Confounding Coincidence

I have a hard time knowing where to start this story.

 

My daughter's mom, my ex-wife, passed away three years ago this March. My daughter, who is now twenty-four, has been hit heartbreakingly hard by this loss.

 

When she died, we put all of her worldly possessions in a storage unit temporarily. As these things often do, temporarily turned in to just under three years and only now is the storage unit nearly empty of what was a household and lifetime of the profoundly sentimental and the utterly mundane.

 

Last Friday, my daughter was going through one of her mom's many boxes and found a letter she had written. It was addressed to my daughter and was written just shy of five months before her mom passed. The powerful words answered some of my daughter's questions about her mom's passing, affirmed the love they shared and supported the decisions my daughter has made since she lost her mom. It was devastating and cathartic at the same time.

That Sunday was Oscar night. While watching the show I received a text at about 8 o'clock from my sister who lives in Arizona. She was also watching and said that the Oscars always reminded her of my mom, who would sit with her writing tablet and make note of the winners as the show progressed.

 

My mom passed when I was five years old and I don't remember her at all, so this kind of recollection is always welcome.

 

An hour later I received a text from my daughter. It was a picture of a letter she had found among her mom's effects.

The letter was addressed to me. The letter was written by my Arizona sister.

The letter was written on the same type of tablet my Arizona sister had been picturing an hour earlier. By same type, I mean it could have even been the same tablet used for the 1971 award notations.

 

The date on the letter, December 7, 1972, was five months, to the day, before my mom would die in a car accident.

 

Two letters, involving two moms, both written five months before they would pass much, much too young.

 

A memory from my sister is all but physically manifested an hour after she texts me about it.

 

Sometimes the content and timing of coincidences is so powerful that the word coincidence no longer fits the situation.

 

I can't help but picture those two moms having a little palaver somewhere and deciding to pull a fast one on us lowly mortals.

 

Comments

  1. Unknown26/2/13 20:25

    Absolutely fascinating. I am captivated. So sad for the loss of both of these women.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Casey Freeland27/2/13 07:54

      Thank you Lady! :) I hope all is well on your side of the world.

      Delete
  2. ♥ Braja14/3/13 07:11

    The possibilities are endless....:)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Joanna Jenkins18/3/13 19:34

    That gave me goosebumps--

    It's always heartbreaking to lose a parent at a young age is, I'd imagine, beyond heart-breaking.

    And you are right-- "Coincidence" doesn't fit the situation.

    Big sigh.
    jj

    ReplyDelete

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