Oh, the telling of the future. For thousands of years, people have tried to predict the outcome of the oncoming. There are as many ways to predict the future as there are days in the month. And then some.
Most commoners, like me, do not have an inkling. Although, every so often, my psychic powers will kick in while watching The Price is Right, when I tell Gary to pick number 3, and sure enough, that’s where the money was.
Back to the future. Humans have long wanted to have a better sense of what lies ahead, the Divining of the Future. Yes, Divination — the interpretation of omens or, even perhaps, the assistance of supernatural powers.
As I mentioned, there are scads. Many of us have tried these things, in some way or another. Take, for instance, Aleuromancy. By definition, it is Divination using flour. What, you say? We’ve all dabbled in a little aleuromancy every time we cracked open the fortune cookie that arrived with our Sweet and Sour Pork. Those little papers of prediction.
Then we’ve seen the likes of the wicked queen in Snow White, or perhaps the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz. They use methods of Catoptromancy. It might involve invoking the power of a mirror or a crystal ball. It has also been called scrying. Either way, that thing you see me in town, the thing in the bag I carry is my bowling ball. Just so we are crystal clear on this. A twelve-pounder.
Another method we are familiar with, especially if we’ve ever watched a scary supernatural movie, is Necromancy. It is the “conjuring of the spirits of the dead for purposes of magically revealing the future or influencing the course of events.” The good old seance. The Ouiji board. The graveside incantation. A few years back, after my father died, a few of us went to see John Edward at one of his per-ticket sessions. We’d watched his accurate readings on TV and thought maybe dear old dad would have a few more things to say to us kids. John never picked us from the audience, and most of his other readings seemed to be a real stretch that night. He had a terrible cold. I’m guessing the dead didn’t want to be around him either.
I’m always interested in trying new things, and I’m fascinated with the worlds we cannot see or understand. One method I just learned of is called Oomancy, which is the Divination by means of eggs. The shape of the egg white as it cooks is believed to offer clues about the future. Now, given how many eggs I ingest each morning, all in different shapes and sizes as they cook in the pan, I can only say this. My future looks to be a total mystery, yet cooked to perfection.
Yes, we try to explain the secrecy of the future. Which is why I bring up The Old Farmer’s Almanac. It was on this very date, October 13, 1792, when the almanac was first published.
It was brought to the public under the guidance of its first editor, Robert B. Thomas. A lot of other almanacs were being published at that time, but for some reason, Thomas’s new book became an immediate success.
It sold like hotcakes. By the second year, circulation had tripled from 3,000 to 9,000. And such a bargain, I suppose. The almanac cost only six pence which equals about nine cents. Common cents.
An almanac, by definition, is “an annual calendar containing important dates and statistical information such as astronomical data and tide tables.” But Thomas’ edition predicted the weather too. People like to know the future, and here it came to them in a neat little book.
So many people today still use the Farmer’s Almanac as their bible when it comes to foreseeing the upcoming winters. And the people who write the book claim to be accurate 80% of the time.
However, like all fake news, people fact-checked their claims. The Farmer’s Almanac is only right about 50% of the time. So-so.
Divination of the weather, the spirits, the future and the gods. I can tell you what the future holds right now:
The future.
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“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”
― Søren Kierkegaard
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“When I pronounce the word Future,
the first syllable already belongs to the past.
When I pronounce the word Silence,
I destroy it.”
― Wisława Szymborska, Poems
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“The future depends on what you do today.”
― Mahatma Gandhi
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Prediction. The Divination. We see, we see.
