I am a fool.

Ask any of my friends and they will tell you I make the poorest decisions of anyone they know. I did not need a stranger to tell me something I already knew, but I did find it funny when the fool card showed up as my foundation in my tarot card reading.

Enter the controversial world of tarot card reading. Some say it is just a hoax, that the readings are too general, that anyone can find something that fits in their lives. Others swear that it is real and heed the advice of the 78 cards.

Michelle Abruzzo, freshman in LAS, is unsure of how she feels about tarot card readings and the psychic realm in general.

“I think it is a difficult situation for some psychics,” Abruzzo said. “I think there are people who have some sort of intuition and use it to tell the future, but for the majority of psychics out there, I think it is just a hoax. They play on what you tell them.”

I feel the same way, but I set out on my quest to find out if local Catherine Novak, owner of Beads and Botanicals and tarot card reader, could make up my mind and make me a believer once and for all.

Every Tuesday evening at The Office, 214 W. Main St., from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m., Novak offers students and community members discounted tarot card readings for only $10.

Lisa Moreno, general manager of The Office, said this discounted price makes it more accessible to students.

“Each reading is only $10 for 10 minutes,” Moreno said. “Most other readings in town will run from $30 to $60. She is very intuitive though, and she will read you for longer than 10 minutes if you have a problem.”

Moreno thought of the idea of offering tarot card readings as a new and different way of bringing people into the bar. She said as soon as she started looking for psychics and found Novak’s name, she knew she was the one.

That was in July, and Novak has been a regular at The Office ever since, becoming like a member of the staff, Moreno said.

Walking into the bar, it was not hard to pick out Novak. She set up the booth with a piece of violet fabric running down the center, multicolored stones along one edge and a silver spider on the other. The deck of cards was fanned out across the fabric, as Novak patiently waited for her next customer.

I sat down and we chatted about how she got started and a little background about the tarot card deck she used, and then we got down to my reading, which, embarrassingly enough, is my third. What can I say, I am an impatient person and want to know what to expect before it happens.

Novak prefaced the reading by saying every card has a meaning and the placement that it falls at changes the meaning of the card.

I shuffled the deck and we started on my general reading, either because I had nothing specific I wanted to know or because I did not want to lead her in any direction. Either way, the cards were dealt, and as I said earlier, my foundation card, the card that is indicative of what is going on in my life right now, was the fool.

“It’s about going out there and trying different things,” Novak said. “It’s about taking leaps of faith.”

Right off the bat she had me nailed. I act before thinking about the consequences, and most of the time wake up wondering why I make such poor decisions.

I could already tell this was shaping up to be a pretty accurate reading, and this was just the beginning.

“You may not feel as if you are able to make choices,” Novak said, “but you can. Look at the card. There are two paths but the end result is going to be the same. Just pick a direction and go for it, rather than worrying about it. You are projecting too much in the future and worrying about what the consequences are going to be, and it’s too much.”

Major crisis anyone? I am in the process of deciding what I want to do with the rest of my life: if I want to stay in journalism, switch to English or attempt to get a dual degree.

The only thing holding me back is the fear that I will never get a job with an English degree because, after all, what can you really do with it other than become a teacher?

When I didn’t think she could get any more specific, she did.

“In the next few months, you have to focus on things that make you passionate,” Novak said. “If you have to make decisions, make them with things that excite you. Ignore how other people are going to view your actions because you are going to feel overwhelmed. You have too much regard for what others think of you, but make your own decisions. You are quite capable of doing so.”

So ignore the fact that my parents might be angry with my decision to drop something that has been my dream for as long as I can remember and focus on reading the classics for the rest of my life. When people ask me why I did that, I’ll just say “My psychic told me it was best.” Because that wouldn’t elicit any strange looks and have me sent to the psych ward faster than you can spell C-R-A-Z-Y.

But still, something about what she said hit home, and it made a believer out of me.

Then again, I am a fool.

So check Novak out and make up your mind for yourself.

Get your own tarot card reading every Tuesday from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. at The Office, 214 W. Main St. in Urbana