December 7, 2011 - "Kim meet Kelly - Kelly meet Kim"; a cosmic introduction

Background – My yoga instructor Kim stopped me after class to ask me how I knew a woman named Angela Westbrook.  Angela is Kim’s neighbor and Kim had seen Angela on my list of Facebook friends and wondered how I knew her.  I told Kim that she had once been my neighbor as well, many years ago.   This should have been the end of the conversation, but for some reason I felt compelled to ask Kim if she also knew another of my old neighbors, Kelly Stanley.  Kim didn't recognize the name or any of the other details I was pouring out about Kelly; she has three boys, they play football, she has blond hair, she lives out in Leesburg… the only thing I didn’t mention about Kelly was Kelly’s husband, Hardy.  Kim continued to insist that she had no idea who I was talking about and I finally let the subject drop, wondering myself why I was so obsessed with connecting Kim to Kelly.  I had this strange feeling that they had to know each other.

S.C.O.U.T. – One week later I received a text from my dear friend Kelly informing me that she had met my yoga instructor Kim, having absolutely no idea that I had been interrogating Kim about this soon-to-be (but currently non-existent) relationship only a week before!  I assumed Angela had given a party in which both Kelly and Kim were invited and texted Kelly a message to that effect.  Kelly replied with “???, what does Angela have to do with this?  I met her at Hardy’s holiday party.  Louis (Kim’s husband) and Hardy work together!  Isn’t that crazy!”

What a Strange Case Of Uncanny Timing!  In addition to this weirdness, Kim has, for all the five years I’ve known her, always reminded me of Kelly and I often think of her when I’m in Kim’s class.  Is it just a cosmic coincidence that they would randomly meet?  Was I having a premonition that they were about to meet?  Did I somehow “attract” this meeting?  These are the questions I ask myself, and then I wait.  I wait and I wonder if the answer will ever be revealed.

My goofy dog Scout just gives me his wise, knowing look.  A look that says “patience, all will be revealed time…”  I scratch him between the eyes as he drops his heavy head into my lap, and I continue to wait, and to contemplate.

Cause and effect, premonition, or nothing but a coincidence?

Background -  On Monday I found myself thinking about my cheap, little fake diamond earrings.  It was just a random passing thought as I took them off before bed.  You see, I eventually lose one from the pair and am forced to go buy another.  I have to come to accept it and is one of the reasons why I like the fake ones, there is no stress or guilt or call to the insurance company when one goes down the air conditioning vent in a hotel room in Paris!  I spun the little glittering jewels around in my hand and thought back to when I had purchased this pair.  It was dawning on me that I had had this particular set for quite some time now; in fact, I soon placed their purchase date as the week following my trip to Paris where I had indeed lost the mate to the former pair.  That was over three years ago!  I chuckled at what a run I was on.  I couldn't believe that I had actually held on to this pair for over three years and proceeded to gently place them in my jewelry box as carefully as if they were the real thing.

S.C.O.U.T. -  On Tuesday I lost one of the earrings.  I was reaching behind me to grab my seat belt and brushed my left ear with my hand.  I felt the backing slip completely off and both it and the earring fell onto my shoulder... at least that's where I think they fell.  The very first thought I had was "you've got to be kidding me!" and the next was "go slow and feel for it, it can't have gone far".  Fifteen minutes later, and with dirty knees from crawling around on the pavement out side my car door, I conceded that the earring was not to be found.  I spent the next few hours wondering about the the question posed in the title of this post and worked to shake the feeling that that little jewel had seemingly just vanished into thin air.

My goofy dog Scout doesn't get the whole "jewelry" thing to begin with and therefore refuses to contemplate with me ;)

September 1, 2010 - Zucchinis from heaven

Background – Stuffed zucchini was one of my mother’s specialties and one of my favorites!  It was best if you could get a hold of an enormous, freshly home-grown zucchini and cook it up right away.  My mother, who was much beloved at her place of work, had a friend who would, every now and again, provide her with just such a zucchini; this friend I speak of not only grew the most enormous zucchinis I have ever seen to this very day, but also had an enormous crush on my adorable mom.  Worked for me!

My mother had been gone for five years that July, when I decided that my heart was strong enough from the loss of her to attempt a home grown zucchini of my own.  I was hoping to resurrect some of the fond, delicious memories from my childhood, while creating a few new ones for my kids.  The problem was that my thumbs are as pink as pink can be, not so much as a tint of green to either one.   I tried growing my zucchini in a standing planter, one similar to the Topsy Turvy Tomato Grower (I know, pathetic) and as you might guess produced nothing larger than a gherkin.  I was disappointed, but not surprised and sadly gave up my quest to duplicate my mother’s culinary masterpiece.

S.C.O.U.T. - During the time that I was fighting my gardening ineptitude and trying to produce something green and edible, I was also fighting another ongoing battle, my neighbors “garden”; which more resembled an unruly jungle with no sense of boundaries, or property lines.  On a regular basis I was forced to cut, rip and even uproot entire plants in order to try and preserve our fenced space.  I was successful in this task except for one stubborn vine; a vine that even when picked up and thrown as far as I could hurl it, would magically appear back in my yard within days, snaking its way over the fence and down into the middle of our lawn.   At first I thought that this creep show vine was mocking me and got a little freaked out when it once again defied my attempts to relocate it to the other side of the fence and appeared in my yard.

I was freaked out until, standing in my kitchen safely behind the closed door (I now wasn’t sure this thing was really just a plant), I saw a large green gourd attached to the thickest part of the vine.  It was an enormous zucchini; one that would have gotten at least a nod of recognition from my mother’s old friend.  My sweet neighbor, a very “Zen” man of Indian descent, was more than happy to give me the vegetable as it had clearly stated where it belonged.  I smiled and thanked him for his generosity, and then my mother for her gift, even as the chill crept down my spine; uncanny, simply uncanny how I had indeed gotten my large, home-grown zucchini.

My goofy dog Scout once again just smiles knowingly.  I can tell he’s thinking of my mother.  You see, she loved him too and therefore he had left this plant alone each time it appeared on our side of the fence, even as he tore through all the surrounding landscape in his game of “Destroy The Yard”; again, simply uncanny.

Reader contribution - Let me give you hand, or if you prefer, take one away

Background – I had a heated discussion with my dear friend Sujatha at the gym this week about our struggling economy.  The subject centered on the unemployment rate and the fear of one’s spouse losing their job.  Sujatha is of the mind that if you think about a subject, and focus on it intently, that you will bring some form of it into being; be it a positive thought and something you desire, or be it a negative thought rooted in fear.  This belief is commonly called the “Law of attraction” and it was the motivation behind Sujatha’s desperate attempts to change the subject so that we wouldn't attract something negative from this very negative conversation!  In general I agree with her, but stubbornly wanted to make my point (I’m Irish and us Irishwoman want to make our point when we want to make it, regardless of the consequences!), therefore I turned my frustration to her and told her that she has no fear of this because her husband is an orthopedic surgeon and that there is no chance he will lose his job.  In other words, she has the luxury of not having to worry about this subject and therefore it’s easy to ignore it.

Sujatha is an extremely kind and sensitive person and therefore my frustration wasn’t lost on her.  In fact, she spent most of the remaining day thinking about what might cause her husband to lose his job because I had been a good Irish woman and made my point! After much consideration, Sujatha came up with just two realistic scenarios in which her husband could lose the ability to perform his job; loss of his eyesight, or loss of the use of his hands.

S.C.O.U.T. - Sujatha’s husband arrived home from work that night and while he was pulling off his wedding ring she noticed that he winced while ever so gently wiggling the ring off his finger.  She asked him what was wrong and he told her that his assistant had dropped a heavy instrument on his hand that day and that it must have bruised because it was still very tender.  Sujatha was dumbfounded as she connected the amount of focus she had poured into the thought of her husband hurting his hands that day to the fact that he was now, for the first time in Sujatha’s memory, standing in front of her nursing just such an injury.  Thankfully it wasn’t serious, just a fractured thumb and blackened nail, no career ending injury, but the uncanny timing of this event gave Sujatha pause none the less. 

You can decide for yourself if you think these events were connected, or nothing more than a coincidence, but for the record Sujatha, I give you my Irishwoman’s promise (for whatever that’s worth), that we will now only speak of positive things when we meet at the gym ;) 

Reader contribution - A son's love for his mother

Background – My friend sent me this story about Anna’s blog, “An Inch of Gray”.  Anna is the woman who lost her son Jack in the floods this past September, and this entry “Jack-ed up phone”, is about how her cell phone will start playing music at random, only since her son died.  This is her blog entry and then the link for the song that randomly started playing on her phone: 

S.C.O.U.T. ~ Anyway, this past Friday morning I walked down to the Bridge for only the second time since the accident. It's just too hard seeing how very, very far the bridge where they found Jack is from where he fell in the water in our neighborhood. I mean really, really far. It's too outrageous seeing a mere trickle of water, even after days of rain, in the shitty little creek bed, yet to know that on that one horrible night it was a raging wall of water that reached over the banks, the bridge, the road.

I took a picture of the cross that friends erected on the roadside. I wanted it for myself, and to share with you on the "Jack's Thrift Store Playlist" post.

So that night, on our way to pack shoe boxes in Jack's memory for Operation Christmas Child, Tim, Margaret and I ducked into a pizza place to get Margaret a slice. It was loud and crowded. I felt trapped. I was angry at all the families having a care-free Friday night.

I went to stand outside on the stoop and heard music coming from my coat pocket. Again? It was one of the very songs that had popped up in the thrift shop weeks earlier.  Which one? Check it out. Believe me, it's worth it.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w6l4AnJ5yjo&feature=youtu.be

How could anyone ever possibly argue that this was just a coincidence and not her son trying to comfort her and tell her that “life is such a gift” and that she needs to “live and to love, and to forgive and never give up”.  How could anyone possibly argue that?  Anna will see Jack again.  I’m not sure about a lot of things in this life, but of this I am sure. 

August 30, 2010 - Twenty odd, very odd, dollars

Background – Yesterday I bought a small folding bookcase for $59.99 and, after getting it home, liked it enough to want two more for another area in the house.  I went online because I figured such a common bookcase could certainly be found for less than $50 bucks with all the sites to choose from.  After searching at least ten sites for the exact same bookcase, I came to the conclusion that $59.99 was the lowest price I was going to find and laughed at myself for making such a fuss over a sum of twenty odd dollars or so; but I was stilled bummed about my failure to hit the “goal price”.  I sucked it up and headed back to the store to purchase two more bookcases and relinquish my twenty odd dollars.

S.C.O.U.T. – I had gotten my bookcase at the back of the store, but there were none left in that spot.  The clerk told me that they had a few more up front and I headed off to find them.  The bookcases I located in the front window of the store were marked with a sign that read “$49.99” and I immediately jumped for joy at my good luck!  I would indeed get my bookcase for the price I had been so determined to find. 

As I filled the cashier in on my story and my apparent “good luck”, she suddenly lifted her head from her clicking and her clacking and informed me that the price wasn’t coming up in the register.  These bookcases were $59.99.  We called the manager over and she quickly figured out the problem.  The $49.99 sale on these bookcases had ended yesterday and the sale sign hadn’t been taken down!  She gave me the sale price and destroyed the sign. What uncanny timing!!

Another case of “ask and ye shall receive”?  I don’t know…I’ve asked for a lot of things that I haven’t gotten (yet); although I have a sneaking suspicion that God, the universe and “the powers that be” know me better than I know myself and that I get the things I’m supposed to get, the things that really feed my inner happiness.  Justification?  Reaching?  Maybe.   Maybe these things really are just coincidences, the problem is that when it happens that little tingle running down your spine makes it feel anything but coincidental.  My goofy dog Scout says he knows me better than I know myself and that the “real me” really wants to give him that big bag of “Bacon Bits” in the fridge.  Sigh, typical.

Reader contribution - Faster than a speeding lacrosse ball (named Scout)

Background – My son had spent the day at a physically grueling lacrosse tournament and was finally lying in bed trying to relax into sleep while reviewing the day’s events.  He was headed off to yet another tournament the next day and found himself thinking about ways to improve his performance and “kick up his game” so to speak.  As his mind drifted, he found himself wondering just how fast his reaction time could be.  Just how fast could he catch and then shoot the ball?  What are his physical limits?  He ran through a number of scenarios that would test, and answer, that very question before settling on one particular set of circumstances.  He drifted off to sleep wondering whether, in infinitesimal chance that this particular play should occur, he would be able to react quickly enough to catch and then shoot the ball, thereby turning it into a goal.   It was only a dream however, because in his seven years of playing lacrosse he had never seen it happen.

S.C.O.U.T. – It was the second game of the tournament and my son was sliding back and forth around the goal, shouting to his teammates that he was “OPEN”!!  The ball came hurling his way and he easily scooped it out of mid-air, wound back his arm and shot it at the square orange framed net.  He aimed slightly to the left in order to avoid the swiveling goalie, who was determined to thwart his success, and ended up hitting the goal pipe with a loud claangg.  The strange part, however, was that the ball bounced off the pipe which sent it hurling straight back at my son.  In one smooth motion, his reaction time was lightning fast as he caught the ball, shifted his weight forward and shot, this time hitting his mark and scoring the goal.  He couldn’t wait to tell me after the game how he had been day dreaming of that exact scenario only the night before; wondering if he would be fast enough in the split second that the ball bounced off the pole to catch it and score a goal.  It was as if he had to tell someone about this strange case of uncanny timing because he was in awe of the fact that his daydream had come to full fruition the very next day.

Once again I find myself wondering if it was just a coincidence, or perhaps a premonition, or rather some mind/body/universe connection.  My goofy dog Scout simply nods his head knowingly and nuzzles my sons hand in a furry congratulation for a game well played.  One of these days he’s going to give up some of those cosmic secrets he’s guarding, so help me God!