Predators, Prey, & Feng Shui
Pepper, my roommate’s cat, is staring at me. What is she thinking?
Cats are predators, right? Or at least their ancestry and schemer nature lead me to believe so.
Dogs aren’t predators, right? At least, their goofiness and kind spirit lead me to believe so.
Beings become predators when they can’t get what they need from themselves, so they actively seek it from their prey at all costs.
Today, my roommate and I went to The Whitney Museum in Chelsea. We both became enthralled by a video explaining Feng Shui. Evidently, the Chinese government banned practicing it when the country began orienting itself around Western ideals. Yet, someone built these apartment buildings with holes in them, so mythical dragons may pass through on their way to drink from the sea. The idea is that energy is real, and it must flow and align.
A certain person in my life recently hired a Feng Shui expert to design her house. The house must contain fountains and plants. Furniture faces certain directions in the significance of pushing and pulling certain energies.
I think about this as I pull out my phone. This person texted me. The energy in the text transpires, and it hits me like a block, like how the energy might hit those buildings if there weren’t holes in them.
The text is mean and meant to provoke hurt. It floats in my head for the rest of the day like a chair incorrectly placed in a home to the feng shui guru – a little hole of misdirected energies.
After the museum, my roommate and I melt into the humid Manhattan air. Sweat percolates on our shiny foreheads. We meander towards our chosen dinner spot, The Cafeteria. Just yesterday, I shook hands on a deal with one of the top interior designers in the nation – the same one who designed our dinner destination.
The restaurant’s Feng Shui is vibrant, cheeky, nostalgic, and exudes “city summertime.”
Grasping my Bloody Mary, I skim the menu and wonder how a salmon BLT could taste while simultaneously wondering what a cat may think as it stalks salmon, and how energy flows from prey to predator.
