Published: January 02, 2008 03:30 pm      

HOLLEY: Psychic Faire offers healing, answers for the new year

HOLLEY — New Year’s Day is traditionally a day off from work, but for six psychics and two healers, it was another day of doing what they love.

They gathered at the American Legion Jewell Buckman Post 529 in Holley for the first Whole Life and Psychic Faire where those who needed guidance or were looking for answers could enjoy a day of tarot readings, runes and Reiki healing.

“We all make New Year’s resolutions. How much better if we guide you through?” said Rev. Ann M. Maid, psychic and A to Z Entertainment event coordinator. Maid recently moved from Albion to Rochester.

Shortly after the doors opened at 10 a.m. the hall was filled with patrons, Maid said, many signing up for 30-minute readings with psychics from Orleans County, Rochester and a palm reader from Istanbul, Turkey. Their talents ranged from being clairvoyance, palmistry and mediumship and other methods.

“It’s nice to have something small and local,” said Tara Chapman of Holley, who has attended other psychic events in larger venues in Rochester. She said the wait for her reading was more than an hour because of the number of people who had signed up before her.

Anne Karpiak, of Waterport, had her first experience 15 years ago with Reiki, a treatment in alternative medicine where the practitioner channels energy to the patient to heal pain, relieve stress and enhance energy. Karpiak provided readings for people, which included the use of runes and tarot.

“(Runes) are the first symbol that was invented to get an answer,” she explained. “It’s called divination.”

In ancient times, runes were cast for several reasons, Karpiak said, one being to guide warriors through battle. Through the use of the varying sized stones, she works with God and the person’s spirit she is reading for rather than other spirits that surround the person.

Formerly of Hawaii, Karpiak attended school for four years to “learn how to see clairvoyantly” and learned the chakra system. The chakra is somewhat like a ladder where each portion of the body represents a center of spiritual power such as knowledge and emotion.

“We studied ourselves as we were studying others,” she said.

Working with the spiritual centers, reading the tarot and casting runes, Karpiak also does past life readings, saying she sees many Native American past lives.

“A lot of spirits want to get back to that freedom and simplicity,” she said. “Past life readings always bring up what is happening now.”

While Karpiak can speak to a persons spirit, Gary Condoluci can speak to their muscles. A licensed massage therapist affiliated with Medina Memorial Hospital, Condoluci was set up at the faire next to Reiki healer Donna Fanton, of Murray, and offered chair massages.

“I know Ann (Maid). She figures this is kind of a psychic health faire,” he said. “I’m never as busy as the psychics though.”

His hands are much different than those of a Reiki healer. Condoluci works with muscles and tendons while his neighbor in the next booth was using healing energy to work with the energy of the patient.

The day was not entirely about psychic readings and the transference of energy from one body to another, though. Kent resident Jean Knobloch, a member of the psychic caravan, had an ESP game set up. The game was developed for people to test their ESP — extrasensory perception — and allowed the player three tries.

“I draw a card, I look at it, then I lay it down, face down,” Knobloch said.

Explaining further, she said the player then tries their best to see the card in their mind and, taking a glass bead, chooses their answer on a card in front of them. Depending on the number of correct guesses, the player can choose a prize.

Knobloch said she and Fanton became friends with Maid after the event coordinator had done a couple of psychic readings for them. Maid has worked in Canada and the United States, but is no longer in the circuit and semi-retired.

While Tuesday’s day-long event was a first, Maid said she is planning on doing a lot more in the future, now with the added knowledge of things she’d do differently.

“My plan is to bring psychic entertainment to rural communities,” Maid said. “It’s (Tuesday’s event) extremely successful.”