May the odds be ever in your favor
On holiday in Manhattan, I’m buzzing along the sidewalks with three million other people when I cross paths with a friend from my hometown.
As we prepare a final resting place for a special pet, a butterfly emerges just above his lifeless body. The monarch lights in a nearby tree and stays there for hours. I finally bid them both farewell and make my way inside. When I check on the butterfly again minutes later, it is gone.
I pick up the phone to call a friend. Before I can finish dialing, it rings. It’s her. Of course, it’s her! I know this almost before I say hello.
On the last day of a trip to Australia, I set out to find a tiny consignment shop I’ve discovered online. The walking route takes me down a small side street. As I approach the store, I see a familiar face heading my way. I only know a handful of people in Sydney, but here is one of them. We laugh and give each other a hug.
Packed up and underway to my mother’s house for the first time since she passed away, I glance at the time: 12:22. Her birthday.
What are the odds?!
Scientists contend that happenings like these are nothing more than coincidence, attention-grabbing but otherwise meaningless events germinated from the seeds of probability. Like winning the lottery, they’re just matters of chance that are statistically more likely than they seem. The Birthday Paradox is a ready example: Put 23 people in a room together. There is a 50-50 chance two of them will share the same birthday. Bump the number to 70 people and the odds of a match increase to 99.9 percent. Those who interpret the world from a mathematical mindset aren’t looking to create order or understanding out of serendipity. They have calculus for that.
Math has never been my strongest subject. I am challenged by absolutes and the presumption that every problem must have a logical solution. Though I have tremendous respect for the many advances you number-crunching types have brought to my existence, if you put me in a room with 22 other people, I’ll snag a seat on the couch next to the ones finding meaning in the flukey. Give me mysticism! Give me divinity!
Enter the vultures. Last weekend, after a five-hour road trip, I stopped by a grocery store just a mile from home. It was almost 5:00 PM. The sun had slipped below the horizon, its light now bending around atmospheric particles with fire-hued results. As I found a place to park, I noticed the birds and tipped my head back to watch them for a moment before walking inside. There must have been at least 100 circling overhead. I assumed they were preparing to roost on a nearby water tower where I’ve seen them congregate in the past. When I left the store 15 minutes later, there were none to be seen.
Peeking at social media while prepping dinner that night, the first story in my newsfeed was that of a veritable vulture convention taking place at an abandoned grain elevator in the next town over. I would have blamed insidious data-mining and algorithms were it not for the fact that I had neither spoken of nor searched for anything related to these much-maligned birds. The next day, a single vulture landed in an open, grassy area just opposite my front door.
Individually, there was absolutely nothing exceptional about these occurrences, but I couldn’t help noticing the trio of events coming in one after the next. Intrigued, I did a little reading. As with other birds, groups of vultures have been given some interesting names by us humans. A kettle refers to vultures in flight. When at rest, they are a committee, and when feeding, the group is called a wake. Some Native peoples refer to vultures as peace eagles, because they never kill their own prey.
Vultures are nature’s purifiers, eating what would otherwise require weeks to decompose, thereby restoring balance. By sustaining themselves in this way, they represent a form of rebirth. Similarly, the association with death so often attributed to vultures can be viewed as a form of spiritual transformation, an opportunity to move beyond the constraints of the physical body. Vultures ride thermal air currents so gracefully that at times they appear to levitate. Symbolically, they are using energy efficiently to lift themselves above the heaviness of the world.
At the start of another year, days expanding and hope finding opportunities to rise, the vulture brings assurance of renewal. Reality is complicated. Gratefully, if we care to notice, our days are filled with synchronicities to remind us that, in all probability, life is utterly marvelous.
~Elizabeth
P.S. Do you have a favorite serendipitous story? Share it in the comments!
Only you could associate vultures with beautiful moments.... And I agree... I approach each day as if every moment is a serendipitous moment.. I look for them every moment... I remember in particular being on a senior high workshop at Blue Ridge Assembly in Black Mountain North Carolina sometime probably in the 1980s.. Our theme was Jesus and the disciples.... I found myself walking around mid Saturday looking for the perfect place for Holy Communion.. My coordinator was walking with me and urging me to make a decision where we should have this moment... I replied I'm sure there is some special revelation yet to come.... I think I heard a little laughter as my coordinator walked away to go to some other responsibilities... I almost laughed myself at my own words.. In about 15 minutes at the top of the hill I saw the manager of the camp coming to me and thought I might be in distress so he asked me if I needed any help... I told him no I was just scouting out some places that I had not seen for some sessions.... Then he made the serendipitous offer... He stated, there are lots of places on campus... Oh by the way, we just opened the building to your left which is a 100 year old dormitory and you can use any room in it if you like, especially the attic is available ..and I said. The attic? And he said yes, and he pointed and said it's the upper room..... The Upper Room??? Jesus and his disciples?? Holy Communion? Serendipitous at its best... However, I saw no vultures flying overhead... But I'm sure they were somewhere close by...
It is amazing how individual perception can influence the understanding of many events. I used to want to calculate the odds of certain coincidences, as if the math would allow me to believe the unbelievable. Now I feel no need for proof as my connection with the universe goes beyond the logic that I try to reel it in with. Much like walking on an invisible bridge that has taken me to places I thought impossible, yet it might just collapse if decide to look down and question how it works.