there could be no coincidence at all. Like the starry night Daniel and I frolicked on the beach. He rolled on top of me, and I saw a shooting star he couldn't see. A little rock flying through space for a million centuries, chose that moment in that place to end its life—with Daniel in my arms.
Or like the night an old woman from a local rest home got hit by a car, and I happened to be the fire fighter in charge of the incident. It was up to me to either let her go, or start CPR and bring her wrecked body to the hospital ER, where someone else would let her go. I said good-bye, and with my bare hand on her head, I let her go.
There were other times when I felt a similar awe. Some might call it fate, but I feel a more benevolent intelligence presenting itself in those uncommon moments of quiet presence. Here is another:
i was younger, at the beginning of this current age of frustration; about 33. The youth group, Up With People, was performing in Worcester and someone had given me a ticket. An anti-cynical experience I expected it to be, so I was reluctant. I had a new pair of jeans, and I put them on just in case I drifted down to Mechanics Hall. In the pocket of the new jeans I found a slip of paper; Inspected by No. 64.
Up With People is a group of high school age performers which I was uncomfortable seeing at that time—1990 or 1991. The bile-ish taste of my life-drift was just beginning for me, and I had not yet mastered my rambunctious and unconventional libido, so looking up to the stage at young men who I already worshipped for their beauty, and who already, at their young age, were considered among society's best products—well, that all raised feelings I did not want to feel. However, my libido (or something) prevailed, and I wandered (or was led) to a seat in which to receive the feel-good, love-life message of these kids.
seventeen in 1990 is 27 today. I wonder where he is, and I doubt it matters. He was merely the one selected by the universe on one (was it summer?) night, to convey its message to me. He sang a duet with a girl; I wondered if any guys in that group were gay, and I wondered if any of the men managing the group were doing any of the boys...
The one with my message was not as cute as a taller young man, who appeared at other times during the show, but the cuter one is less important in my memory—he had no message for me.
I sat at the end of a row, smiling at people because I thought I should, trying to not flounder in all this positivity. I cruised the boys on stage as best I could from 20 yards, and constructed fantasies of hotel-room passions; of wordless messages passing between them, their bodies cloaked in night. That's how I endure goodness—I make it all sex. Goodness hurts too much.
Their duet tried to express in sweet young voices the significance of every individual. It would have sickened me, except he was kinda cute, and his song told a story about his love for everyone he encounters, even for the person represented by the slip he found in his pocket; Inspected by No. 64.
it could just be a coincidence. But it's just as likely that it's no coincidence at all.
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