When the universe smacks you on the head

I was once walking through town having just been reading Take A Break Fate And Fortune (I'm not proud that I read Take A Break Fate And Fortune, when I should probably be reading Sartre or something, no I am not) and I was thinking about guardian angels. For those of you who are not up with Contemporary Angel Culture, I shall provide a brief introduction.

{Clears throat}... According to Take A Break Fate And Fortune and various paperback books with pastel covers which you may occasionally see remaindered in The Works, we each have our own guardian angel who does the following: keeps an eye on us generally even when we make Bad Choices, as I am wont to do: intervenes if we do something particularly daft like falling in front of a bus by mistake: reminds us of his/ her presence by scattering in our path Angelic Reminders which are normally either feathers or coins.

Now, the first time I read this I started noticing coins everywhere and it was very odd, in fact I was like Gretel wandering about following a trail of 2ps all over the place. It may be that my guardian angel (thanks mate, it must have been quite a long road) is particularly enthusiastic; or, it may be that I worked close to someone with a hole in the pocket of their polyester mix Chinos. It may have been a lot of things. Anyway, as I was walking through town that day, I thought: perhaps the whole guardian angel thing would work better if they gave you a proper sign rather than scattering feathers about or a bit of small change - something a bit definite. And at the very point when I thought that, a conker fell off a nearby tree and hit me really hard, right on the top of the head, causing me to stagger. This is how life is: sometimes the universe smacks you on the head with an omen.

You'll be delighted to know I've still got that cardigan

I was thinking about this recently. A while ago I did this post about a Ring Of Bad Luck which somehow I had acquired. Because I am wishy-washy and new-agey and tend to think, entirely erroneously, that I have enough good karma to neutralise difficult things {goes off to consider aforementioned bad choices in light of new insight}, I started wearing this ring more, with the intention of charging it with positive energy. ( I appreciate the sentence you have just read is the point where I started sounding a bit odd to some of you. However, bear with me).

I dragged that big old black ring out and tried to wear it in happy situations but it always had a bit of a dark feeling to me. Anyway, you may remember that last year I was going through a bit of a difficult situation which became so thrillingly difficult that at one point I succumbed and read Fifty Shades Of Grey, that is how bad it was (I've since read the sequel! It's worse!). Well, on the first day of my difficult situation, for some reason instead of wearing something cheerful I decided to add my black ring to my carefully chosen outfit (tight black dress, red pixie boots, suit jacket, bleach hair, red lipstick, why be miserable and also look it?). However! As I was getting off the tube, I kind of got my hand stuck in the rapidly closing door between a couple of commuters. I dragged my hand out frantically thinking how things would really, really not be improved by me having a broken wrist - schluuuuuurp! - and, amazingly, I hadn't hurt myself, but - the stone on the ring had been sucked right out and was travelling away from me at speed northbound on the Northern Line. I took it as an omen. I took it as the Universe saying, do not worry, Susie, negativity will be schluuuurped right out of your life just like that black glass stone in the door of the tube at Holborn.

I threw the rest of the ring away - the stone was kind of the point, and besides, I felt it had served its purpose.

Spiky yet cheerful, just like me

Anyway, here's the funny thing: from that moment on, things, which had really, really not been looking good, and let me emphasise that to you in the strongest terms, started looking up a bit. And now I think I have to say that things are pretty much looking A-OK. I'm just slightly too superstitious to say, categorically, no more difficult situation, but, I did not think a year ago that I would be where I am now, and if my guardian angel reads my blog which I cannot imagine he wouldn't - indeed I imagine he's sitting up there on a cloud now, crocheting something, scrolling away and tutting whenever I make a spelling mistake - I'd like to thank him formally for all his hard work. These days I wear this sunstone necklace. It says on the internet sunstone is a cheerful kind of stone, and if it says it on the internet then it obviously must be true. I wonder where I'll be a year from now? Onwards and upwards...