My first — and, until recently, only — tarot card reading was on a girls’ trip to Salem, Massachusetts, just before Halloween in 2010.

My childhood friend from Connecticut, who loves everything occult, always had wanted to go, and I couldn’t resist a steeped-in-history New England town. So, I drove down to meet her.

Getting a reading from a medium was on her must-do list for the weekend, even though she was worried about what she might find out. And while I’d probably have a heart attack if I had to walk through a haunted house, I was a complete skeptic when it came to psychics.

Rather than looking for meaning in the reading, I spent my session sussing out every comment for how it could apply to anyone. (“I’m seeing your mom,” I remember the reader saying.) As for the one specific prediction she made — that I would be moving in March — I scoffed at that, too. I had just started working as a reporter at the Morning Sentinel in Waterville. I wasn’t going anywhere.

But a few months later, there was an opening at the Press Herald to cover the western suburbs of Portland, which I had done before. Even though I wasn’t ready to leave, I thought, if there was a chance for me to work at the big-city paper anytime soon, this was it.

I started my new job in March.

Now, as I begin another new position, as the Press Herald’s culture columnist, and as we all embark on a new year, I thought it would be a good time to revisit the tarot deck to see what might be in store for Maine.

Nico DePamphilis, the tarot reader at Arcana in Portland, was game to take a look. We met in a back room of the metaphysical shop on Market Street and dove in with the perennial question on Mainers’ minds this time of year.

Will it be a snowy winter?

He pulled a Panther card from the Animal Spirit deck that had markings in the background that looked like rain.

“I’m seeing more water than (snow),” he said. “There is going to be snow; it’s just not going to stick as much.”

From a pouch, he plucked a small stone with a symbol: the isa rune, which represents ice.

“So maybe freezing rain,” he said.

Whether storms bring snow or ice, he said, it should melt fairly quickly.

But what about more extreme weather?

DePamphilis pulled the Ten of Wands, which he called a “harder card.”

“It’s the end of a cycle,” he said. “The weather might start to feel oppressive … but there is harmonious change. So maybe it’s not as bad as last year, the flooding, but I do feel like there’s some maybe water damage to look for and be aware of.”

References to fire indicated to him there’d be more extreme weather in summer, too – a shift from flooding to drought.

“It does seem like a flip of a switch to get our attention,” he said, but added that the community would come together in the face of it.

That all falls in line with weather patterns we’ve seen recently, and though I would have considered our attention grabbed, I guess not yet as much as by our grocery bills.

Even if humans are taking their time, it seems the wildlife is catching on more quickly. DePamphilis saw changing animal migration patterns that would bring new species of birds and marine life to Maine in search of a safer home — when preparing for our reading, he had had visions of orca whales — with people following close behind.

Will the housing crisis ease?

We know Mainers are all about new birds, but how are more climate migrants going to impact our already-crippling housing crisis?

DePamphilis pulled the Justice card, perhaps an indication of laws shifting or balance achieved, he said, followed by the Wheel of Fortune card, indicating “more opportunity and money and abundance” coming to Maine.

So maybe we’ll see some new housing-related laws that will help ease the pressure, but what about new lawmakers?

Will Janet Mills run against Susan Collins?

We recently asked Gov. Janet Mills whether she might challenge Susan Collins for her Senate seat in 2026. She wouldn’t say, but can the tarot cards tell us whether she’ll announce a bid anytime soon?

First, DePamphilis pulled The Hermit, which he saw as a symbol of Mills taking her time with the decision. Then, there was The Emperor or, as we know him, The Donald.

Next was the Queen of Wands (Collins, sitting in her power, he thought), the Queen of Swords (Mills, holding the Emperor’s cut-off head) and, lastly, The High Priestess, looking backwards.

“There might be this fight, but … at the end of the day, I’m almost feeling a call for somebody new, and it does seem like a younger woman,” he said.

Will the wave of restaurant closures end?

Speaking of the end of an era, what about Portland’s restaurant scene?  Have we reached the peak?

DePamphilis pulled the Fortitude card.

“There’s just more growth and more stability in this,” he said.

What is the fate of the former children’s museum in Portland?

Turning to the arts, I asked about the debate over whether to tear down the former children’s museum to make way for the Portland Museum of Art’s expansion, currently the subject of a lawsuit.

“I don’t know what happened there, but something feels off, and I think it needs to go,” DePamphilis said about the building at 142 Free St.

He then pulled the Ace of Swords, followed by the Nine of Pentacles aka The Lord of Material Gain.

“If the PMA were to expand, this is going to bring in lots more money and lots more tourists,” he said.

DePamphilis might just have landed himself a gig as the PMA’s new marketing manager.

Meanwhile, I couldn’t help but wonder about my future. As our session came to an end, I managed to squeeze in a more personal question.

Is anyone even going to read this column?

He laid out a whole trajectory for how things would go for me — feelings of uncertainty and being ostracized, a need for frugality and, then, a shift to creativity, passion and self-empowerment.

“I think this is beautiful for you and also maybe more authentic to who you are and why you started this journey,” he said.

Bring on the orca whales.

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