Maybe because my first-ever job was at a Chinese restaurant, or maybe because I ate a lot of Chinese food (not likely in Portland) I managed by my early 20s to amass a big bag of fortune cookie fortunes. I honestly don’t know where they all came from, and memory lapses are something I’m realizing are legit even though I’m always baffled when I ask my mom about things, petty things usually, that happened during my childhood and she claims to have zero recollection of them. Recently, I’ve been reminded of things I said or did twenty years ago, like going to a particular movie or restaurant, and maybe 15% of it is like it never happened.
So, I still have a tendency to hold onto fortunes, hoping for some profundity. I’d been keeping “Truth can be harsh, but it can be helpful” at my office desk for ages even though that doesn’t mean anything personally at all because I’m hyper-aware of harsh truths and don’t need to be reminded. Around November, I scrawled “Expect the best” on it instead as a counter-acting measure even though I hate inspirational quotes. It couldn’t hurt anything to see that and believe it. And then the thing I wanted to happen that month did, so now I’m just going with it.
It was only this morning that I remembered the rest of that saying is…be prepared for the worst. Nope, I’m just not going to do that.
I’m not much of a self-portrait type and not terribly vain at this stage (I’ve been experimenting with blow-drying and trying to not let bangs that hang over my eyebrows bug me) but also feel the urge to balance my recent zit pic with a pre-bender Valentine’s Day selfie. I mean, the zit is still totally there. Five days later now and I think it’s permanently part of my face.