The hand of Fate has bony fingers. Cold, too. When it pokes, The Flying Fickle Finger of Fate will not be ignored. Attention must be paid. Nobody puts Fate in the corner, try though we may.

Fate’s touch is a harbinger, a moment of reckoning. It could represent an awakening to an essential truth about ourselves. The presence of true love. A recognition of one’s duty and obligation to someone/thing else. A growing awareness of our minuscule place in the larger order of things. A glimpse of life’s abundant potential or a reminder of fragile mortality. Messages derived from the random associations generated by the gnarly digit’s touch drive inspiration and striving. Its touch can serve as a welcome reminder of our vitality, no matter the shiver down the spine.

But comes that moment when the bony digit lays its frosty touch on your shoulder yet again, and all you can say is, “Fk, dude, could you just give it a rest?”

Alas, no, as the FFFoF has no intention, no agency, no recognition of any of us as an anything. It is random and impersonal, and any meaning we may derive is our own doing. There is no task from which it could rest. The Finger, c’est moi, c’est tu, c’est notre. We can no more ignore it than we can ignore ourselves.

Still, I am compelled to exclaim: “Fk, dude, give it a rest already.”