Otherwise known as coincidences.  I do like to play with words. Wordplay is one of my favorite things to do, read, listen to, laugh at, share.

Speaking of sharing, I have so  many things I’d like to share with you today: the weather, upcoming teacher/parent/student conferences, yesterday’s Bloomington Symphony Orchestra concert, sopranos, my son Michael’s tuba solos, bear hunting, my daughter’s 25 pound mahi mahi catch,  switching closets from hot weather wear to cold weather wear, the Rankin family of Celtic fiddlers, and Herman Hesse.

Hmmmm. Well, I did say that I’d talk about coincidences on the last post and today’s title does indicate that coincidences would be in the post somewhere…

So, coincidences it is. Interestingly enough, several of the above topics can be touched with that topic.

I get a little shiver when two seemingly disparate things have a connection. Teachers: get out your Venn diagrams! I was doing a crossword puzzle and the clue was ______ Spiegel.  The answer was Der.   I was thinking of the Spiegel catalog from which many game shows from the 60’s got their prizes.  But that didn’t have any Der or Das in front of it. So it must be something else.

The. Next. Day. I am reading my book before going to sleep at night, and the main character is at a newspaper stand in Hollywood and she sees Der Spiegel!!!!! which I now know is a German newspaper. How weird is that?

While I was reading an earlier part of the book at night, during the day, an old and very racist rhyme popped into my head. I remember exactly where I was on the way home from grade school when I sang it out loud and laughed. Why did it pop into my consciousness? Maybe I was thinking of all the racist/sexist problems our country is having and thinking about how just knowing someone of that race, that gender identity, would make a difference. When you put a face to a stereotype, it makes the stereotype evaporate.

At that time, I knew no one of Asian descent, so when I sang the song, I was laughing at how clever the wordplay was. (Yes, even then)

The. Next. Day. Someone sings that very rhyme to the main character of the book, asking in her own ingracious way which Asian country the main character came from. How weird is that????!!!  I got chills from that one.

Yesterday I went to the BSO concert in which my son and daughter-in-law play. The second number was Four Last Songs by Richard Strauss. As the soprano is singing the German words, I looked at the program for the translations, to know what she was singing as she was blowing off the roof  of the church. I read the words and was impressed by the poems and then I looked up to see who wrote them.   Hermann Hesse.

The author of Siddhartha. Which my best friend from Kindergarten had just told me she was reading a few weeks ago as she was recovering from a bad fall.  H. W. I. T.?????!!!  (How weird is that)

And this morning, this same friend emails me that yesterday her husband had pulled out an old  DVD of Celtic music and there were members of the Rankin family on it. The Rankin family from Nova Scotia. You can guess where this is going, can’t you? Yep, we had gone to a small pub in Mabou, N.S. and listened to two fiddlers from the Rankin family. And, I had shared that with Jean E. when she came over last week.

H. W. I. T.

Sometimes I just think someone is following me singing the theme from the Twilight Zone. You know: Doo, doo, doo, doo.

Stranger things have happened…

Have a marvelous Monday.  And to all my teacher friends, good luck with the upcoming conferences. May the Force be with you. and some chocolate, too.

Remember, if you want to chime in with your coincidences/comments, just click on today’s title, then scroll down to the bottom of this entry and type away!

Hugs,

Janet