A Ghost Story

On feeling haunted by hope.

A lot has been written about New York — the energy, the history, the architecture. But my favorite thing about it, and the part I never want to leave, is that New York has the best ghosts.

I’m not talking about apparitions, silent figures in Victorian nightgowns that disappear in a flash. (Though if you’ve witnessed something like this, I’m all ears.) Mine are purely energy, felt but never seen.

I sense them in their old haunts, in flickering theater lights and the glow of dimly lit bars. E.B. White and Edith Wharton, Nora Ephron and Truman Capote, Alvin Ailey and Billie Holiday, Margaret Sanger and Shirley Chisholm. Those whose spirits we invoke, including many we don’t know by name, who live on in the worlds they created.

This city is also populated with my ghosts. The people I’ve been, versions who’ve aged or changed or hopefully came to know better. The moments I’ve inhabited and never will again.

Of course, ghosts are not unique to New York, but here they feel inescapable, their legacies as much a part of the air as the wind rustling through the trees. If you’re lucky, they envelope you from time to time. Reminding you what is possible, of your role in the story.

“Save the date!” The text caught me off guard.

The date in question is a Saturday in October. The occasion is my twentieth high school reunion.

“Well, that can’t be right,” I said, to no one. “I’ve barely been alive that long.” (False; I am nearly twice that.)

It was a curious feeling, one I wouldn’t describe as excitement nor nostalgia nor dread.

No, the word I’d use is haunted.

Just all my dumb mistakes waving from the past.

High school is the land of yearbook superlatives — most likely to succeed, class flirt, class clown, best athlete — words to live up to or try to escape.

In the movie version, it is the most changed character who relishes the reunion. The underdog-turned-rock star or wallflower-turned-CEO who rolls up in a chauffeured vehicle — or hell, an actual motorcade — with tales of their sparkly new life.

For most of us, it is less climactic.

Thanks to social media, I still keep in touch with (or at least keep tabs on) friends from college, high school, and in one notable instance, kindergarten. We text and talk and share meals. Some of them subscribe to this newsletter.

To venture beyond that — to share refreshments in the same building where I once slow danced to the theme song from Titanic — feels like a hostile version of that Didion quote about keeping on nodding terms with the people we used to be. Sure, I’ll acknowledge that girl. But does that mean I must also nod at the middle-aged version of a boy she once dated?

The truth is, I am jealous of my high school self. She saw the world in terms of possibilities, unencumbered by the weight of loss, the sting of life’s inevitable disappointments. She trusted so easily — in people, in process, in the figures in charge. She regarded the future as only the young can, a yellow brick road that stretched on unceasing. Ripe for exploring, and eventually, for repaving however she saw fit.

I know her ghost is right where I left her, and I relish the thought of her haunting those halls. Her optimism landing on others. Her sense of possibility eventually coming to pass.

Historically, I’ve always taken issue with superlatives, because they don’t reflect real life. The world is too vast for such titles — there can be no “most” or “best.” Someone will always have more, do more, be more. Records will be broken, titleholders replaced.

But from where I now sit, I see that any statement beginning with “most likely to…” is more about possibility than probability.

Likelihood is beside the point. What matters is the road ahead of us.

My beloved yoga teacher never lets us sit in the same spot twice, a mild point of irritation for this creature of habit.

“No attachment,” he says, wagging one finger. “We want to be flex-i-ble.” He draws the syllables out as if they, too, are made of rubber.

Clinging in any one area helps foster attachment in general, which does us no favors when we are faced with change.

I’ve considered this a lot in the past few years, in the wake of life upended by COVID, civil unrest, sweeping societal shifts. The less I feel in control, the more I’ve found myself clinging to anything static — the same lunch, the same park bench, the same morning routine.

My body is baffled by change. It moves through the shape of a day still wanting to retire to a former apartment. It looks for friends who have left, businesses that have closed, places that are no more. It feels the pull of familiar ghosts and tries to dance with them.

Here on this plane, I attempt to land firmly in the moment. I practice observing the world with some distance, as though my life is a film about a character whose fate I am less invested in than fascinated by. A story I can watch but cannot control.

That’s where I see that we are not just haunted by the past.

Perhaps there are ghosts of the future. Watching from an as-yet-uncovered reality, urging us ever onward.

They are pure possibility. And by that measure, so are we.

Card of the Week

Here is this week’s card for the collective, as well as some thoughts to carry into the days ahead. As most modern readers will tell you, the tarot is not about fortunetelling, nor is it about neat, definitive answers. The cards are simply one path to reflection, a way of better knowing ourselves and others through universal themes. If this reading resonates with you, great! And if not, no worries. Take whatever may be helpful and leave the rest.

Featuring The Fountain Tarot by Jonathan Saiz, Jason Gruhl, and Andi Todaro

When The Hierophant appears, some say to look out for the teacher.

It could be an anointed person — a professor, instructor, coach, or guide.

It could be an unintentional mentor — that person who really gets under your skin and holds a mirror to your frustration.

It could be a book, a podcast, a sacred text.

It could be observing the shape and sound of your breath.

The world is never short on empty aphorisms, like “everything happens for a reason” and its marginally less irritating cousin, “there is a lesson in everything.” While it is impossible (not to mention maddening) to extract the “reason” behind the terrors and tragedies of our time, there are often takeaways to be found — some profound and others merely practical.

This is why we study history. Why we create, uphold, and share traditions. To honor those who came before, by learning from their efforts and (in the best of cases) not repeating their mistakes.

At every stage, we all function as both student and teacher, with much to learn and much to share. Everywhere we turn, there is wisdom to be imparted, whether we recognize it or not. But to truly benefit, we mustn’t merely ingest, but alchemize, finding a way to make it ours.

Humans often turn to spirituality in desperate times, when we want — or perhaps more accurately, need — to find hope. When optimism is on short order, it can be a way to relinquish control, to trust in the unfolding.

Traditionally, this card shows an imposing figure, sometimes on a dais, cloaked in an elaborate robe. But The Hierophant need not take the form of some exalted leader. In fact, I’d argue it’s more powerful when it doesn’t.

I love how this interpretation shows what appears to be an ordinary citizen opening a box of mysteries. Did they just stumble upon the answer to a long-held question? A talent they didn’t know they had? A spiritual breakthrough?

Whatever it is you seek — answers, enlightenment, mysteries, miracles — this card wants you to know that you can find them. And this is very well how it may look — a discovery you make in your own way, in your own company, within your own self.

Our society wants us to believe that the answers exist somewhere outside of us. What better way to sell a product, a message, a class? And while much can be gleaned from others, it is worthless unless we can also access our consciousness, until we can marry what we absorb to the hypotheses we already carry.

The Hierophant says you may follow whatever recipe you like. You can take what resonates from different traditions and apply it to your own experience, until you’re left with whatever rings true for you. It’s always okay to question. It’s also okay to change your mind.

“Seek for the Path within yourself,” wrote Russian esotericist P.D. Ouspensky over a century ago. “Do not expect to hear the truth from others, nor to see it, or read it in books.”

There are so many ways to access truth, so many ways to arrive at what already resides within us. Wisdom resides in the space between outward observation and inner reflection — each is empty without the other.

Learning happens as we move through the world.

Knowing happens inside of us.

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