Thursday Thirteen

1. When I was in the seventh grade, in 1975, we had six weeks of exploratory classes. One of those was the business class. We had to draw a picture of ourselves when we 40. My picture was of a woman with glasses in blue jeans holding a pencil and paper because I wanted to be a writer. The picture was strangely prophetic, except that the woman in the picture was skinny as a rail. I missed the part about gaining weight in my prophecy, but I got the glasses right.

2. My grandmother on Christmas Eve, 1975 dreamed that Jesus came down to her and took her wedding ring from her while she walked with him in a lovely garden. He told her she didn't need her wedding ring any longer. A week later, my grandfather died of a massive heart attack.

3. A week after we buried my grandfather, a black cat showed up at my grandmother's house and stayed. It disappeared a year to the day my grandfather died.

4. A week after my mother died in 2000, a black cat showed up outside the window of my office. I saw it nearly every day; the last time I saw it daily was in 2001, a year to the day my mother died.

5. However, I have on occasion since then seen a black cat cross in front of my window, and every time, a day or two later I've run into my father in a public venue (my father and I are estranged).

6. Once I purchased a set of runes that have to do with creativity (not the runes you might normally think of). Seven times in a row, I drew out of a bag the rune for Chaos. It was one of the 21 runes available.

7. Prophecy is not something I've thought I have a penchant for, but I have always been in awe of the spooky and the divine.

8. When I was quite young, possibly in the fifth grade, I felt like I was being watched at night. I thought there were aliens looking in the windows. Not long after, there were reports of strange lights in the sky in the air over Craig County, just across the mountain from us.

9. I once participated in a National Enquirer skywatch for aliens. I was 13. I went outside on a hilltop and laid on a blanket and spent the night watching twinkling stars.

10. As an adult, I love the stars and spend lots of time looking at them in the summer, when the weather's not so cold. But I have gotten up in December and gone and sat outside to watch the meteor showers at 2 a.m. You can almost see prophecy in the glow of the light when a meteor streaks across the sky.

11. I do not read the National Enquirer now. My mother read it all the time, though, which is how I came to read it at age 13. She believed it.

12. I think the Old Farmer's Almanac is pretty good at prophecy; they get the weather right about as much as the TV weatherman and they do it a good year in advance.

13. I don't know how I feel about end-of-the-world prophecies, but I understand that ancient prophecies from the Mayans and other native civilizations indicate December 21, 2012 is it for us. Make your plans.