14 Apr 2011
Coincidence or Divine Intervention?
Sometimes I have a feeling the universe is trying to tell me something. A while back I was writing about a man I once observed while riding the bus. He was the obligatory crazy man that all buses seem to have. I was straining to remember the details, not of the words he spoke to himself, but rather the way in which he conversed with himself. Did he answer questions no one was asking? Did he yell out random words and phrases? I couldn’t remember exactly, so I just embellished a little. After all, what I was writing was fiction.
Well, a few days later I was at Costco and I heard a voice approaching me from the aisle perpendicular. I knew that voice from somewhere. Seconds later, the “crazy man”, the very same man with whom I had ridden a bus two years earlier, the same man I had just written about, crossed my path.
I didn’t hear the words he was saying as he passed me, but I did note that he was having a complete conversation with himself. He would state an interesting fact and then marvel at how interesting the thing he had just heard was, as if it were the first time he had ever heard it.
I could chalk it up to a fascinating coincidence, but I’d rather assume that the universe put us both there at the same time for a reason. Maybe it’s a sign that I should continue writing about him?
I’d love to hear a story about a shocking or funny coincidence in your life.
A single comment
My favorite coincidence was running into an old college friend from my school days in Nashville–in SEATTLE, six years later (no contact between), mere moments after we’d driven in and were just walking down a random street looking for a public bathroom. We ended up staying the night at her house and having a wonderful time! Don’t know if the universe meant for us to be friends, as I’ve lost touch with her again…or perhaps I screwed the universe over.