expect.
“I thought you might like coffee, so I have some brewing - but if you’d prefer tea...?”
“Coffee is great,” I smile and he leads the way into a bright oak kitchen with yellow walls and huge triple doors out to a well-manicured garden beyond. "What a beautiful garden," I marvel. "It must keep you very busy." He nods and smiles.
We sip our coffees at a big, honest-looking table; the sort you can tell was made from reclaimed wood, perhaps railway sleepers or old church pews. There are some huge dents and scrapes in the table top. Without them it would be even more beautiful. Absentmindedly, I follow the line of a deep scratch in the wood with my finger. “Ever thought of sanding it down flat?” I ask. “This table would come up great with some TLC.”
Surprise registers fleetingly on his face. I feel like a twit. How rude of me. It was probably his grandmother’s or something.
“The marks of age tell a thousand stories,” he says, smiling kindly like he knows how pretentious that sounds but doesn't really care if I think him so. “And I like listening.”
Oh. Deep . I think. I cradle my coffee cup, feeling like a fool. Then tell myself to pull it together. I am a professional.
“So tell me about what you do, David,” I ask.
He grins. “Would you like me to show you first?” he challenges. “With a reading for you perhaps?”
“OK – err – yeah that would be great, thanks.” And so begins one of the strangest mornings of my life.
David takes a pack of large pictorial cards out of the kitchen drawer. “These are archangel cards,” he explains reverently. I stifle an involuntary smirk. He starts to shuffle them while he continues talking about angels and orbs.
He hands them to me. “Hold the cards like this,” he says, cupping them in his hands, “and try to infuse them with your energy.”
I try not to giggle while I do what he says. And strangely enough, I really am able to imagine that my energy passes into the cards. A crazy kind of energy, bubbly and erratic. I hand them back.
He re-shuffles the cards, explaining that it’s up to me to tell him when to stop, or cut the pack, or do whatever I feel he should do with them. I let him continue shuffling for what feels like a polite moment and then ask him to cut the pack and place the bottom half on the top. He misunderstands, removing the bottom half and almost shuffling them into the top half. I surprise myself by confidently intervening before he loses the place where I wanted the cut to be made. I help him re-cut the cards the way I meant him to and place them where I wanted them to be.
“I’d like you to deal from there please,” I say, wondering why I was so intent on those cards being at the top.
The cards lay in the following order: Clairvoyance, Counsellor, Death. I must look a bit shocked. “That doesn’t sound good,” I mumble. If he heard me he doesn’t show it.
“Okaaay... The Clairvoyance card can have a wider interpretation, for example using one’s intuition, gaining a deeper understanding of others,” says David. He looks down, waits for a moment, deep in thought. Then his eyes meet mine with a confident expression. “However, I would go so far as to say that you have been speaking with spirits.”
I am gobsmacked. I try not to react so as not to steer him one way or the other. I have heard about cold reading, where your own reactions to statements are used to help a pseudo psychic ‘reveal’ truths that you yourself have unintentionally given away.
“The second card is what you are doing now,” continues David. “You are being an emotional counsellor for someone. A person who needs you to be there for them, to hear their thoughts.”
Wow.
“The third card is Transformation.”
“It looks like it says ‘Death’ to me…”
“Every exit is merely an entry to somewhere else,” he says quite matter of
“I thought you might like coffee, so I have some brewing - but if you’d prefer tea...?”
“Coffee is great,” I smile and he leads the way into a bright oak kitchen with yellow walls and huge triple doors out to a well-manicured garden beyond. "What a beautiful garden," I marvel. "It must keep you very busy." He nods and smiles.
We sip our coffees at a big, honest-looking table; the sort you can tell was made from reclaimed wood, perhaps railway sleepers or old church pews. There are some huge dents and scrapes in the table top. Without them it would be even more beautiful. Absentmindedly, I follow the line of a deep scratch in the wood with my finger. “Ever thought of sanding it down flat?” I ask. “This table would come up great with some TLC.”
Surprise registers fleetingly on his face. I feel like a twit. How rude of me. It was probably his grandmother’s or something.
“The marks of age tell a thousand stories,” he says, smiling kindly like he knows how pretentious that sounds but doesn't really care if I think him so. “And I like listening.”
Oh. Deep . I think. I cradle my coffee cup, feeling like a fool. Then tell myself to pull it together. I am a professional.
“So tell me about what you do, David,” I ask.
He grins. “Would you like me to show you first?” he challenges. “With a reading for you perhaps?”
“OK – err – yeah that would be great, thanks.” And so begins one of the strangest mornings of my life.
David takes a pack of large pictorial cards out of the kitchen drawer. “These are archangel cards,” he explains reverently. I stifle an involuntary smirk. He starts to shuffle them while he continues talking about angels and orbs.
He hands them to me. “Hold the cards like this,” he says, cupping them in his hands, “and try to infuse them with your energy.”
I try not to giggle while I do what he says. And strangely enough, I really am able to imagine that my energy passes into the cards. A crazy kind of energy, bubbly and erratic. I hand them back.
He re-shuffles the cards, explaining that it’s up to me to tell him when to stop, or cut the pack, or do whatever I feel he should do with them. I let him continue shuffling for what feels like a polite moment and then ask him to cut the pack and place the bottom half on the top. He misunderstands, removing the bottom half and almost shuffling them into the top half. I surprise myself by confidently intervening before he loses the place where I wanted the cut to be made. I help him re-cut the cards the way I meant him to and place them where I wanted them to be.
“I’d like you to deal from there please,” I say, wondering why I was so intent on those cards being at the top.
The cards lay in the following order: Clairvoyance, Counsellor, Death. I must look a bit shocked. “That doesn’t sound good,” I mumble. If he heard me he doesn’t show it.
“Okaaay... The Clairvoyance card can have a wider interpretation, for example using one’s intuition, gaining a deeper understanding of others,” says David. He looks down, waits for a moment, deep in thought. Then his eyes meet mine with a confident expression. “However, I would go so far as to say that you have been speaking with spirits.”
I am gobsmacked. I try not to react so as not to steer him one way or the other. I have heard about cold reading, where your own reactions to statements are used to help a pseudo psychic ‘reveal’ truths that you yourself have unintentionally given away.
“The second card is what you are doing now,” continues David. “You are being an emotional counsellor for someone. A person who needs you to be there for them, to hear their thoughts.”
Wow.
“The third card is Transformation.”
“It looks like it says ‘Death’ to me…”
“Every exit is merely an entry to somewhere else,” he says quite matter of
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