What's your fortune?

There's a little Chinese place down the road from me. Sometimes on the weekend when I don't feel like cooking, I'll get hubby to run down and pick  up some lunch. Today was one of those days. Although I didn't really feel like eating anything, I knew I had to eat something to keep my strength up so I ordered vegetable Egg Foo Young.

Jamie, my youngest daughter, and I sat down with our Chinese food and popped a movie in. We enjoyed our lunch and when it was time to  read our fortune cookies, I opened mine first. I couldn't believe what it said on the little slip of paper - "A carrot a day may keep cancer away." REALLY? If I'd known that, I could have foregone all of this pain. I wonder who comes up with these silly statements anyway?

For years, I didn't eat fortune cookies. I didn't care for the taste, but I'd crack those things open for the fortune. That was one of the best parts of the meal. When I was in college, while sitting with a group of friends, the game was that you had to read the fortune aloud to the rest of the table. Everyone would add two words to the end of the fortune making it hilariously funny. The two words that were added were the words "in bed." Most of the fortunes took on a whole new meaning by just adding those two little words, for example: "your life may be filled with magical moments...in bed" or "it never pays to kick a skunk...in bed." But today's fortune wasn't funny even with the two little words "in bed" added to the end of the statement - "a carrot a day may keep cancer away...in bed." No. Definitely not funny. 

I did laugh thinking about the person who was paid to write fortune cookie sayings for a living. I could just picture the job description in my mind:  "Need sharp thinking individual with strong writing and communication skills, as well as a quick wit and sense of humor. Personally rewarding career for a unique individual but don't expect to get paid very handsomely … in bed." LOL!

People often take fortune cookie messages to heart. They crack open the yellow crescent moon cookies that conclude their Chinese restaurant meal, and eagerly hunt for predictions, revelations, and deeper meaning. Many save their favorites, carrying them around in a wallet or purse thinking the cosmos has imparted a divine snippet of wisdom chosen personally for them. Others simply toss their little slips of paper into the waste with the leftovers from their meal knowing it will soon end up in the garbage.

For most of us, it's just a silly childish game we play to add a bit of humor into our day. For me though, the carrot/cancer fortune wasn't funny. In fact, I really wished that the person who'd come up with that statement could have seen my face as I read it. I would have loved for him/her to see me sitting on my bed with the clear plastic vials of bodily fluids pumping into them as the wounds from my mastectomies slowly healed. Perhaps then the writer would have taken a different approach to writing silly cookie fortunes. Perhaps he/she would have changed the saying to read "Wise man never upsets woman with blood grenades dangling from chest...in bed" instead of using a flippant statement filled with stupidity.

©bonnie annis all rights reserved