Fortune Cookie

I have to confess: I am not a big fan of Chinese restaurants. Especially the kind of Chinese restaurants that proliferate here in the South. Buffets laden with fried-whatever layered in sweet or salty-whatever sauce and served up with a big bowl of starch. Although very satisfying after the hard Ironman workout, the Chinese buffet, for a not-currently-in-training triathlete like me, is poison.

However, I do like fortune cookies. I reason that fortune cookies are the healthiest choice on the Chinese food menu. And unlike many people, I do actually eat the fortune cookie. And I usually eat everyone else’s fortune cookies after they get their fortunes, too. They are probably flavored pieces of cardboard shaped into a “C”, but they taste just fine to me.

I am usually more concerned with eating my fortune cookie than actually looking at the fortune inside. They rarely seem insightful to me. I do, however, enjoy the adult party game of adding “… in bed.” to the end of a fortune cookie fortune.

But I have been thinking about the fortune that I saved recently. It ended up in the pocket of my shorts and, amazingly, didn’t get incinerated in the dryer.

“You could prosper in the field of entertainment.”

If you add “…in bed” to the back of that one, I suppose it suggests that I should make a career move to adult entertainment.

The fortune is tacked up on my desk at work. I don’t even remember when I tacked it up. I noticed it when I was attempting, with little luck, to think of a name for this blog. I wasn’t getting anywhere. But I looked at my bulletin board and, there it was, pinned on top of all of the doctors’ phone numbers and other notes that I keep handy.

“You could prosper in the field of entertainment.” For some reason, the stupid little piece of paper with the winning lottery numbers on the back has caught my attention.

So, as all good scientists do, we will place this fortune under a microscope to ascertain its hidden meaning.

One of the definitions of “entertainment” in The Random House Dictionary is “an agreeable occupation for the mind.” Well, for me, the most “agreeable occupation for the mind” is writing.

I have been writing ever since I could hold a pencil. I wrote my first “Dear Diary” entry at the age of seven. January 1st detailed that I was happy to receive the little white leather diary, with “Diary” written on the cover in gold letters, for Christmas. (I was really more excited about my new white figure skates, though, because I believed that I was destined to be an Olympic figure skater like my heroine Dorothy Hamill.)
I’ve filled notebook after notebook with journal entries, poems, short stories, essays.
That stuff was mostly for my amusement. Few eyes other than mine ever saw it. It’s been an avocation for thirty-odd years now.

So, obviously, this “entertainment” business must be about writing. Ok. We have it half figured out now. Back to the dictionary.

We now analyze the word “prosper:” “to be successful or fortunate, esp. in financial respects; thrive; flourish.”

Another confession: it is my not-so-secret wish to quit my day job and make a gazillion dollars writing for a living.

So, obviously, this fortune is good news for me and I should send in my resignation and get comfortable in my pajamas at my desk at home.

However, being a scientist, I am a skeptic. I’ll keep the day job for now.

My belief is that fortune cookies, like Tarot cards and horoscopes and palm reading, are little windows into the psyche. Through them, we view our wishes and our worries.

“You could prosper in the field of entertainment.” I really don’t want to be a gazillionaire novelist. I just want to put the words out there. Thrive and flourish in my “agreeable occupation of the mind.”

Here is my fortune cookie.