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| Serendipity? |
So, it’s Saturday which generally means I get to sleep a bit longer and am able to get back into bed after making early morning coffee. However, this morning I woke early to the annoying squawk of a cockatoo on the Honeysuckle shrub outside my bedroom window.
My first instinct was to select a few choice words from my vocabulary to chase it from its perch so that I could go back to my peaceful slumber. But instead I was silent and I lay there looking at it and it seemed to be watching me too. In the few minutes that the cockatoo and I were looking at each other, I came to the conclusion that perhaps this is exactly where I should be right now – alone in bed in Australia looking at a cockatoo through my bedroom window. Perhaps I need to be still and listen and become aware of life that is happening all around me every moment in the NOW.
I’m not referring to pre-destination – I don’t buy that since that seems to render morality and freedom of choice redundant – but a phrase from Coehlo’s book The Alchemist came to mind. I remember reading the book when Handsome was in Mozambique – not too long after we had met a few years ago. There was one line in the book that jumped out at me at the time – “The whole universe conspired for me to meet you.” I am beginning to think that there is a lot to be said for serendipity in life.
I know that you don’t reach serendipity by plotting a course for it – usually you set out in good faith for an entirely different destination and lose your way – serendipitously. Come to think of it, serendipity has played a large part in some of the biggest decisions I have made in my life. I stumbled into a bursary for my tertiary studies – I was just at the right place at the right time; I met my ex-husband by sheer chance in rather interesting circumstances; I got a sought after position at the University by absolute fluke; met Handsome by sheer luck and how I managed to get the job here in Sydney is nothing short of a miracle. So many things in my life have happened as a result of coincidence. So, I think there is definitely something to be said about serendipity.
While I was watching the cockatoo this morning, a friend from South Africa called checking up on me to see if I am ok. He had stayed up late so that he could call me at a civilized hour due to the 8 hour time difference. How sweet is that? Perhaps that is another safety pin blessing – a small miracle – friends.
I still cannot help believing that there is a synchronicity and inter-connectedness to everything in life. I was flattered to see that Mont Blanc had drafted a blog in response to this one – and in it s/he refers to a fairy godmother as the catalyst for the change and the magic. I think the fairy godmother’s name must be Serendipity. (I will post a response to Mont Blanc on his/her blog directly.)
So today my thoughts centered around friends and serendipity and the curious interplay between events in life. Switches flicked today: appreciation, patience, faith and I definitely turned the knob on the perspective dial.
Friends are such a blessing. I think sometimes being a friend means mastering the art of timing. There is a time for silence, a time for distance and a time to let go and allow people to hurt themselves into their own destiny. And of course, a time to be there to help them pick up the pieces when it is all over.
Isn’t it bizarre that the moment of most profound doubt that gives birth to new certainties? Perhaps hopelessness is the soil that nourishes human hope; perhaps one could never find sense in life without first experiencing its absurdity. Perhaps this is what this time is all about – I will not appreciate the miracle of a sunrise if I did not have to wait in darkness for a while.
I'm beginning to think that small miracles are a retelling in small letters of the very same story which is written across the whole world in letters too large for some of us to see. Or perhaps Buddha has a point – am I the miracle?
