Many years ago, one of my friends got married to a rich girl and the reception was held at an expensive hotel on the Main Line. Since so many of the groom’s friends were poor musicians (and troublemakers, I guess), they sat us all at a long table in a back corner. I got bored sitting around waiting for the food, so I started singing the high notes of the opening bars to myself — quietly at first, but then louder. The table of musicians AND THEN THE ENTIRE PLACE JOINED IN. (Years before “My Best Friend’s Wedding,” so don’t even think I stole this story.)

Then we did “Chapel of Love” and “Come Go With Me.” After the singing ended, the guy I’d given a ride turned to me and asked me to go out to dinner with him the next weekend. Since he was a heroin addict, I wasn’t interested. But I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, so I pretended I didn’t hear him.

I was baffled. On the ride there, I’d told him all about the alcoholic lawyer I’d just broken up with, and then the alcoholic journalist who took me on the worst date ever. I complained about how my cheery persona seemed to be a magnet for addicts and substance abusers, despite my clearly-stated preference for sober types.

And yet, he interpreted that as a go-ahead signal.

In a snit, he got up and moved to another table. I found out later he went home with the maid of honor and moved in a few weeks later. The bride told me her friend kicked him out and had to get a protection order against him because he kept trying to strangle her. Some kind of sleep disorder, apparently.

(Sadly, the newlyweds also went downhill from there. They had a kid but got divorced shortly after their S&M proclivities spilled outside the marriage and the heiress bride became a sex slave. It was all so Jerry Springer-ish.)

Anyway, I gave an artist friend and his date a ride home instead (they sat in the back and kept ridiculing my hand-me-down Buick Regal — I wanted to tell them to get out and walk, but I didn’t. Fuck them, though. I can nurse a grudge with the best of them.)

Several of us who were at the wedding met up downtown for drinks, and I had my tarot cards in my purse. I started doing my friends’ readings. A stranger came over and asked if I would do one for him. I said sure, and as I spread out the cards on the table, the hairs on my arm stood up: I realized he intended to leave the bar and go kill a woman who dumped him. I can’t tell you how I knew this, or why, but I was as certain as a person can be.

Nothing like this had ever happened to me before; I was a little freaked and sort of strongly hinted to him it would be a really bad idea. “I mean, if she’s dead and you’re in jail, that means she wins, right? It’s all about the power. Why give her the upper hand like that? She’s not worth it. Let it go.” I’m persuasive when I really want something, and I really wanted him not to do this.

He didn’t respond to anything I said but thanked me, and got up to leave. The next day, I carefully checked the news, but nothing. Whew.

In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight…