Marking a birthday with a new experience has become a bit of tradition. At 30, I marked myself with a tattoo — first one — and a psychic read my palm. At 40, I spent four days in New Orleans with my BFF. Good times, except for the reality check on my age.

You get the idea.

So, Friday, Jan. 13, I had a tarot card reading — another first. The palm reading went pretty well, so why not? I’ve had my astrological chart done once. That showed I was going to be famous — still waiting for the stars to align on that one.

Carli Krueger, our copy desk design chief, set it up. She’d had readings with Barbara Stott LLC, a former psychotherapist turned spiritual guide and energy healer, on a couple of occasions. Another co-worker, Allison Bye — she turned 25 on Jan. 15 — joined Carli and me to have her cards read, which gave us a discount for doing the tarot reading together.

I was intrigued with Stott from the start because she’d been a licensed therapist who left her practice after 19 years. Here’s a super brief explanation of why: “You had to put a label on people. It was pathological. I thought of people as being from more of an ancient spiritual place.”

Rather than listening to people retell painful stories, Stott wanted to provide guidance for life’s journey moving forward.

Allison was up.

Stott flipped the first card: The Magician. It means “incredible manifesting,” with one wand up and one wand down signaling “I am (Stott pointed up), I create (Stott pointed to the ground).” The next card, Wheel of Fortune, signaling ongoing change. The Sun, is about bringing yourself and being a life force.

Wow, all good cards. This is exactly what skeptics said would happen. Nothing negative.

Other cards revealed Ms. Bye worries too much; she’s a hard worker, strong, too stressed out, responsible, dutiful and keeps to herself.

Five or six cards into the reading and my short attention span (the inner impatient child) was already suffering: This … is … taking … so … long, I thought. The whole reading is 10 cards, a Celtic Cross Spread, plus three or four more based on a calculation having to do with the person’s birthdate.

The reading continued: Allison needs to relax. She should pay more attention to her emotional side and be ready to learn new matters of the heart.

When Stott finished explaining all 14 cards — about an hour from start to finish — Bye nodded, grinned and remained quiet.

My thoughts screamed: Those cards sound like they belong to me. I work way too much, my husband says. I worry — lots — and I’m driven by ambition. Make it happen! That’s my motto every day. It says so on my coffee cup.

I had every expectation my reading would be similar.

Nope, not even close. Two death cards popped up as did lots of swords and pentacles, not a magician or an empress, bringing light and power, and greatness.

To clarify this mystical journey, the person receiving a tarot card reading does have the opportunity to pose a question. The client cuts the large deck of tarot cards while trying to will the deck to give us the right answers. The cards are flipped one by one to identify strengths and weaknesses, and provide guidance. Allison and I didn’t ask the same question — nope, not going to say what we asked. Still, I expected the cards to identify similar personality traits. After all, we are both Capricorns.

Stott jotted down my birthdate and did some calculations. Without knowing I’d declared 2017 a year of major change in my life — right, Donald Trump is president and I’m a journalist, but that’s not what I’m talking about — Stott said that’s what the numbers revealed.

She flipped the first card: The Hierophant, spiritual master teacher. What? Stott continued, “you are here to learn how to bring the spiritual life into everything, oneness of everything.” Hmmm … OK. We’ll see how that goes. Not super impressed with that.

Three cards in, Stott pulled the death card. Nooooo!!

After the spiritual guide explained death was not in my near future, I calmed down. This card, despite the evil-looking skeleton, in this case meant transformation, lots of change, death of a structure. I decided it must be reflecting that I officially quit smoking a year ago.

The next few symbols were more what I’d expected or hoped for: I’m grounded, have a civilizing influence, successful, emotional, surrounded by good people, love fills my life.

Then Stott turned over another death card. Wait, what? The energy healer furrowed her brow, presumably a little surprised, too. When she asked if there was someone in my life who was sick, I started to cry. I didn’t see that coming.

I thought: This is not all positive, happy stuff. People were wrong.

Once I regained composure, Stott continued. The card after that had an open coffin and suggested contemplation and retreat. OK, whatever, sure.

The rest of the cards were more uplifting, a few were demanding. “Dance the dance without worrying about the dance,” Stott said. “Dance your own dance.”

Fiery and passionate, high priestess of opportunities for duality and intuition, lots of ah-ha moments, love yourself, you’ll be powerful in the future and pay attention to what you’re juggling.

Well, that was a fun thing to do for my 46th birthday. Clearly, dabbling in the mystical, ancient soul world is, in my view, entertaining.

Maybe for my 50th I’ll travel to New York, find someone to read my aura and be inked with a tattoo representing those colors. Maybe.

— Reporter: jlawrence-turner@bendbulletin.com or 541-383-0308.

My thoughts screamed: Those cards sound like they belong to me. I work way too much, my husband says so. I worry — lots, and I’m driven by ambition. Make it happen! That’s my motto every day. It says so on my coffee cup.”