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Believe It or Not

Wherein esoteric Eastern principles reinforce my magical thinking—and high hopes—regarding romance.

by Natalie
posted on April 01, 2007

Credits: Rachel Domm

When it comes to New Age topics, I’ve always been a flip-flopper. Mom calling a pet psychic to chat with our Himalayan cat Tawny? Highly suspect. And yet, Tawny’s demonstrated affection for the black rhinestone collar she “requested” via animal medium was hard to discount entirely. So when my sister’s friend Alison—who also happens to be a feng shui expert—generously offered to consult on my apartment, I silenced my inner skeptic and gratefully took her up on her offer. Next to animal telepathy, feng shui seemed almost scientific.

Because Alison lives in L.A., I faxed her a rough sketch of my apartment and its fixtures, and awaited her feedback. A few days later, she called with suggestions designed to enhance elements of my life by promoting positive energy in my environment. I devoted my Sunday to following her directions—paying special attention to her tips for the “love and romance” corner of the apartment. Among other stipulations, I was instructed to hang a special-order crystal in the window to distribute the energy in that corner. It all seemed very Magic 101, but after I’d completed my little makeover, I felt a genuine sense of accomplishment and, oddly, empowered. My logical side knew that the strategic spring cleaning had nothing to do with my life’s trajectory, but the other side of me (the one that irrationally insisted on keeping my JetBlue TV monitor tuned to the in-flight map during turbulence, as if charting our plane’s progression would keep us safely airborne) was beginning to believe.

The next morning, I caught a ride to work with Jules. We exited the parking garage and there, across the street, I spotted him. “Him” being a handsome animator by the name of Mark, whom I’d met on the street outside SFMOMA two years ago. Mark had literally run a block to introduce himself, and though I’d been charmed, I’d had a boyfriend at the time and, so, had declined his invitation for a drink. We’d exchanged cards and parted ways, and I’d nearly forgotten about the encounter until now. I filled Jules in on the sighting. She scanned the street frantically, but he’d already disappeared around the corner.

“Maybe it’s the feng shui! Did you save his card? Email him!” she insisted. Swayed by her enthusiasm and not wanting to stand in the way of feng shui, I decided to take the initiative. I unearthed the card from my Rolodex and dashed off a “Remember me? I think I saw you this morning …” email before I lost my nerve, bracing myself for a failure message informing me that he no longer worked at the same place. Instead, I received a reply within the hour. “Of course I remember you,” he wrote. “It’s not every day I chase someone down the street. Sorry I missed you—drinks on Thursday?”

“It’s like a movie!” Sia squealed when I brought the girls up to speed over drinks at Rye. “And remember how your fortune cookie at Dragon Well the other night said that you’d write your own fortune? Maybe it was talking about you emailing this guy! And the timing of the crystal? It all fits.” I laughed and shook my head at the suggestion but realized with a blush of shame that skepticism was far easier to pull off when it didn’t involve a rom-com scenario in which I was the star.

In the days leading up to the Big Date, I fought to keep my expectations in check. It was the perfect story, and thus, he couldn’t possibly be the perfect guy—could he? Would destiny really go to all this trouble for little old me? I somehow doubted that while other couples met at work or a bar, me and Mr. Right would be the recipients of a plotline worthy of J. J. Abrams—complete with chance encounters, time lapses, flashbacks and cryptic signs. When I arrived at Dalva on Thursday, I noticed with a start that I was the most nervous I’d been, possibly ever, for a date. This is crazy—you know nothing about this guy, I reminded myself. I realized that that was exactly why I was so nervous, because at that moment, everything was possible—including the chance that the whole magical scenario wasn’t too good to be true.

I spotted him, wearing a pinstripe blazer and a newsboy cap, seated at a two-top toward the back of the bar and willed myself to walk over. “Long time no see,” I smiled. “Right, I remember you,” he said, standing to give me an awkward hug. He bought me a drink, and I nervously launched into interview mode, grilling him on his career, family, thoughts on the city, etc. “This is weird,” I said, finally. “Not really,” he said, making no attempt to ease the tension.

Things picked up a bit when we reached the subject of age. “The minute I reached my 30s, I totally stopped caring what people think of me,” he said. “I mean, I couldn’t care less.” I was getting the distinct impression he was talking about me specifically, and found myself nostalgic for the eager stranger of two years back. Later, we shared a cab home and Mark jumped out, leaving me with the parting words, “See ya around!” I felt a wave of disappointment wash over me. Usually, I would have chalked up Mark’s indifference to his own loss and moved on, but this time it felt as if I were being punished for my own baseless hopes. I felt all along that my imagination was setting me up for a letdown, but even in retrospect, knowing the romantic that lurked within, I struggled to see how I could have prevented it.

The next day, I phoned Alison for her opinion. Yes, it was silly of me to read so much into the Mark encounter and its proximity to my apartment revamp, but I wasn’t ready to give up on my new feng-shui faith—fragile though it was. “I should have told you this earlier,” she said. “When people hang a crystal in their ‘love and romance’ corner, the first thing that will happen is that it will clear out any would-be romantic figures from your past—people you never really got the chance to try out.”

If she was trying to make me feel better, it worked. The idea that I had some sort of control over the unknown via the organization of my apartment was probably as nonsensical as my aviation-charting habit. But I decided to take Alison’s explanation as an indication that not only was the crystal working, it was also helping to set the stage for good things ahead. Because when it came down to it, I had to believe that good things were in store for me—it was the way I thought, whether silently or out loud. And if believing in something helped to get you where you were going and made the trip more pleasant, then whether you called it positive energy or just coincidence, it really didn’t matter in the end.

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