You wouldn’t expect a Guns N’ Roses concert in Las Vegas to bring much in terms of serendipity but life is full of serendipity. Mitch Traphagen photo.
Life has become so serious.
And the reality is, despite the seriousness that has lasted far too long for a world as supposedly advanced as ours, there is still a lot of serendipity as well. It’s just that bad news apparently sells.
Take airlines, for example. Yeah, really.
If corporations “are people, too,” they can often be asocial and occasionally mean people. But somehow the actual living, breathing people within them are not.
I have no idea how many miles I’ve flown, but it’s well into the hundreds of thousands. It used to be fun, but today it’s more like being stuffed and trapped in a tube-shaped cattle car filled with stale air and, probably, every horrible bacteria and disease known to mankind — and some that are as yet unknown, possibly because they are just too scary to study.
My hearing is very nearly gone. I am an experienced flyer, but I can no longer understand the overhead announcements at airport gates. To help with that, I ask the gate agents if they could signal me when it’s my time to board. I also apologize because they usually have their hands full with hundreds of other cattle … I mean, passengers.
Invariably, they not only remember but they always signal me to board early. It’s kind of fun because it offers the opportunity to carry luggage for the older people I board with — flight attendants are there to help, too, but they aren’t on the clock until the door closes so it’s also nice to spare them the extra, unpaid work. There aren’t many advantages to going deaf, but the people working for airlines at least provide all of that. And often, the flight attendants show their appreciation in little ways, too.
I think of that as serendipity.
Log off the news websites, turn off talk radio and the world somehow seems to be a better place. Yes, we do need to be involved in this world, but increasingly I’m of the belief that we can also escape it now and again, with ignorance being bliss.
A few days ago I was able to get the whole airline experience when I found myself in Las Vegas for the second time in six months. Las Vegas is a city on a different planet, and certainly so when coming from the East Coast.
It’s been nearly a year since my childhood best friend was killed in an accident. His death was serendipitous for a number of people. He was an organ donor and his passing saved several lives, some of whom have contacted his mother with words of thanks that, for them, can never be adequate. It makes her happy to know that Jon saved lives.
His 53rd birthday was last week. A few months ago, another childhood friend and I were texting back and forth like teenagers when one of us mentioned that we should do something to celebrate Jon’s birthday. A few minutes later, without notice, my friend, Mark, sent a text of a receipt for two concert tickets in Las Vegas. The concert was sold out and the tickets cost him a fortune. But Mark had just retired early from 23 years of saving lives as a cardiologist in the Midwest. He retired hoping to find ways to make sure that people didn’t need to be fixed in the first place. He had spent several years researching longevity and health and found a company that was producing a nutritional supplement that he believed in. This is not dime-store stuff — it’s based on real science and involves real doctors, people like Mark, people dedicated to making life better for everyone.
What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, so I won’t talk about the bar bills or the orange “Caution” cone that appeared outside one of our flooded hotel rooms — on the 21st floor, no less. But that night we joined 20,000 people who filled T-Mobile Arena for a Guns N’ Roses concert.
Ironically, despite that I really don’t know any of their songs, they performed the two songs that we (the remaining members of our rock band from high school and college) played at Jon’s memorial service: “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” by Bob Dylan and “Wish You Were Here” by Pink Floyd.
Serendipity.
It was a 24-hour trip with toasts to our friend and for me, at least, a tiring but wonderful time getting to know Mark again, my friend who gave so much of his life to saving others — and is now dedicating himself to helping people before they need to be cut open in the first place.
I am a stress ball. I am 53 years old and now, with my hearing problems, am wondering what I’m going to do next week or next year, assuming I’m blessed to have a next year. The world sometimes feels like it’s going to hell in a hand basket, and I work to put a positive spin on things. I’ve paid for that stress with two heart procedures. Life is too serious, so running off on a lark was a very good thing.
Mark dropped me off at the Las Vegas airport and handed me a bag of the nutritional supplements that caught his attention. He said, “Give it six months and let me know how it works.”
After three days something was happening. Perhaps it could be a placebo effect, but I felt better. I felt … younger. These days there are few things that I need more than that. Knowing Mark’s commitment to saving lives, I’m pretty sure it’s more than mere hope and my imagination — something good is happening.
Serendipity.
In fact, I felt so good that I didn’t really mind sitting on the tarmac stuffed in an airplane in Vegas for two hours waiting for a desert storm to pass. A wait that cost me my connecting flight in Houston, forcing an overnight stay there. I didn’t mind boarding yet another flight to Tampa the next morning. I was signaled aboard early, in time to take the bag of an older woman struggling to make it down the jetway. She smiled as she handed me her bag to carry. Together we boarded the plane bound for home.
Serendipity.
P.S. — As Mark asked, I will give the supplement six months and then I’ll tell you all about it.
April is “Donate Life Month.” Are you a registered organ donor? In Florida, it’s easy to become one. For information on how you can save lives, visit www.DonateLifeFlorida.org.