Jen Green, who describes herself as an eighth-generation muse, says the future can be seen in cards, but each individual can change their future by changing their behavior.

-- Tim Ghianni | The Ledger

“I believe in the Zombie Apocalypse,” says the sprightly Greek psychic, who climbs from one of Liberace’s gilded chairs and begins staring down at her iPhone, purposely unaware of the direction she’s going and its barriers while stumbling blindly around the room where she conducts psychic readings.

Never taking her downcast eyes from the iPhone screen, she bumps into some of the other furniture – there are five couches and much more stuff in this massive room – and jostles her hip against my left arm.

“You see this every day. This is the Zombie Apocalypse. Steve Jobs gave us the Zombie Apocalypse.”

Nashville’s Astrologer – Jen Green’s professional handle – admits she’s not really sure what the Zombie Apocalypse looks like, but says even though the skin is not falling off our bones – as popularized on television – too many of us stumble like Zombies as we go about our daily lives, staring down at screens, blissfully ignorant of life around us, love and opportunity passing us by.

“Look at the people who walk out into traffic while looking down. Look at the number of accidents caused by drivers who are texting.

“I believe this really is the beginning of the Zombie Apocalypse.”

Placing her phone near a deck of oracle cards, she settles into one of eight gilded chairs surrounding the table of everyone’s favorite dead, glitzy piano showman. She turns her rich, brown, seeking eyes toward me. “The phone hypnotizes people,” she says.

Jen knows a bit about hypnosis, since that is one of the talents she employs when forecasting the future for her clients, many of whom are country music stars, she explains.

“Once someone starts coming to me for readings, they keep coming back. I become their spiritual consultant.

“I help people find themselves build confidence and self-esteem,” she adds. “Many important people won’t make a decision without coming to me for a reading.

“The future is always changing, depending on the decisions you make,” she says.

Jen adds that in addition to a world being overtaken by phone-hypnotized Walking Dead, she believes in aliens of the outer space variety. As Nashville’s Astrologer, she knows there is much yet to be discovered in the universe she studies as part of her prognostication routine.

Jen is not your normal neighborhood psychic, though she admits there are many of her relatives practicing the art around Nashville and the world. Some cousins and aunts even use the rooms in this spacious home on Gallatin Pike to do their own readings.

“I used to think I was a fifth-generation muse, but looking back, I can see that I’m at least the eighth generation, and it all goes back to the time of the Parthenon and ancient Greece,” she says.

Call her an oracle, a muse, a psychic, a spiritual adviser, whatever. Her destiny was dictated by a Greek bloodline linking at least eight generations.

According to Greek mythology, the nine original muses, born to Zeus and Mnemosyne (daughter of Uranus and Gaea), went into the world to spread knowledge, love of the arts and in general help people learn the godly way to realize their life’s direction (or something like that…).

“Those same muses also created the Zodiac,” says the attractive brunette sitting at Liberace’s table.

Jen explains she is descended from those muses and is proud of her relationship to Zeus, the sky and thunder god who reigned over Mount Olympus.

Raised in the Greek Orthodox Church, Jen also says she believes the Holy Bible. “I believe in God. I believe in Jesus, the savior,” she says. “I believe in the universe.”

My muse, Jen, focuses on me as I scan her surroundings, finally saying how much I admire Liberace’s gilded table and chairs.

“I got this at a consignment sale down the street,” she notes of the golden table-and-chairs set. “It’s a miracle I found it.”

I don’t doubt it was Liberace’s stuff. First of all, she seems to be a darn fine muse who would only speak the truth. Besides, the gilded furniture matches that man’s flamboyant personality.

Near the head of the table stand two floral-patterned, giant, porcelain vases. At least five-feet tall, the top of one drips boughs of glass crystals, the other is filled with stalks of that wheat-like designer grass that often bookends the mouths of upscale driveways around Nashville.

“Be careful how you handle the chairs, they are fragile,” she cautions me as I try to scoot one of the chairs out of my way so I can take a photo of my muse.

You also must be aware of the frailty of the minds of people who come to her, trust her counsel and spiritual advice while negotiating the storms of life. Jen’s goal is to help these folks understand themselves, learn to live good and godly lives.

As Nashville’s Astrologer, of course, the stars are among her major tools. She also employs a deck of oracle cards (she says these are more prestigious than simple tarot cards), a slight whiff of incense, lighted candles, amethyst crystals and more.

She prefers it when her readings are positive, when they shed hope’s light on her clients.

“There sometimes are bad readings,” she acknowledges. “That doesn’t mean that the bad things are going to happen. You can change your future in the good way.”

All you need is love and a good muse to help guide you.

She reaches out to gather and then spread the purple amethyst crystals between us.

“These are the most important things. They are priceless,” she says of these purple crystals – passed through generations of muses – that could perchance be of biblical importance. “They are from the Holy Land. And the color purple is the color of royalty, spirituality, power.

“They also represent the crown chakra. That’s the energy above our head that connects us to the universe and the spiritual realm to our minds. It reveals itself to us in our dreams.”

I’ve not heard of any type of chakra, crown or otherwise, but, she adds “anyone who takes yoga will know about those.” You don’t want to see me in yoga pants.

Even though Gallatin Pike’s traffic bustle fills the “soundtrack” outside, no urban noise penetrates this quiet room where we speak in sometimes hushed tones about her art, her craft, her birthright.

“I don’t want it to sound like dogs, but I am purebred. My bloodline is pure. If you have a Maltese, you don’t want to cross it with a Chihuahua.

“I was literally bred to do what I do. ... We have arranged marriages so we marry someone of the same bloodline. It’s not in-breeding. The father of my children came from the same ancient Greek descendants.”

That union evaporated, but not before producing Christopher, 10, and Daniella, who at 13 is beginning to realize her birthright. Other schoolchildren have their own skills and talents. Perhaps they play football, perform in the drama club or lift hearts with violin solos and Sousaphones. Daniella keeps busy with her muse-studies.

Jen fans the 48 oracle cards in front of me on the table and directs me to pick 14 of them at random. She stacks those up and tells me to hold them between my palms before she spreads them face-up on the table. I have a pair of Jesuses among my cards. Another card reinforces my doctor’s advice to “Drink More Water.”

“The universe is complex,” Jen says, as she proffers a smooth, white stone. “I want to prepare you for what’s going to happen. Put this between your palms.”

My arms quiver as I hold what she calls a moonstone between my palms for several minutes.

“Don’t worry. A lot of people are scared and shake at first,” she points out. I tell her I’m not really all that frightened. I’m just a normally tight-wound fellow whose 65-year-old arms grow weary at many tasks, including, obviously, pressing magical moonstones and the like to aid my muse in ascertaining my fate.

Even as I quiver, she insists I continue pressing the stone between my palms “so I can get a better understanding of your body’s energy,” she says. “That connects you.”

Green has not always been her name. It is a name she chose a few years ago because “the Green represents our heart chakra, and that (her heart) is where my work comes from.”

She declines to say what names she’s held over the years, though admits they were of the Grecian variety.

“Have you ever seen the movie ‘My Big Fat Greek Wedding?’ That’s how my family is when we get together. We see ourselves in that (movie).”

Jen notes she is a bit tired on this day because her big fat Greek family is in town to visit her father, who is in the hospital because “some of his internal organs are not working properly, poisoning him.

“When we (the family, both local and those visiting) describe what’s wrong with him to each other, you’d be surprised at the number of ways we can say ‘shit,’” she says.

She had to prepare a family feast that went well into the night before. “You know how big Greek families are when they get together,” she offers, eyes twinkling as she adds that her father’s condition is “much better.”

She takes a quick sip of her 6-ounce Coke to help her continue our long conversation.

“I help people discover yourself. It’s self-discovery. I don’t feel I’m a medium or a palm-reader, but I can do those things,” she says.

“It’s all about self-discovery,” she says. “I’m a life coach. I’m a muse. I inspire in the universal language of life.

“I truly feel that God gave me this gift,” she adds, noting that her mother and grandmother both are muses. “My grandmother opened Nashville’s first psychic store down on Second Avenue North. I worked there from the time I was 12. By the time I was 14, I understood my gift.”

“Our future is always changing. It depends on the path you take,” she says. “Maybe YOU can help ME find ME.”

Since I’m closer to psycho than psychic, helping her find herself isn’t in my wheelhouse. Course, as she is a psychic, perhaps she “knows” I can do it. I’m unable to deliver.

In her role as a life coach and confidential inspirer, she says many country music stars seek her out to help them discover their direction. Most businesses in Nashville that have music stars as customers broadcast that fact by having autographed pictures on the walls of their places of business.

“No pictures here,” she says, opening her palms toward the walls of the ornate room. If Johnny Cash or Merle Haggard ever came here, they left no autographed photos.

“Everything that is said here is private, personal and confidential,” Jen adds. “After the session is over it’s not talked about.”

The lovely Greek psychic and muse smiles when I ask her age. She insists on sticking with “young lady” as her answer.

“I haven’t counted my birthdays in forever,” she says. Oh, she still “celebrates” birthdays, but she does not put a candle on her cake for each year of her life. “Last time I had candles like that on my birthday cake is 30.”

While she doesn’t like to say her age, she doesn’t mind talking about her fee scale: $50 for palm readers, $80 for Tarot readings, $125 for energy sessions.

As an under-employed freelance writer, I tell her that I can’t afford her services, a comment which raises a big smile.

“Maybe someday you will come out here and give me a tip,” she says.

“The universe prepares you for what’s going to happen,” she points out. Before she begins my reading, I hold the moonstone in prayer position and vow – at her insistence – to “thank the universe for the information I am about to receive and promise to make the best use of it.”

“Yours is a very unique reading. It’s absolutely because of your purpose in life,” she says, adding that the heavens may help me. “You need to go outside. And look up. When was the last time you looked up at the sky?” I tell her it was during the recent total solar eclipse, but it didn’t really change me.

“Most other people who have readings have concerns on a physical basis. People are making more choices for the present moment. They are about love, children, faith, on a very spiritual level knowing how to find your purpose.

“I feel finding your purpose weighs heavily on your mind.

“You are a late-bloomer. You will live for many, many years. Your mind is supposed to catch up with your body. Everything is for a reason.”

My hair is long and white, but “You are blessed with a baby face.”

“You have to know by your own self that you are different. You are someone who is meant to be talked about, not after you die, but during your life.

“The change can come tonight.” (It didn’t, but I was ready for it.)

“I see you writing and I see God in it,” she adds.

Jen smiles and looks across the table, which is now cluttered with the crystals, the oracle Cards, a flickering candle, her mini-Coke and my empty coffee cup.

“I’ll never forget your reading and I want you to come back out here.”

Intrigued by the thought that she might just be right, I agree to come back soon.

She pauses, then smiles. “I know what I am telling you are weird and strange and curious.

“I don’t think anyone in my family has ever talked like this to a writer who is putting it in pen and ink before. … It is sacred and spiritual knowledge.’’

Jen says she’s opening up to me, because she hopes to dispel misconceptions about her job. “Even though I’m in the category of psychic, I don’t really feel that fits to what I do. Because I am a life coach.

“I give direction to people in their lives. Kind of like a compass,” she says, adding that sometimes she uses the stars and planets as her guide for her sessions.

“I don’t know how it comes off,” she says, elaborating on the strange and quirky life she has detailed. “But people come in with a problem, and I promise to fix it.”

She stares down at the oracle cards and other implements of foretelling and quiets her soothing, open voice.

Some might write her off as just another carnival sideshow fortune-teller, the kind of people who give her “profession” a bad name. For the most part, those are frauds who don’t share the ancient Greek bloodline that sparks psychic abilities.

“This is my destiny, and I am determined to be the best spiritual adviser that I can be,” she adds, recalling that her ancestors “took an oath” to help people, and she’ll continue to do her best to listen, to read, to touch in her role as spiritual adviser, muse, oracle.

Then she brightens.

“With great power comes great responsibility,” she says, solemnly, as if reciting ancient Greek dictum.

“Spider-Man said that.”