"Yes" came the reply, "just go do it".
Well, OK I thought, because this friend has never steered me wrong, so I joined facebook. Much to my dismay, I found some people I knew there, and got caught up on what was happening in their lives. I also started getting messages from people I didn't know, but what the heck, you can never have to many friends.
So I hooked up with the guy from Wales that shares my last name, he was gathering people that share our name, and, it turns out, he has quite the sense of humor. I hooked up with "shared name people" from here to the edges of the known world. I figure we may be faintly related by name but we are definitely related by species. After all, we are all human, and in our brief notes back and forth, we are all sharing not only a name, but the things that make us human. All one, all the same somehow.
I also hooked up with the guy from Italy that is interested in Tibet, and things Tibetan. Then I hooked him up with my friend Chophel, the East LA kid turned Magna Cum Laude, turned Tibetan Buddhist Monk. Now the guy from Italy, and all my other new friends are enjoying Chophel's updates from his trip to the monastery in India.
See how Facebook works? It's like a giant cocktail party in cyberspace, and small talk rules as you work the room, making contacts and sharing contacts and learning about people.
I also, one day, got a "friends request" from a long lost friend. I had not talked with this friend since we graduated from the university, we had lost track rather quickly and I had not thought about her in many moons. We quickly got caught up on the where are you, what are you doing kind of information that is so interesting. I was happy to hear about her successful business, marriage, three children and her positive attitude about life that was a cornerstone of our friendship many years earlier.
When you run into someone at a cocktail party that you really connect with, the small talk slips away before long and you get to the questions that tickle at the back of our minds, those that we normally only speak of with close friends. Eventually, you find yourself standing in a corner with an empty cocktail glass after the party has wound down, contemplating some big question with your new found friend. Somehow it's reaffirming to know that a total stranger shares the same ideas that you have, and it's comforting if they can help refine the picture in your mind by giving up some insight that was obvious to them, but somehow had eluded you until this very moment in cocktail party history.
It didn't take my long lost friend and I very long to get to the nitty gritty. What is the nature of faith? What do you believe when you think of the almighty? Is a fortunate incident luck or is it divine intervention?
Albert Einstein said "God does not play dice with the universe."
Stephen Hawking said "Not only does God play dice with the universe, he cheats."
Two of the biggest brains ever born and they can't agree. Where does that leave us normal folk when we are pondering the big questions? Is it possible to know the answer to something like this?
My long lost friend related a incident of very good fortune involving a broken down car on the highway, a roving car full of unsavory guys, and a couple stopping to offer assistance- they just happened to be going my friends way, and just in the nick of time swept, her out of harms reach and right to the door of her destination. Her thought? "It wasn't luck."
My reply was the story of how I found my best pet. I wanted a pet, but was getting ready to make a move across the country. I was in conflict about the move, it would be difficult, but I thought it was the right thing to do. I admit I bargained with God. "I'm going to do what I think is right but you damn well better send me a cat to keep me company in my new life." was what I told God.
Two days after I arrived at my destination, I parked the car in a driveway and opened the door. A kitten jumped in my car and right into my lap. I don't know to this day how I did not run that kitten over when I pulled in the driveway. I thought it must belong to the people in the house, so I took it inside. It was not their cat. They lived in the middle of no where so it could not be the neighbors cat. It was so young it still had it's kitten teeth, and it turned out to be a Norwegian Forest cat, the breed at the top of my list for next time I got a cat. ( By the way, no one knew my top cat preference but me). I named him Fe, which is Spanish for faith. That cat is the most loving and loyal animal I have ever had, and that is saying a lot because I have had dogs that would follow me to hell and back, and cats that glued themselves to me when I walked in the door of the house, and had to be peeled away before I could walk out the door. My thought? It wasn't luck.
I bet everyone has a story like that, something that happened that can't really be explained, but can't be dismissed either. Everyone has a story that illuminates the question we ponder- is it luck or divine intervention? I don't know the answer for you, but I do for me. I'm with Einstein, God does not play dice with the universe, if it appears that she does, it's just because we don't understand the patterns of the universe.
What do you think? Take a moment and share your story in the comment section, I will publish all of them.
Peace, Meandering.
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