I have written before about my love of Chinese food and fortune cookies.  And I have a new sequence of fortunes to share.

As a reminder, here’s the drill: you treat the cookie like a Magic 8 Ball.  Ask it something, crack it open, and see what it has to tell you.

Most of the time I ask the same questions: I either ask about vocation or treating my family right.  I went last week and received this fortune:

Wish you a long life.

I tried to determine what that meant in relation to my question, and I couldn’t…mostly because I couldn’t get over that amazing display of grammar!  “Wish you a long life.”  There isn’t even a subject; this statement doesn’t have a noun!  And what does being wished a long life have to do with my vocation or my family other than the obvious–people need me to live a long life!  Way to avoid burn out, Drew!  All you’ve left to do is put yourself in the place of Atlas!

So then I visit my favorite Asian restaurant in town Yumi Asian Fusion.  It’s my favorite because of how I feel when I’m there.  I like the silverware–it’s modern and ergonomic.  I like the decorations–it looks the way I want a restaurant to look.  I can order Thai or sushi or Hunan and Mandarine-style Chinese–they have the best Mongolian Beef I have had since leaving Alpena–some know that this is high praise.  But the best part is that I like the servers.  Mostly the one that treats me well.  So my like of this restaurant is purely selfish.  After my meal was over (General Tso’s Chicken), I opened my cookie to find…nothing.  I had the dreaded fortuneless cookie!

Taking these fortunes together, [someone–presumably] wish[es me] a long life one minute and the other, I have no fortune–no future!  Is that the reason I was wished a long life?  Did the cookie know then that I didn’t have a future, and that it was simply trying to change what it saw?  I’m certain that my death is immanent, so I have to get a new fortune.  Here’s what the newest one read:

Wish you a long life.

The grammatically-challenged fortune-writer returns with the same wish!

I know that my obsession with these little treats is irrational and ridiculous.  I know that they no sooner predict the future than a Magic 8 Ball does or the newspaper’s astrology section, but I really do miss it when I don’t get a proper fortune.  And sometimes I don’t get a fortune in my cookie–I get a statement.  I’m not fond of statement cookies unless they attempt to demonstrate something useful to me.

On my desk next to the duplicate ‘wishes’ are these fortunes:

You will travel far and wide, both pleasure and business.

Be prepared to receive something special with no strings attached.

You will win success in whatever calling you adopt.

I actually received these in Lansing and brought them with me.  I feel like they’ve already begun to come true.  I’m hoping for a little more juice out of them.

Perhaps the biggest question you may be asking yourself–bigger even than why am I writing this–is this: why does he keep his fortunes (or statements or grammatically confused pieces of paper)?  Because they reveal something about myself to me.  I learn something when I read it.  When I read it the first time, of course, I learn about hopes and expectations.  What comes immediately to mind when I get a fortune like one of the above?  For instance, if you were to get this one:

You will cross the ocean soon.

What would your response be?  What would you immediately think of?  My first thoughts jump to the places I want to go and the dreams that I have deferred.  I would think of Ireland or Iceland or Israel.  I would think about how much I want to travel to those places with my wife and closest friends.  I dream about telling my daughter stories about the places we’re visiting.

And when I take the time to read an old fortune, these thoughts become less of a dream and more of an imperative.  It is less about “oh, wouldn’t that be nice” and becomes “I need to do this.”

Perhaps I’m getting older.  Or perhaps my perspective on life has changed.  And perhaps I’m just a teensy-weensy bit jealous of the guy I imagined I’d be at my age.  But I’ve got to tell you, nothing gets me thinking about the future and making dreams into realities like fortune cookies.