by Michael Jackman. First broadcast 12/13/01 WFPL, Louisville, 89.3 FM

Note: 6/11/09 – This has been a really popular radio essay, and I’m posting it here by request. I’d put it in podcasts, but I don’t think I have a recording of this one. Okay, the request is by my wife Dana, whose first date experience with me was broadcast a month later to the Louisville listening audience, though I didn’t use her name at the time. She still likes me anyway. – mj

Recently, a friend of mine was told:

“You are very stiff in your opinions.”

This unsolicited analysis didn’t come from a concerned pal, wise counselor, miffed lover, or even a self-righteous yenta. Believe it or not, it came from a fortune cookie.

The bad news arrived after a good dinner. The food was excellent, the company interesting. All that remained was to pay the bill, but before that, there was the ritual cracking of the fortune cookie and the reading of innocuous good news.

Only this time the news wasn’t good.

“You are very stiff in your opinions.”

The blast from this oracular hand grenade blew her away.

“I’m working on that,” she said, to the universe at large. Since I was just getting to know her, I appreciated the insight.

But she looked puzzled, wondering why fate had singled her out from a restaurant full of laughing people.

We don’t expect fortune cookies to be honest, or critical. We expect brief, uplifting messages, whether or not they’re true:

“You have many admirers,” or

“Good fortune will surely come your way.”

Even though it defied convention, I give the Golden Dragon Fortune Cookie Co. of Chicago, Il, credit for a novel approach. It turned a harmless, clichéd ritual of dining into food for thought.

Maybe all fortune cookie companies should load their shells with harder-to-digest messages:

“Life is brief, and sorrow, inevitable,” or

“Remember your student loan payment,” or

“Only 27 years to go on that mortgage.”

My friend’s situation reminded me of another ritual.

At a Jewish wedding the groom stomps a wine glass. Because this looks like a really fun thing to do, you can forget the glass is broken for a serious reason.

It’s meant to be a reminder, during a joyful time, that the world contains sorrow.

When my friend cracked open her fortune cookie that evening, it was just like stomping a wine glass. Among the shards of confection was a reminder that the world contains truths that are hard to swallow.

Maybe after every dinner we need to stomp a misfortune cookie. Especially during a joyful season like this one, when life seems like a banquet, the ritual of the misfortune cookie would help us keep our minds supple and truthful towards the larger human condition. It would help us remember that not all is fruitful with the world.

Even though we know this now, we tend to forget.