From Good to Better Luck

When my husband, Kevin, was offered the job he currently holds, as the lobbyist’s “body man” with a Juris Doctorate,  I told Kevin that I kept thinking about that scene from “Titanic” before she leaves port where Leo DiCaprio’s character is playing a tense game of poker. It’s the moment the four men have to reveal what hand they hold and Leo remarks, “Someone’s luck is about to change.” I realized immediately after I texted Kevin that a reference to winning tickets to sail on the Titanic’s maiden and singular voyage was probably not the analogy I should be making since the ship sank and all and it referenced one of the worst shipwrecks of all time. In my misguided defense, there were totally people who got space on the lifeboats. Besides, Kevin is scrappy and an excellent swimmer.

I don’t believe in psychics or tarot cards or astrology. I do, however, knock on wood when I tempt fate by saying something gauntlet-worthy such as, “Our household hasn’t been sick the entire flu season!” I also raise my toes and feet from the floor mat in my car when I drive over railroad tracks. And I blame my high school friend Stefanie for infecting me with the idea that I need to scratch the ceiling of my car when I run a yellow light. Unenthusiastic superstition? So it was with guarded amusement that I opened a fortune cookie fortune the day I had my first biopsy. It said “Your luck is about to change”. I don’t think God is communicating with me via cookie fortunes. I mean, probably not. Surely he has better things to do with his time and better avenues for communication?

It did make me ponder, though, because I felt like despite my long-term unemployment, Kevin had just landed the job of his dreams, my marriage was solid, the kids were doing well at school and I had just finished the book I’d been writing for a couple of years. I was slightly spooked by the fortune because I felt like my life was going rather well and if my luck was about to change, that perhaps this was a bad omen. Thankfully, I’m inherently a “grey” person. I don’t think in black and white. I realized the cookie was not necessarily foreboding “good to bad” or “bad to good”. It was foreboding “good to better”. There’s just a little hurdle jump on the track before good goes squarely in the realm of better. I’m up for it, though!