Real Answers, Real Fast

“Please, sir,” the woman pleads over the telephone. “I need to know if I’m ever going to see my daughter again.”

It’s 1:30 a.m. here in L.A. and a woman from New Jersey (where it’s 4:30) is pouring out her problems. We’ve never met, of course, and whatever mental picture she has of me surely is not the correct one; that is, of an unshaven man, sitting on the carpet in his underwear, staring at some Tarot cards.

To her, I am some kind of metaphysical authority--a voice of hope she reached by dialing a 900 number.

For my part, I’m listening to a total stranger recounting a wrenching story of how her ex-husband has abducted her only daughter and told her she’ll never see her again.

It’s more drama--not to mention responsibility--than I really bargained for as a telephone psychic.

“What I see happening here is that you’re at the beginning of a process,” I offer. “You’re going to have to be patient and work things through. It’s going to take time.”

*

This all began a few weeks back when I answered an ad to be a Tarot reader for one of those psychic networks you see advertised on TV. I assumed a velvety-smooth voice (I pictured myself as Michael York with a crystal necklace) and left a message on their voice mail. A fast-talking guy with a New York accent called me back and perfunctorily ran down the job description, which I’m pretty certain he was reading off a script.

For credentials, I told him that I studied Tarot reading and read at a nearby coffeehouse. That was enough for him.

“I’ll cut to the chase, Mark,” he said, after complimenting my phone voice. “I’m going to fax you a bunch of pages, fill out and sign pages 4 and 5, fax them back and we’ll have you on-line tomorrow.”

Was that it? Would he even call the coffeehouse to check my story? Since no one has ever mentioned the fact that the phone number I gave them for the coffeehouse wasn’t correct, the answer is, apparently not. It seems that a good speaking voice and the willingness to sign a declaration that you have “experience as Tarot reader, astrologer or psychic” and that you can give “genuine, accurate readings . . . with confidence” gets you on-board.

The next day, one of their “psychic coordinators” called and asked me to read for her. I laid out some cards, talked about some general stuff for maybe a minute and that was that. She gave me a password with which I could log onto their system and receive phone calls. From that moment on, I was a telephone psychic.

*

I would log onto the system after midnight. One part of me would always be hoping nobody would call. But within minutes, the phone would ring. Each time it did, it would creep me out a little. Somewhere out in the great American spiritual vacuum of late-night TV, someone was reaching out to me.

“Thank you for calling,” I would answer in my velvety Michael York voice. “Can I have your first name, date of birth [to screen out minors] and city you’re calling from?”

Then I would shuffle the cards and begin to read.

While it’s too complicated to debate the validity of psychic phenomena, I will say that I do know the rudiments of Tarot reading, I have read for people (some of whom seemed to have been fairly impressed at my intuition) and I wouldn’t call myself a complete rationalist.

One hour into my first day, it became clear that what I would call an orthodox reading of the Tarot cards wasn’t going to cut it. They wanted real answers, real fast. Worse was that these callers were not only desperate but quite often poor and unemployed--too poor to be talking for 30 to 40 minutes at $3.99 a minute.

With the meter running--I was paid 25 cents a minute--the network wanted us to try to sign up callers for a psychic club membership, which includes three minutes of free readings a month, free daily horoscopes and a bunch of psychic doodads. But I never did. I felt guilty enough as it was. At somewhere between $120 to $160 a call, I couldn’t help but think how many welfare checks were being split between these psychic networks and the telephone company.

It was also apparent that despite the “For Entertainment Purposes Only” disclaimer, few people, if any, use the service for anything resembling a good time.

My first two calls were cases of children who had been abducted by parents, but these were hardly the saddest and most unusual stories I would eventually hear. For many, the psychic part was probably beside the point. They were just lonely and needed someone to listen to their problems.

One woman wanted to know if there was any truth to her daughter’s claim that her father had molested her. I would try to handle these people responsibly and give them some hope. The company asked us to put in six- to eight-hour shifts a night, but after about the fourth or fifth call of the night, I would be sick of the whole business and log off. Then I would try to go to sleep, but all these pathetic stories tumbled around my head until well after sunrise. All I ever got by way of comic relief was a woman who needed me to divine where she’d misplaced her house keys.

During my first readings, I would try to go it blind. To solicit help or information would be cheating, I figured. Only thing was, I found almost everybody too willing to feed me whatever I needed to know. In the material the network sent me there was a recommendation that I read a book called “Tarot in 10 Minutes.”

That no one seemed to approach these calls with anything resembling skepticism, I found amazing. Everyone seemed to take my psychic abilities--as advertised on TV--as a matter of faith.

My biggest fear, that someone would answer a question of mine with “You tell me, Mr. Psychic” never happened. Most seemed to be dazzled by the simplest of parlor tricks. For instance, every minute or so I would stop my reading and say, “Do you understand what I mean?” This usually netted a wealth of information. An emphatic “Oh, yes,” and I knew I was on the right track. “Uh, I think so,” and I would recast and redefine my message. And more often than not, they would give it all away by saying something like, “You’re talking about my husband, right?”

When I began, I was afraid that I wouldn’t have the skill, the intuition or the audacity to make a competent telephone psychic reader. By my second day, I was convinced anybody could do it. If I were to keep at it, it would be a journey further and further into cynicism.

By Day 3, I had had enough. I knew I could wean myself away from even using Tarot cards and just speculate and prognosticate off the top of my head. To keep at it would be to journey further and further into cynicism. I unplugged the phone, put away my Tarot cards and went back to my so-called normal life.

Only now I still imagine the hundreds of phones ringing across the country, and the desperate stories told by desperate people hoping to buy some psychic salvation at $3.99 a minute. For entertainment purposes only, that is.