What a coinkidink

I don't know why it surprises me when someone else is thinking the same thing as me. This is, after all, an increasingly small world with an increasingly large number of people on it. I suppose I've always thought of myself as a unique individual thinking extremely unique thoughts. Although it surprises me that someone else is thinking what I am, or that two disparate parts of my life but up against one another, it does not upset me. I actually find it extraordinarily comforting, a wonderful sense of being connected to others--friends and strangers.

Frinstince, today I was searching online for a long-ago friend from my theatre days. I was terribly fond of this person, spurred I suppose, by the fact that he was terribly fond of me (both in very unromantic ways). I clicked on a review of one of his plays and saw a picture of another friend from a totally different theatre experience. Okay, not totally crazy as theatre people are migratory folk anyway. It struck me, though, because I hadn't thought of that second friend in years and then there he was.

As it happens, I had met the second friend at summer stock, so seeing his picture made me look up lots of old acquaintances. Several hours later I'm reading a magazine and there is an article written by a woman who grew up in that same town where I had done summer stock. And we're not talking Chicago, we're talking about a town with a college and an ice cream shoppe and not much else.

I still don't know if I believe in God, but I totally believe in the unity of coincidence.