In these days of continued quarantine, serendipity seems to occur often. I think of an older friend who lives alone. Has she been walking or biking? What’s she reading? I go to the phone and, as my hand picks up my cell, it rings. Guess who’s on the line? The friend of my thoughts. We joke about being able to communicate without the phone company. Merely thinking of the other is enough to bring on a phone call. With so many people reaching out to one another, it’s almost inevitable that such serendipity happens more and more. Delightful. Serendipity.
Serendipity crops up all the time. Probably the most dramatic surfaced when I ran into the pope. Well, not literally, but close enough. Heading into St. Peter’s basilica in Vatican City years ago, I was accosted by a Swiss Guard. No entry with bare shoulders. We left in a rather un-Christian huff, but returned the next day attired as the dress code defined. Voila! A packed church. The pope’s last public audience before he left for his summer villa. Not only that, but here he came, carried aloft on his big red chair, not ten feet from where I stood. If I’d been dressed appropriately the day before—no Pope sighting. Serendipity.
When the weather turns a certain way, it’s criminal not to take advantage of any sunny day without wind. At first call, I pack up and move outside to read. On one of those days, Mark Adams’ Turn Right at Machu Picchu—which is a really good read, by the way—had me squirming in sympathy as he tried to sleep through a barnyard symphony of moos, clucks and an especially loud rooster. The book apparently came with sound effects. Into my fantasy world, the neighbor’s resident rooster added a nice layer of realism. Serendipity.
Serendipity. A dear friend in Indiana pops into my mind, because… Oops! Gotta run. The phone’s ringing.