When some of her relatives heard the stories about Joanna, they asked her to do things like pick the winning horses at the racetrack or the team that would win the World Series, but she always pretended not to know such things. She knew her gift was special, but it also brought great responsibility.

One day she was walking from the subway to her apartment in Greenpoint, when she was drawn to a young man walking ahead of her on the street. She couldn’t see his face, but she knew he was very angry. Angry about what? she thought. Then she heard his mind: I know she’s cheating on me. I’m going to beat the hell out of her as soon as I get home.

She immediately threw herself on the ground. “Help, mister. Help me!” she cried. He stopped and turned around, and was tempted to keep going, but instead he came over to her.

“Are you okay?”

“No, I’m not. Could you please help me up? Could you walk me to that bench over there?” She pretended to limp and moaned in great pain.

When they got to the bench, she raised her head and looked him straight in the eye. “Your wife is a good woman. She loves you very much, and she is faithful to you. You shouldn’t hurt her.”

The man blinked at her. “How did you know …? I don’t get it.” But she had succeeded in slowing him down, and he sat next to her on the bench and thought about what she had said.

Joanna was used to this sort of reaction by now, and she knew it was better not to try to explain, but simply to help. “Trust me, sir, I know. You’re lucky to have such a good wife. I know you think she is interested in the man who lives in the apartment below you, but she isn’t. You should tell him to leave her alone, and he will. He’ll be afraid of you.”

They sat and talked for the next fifteen minutes, and finally he thanked her, and headed home in a completely different state of mind.

This sort of thing happened from time to time with Joanna. In a flash, she could see the two different directions this man might take. If he took the path of kindness, forgiveness, and trust, he would go on to live a fulfilling life of hard work that would allow him and his wife to move to the suburbs, raise several children, and one day be surrounded by a large, loving family. If he chose the path of mistrust, hate, and violence, he would be in jail by nightfall, his wife severely beaten and almost dead. She would divorce him, and, after his release from jail, he would grow into a lonely and bitter old man. It was almost as if two movies ran in her head simultaneously.