Kindred Spirit

That’s what the slim strip of paper in the fortune cookie said. “You will find a kindred spirit”. I was relieved to know that I, too, like Anne of Green Gables, would soon have someone bonded to me heart and soul. Someone to share every small irony; someone who would know what I was always thinking, and not think the worse of me; someone who would not think me insane for relishing bizarre thoughts at inappropriate times.

I tucked the small prophecy in my pocket, and we left the café.

The next day I set off on my usual travels to work, expecting a serendipitous moment at anytime—it could be anyone, anyone of the people I meet, or see, or work with during the day. But I didn’t leave the building all day. Nothing happened. There was a time, I thought, just a moment when someone in the elevator snickered at one of my better sarcastic comments, then nothing.

When the day was over, I sat on the sofa and asked the family dog what I should do, and she just looked at me. She is old, and deaf, and almost blind. She has survived the kids, survived breaking free, getting lost and then found, tolerated eating things she shouldn’t have, spent endless hours in the garden digging and sniffing about, slept and snored in the mound of covers on the bed; but her look let me know, without a doubt, that she thinks I am her kindred spirit.