What kind of an asshole doesn’t talk to their own mother? Let me try to answer that. This past July, soon after my 31st birthday, I received a letter from the IRS. It instructed me to immediately pay back-taxes I owed on a large cash withdrawal I had made in 2011, or suffer dire, IRS-y penalties. Since I hadn’t made any large cash withdrawals in 2011—or, like, in any year, ever—I was briefly confused. Briefly.

There are many things I’ve done in my life that I am not proud of. I’ve lied. I’ve stolen. I’ve misled boyfriends regarding the extent of my interest in jazz-fusion music. But I am perhaps least proud of a phase I had in my early twenties, when I became hooked on storefront psychics. Alone or with similarly miserable girlfriends, I walked into their offices—neon sign, red flocked velvet wallpaper, almost always located within stumbling distance…