metal armet and pink eglantine flowers winding around golden chalices. “I’m not looking for a one-night stand or a part-time lover.” After Anthony, I vowed to never befriend any man as a potential romantic interest. 

She touches my hand. “My dear, this man is not a one-night stand or a part-time lover.” She leans closer and squeezes my cold fingers. “This man is your next husband.”

 Excerpt 2

I did wise up a bit after seeking counsel from the trusty tarot. Back then, Laura read my cards. She spread the shuffled deck into a relationship reading and revealed the path I should take with my romantic life. 

I remember this reading in particular because I had spent the night in her bedroom at her parents’ house. Sleepovers had always been forbidden, but I was eighteen going on nineteen, so my parents didn’t protest. I sat cross-legged on her hardwood floor, placing my palms on the backs of the cards, silently asking my question, “Should I stay with my boyfriend, the Page of Swords, or should I date his best friend, the Magician?” 

A few events had led up to this quandary, but I will only mention the one that matters—the day I fell in love with you.

On February 11, 1990, you came over to see the Page of Swords. You wanted to talk, but I was there. At first, you thought the two of you were alone. The Page of Swords’ big, burly body blocked the doorway. As soon as you stepped into the hallway of his parents’ house, you glimpsed me, a wisp of a woman behind him.

You raised your eyebrows and crinkled your forehead.

“I can leave.” I waved my hand toward the hallway. “I just need to save my work and get my purse.”

At the last moment, you relented. “No, please, stay. I have something for you.”

From out of thin air, you produced a long-stemmed chocolate rose the color of my lipstick. 

“I made it.” You handed me the rose wrapped in clear, plastic cellophane. 

 Smiling, I twirled the gift between my fingers and followed you down the hallway to the Page of Swords’ bedroom.

The two of you sat on the edge of the bed while I resumed my space in front of the computer, typing the first draft of my memoir about growing up Chinese American in the late seventies. Years later you would tell strangers we met when you rescued my memoir off the failed hard drive of my boyfriend’s computer, which is a fact, but not the truth. The truth is I fell in love you with that night, listening to you tell my boyfriend about your struggles to gain the love and affection of the Empress who was dating another man, a woman I had seen in passing but had never met, a woman who I felt did not deserve you. 

At one point in the conversation, you slapped your hands against your thighs. “I just want someone to go to the library with.”

Library? I stopped typing. I loved to read. My favorite place in the whole world was the library. I even thought about becoming a librarian before a teacher dissuaded me, saying one day the Dewey Decimal System would be completely replaced by computers. I dropped my hands into my lap and swiveled. “I’ll go to the library with you.”

You lifted your bowed head and met my gaze. “You will?”

I had never seen eyes so blue—electric blue like the song by Icehouse. The lyrics raced through my mind then disappeared. I felt like I was seeing you for the first time—a shy, young man with no self-confidence striving to be loved, accepted, and understood. “Yes, of course, I love the library. When do you want to go?”

You drew a map showing me directions to your house. You wrote your phone number at the top of the page in small, fine print. 

The Page of Swords observed this interaction without comment.

When I glanced down at my watch, I gasped. Fifteen minutes to get home before my curfew. With trembling hands, I gathered my belongings, folding the map and tucking it inside my purse next to the long-stemmed chocolate rose. 

You and the Page of Swords walked me to my car parked along the street. 

I opened the passenger door and tossed my purse on the seat. 

“May I have a hug?” You approached me with your arms wide open.

My father taught me to always hug everyone hello and goodbye. But your request caught me by surprise. Before tonight you had always shied away, refusing to be touched. I stepped around the bushes next to the curb, back onto the sidewalk, and into your embrace. I squeezed you tight, flattening my breasts against your chest, patting my hands against your back. You smelled of fried fish from working at Tom and Jerry’s and bergamot and mandarin from your signature cologne. The dark night enveloped us. The air was as warm and comforting as friendship. The rush of traffic on the busy street sounded like background music. 

For a long moment, neither one of us wanted to let go.

Remembering that night and everything that transpired since, I closed my eyes and placed my hands on the tarot cards and asked the question burning in my soul—should I stay with the Page of Swords or leave for the Magician?

Laura read the interpretations of the cards from a book, adding her own insight into the process. She revealed the first card. “One of the men is full of intellect. But he is all talk and no action. He will promise, but not deliver.” She flipped over the next card. “The other man is full of mastery. He says what he means. He delivers what he promises.” She frowned. “Do you know who these men are?”

I nodded. The first man was the Page of Swords. The second man was the Magician. 

She continued with the reading. “You have always followed your head.” With her long fingers, she caressed the card full of swords before flipping over the next card full of cups. “But you need to follow your heart this time.” She turned over the final card and smiled. “In listening to your heart, you will know which man to choose.” She blinked back tears of joy. “His love will transform you.”

I stared at the overturned cards and nodded. The decision was self-evident. I would break up with the Page of Swords. I would date the Magician. I would let my life be transformed.

Angela Lam is an author of several books focusing on the lives of modern women struggling to find their place in this ever-changing world.

She has spent the past three decades writing professionally for newspapers, small press, and literary magazines. She’s also worked in real estate, finance, art, and nature therapy.

An award-winning author, she is the recipient of residencies at Hedgebrook and Vermont Studio Center.

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