True Story - Serendipity?

[Iolanthe]

I wasn't quite sure where to put this so I hope here is OK.

This is a true story which spans almost 80 years.

My father lived in a fairly large village in Cheshire, England until he was 12. Both his parents were in service, my grandfather was gardener at a large house and my grandmother was an indoor servant there. My father's sister, 10 years older, was in service with a different family and they decided to move to Essex. They asked her to go with them which she did. She married there, and at the age of 12 my father with his parents moved to Essex where they lived in a house owned by my aunt's new husband, and operated a cafe opposite the garage which my uncle owned.

In 1941 my father, then in the Royal Engineers, was standing in line waiting to be evacuated from Crete, his kit bag, with his name on it, turned outwards. A soldier from another line came over to him - it was an old friend called Alan who my father had been at school with in Cheshire and who he hadn't seen since 1931. Dad later learned that Alan had been captured by the Germans and he wrote to his parents to tell them that he had seen Alan and that he was OK.

In 1982 I started doing the family history, and I also started writing a twice yearly newsletter, a copy of which I always sent to the Family History Society of Cheshire. One day in the mid 80s I received a letter from a man I had never heard of, but with the letter was a copy of another letter, the one that my dad had written to his parents in 1941! Alan had found my newsletter and realised whose daughter I was. Dad kept in touch with him from then on until Dad died in 2005 at the age of 84, and of course I still have the letters.

So, two examples of serendipity. Does anyone else have a similar story?

[[Syl]]

Well, five years ago, I went back home to Nevada for my grandmother's funeral. The paper messed up running the obituary, though, so I didn't see it til I got back home. Especially with Mormon families like mine, there's a long list of grandchildren, great grandchildren, and all that. Now, my mom had had two children before me but lost them in a very nasty divorce. Having seen them only a few times and not since I was about two years old, I don't remember them. But being a child of the internet before it was really even a thing, I always looked for them. But reading the obit, I see my sister's name is spelled "Aimee" rather than "Amy." So in the age of Facebook (MySpace, actually), I decided to look again. Lo and behold, I see someone with the right name in the right geographic location. Send them a message. 'Hey, this might sound kind of weird, but...' Sure enough, it's my long lost sister.

So we message back and forth a few times. Less than a week later, I get another message, from a girl named Lauren. She says, 'Hey, are you the [my name] that grew up in Fernley, NV.' I say yes. She says, 'This may sound weird, but you're my brother.'

See, my dad also had two kids after he and my mom split (she still has my sister's dad's last name on my birth certificate, if that tells you anything). I more or less knew this, but the last time I saw my dad, I was seven years old, and that was only the third or fourth time in my life.

For all intents and purposes, at the age of 30, I went from having one younger brother to having two younger brothers, a younger sister, and two older sisters. Even ended up seeing my dad and playing some poker together.

[DoctorGamgee]

I grew up in Ohio, my wife in Louisiana. We met in Salzburg, Austria at a summer opera program (we are both singers). We dated for 6 weeks, then she headed to England to study, while I returned to the states to work. We met up again in Salzburg a year later and were married 12 days later.

When she was telling her grandfather about me, he said, "I believe we went to school with some [my last name]'s. Wonder if they are related?"

Came to find out that my father and her Grandfather were in the same class in the small mountain town of Prestonsburg, KY. He pulled out a yearbook and found a picture of my father in his football uniform that nobody in my family had ever seen.

Serendipity indeed!

[Iolanthe]

Lovely, lovely stories. Syl, I salute you. I've spent many happy hours at my local LDS library!

[deer of the dawn]

When I was in high school I went to a youth group for a while. I didn't go in for being a Christian, but they needed guitar players and the place was always packed, it was fun. I made a friend there named Peter. We weren't close but would end up at some of the same debauches together and would stop in the hall at school to talk, etc even though he was a football player and I was a hippy freak. We understood each other.

Fast forward 22 years. My family was visiting Nigeria for the first time to scope it out. The friends we were staying with wanted us to meet some other missionaries so we went to their friend's house. We started talking about where we came from and lo and behold, it was Peter from my high school.

He and his family are still here and his daughter is my daughter's good friend, and also a student in two of my classes. Peter and I still seem to understand each other in an unusual way.

It may surprise you that we didn't recognize each other, but we were both so high in high school it's almost surprising we remembered anything at all.

Serendipity!!

[aliantha]

These are great. The only weird coincidence I can think of is that my ex-husband's sister's birthday is the same date as my mother's, and the birthday of one of his brothers is the same date as my father's.

Oh, there was a weird thing that happened just a couple of weeks ago. On our first night in Prague, Kim and I were chatting up the other tour attendees from our alma mater. A couple of them live in Indianapolis, and I mentioned that I used to have a whole bunch of friends who lived there, including one of my college roommates who attended law school in Indy but then moved to Lafayette and had practiced elder law there for several years. One of the women we were talking to then turned to me and said, "You mean X? How do you know her?" Turns out my old roomie and this woman work for different agencies of the Indiana state government, but they work on projects together. Small world...

[[Syl]]

Heh. Reminds me. I was back home in Reno in between enlistments. My buddy Michael was over at my place. He tells me he ran into Dustin, a very close friend of mine, when he was in Bahrain. They were there on different ships, and Dustin was on the Wasp.

A year later, I decide to go back in. While I'm in training, I learn one of the guys in my class was on the Wasp. I say, 'Hey, you know Dustin?' He says yes, they worked in the same work center. So yeah, small world.

Heh. Better story. Also when I'm back home in Reno, a buddy I used to work with in GA got out several months later and was working as an IT contractor on a job at Fallon (about 60 miles east of Reno, but in NV, that's nothing). So, I'm hanging out with Gordo, and he tells me about this date he went on.

He met this girl and asked her out. Apparently, she wasn't too into him but agreed to the date. She brings a friend with her. A guy. Not to worry, he's gay, so just an escort, like. So they're talking, and she asks what he does. Says he just got out of the Air Force where he was a linguist stationed in GA. The guy says, 'Hey, do you know Dustin [last name]?' Gordo says, 'You mean Jack?' The guy says, 'No, his name's Dustin.' He didn't know that I'd gone by Jack since I enlisted (a nickname a Navy buddy gave me that's stuck). Gordo realizes this and explains (luckily, he wasn't one of the people who never realized my real first name wasn't Jack). So yeah, the guy is an old high school friend of mine (named Justin, though we always called him Happy).

And for those interested, the rest of the date apparently didn't go that well. Some issue about the check, IIRC, among other things. For the best, I suppose, since he's now married to a woman who is way too hot (and into all the geek stuff that he is) for a guy like Gordo.

<edit>
Oh, one last one, I suppose. So I'm talking to Cail over PM. I'd just moved to a very small town in MD earlier this year, and I knew Cail lived in MD. The area where I live is pretty scenic and ideal for motorcycles (and the lycra-wearing bicyclist scourge as well, unfortunately). I say, 'Hey, if you're ever in [my town], let me know and we'll grab a beer.' Cail says, 'What? I live in [your town],' apparently moving here about a month after I did. So yeah, beers were had.

[Damelon]

About 15 years ago I stopped at a car dealer in Rockford, IL as a part of my job. Introducing myself to the finance manager, on hearing my last name, he asked me if I was related to (my father and grandfather's name). He explained when he was young an insurance salesman by that name used to stop by their apartment in Chicago. My grandfather was an insurance salesman for 28 years at Prudential and his job was to make the rounds collecting on the penny policies of people. His territory, if I remember right, was in the area around Wrigley Field. In any case he remembered him from his cigar that he always was smoking. He loved his cigars (though my dad also does today).

My grandfather was gone by that time, but my grandmother loved that story.

[sgt.null]

when a teen my family drove from new hampshire to minnesota to visit my older brother and his family. in a truck stop somnewhere in ohio or indiana atruck driver approched me and asked "is you father named vinny wood" i replied yes and he said... "tell him so and so (it was a long time ago) says hi."

only my dad could that have happened to.

[deer of the dawn]

When I was busking in Oregon, apparently Ken Kesey dropped money in my guitar case.

[Iolanthe]

Who he?

[aliantha]

He wrote "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest".

[Vraith]

When I was busking in Oregon, apparently Ken Kesey dropped money in my guitar case.

Are you sure?? I mean you say "apparently" so maybe it was the kool-aid?


yea ali, that...and "sometimes a great notion" which I've been meaning to reread forever. I picked it up off my uncle's shelf when I was 13 and liked the little snippet of poem, so forced myself to read it all the way through. all I remember is that snippet, and the fact I got through it. I have no idea what it was about...I think it took place in alabama or the deep south?

I just put that in, cuz it is watch serendipity, is it not?

But really, I've had a lot of it. [or at least "small world" cuz they were mostly just interesting in occurrence, no significant beneficial result]

[aliantha]

I don't think I've read either one, to be truthful -- and in fact, I'm not sure I've ever seen the whole movie version of "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest". I suppose I ought to Netflix it...

[Major Isoor]

When I was busking in Oregon, apparently Ken Kesey dropped money in my guitar case.

What do you mean by 'apparently'? Did you just see his face, then see his face later on in an article about his books, or something? Either way, that's pretty cool! I've seen the OFOTCN and read the book, so he's not unknown to me! (although I'm not too good with names, so I didn't recognise it until aliantha mentioned it! )

But yeah, on-topic, nothing of the sort's really happened to me, that I can recall. (only posted to say the above, heh) Although when myself and my immediate family went to Malaysia the other year, we found that one of my relatives who fought in World War II was buried at a place we visited, among other Australian and New Zealand soldiers who were captured by the Japanese. (my family has got a fair history of great-uncles etc. fighting in WW1 and WW2, although I don't think any of them survived, sadly)

[Avatar]

Who he?

Uh, The Merry Pranksters? The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test?



--A

[deer of the dawn]

When I was busking in Oregon, apparently Ken Kesey dropped money in my guitar case.

Are you sure?? I mean you say "apparently" so maybe it was the kool-aid?


yea ali, that...and "sometimes a great notion" which I've been meaning to reread forever. I picked it up off my uncle's shelf when I was 13 and liked the little snippet of poem, so forced myself to read it all the way through. all I remember is that snippet, and the fact I got through it. I have no idea what it was about...I think it took place in alabama or the deep south?

I just put that in, cuz it is watch serendipity, is it not?

But really, I've had a lot of it. [or at least "small world" cuz they were mostly just interesting in occurrence, no significant beneficial result]

"Sometimes A Great Notion" took place in Oregon. I should re-read that, it was decades ago and it was very memorable.

By "apparently" I mean I didn't notice him, someone else told me later; and in fact maybe he didn't drop money in as there were a few contributions of an illicit nature in there as well. Ken Kesey was also the subject of a book called "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test" by Tom Wolfe, which I read in high school.

[Iolanthe]

Sorry everyone. I have heard of One Flew Over the Cookoo's Nest, but I don't think I've seen the film and certainly haven't read any of the books mentioned.

Just googled, and yes, I have seen part of the film - I remember Jack Nicholson and white coats.

I have one more story worth the telling.

About 5 years ago I came out of the searchroom at Lincolnshire Archives to get my stuff out of my locker and go home. There was a lady sitting in the foyer on her own, and, as you do, I remarked on the weather. She was quite talkative and we got round to where we came from (born in the same town) where we went to infant and junior school (same school) and eventually realised that we were the same age and she was Linda J who had been my friend from the age of 5 to 11! She was waiting for her husband who was in the searchroom. As we went to different senior schools we had lost touch, and I hadn't seen her for about 45 years! She had stayed down south while I had moved to Lincoln. The chances of us meeting like that must be very slim. It pays to talk to people folks!

[deer of the dawn]

That is great. While in the US recently I got to go to a concert given by a friend I hadn't seen in 28 years. We had reconnected via Facebook, of course. It was like a day hadn't even passed.

I remembered another one. I filled in for a couple of weeks for the receptionist at a small college. It was in the summer, so most of the phone calls were about a concert the college was hosting. One phone call was from a woman asking about tickets. She started telling me how excited she was about the concert and she sounded so familiar. I interrupted her: "Ellen?"

A moment of freaked-out silence. "Who IS this?" she asked.

I told her, feeling very pleased with myself. We hadn't seen each other in about 5 years, since I moved to another state, but there had been a time when we had hung out together quite a bit (New Englanders do not tend to keep in touch if you move past the horizon).

[Iolanthe]

The strangest thing has happened. Someone joined my Family History group page on Facebook, and sent me a message in January that I found today in the "other" messages. I saw that the message had been sent from Ballyjamesduff, Cavan, and when I replied I mentioned that I had been there and that my husband's uncle and aunt had lived nearby. Turns out that her aunt knew C's aunt and uncle and tried to fix her up with one of their sons! How's that for coincidence?