Feng Shui!

The nice people at Origins sponsor these monthly newagey clinics on various topics (that might possible be spun to sell their products). This month was a feng shui talk on the Upper West Side, so of course I corralled my DBS to come along with me.

I suspect that everyone in the audience (myself included) could not imagine how our intrepid Feng Shui Master, Carol Swann Meltzer, was going to relate interior design to any product at Origins (and I will get back to this mental trap later).

Not surprisingly, she was hawking a book. Feng Shui Chic. But it was a surprise that the book is only tangentially about “where to put the sofa.” It’s more about feng-shui-ing your self, your clothes, etc., etc. So she gave a nice little talk about what colors and lines to wear in clothes and in makeup, and mentioned (especially interesting to me) that one could also apply the rules of feng shui to music and fragrance. I suppose those are the reasons she was able to get Origins to host her appearance.

But, even though she offered to give us tips on what eye shadow colors to use—well, her face was way too heavily lacquered up for me to take cosmetic advice from her—the audience still wanted to hear about how to keep prosperity from flushing down the toilet. (Here’s where I get back to the mental trap.) And, after the formal talk when she offered to autograph books and answer questions, people started pulling out sheets of photographs of their sad little ratholes (I never thought I’d say this, but Damn the digital camera and color printer!), asking her to solve their life’s problems by telling them what friggin’ tchotchke to put on the shelf. One lady, I swear, had half a dozen 8 ½ x 11’s of her “efficiency” apartment and had questions on each and every angle. (Did I mension that this was a FREE clinic?) Ms. Meltzer—bless her heart or damn her, I’m not sure which—drew a play-by-play diagram on each of them for her. Somewhere around Photograph Four, the two girls in front of me said, “I never thought to bring pictures of my apartment. That was smar…” I interrupted, “I was going to call it presumptuous.” One or two questions are fine. Even one or two questions accompanied by a photo are fine. But keeping four people behind you in line waiting fifteen minutes while you take advantage of the Feng Shui Master’s helpful nature … Bitch, cough up the benjamins and make an appointment.

But if you think I didn’t run right home and—even before I fed the cats—take my cheesy little bagua mirror that I got in Chinatown last year and hang it on the hook inside my bathroom door, I’m flattered, but you WAY overestimate me.