What was the last strange coincidence you experienced?

A few weeks ago, I received the very first international submission for the caregiving anthology I'm editing. It was from a man living just a few miles from where I grew up and his bio included his poetry website, which is named for a tiny island that's only a few miles away from where I live now. What makes the coincidence a bit strange is that the city and the island are 4,000 miles apart, in different countries.

In at least one case, my life was changed by coincidence.

Nearly ten years ago, my husband was working a demanding job that he hated, as a Green Card worker in America. On an icy January day right before his birthday, he was ordered to repair a 20-foot tall piece of machinery so up he went---and fell back down, cracking his ribs among other injuries.

After an uncomfortable hospital stay in which his lung collapsed but xrays showed no serious damage otherwise, we had a long talk about that job. We couldn't afford it, but we decided he needed a break; besides, we had a brand new baby son that his family hadn't met yet. So, we decided to take a six-week recovery holiday back in Ireland.

His sister happened to have a house standing empty in his home city, after her tenants had moved. That was lucky, we said, and took up her offer to stay there.

Then one day, while we were pushing the baby buggy to Granny's, a car pulled up beside us. "Is that you?" a voice calls out. It's his old supervisor, from the job he used to do before he emigrated. Saying goodbye a few minutes later, he told my husband that he could have his job back if he wanted it, if he wanted to stay home.

Well, we said. THAT's lucky. We'd been talking about staying, and wondering if it was the right thing to do...moving house is one thing, but moving country? Again? The very thought made me tired.

Then my husband ran into an old co-worker while in town a few days later, and mentioned the job offer. It was a sad thing, the friend said. The man who'd replaced my husband had climbed onto his shed roof a few weeks before to wire it (about the same time as my husband's fall), had slipped on ice and fallen, and gone to the hospital with pain in his ribs and chest. He was sent home with pain medication, but died later that night after his lungs collapsed.

So my husband's old job was opened up by the exact same circumstance that sent him away from his current one. That, we agreed, went a bit beyond 'lucky'.

So he took the job, and family in America shipped our things to us. (I'll never forget THAT bill.)

So, our son is growing up in Ireland, a very special special-needs child, and I've come to believe that something about him--some touch of destiny--is behind that coincidence and some other odd occurances in our lives.  In strange ways the world often shifts in his favour, as if watching over him, and when I'm with him I often feel myself in the presence of Something mysterious and wonderful.

I'll save his story for another post; this one is long enough already!