I have never considered myself to be
an overly sentimental person. While I
pin old Playbills from my favorite Broadway shows to my bulletin board, I have
never been a scrapbook keeper or a superb memory preserver. The movie ticket stub from my first date is
nothing but a fond memory, and my camera generally lies untouched and forgotten
in a desk drawer. Of the half a dozen
diary entries I actually committed to paper in my youth, the most exciting one
reads, “Dear Diary, I felt sort of barfy (sic) today. Mommy gave me some Saltines. I hope tomorrow is fun. Love, Rebecca Gayle Marks.” My elaborate calligraphic signature takes up
nearly as much space on the page as the scintillating entry itself. I do, however, maintain one sentimental
practice: the preservation of years’ worth of fortunes from fortune
cookies.
I have always loved fortune
cookies. In truth, I have yet to meet a
cookie that I did not adore; complex carbohydrates and I share a deep, enduring
bond of love and commitment. Fortune
cookies, however, have always been a favorite of mine. From the rare opportunity to play with my
food to the sweet, buttery taste melting on my tongue, these confections are
truly excellent from start to finish.
For someone who has always lived
with major depressive disorder and generalized anxiety disorder, fortune
cookies have taken on a particularly meaningful role. These multifaceted desserts are my
unscratched lottery tickets, magically holding the promise of wealth and
prosperity. When cracking open the
cookie’s sugary shell to uncover the clairvoyant slip of paper within, I become
the treasure hunter about to unearth an elusive chest overflowing with riches. When your life is largely characterized by
sadness, the fortune cookie’s ability to deliver the promise of a better
tomorrow becomes an incomparable treasure.
Dozens of these small slips of paper float about my room, resting in the
bottom of forgotten wallets and nestling in the deep recesses of unused
drawers. My favorites assume a place of
honor, featured prominently above my desk where I can view them daily. Of the hundreds of fortunes that I have
encountered in my lifetime, three have played an especially prominent role.
The first came to me while celebrating
my younger sister’s ninth birthday at a local Chinese restaurant. Due to my life-threatening peanut allergy, I
must be hyper-vigilant at Chinese restaurants as several traditional dishes
contain nuts. I was dining on an
innocuous bowl of chicken lo mein when the restaurant staff brought a
tantalizing chocolate birthday cake to our table. The glowing candles atop the sugary
confection emphasized the rich frosting and chocolate chips sprinkled across
the top. Our waiter delivered the cake
sans singing or general merriment, as my sister has been known to run from the
table crying hysterically if anyone sings “Happy Birthday” to her. All birthday photos of Shana up until the age
of six display red-rimmed, swollen eyes and a tentative half-smile. As my sister blew out her candles, my father
inquired to our waiter whether the cake contained nuts.
“Why, yes,” the waiter replied
eagerly. “Our chocolate fudge black-out cake is filled with a hazelnut crème
ganache.”
While the waiter’s eyes twinkled, basking
in the glow of this gourmet display, three other sets of eyes shifted nervously
to me. Their owners knew that I would
now face the daunting task of watching my mother, father and sister dine on a
scrumptious looking cake without being able to touch it. Not a simple feat for an eleven-year-old
lover of all things sweet. I couldn’t
very well demand that my nine-year-old sister send back her birthday cake
(though I considered it), so I dejectedly poked at my leftover noodles with a
splintered chopstick while my family enjoyed their mouthwatering dessert. I was confident that if I didn’t complain and
played my cards right, I’d be treated to fruit sorbet upon our arrival home.
After the torturous treat was consumed,
our waiter brought the check and a pile of fortune cookies to our table. Finally, I thought to myself, a smile
broadening across my face. Here was a
dessert in which I too could take part.
As I eagerly tore open the plastic wrapper and split the cookie in two,
my fortune fluttered to the table.
“What does your fortune say, Becca?”
inquired my mother.
Unraveling the slip of paper
reverently, I read aloud, dumbfounded, “You can have your cake and eat it, too.”
After a few moments of silent
uncertainty, my family and I burst into laughter. The juxtaposition of an eleven-year-old
having to watch other people eat a
beautiful, undoubtedly delectable chocolate cake to which she was allergic and
a fortune reading “You can have your cake and eat it, too” was utterly
hilarious. While it was my sister who
was celebrating a birthday and enjoying rich deliciousness, I was the one who
walked away with the true gift that night.
I learned first hand that laughter truly is the best medicine. I didn’t know it then, but this prescription
would prove invaluable later down the line.
Fast forward to my sophomore year of
college. My sorority was celebrating
welcoming a new member class into our organization. After an exhausting day of bubbly name games
and bouncing on trampolines in matching, neon sweatshirts, we were all thrilled
when dinner arrived. The new member
coordinator had ordered half a dozen varieties of noodles, several of which
contained nuts. The members of my
sorority were all well aware of my nut allergy, so I was permitted to jump to
the front of the line and serve myself first.
Avoiding a line of a hundred ravenous sorority girls and tearing into
the macaroni and cheese first is definitely one of the few benefits of having
allergies. After heaping a generous
portion of al dente pasta and creamy cheddar cheese onto my paper plate, I took
my first warm, salty bite. Immediately,
my teeth bit down on something crunchily out of place and reminiscent of Asian
cuisine. I knew that the restaurant had
sent us several orders of pad Thai as well, so I was immediately terrified that
I had unknowingly ingested a cross-contaminated peanut. My eyes wide and my face stricken with
obvious panic, my friend Katie worriedly asked me what was wrong. After violently spitting out the bite in
question, I pointed to the chewed up food and shouted, “I think I just ate a
peanut!” Without blinking an eye, Katie
plucked the regurgitated noodle from my napkin and popped it into her
mouth. Her brow furrowed in deep
concentration, she eventually announced, “Not peanut, bean sprout.” This impressive display of unconditional
friendship would not mark the last time that Katie would swoop in as my knight
in shining yoga pants.
At the end of the school year, I
reluctantly drove Katie to the airport so she could return home to Chicago for
the summer. After a tearful embrace at
passenger drop-off, I returned home and settled down at my desk for some last
minute studying for final exams. Sitting
on top of my computer was a pale yellow post-it note inscribed with the words
“Love you - Miss you” in Katie’s neat handwriting. Taped to the post-it note was a fortune with
the word “bean sprout” typed in Arial 12 on the “Learn Chinese” side of the
paper. Laughing warmly to myself, I
smiled and pinned the note to my bulletin board where it has remained ever
since. Whenever I look at it, I think of
the friend who was miraculously brought into my life, just as serendipitously
as she stumbled across a fortune cookie containing the word “bean sprout”.
The following year, my mental health
took a dangerous turn for the worse. I
remember the day distinctly—February 6, 2012.
The impetus for my almost lethal overflow of emotions is essentially
irrelevant; the combination of my chronic depression, overwhelming anxiety, a dash
of obsessive-compulsive disorder and complete lack of medication meant that
hitting rock bottom was completely and tragically inevitable.
As tears streamed down my face like
turbulent floodwater spewing forth from a fractured dam, I fell deeper into the
dark and dangerous depths of hopelessness.
I became increasingly certain that the situation would never improve and
utterly positive that I would never truly know happiness. Feeling wholly defeated and desperate, I did
not think that I had the strength to continue living and fighting.
I paced back and forth across my
small room, feeling my nervous energy churning throughout my body with
absolutely no outlet. As I continued to
wear lines in the dated carpet, my eyes settled on a bottle of pills. The ordinarily harmless ibupofren that I
often mindlessly swallowed to combat headaches and body cramps suddenly become
a horrifyingly tempting deadly weapon.
While I had experienced thoughts of suicide regularly for the past
several years, this situation was unprecedented. For the first time, I felt there was a
scarily real possibility that my life would end that night at my own hand. In this damaged state, I decided that this
was my destiny, so I may as well get it over with before accumulating more hurt
and sadness. As terrifying thoughts of
overdose and impossible letters to friends and family menacingly swirled
through my head, a life-saving deus ex machina in the form of my best friend
intervened.
Stopping by my room to see if I’d
like to study together, Katie immediately took note of my condition and stepped
in. “I am not leaving your side. Period.”
As Katie took control of the situation, I felt relief wash over my body. The tiny white off-brand analgesic drugs
instantly transformed from a lethal device back into harmless pain
reliever. I was immensely thankful that
my life had been saved, but angry and confused that I had been the one about to
destroy it.
Two hours and one emergency phone call
later, Katie dropped me off at my home thirty minutes away into the open arms
of my mother. Armed only with a pillow
and a haphazardly packed suitcase, I saw my world turn upside down. I had gone
from the well-accomplished college student at the top of my class to a mental
patient living at home. In that moment,
I felt that I was no longer the successful, independent woman of whom my family
was so proud. I was the daughter, the
sister, the granddaughter, the cousin, the niece and the friend who had almost
taken her own life. I was the girl who was
almost gone. While I was still miserably
unhappy, I was determined to get my illnesses in order and above all, continue
living.
One exhaustingly long month of
waiting later, and I was admitted into a partial-hospitalization intensive
therapy program. Every Monday through
Friday, I spent seven hours in a hospital to develop stress management and
coping skills and an effective medication regimen.
The first morning of the program
felt completely surreal. Who was this
person bringing a sack lunch and emergency anti-anxiety pills to a mental
hospital? When I looked in the mirror of
the hospital bathroom that didn’t even lock, I didn’t recognize my own
reflection.
After going far too long without
cracking a smile or emitting so much as a giggle, I discovered that my
therapist for the program sat on an enormous bouncy ball rather than a desk
chair. As I tearfully described what
brought me to this low point in my life, Cindy nodded earnestly and continued
to ricochet back and forth on her bright red alternative-seating device. I quickly discovered that the words “suicide
attempt” sound substantially less frightening when punctuated by constant
squeaks. Little by little, bouncy squeak
by bouncy squeak, I felt the glorious soreness from smiling too widely return
to my cheeks. As I wiped tears of
laughter from my eyes while recounting the nonsensical tale to my family, I
realized that this moment of much needed humor constituted the best medicine I
had ever received. For the first time
since that heartbreakingly dark sixth of February, I felt the tiniest beam of
sunlight fight its way through the clouds and reach my skin.
Later that week, my mother and I were
eating at a Chinese restaurant. As I
licked remnants of sweet and sour sauce from my lips, I split my fortune cookie
in half to reveal the following prediction: “Your eyes will soon be opened to a
world of beauty, charm and adventure.” The
only thing to which my eyes were open was the prickling of hot tears. This slip of paper became a divine message
telling me that my life was worth living, that my simple goal of happiness was
not beyond reach. I have never
subscribed to the superstitious school of thought that ascribes cosmic
significance to a moment, but I know
that this fortune was ordained to be mine.
This moment and this tiny slip of paper was my sign that my world was
turning around for the better.
A little over a month prior to the
almost tragic sixth of February, I was at a friend’s apartment celebrating New
Year’s Eve. “Enjoy the last New Year’s
ever!” shrieked exuberant party guests, referring to the Ancient Mayan belief
that the world would be brought to a catastrophic end in the year 2012. While cheery partygoers surrounded me
toasting with cheap champagne and exchanging friendly kisses, I closed my eyes
in silent prayer. I prayed fiercely
that 2012 would be my year—the year that I would be freed of the shackles of
depression, finally able to embrace life and all it has to offer. In the most unexpected way possible, my prayer
was answered.
On February 6, 2012, the Mayans’
prediction came true for me. My world
burned in a fiery conflagration of pain and sorrow. When I almost took my own life but didn’t, my
world changed. On that night when my
illness almost killed me, I miraculously regained control of my life. The years of hurt and countless tears were
destroyed, leaving behind the glowing embers of potential and
determination. I was left standing in
the ashes, but the flames did not destroy me.
I was a phoenix, reborn amidst the blaze.
Just as fortune cookies splinter
into tiny shards of baked flour and sugar, I too fell apart when I almost
committed suicide. But rather than
disintegrating into forgotten crumbs swept swiftly into a garbage can, I became
the smooth slip of paper, filled with the promise of a better tomorrow. I discovered a new, stronger person
within. A person who can and will laugh
even when she can’t have her cake or eat it, too. A person who can fully realize and appreciate
her amazing friends and family. A person
whose eyes will indeed be open to a world full of beauty, charm and adventure.
And above all, a person who has many, many years of fortune cookies ahead of
her.
Rebecca Marks’ qualifications include a wicked
under-bite that yielded a pronounced lisp, a laundry list of allergies that
necessitated years of shots and an addiction to antihistamine, a Jewish
heritage that provides a boisterous family and an overflow of neuroses and
sarcasm, and most expensively, a nearly completed Bachelor’s degree in English. Her work will be appearing in an upcoming
issue of The Inconsequential and has
been featured in The Portland Review.
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