Sitting in SoHo, smokin' a stogie and this man appears in front of me. He begins to....read me...sort of...in some psychic way. Was interesting at first. I played along. Being a NY'er of course....I figured, this is a hustle of some kind and at some point, he'd want something. I let him continue. He read my palm and said all sorts of magical things and then said a prayer. He told me of great success to come and that I needed to do certain things. I marveled at some of what he said. He seemed to know certain things and sensed much about me. Then, he scribbles something on a pieces of small paper, crumbles it up and puts it in my palm telling me to close my hand. He then asks me to name an animal. I say, a lion. He then says pick a number between 1-47. I pick 12. Another prayer and some more spiritual talk and he then tells me to open the paper to see if the fortune he sees for me and the energy is indeed true. I open the paper and it reads: Lion, 12 and has a symbol or two scribbled. I couldn't believe it. Now, I'm thinking to myself "this guy is obviously a street magician of some kind. How the hell did he do that!?" But, really, his energy and his overall wishes for me and the peace he seemed to project, made it all good. He did of course then ask me for money. He was thinking $60, $80. I had six bucks in singles on me. I just assumed he wouldn't take a credit card. After handing the money, he wanted to give me a spiritual stone of some kind which he indicated was "the lion's eye!" Thing is though, he asked me to give him something for it. A trade of some type. I honestly had nothing to give him. All I had was my camera bag and my camera. So, I said "let me take your picture. I will send it to you and also send you some other type trinket." He agreed to let me take his picture quick. I didn't get the lion's eye stone but it was all good. Honestly, that made my day.
