The Talisman

I was standing by the river but the waters would not flow, it boiled with every poison you can think of… Leonard Cohen

Warning…do not come to Atlanta without your talisman!

Ours just lay there alone on the credenza, its silver reflecting a dull glint in the sunlight. At night it lay darkly, separated from the purpose of its existence. We felt remorse for it, so our office decided to give it a new purpose…our Talisman. We ascribed to it magical powers and good luck since it was found in such a fortuitous (some might even say Providential) way.

It had lain upon the wet grass of the polo field where a horse threw it in the heat of an intense polo match. And we are collectively in one hell of an intense match out there in the business world. Unable to find its former owner, we assumed—naturally, of course—that “finder’s keepers” applied here. After all, it was only a horseshoe.

In case you’ve not read the paper lately, the blood of real estate—money!—has suffered stasis, and the patient is comatose. It walks around in a drugged stupor, like a staggering corpse seeking a final resting place. Many have already found it in the graveyard of foreclosure and Chapter 11 reconciliation. On them was found no charm or talisman.

It has been reported that the city churches have resorted to multiple services, so numerous are the penitents seeking venues of last resort for urgent confession and repentance. Decrepit and aged ministers of all denominations of faith have been called from retirement to administer hope, holy water or last rites to the contrite—who, themselves, resorted to all means available for a transfusion of blood…all denominations accepted, especially $ 10’s, $20”s and $100’s. Ben Franklin was always popular!

The media reports that the soup lines have become blocks long as people in rags, and women holding small children, queued in the mid-summer’s stifling heat for a few morsels of stale bread. In the city parks carnival hucksters huddled under small kiosks, hawking all sorts of cheap talisman substitutes for Almighty blessings (in case He was not listening on that particular day). Fiat of faux gold coins, imprinted with the smiling face of the President, and inscribed with the words, “Change We Can Believe In,” circulated within the ragged assembly of the luckless and desperate wanderers.

But we were not enticed by such charlatan trickery and remained ensconced within our office fort, armed, of course, in case things got out of hand and talismans ran in short supply. No, we continued to pay obeisance to our own talisman, and decided in a moment of reflection not to take any chances. So we combined with it a crucifix, just in case. Why take chances, we concluded. Hey, you know about walking under ladders or stepping on sidewalk cracks, right? Some things should not be tested!

We once had a faith meltdown. So we met and gave personal testimonies of the value of a talisman. I recalled that we once kept in our house a glass talisman sneaked out from Turkey before the Taliban put a taboo on them. It hung on the lintel of the door, and it resembled an eyeball…it was supposed to ward off all people or pests who had an “evil eye,” or malicious intents.

Did our evil-eye talisman actually work? Of course. In all the years it hung there no evil-eyed Taliban entered the house. So confident were we with it we passed it along to the new owners, a nice Muslim couple.

Which brings me to a conclusion. No matter what artifact one may have, if one believes it’s good for luck, it will be. But one thing is for sure about a talisman: you gotta get up and keep moving for it to work!

So for now we’ll stick with our crud-encrusted horseshoe until something better comes along, or the river starts flowing again!


Bud Hearn
July 16, 2009