Last week, I had my palm read for the first time.

I was spending the day with scientists who study the microscopic bugs living on our skin. (It’s actually not as creepy or smelly as you might think.) One of the researchers, a young and energetic dermatologist, was giving me the grand tour of the lab when I happened to mention that my sister had eczema — an itchy red rash — when we were growing up. Then, right in the middle of a long, sterile corridor, the doctor suddenly stopped and demanded my hand.



Before I knew what was happening, she was pointing to the edge of my palm, underneath the thumb. “Yep, you have hyperlinearity,” she said. Before I could