Pete and I (with Sun in tow) headed out today to view a few of NOLA’s St. Joseph altars. Our first stop, appropriately, St. Joseph’s Church on Tulane Avenue. Here’s their altar:

All three of the altars we visited today had lamb and bleeding heart cakes; whole fishes; wine; and breads. Here’s a close-up of a cake on St. Joseph Church’s altar:

At St. Joseph’s Church, I left a petition for deceased friends and family. Upon exiting, we were given St. Joseph holy cards, including blessed lucky beans, and our goodie bags of blessed bread:

You will notice that their beans are two different kind, one large and two small. Pete inquired about these beans and was told that the two small ones were in honor of St. Lucy and were for your vision.

Next on the list, the St. Louis Cathedral in the French Quarter. Their altar was in the St. Andrew Garden behind the church. We arrived at this one around 1pm to discover much of the display dismantled. Here’s what was left:

Here’s a close-up of some of their items:

Their goodie bag included cookies, a St. Joseph’s medal, bread, a lucky bean, and holy cards:

After leaving the Cathedral, we were approached by an impromptu marching club that was led by this fellow:

Next on the agenda, the home of the Talamo family in uptown New Orleans:

The Talamo family has been doing the altar in their home for over 20 years. At both the Cathedral and the Talamo’s, lunch was offered (stuffed artichokes and spaghetti with bread). Here’s a close-up of a whole fish on the Talamo’s altar:

And here’s the cookies and beans and prayer cards from their goodie bag:

After all our hard work, we headed to Angelo Brocato’s for cooling gelatos and perfectly brewed cafe au laits. To our surprise and delight, we discovered they, too, have a St. Joseph’s altar:

Overall, the day was solemn and reverential. I think this may be something I will do again next year.

Last year, I posted about my annual St. Patrick’s parade excursion in Metairie. This Sunday, the parade will be celebrating its 37th year, and I will be returning to the same spot to watch the same parade to catch the same vegetables to make my traditional cabbage rolls.

Katie challenged me to write about the history of NOLA’s St. Patrick’s Day activities. Now, I loooove a good challenge. But this one proved a bit rough. Alls I could learn was that only a handful of cities in the country have a St. Patrick’s parade (and of course that means New Orleans will have at least two) but that we are the only city that throws cabbages from the floats of said parades. We here in NOLA do love our food. So although I could not locate the history behind this tradition (throwing the cabbages, not eating them), its logic is easy enough to follow.

You can click here to read about the history of the Irish settling in New Orleans. Instead of repeating that information, I will give a bit of history about two marching krewes, one of which will be in the parade this Sunday. Katie, I hope this suffices.

First, the Jefferson City Buzzards. Jefferson City was once a part of New Orleans. Jefferson City ran along Mississippi River from Toledano to Joseph Street. This part of town, back in the mid- and late-1800s, was heavily inhabited by immigrants. Many of these immigrants were German and many of these Germans were butchers. These butchers slaughtered meat to be consumed in the city. And with slaughterhouses and butchers came . . . buzzards.

So, 20 years after Jefferson City became part of New Orleans proper, in 1890, the Jefferson City Buzzards began marching. They began marching when it was popular to dress as women; some of the marchers still do this today. They have been marching now for over 115 years. So when one of the marchers drops to the ground and starts doings his famous “cockroach dance,” enjoy a bit of history in the living.

The second marching band is far less famous: The Mysterious Babies. This group started in 1910 and, like many of the marching bands of the day, lasted until the onset of World War I (1914). I learned of this group in a, well, mysterious way. In my grandmother’s photographs was a clipping from the old Dixie Magazine pull-out of the Sunday Times-Picayune. It was a write-up about the Mysterious Babies in the “Picture out of Our Past” section. This article has a picture of the marchers in 1910, and among the faces are several of my ancestors. Further research shows that my great- great-uncles were some of the original officers. They had several write-ups in the Times Picayune over the few short years of their existence. On their second anniversary (they dressed up like baby dolls and marched during Mardi Gras), the Times Picayune had this to say about them:

The Babies gave one parade, which was a scream, and they promise that their showing of Tuesday will not only cause laughter, but excite admiration and wonderment.

Their clubhouse was just a few doors down from the house CS and I now own in uptown New Orleans. This house is located in the part of New Orleans that was once part of Jefferson City. My ancestors were German. And they were also butchers.

In New Orleans, everything has meaning. Everything has a history. Even when that history is butchery and buzzards and men dressing like women and babies, it’s a rich history of which we are proud.

So why do New Orleanians throw cabbages and carrots and potatoes from floats? And why do we chase those floats half a block to catch the vegetables? Well, for me the answer is, because it’s what my family has been doing for as long as any of us can remember.

In the Times-Picayune today, there was not less than three mentions of the Friends of the Jefferson Parish Library semi-annual Book Sale out at Pontchartrain Center. I am a sucker for book deals and have found many oddities at this sale in the past. So, after Sun took the longest nap ever, we headed out.

I had never caught this sale on its first day; in the old days, I worked five days a week. But post-Sun, I now have Thursdays to DO THINGS. So, with no plans on the calendar, we had the freedom to read about something in the morning paper and hit it in the afternoon.

At this sale, I gravitate to the local interest area. Not the romance novels nor fiction. Not the geography section (although I have an odd fascination for maps) nor the self-help. Not horror nor mystery nor health nor Americana nor biography nor children’s books. No; I am there to see what oddball books they have on Louisiana, and New Orleans in particular.

This sale scratched my itch. I walked away with seven books and spent a whopping $22. And had I held off on a streetcar book (”The Saint Charles Streetcar — or the history of The New Orleans and Carrollton Railroad,” by James Gilbeau), I’d have spent only $10. But with our new streetcar site, I felt I needed to get educated. It’s research; I can write that one off on my taxes next year.

This year, other than the streetcar book, I bombed at the local interest section. But I thought outside the box and ended up in the cookbook section and found these little gems:

1. “The Art of Cooking with Spirits,” by Elise Landauer Meyer (1964), hardback with dustcover signed by the author, $2. This author was a New Orleanian and it reminded me too much of Tuesday’s purchase of “In the Land of Cocktails” for me to pass up.
2. “A Cook’s Quiz” by Antoinette & Francois Pope (1952), hardcover with dustcover, $2. This is a book that asks and answers cooking questions, like Do eggs contain vitamins? and What temperature is simmering? and When is water really boiling? and How can hard marshmallows be softened? My question, how could I resist? I couldn’t.
3. “52 Fridays, Meatless Menus and Recipes” by Ethel M. Keating (1957), hardcover (no dustcover), $1. This one was a misfire. I thought it was going to be a Louisiana Lenten cookbook. It isn’t; it’s written by a mid-westerner! Any mid-westerner interested in this? Leave a comment and if more than two want it, well then, the best comment wins.
4. “The New Orleans Eat Book, Facts & Opinions on Dining Out in America’s Best Eating City,” by Tom Fitzmorris (1991), signed and dated by the author, paperback, $1.50. although out of date, I like books that review restaurants and I like Fitzmorris (I know not everyone does) and I like reading about NOLA places. Plus, there are “facts and opinions” that go beyond restaurants.
5. “The New Orleans Underground Gourmet, Where to find great meals in the city and environs for less than $3.75 and as little as 50¢,” by Richard H. Collin (1973), paperback, coincidentally, 50¢. This one, this one. Where to begin? On eating at a new restaurant in New Orleans Collin says, “So many new restaurants open constantly in this protean eating city that trying new and unknown restaurants is a valid sport.” Of a restaurant he was underwhelmed with, “The food here isn’t that bad (it’s not particularly good either), but it is impossible to eat anything in what must be the most foul-smelling restaurant in the city.” Of Galatoire’s, he has much to say. His description of Galatoire’s is spot-on:
   

   Galatoire’s is one of New Orleans’ incomparable restaurants. Over the years people have argued about whether Galatoire’s was the best restaurant in North America. For many Orleanians and visitors it is the only restaurant in North America. One either loves or detests the Galatoire’s dining room, one large mirrored room. To some it resembles a rather large and not particularly fancy barbershop; to others it is a holy temple where great food is enshrined.

   Collin recommends Galatoire’s fish and shellfish: “if you must have meat or chicken, go elsewhere,” but advises that “[t]his has never been a great place for liquor or wine.” Well, on that last point, we will have to disagree. I’d like to think that in 35 years, Galatoire’s has honed their cocktail skills. The point: this book was SO WORTH its 50¢.

I also picked up The Dickens Digest for $3 (have you learned yet that I adore 1850s British Victorian novels? Because I do). The Friends of Jefferson Parish Library will continue to put fresh books on the tables as room is made for them, so even going over the weekend may score good finds. Hmmm. I may just need to make another trip out there on Saturday.

Yesterday, I drove out to get satsumas for Christy over at Misplaced Southern Belle. I ended up at DeWitt’s Fruit and Vegetable Shed on River Road (this stand has been at this location for over 50 years). I have driven past it many, many times and never stopped. So, thanks, Christy, for giving me an excuse to visit this NOLA stronghold.

Unfortunately for Christy, the clerk informed me that satsuma season ended two weeks ago. Well, damn. So the clerk sold me on some Louisiana seedless oranges instead. It was that or navel oranges and he assured me the seedless ones were sweeter. So I got two sacs of oranges (five oranges per sac), and some bananas and pears and one avocado for Sun. I ate one of the oranges after dinner and was surprised to find, yes, you guessed it, SEEDS. CS explained that “seedless” doesn’t mean “without seeds” it means “less seeds.” What kind of marketing is THAT?

I also made a trip to the bookstore to buy, “In the Land of Cocktails: Recipes and Adventures from the Cocktail Chicks.”

Except all I could remember was it was called something about drinking in New Orleans and something something “Chicks.” Pete had sent me this article from The Times-Picayune on the book on Monday. I was sold after reading that the Chicks (cousins Ti Adelaide Martin and Lally Brennan of the famous restaurant Brennan family) do not use the word “hangover” but rather the more civilized expression of “the vapors,” and they gave the advice never to mix grapes with grain.

As I approached the information desk at the book store, I overheard an older woman asking about a brand new book on mixology. I knew we were on the same hunt. She couldn’t remember the name of the book either (although she at least remembered the authors names). So as the clerk walked us both to the NOLA section of the bookstore, I mumbled to the woman, “We’re something, huh? Between the two of us we know it’s a book on booze with the word “chicks” in the title!” She responded to me in a heavy southern accent, “Oh, no. Ti and I have known each utha fawevah. I have comp’ny comin’ and I whant to get a few copies faw mah frienz.”

We arrived at the table and the clerk pointed to the book. I picked it up as the woman said, “That’s not it” (she didn’t see the “Chicks” part in the title). I recognized the cover from looking at it online, and, seeing the short stack of books, I wasn’t going to lose getting one for this woman’s “frienz.” Being polite, however, I assured her it was the right book. She finally saw that, in fact, it was and grabbed the rest in the stack.

I then went to a coffeehouse to meet Penelope and CS. As I waited for them, I flipped through the book. Straight away, I was hooked. Here’s their dedication:

For bartenders everywhere who care about well-made cocktails.

We also want to dedicate this book to our beloved city of New Orleans. New Orleanians have shown a courage and resilience even we did not know existed beneath your head-strong joie de vivre. We wouldn’t trade being of and from New Orleans for any other location on earth. This one is for you.

And if that’s not enough for you (and it was for me!), this book offers so much. It’s got a good look (the illustrations are done by Tim Trapolin), it celebrates New Orleans living, and, best of all, it gives recipes so you can properly mix for yourself (and friends) such famous drinks as the Sazerac, an Old-Fashioned, a Sidecar, and even a Grasshopper (and oh so many more cocktails). No vodka and tonics in this book. Heck, the book even offers a cure for “the vapors.”

So buy a copy of the book and get your shakers and swizzle sticks out and start mixing. And remember to raise a glass and toast New Orleans!

This weekend, Pete, SoMo and I are hitting the streets to check out some St. Joseph altars. I somehow managed to be born and raised a Catholic in New Orleans and yet never been to a St. Joseph altar.

Why my sudden interest in the altars? I owe this interest to my mother-in-law. About this time last year she mentioned to me how she missed St. Joseph altars. Huh? Don’t they have them everywhere, I asked her. No. Turns out they are in several big cities, like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles. But the biggest display of them is in my own backyard. Well, I’ll be damned. That’s just the sort of thing that perks my interest right up.

But what is a St. Joseph altar, you ask? The altars are Sicilian in origin and pay homage to Christ’s “earthly father,” Sicily’s patron saint, who, the Sicilians believe, came to their aid with rain during a terrible famine. By way of thanks, the people of Sicily prepared a table with foods they had harvested as a result of the rain. Why are the altars so big in Louisiana? Well, apparently Louisiana has more Sicilians per capita than any other U.S. state. I had no idea.

A St. Joseph altar is first and foremost a display of food prepared by the parishioners and displayed for the public. The altars are usually built in someone’s home or a church vestibule and not the altar of the church. The food that is prepared is then blessed and distributed to charities.

There is much symbolism in the food prepared. Breads, cakes, cookies, and pastries are often baked in symbolic Christian shapes: chalices, crosses, doves, lambs, fish, wreaths, and palms. Symbols of St. Joseph are also plentiful: lilies, staffs, sandals, ladders, saws, hammers, and nails. Also, the food itself can be symbolic: Like there being no meat on an altar (because the feast falls during Lent); or the breadcrumbs that represent sawdust to symbolize St. Joseph the Carpenter; or twelve whole fish that represent the apostles; or wine that is symbolic of the Miracle at Cana.

Another interesting thing: Petitions of the faithful are written on pieces of paper and placed in baskets on the altar. Photographs of the faithfully departed generally decorate the altar as well.

And the most interesting thing of all? The goodie bag. Yes, I said goodie bag. I love this part especially.

Visitors to St. Joseph altars are given small paper bags containing a few blessed items from the altar. The bags can contain a holy card and/or a small medal. Locally, the bags usually have bread in them. And cookies. The bread is usually not eaten but saved and broken up and spread across the thresholds of homes to protect the homes in storms. I bet there were a lot of breadcrumbs left out to stave off Katrina.

But the most interesting item found in the goodie bag is the fava bean. In Sicily, the fava was fed to the cattle. During famines, the Sicilians ate the beans to survive and considered themselves lucky to have the beans. Thus, the fava bean is also known as a “lucky bean.” Some believe that a pantry that contains a fava bean will never be bare.

As a child, I always had a lucky bean in my change purse. I didn’t think about it; I just carried it. Each year, I’d get a new one. Looking back, I realize it was the closest thing I did to attending a St. Joseph’s altar.

I had lunch with my sister this weekend. She helped bake fig cookies for a St. Joseph’s altar. She explained that you are supposed to carry not one but three lucky beans in your wallet–for, she was told, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. She gave me all three of her beans (she can replenish her stash). Apparently, I will never be without money in my wallet.

So, I am going to dip my toes in some Christian ceremony this weekend. In the NOLA area and want to check it our yourself? Click here to find where and when the altars are being displayed.

It’s hard to believe I have been sharing pieces of my life through blogging with the unknowns of the Internet for just over a year now. I think I am starting to find my voice. Here’s a short list of things I’ve gotten from blogging:

1. New NOLA friends, Katie, Leigh, and Stacey that I have met in person. With Belle and Jane soon to join this list.

2. A [soon to be received] knitting-related gift for no reason from Christy. In return, I am sending her Louisiana satsumas.

3. The release of forgiveness.

4. Many field trips with Captain Sarcastic, Wendy and/or Pete to get Cajun meats, visit art markets, see Bonerama, and take pictures of fleur de lis. Okay, technically I would have done some of these things anyway, but doing them with the idea going in that I’d be blogging about them made the experiences a bit richer.

5. I have also made many, many online friends. I have read many others’ blogs, and they have made me laugh, cry, learn, grow.

6. I have fallen even more in love with New Orleans (and I didn’t think THAT was possible) and shared the birth (and fertility problems related thereto) of my daughter.

I think about how Year Two will be–will things be as interesting the second time around? I am such a creature of habit! I promise you I will do a lot this year that I did last year. I am a sucker for tradition and rituals.

But the beauty of this city, of life, is that even in doing the same thing, it’s always new and a bit different. And at least Year Two will be many of Sun’s Firsts. Plus, we have the streetcars to photograph.

So, thank you, Internet, for the gift of blogging. And thank you, too, fellow bloggers (and even you lurkers), for reading me and supporting me. The whole process has given far more than it has asked in return.

I had made arrangements to go with Wendy to the knitting store to pick yarn for me to knit her daughter a scarf for Christmas. I had just finished knitting the behemoth blanket. I was very excited to return to my favorite local yarn shop for the first time since having had Sun.

We stepped into the shop, me lugging a sleeping 4-month old Sun in her carrier and Wendy holding Sam’s small hand. As usual, I heard, “Noooola!” The clerk recognizing me said, “Ooooh, you had the baby! Did Dr. Socks deliver her?” and with that she turned her head and pointed. To Dr. Socks. Who was standing in the very spot where I’d met him. Talking to a clerk about needlepoint threads.

Deep inside, I screamed. On the outside, I answered the clerk with an icy, loud, firm, “No.” I then turned to Wendy and said under my breath, “That’s him. That’s HIM. THAT’S HIM.” The blood was beating so loudly in my ears I couldn’t hear anything or concentrate on anything. Except him. I couldn’t stop looking at him. Waiting. Waiting for the right words to come to me. Waiting for him to see me. Waiting for him to see Sun. Waiting for him to realize he had been wrong. Waiting for him to speak to me.  Waiting for him to apologize.

He gave me the quickest of glances and returned to his work. Looking back, he focused an awful lot of attention on his work. He did see me, although I couldn’t tell if he’d recognized me. But then I thought, of course he recognized me! He recognized me in his office after one short meeting of him in this very shop. I’d seen him in his office no less than ten times as his patient. Was he… could he be… surely he wasn’t… IGNORING ME!?!

My mind raced. Do I SAY something? Do I NOT say something? Do I make a scene? Do I embarrass him? Will I embarrass myself? WHAT SHOULD I DO, DAMMIT! What would you have done?

What did I do? With shaky hands, I picked up Sun in her carrier and walked over to the table Socks was working over. I tapped into all the courage I could muster and called to him in a sing-song voice, “Ohh, Dooooctor Soooocks, looky what I have!!” And I rocked the carrier back and forth with a large knowing smile on my face.

He looked up, looking decidedly caught, and meekly said, “Congratulations.” Then he turned his head back down to his work.

That was it.

I didn’t know what more to do. He couldn’t think Sun was adopted; he had to have heard the conversation I had with the clerk (it’s a tiny shop). He had to know, in that moment, that my decision (against his advice) to go to a local fertility specialist had been the right thing to do. I don’t know how much he’s thought of me and my case, professionally speaking. I don’t know if he questions the diagnosis he gave me. I don’t know if he feels badly or guilty or anything at all about his care of me.

I do know that I have thought a lot about him. And the mistake he made.

In the end, I am living happily ever after. And part of doing that requires harboring no ill will. Blogging about him for the past several days forced me to deal with my feelings over the whole debacle. And I can finally say with honesty that I feel no more ill will towards Dr. Socks. I feel nothing for him at all. Plus, I learned that sharing a love of needle arts and 1850’s Victorian British novelists is not a basis for choosing a health care provider.

I have recently been writing about my time as a patient of Dr. Socks. Tomorrow’s post will likely be the last post dedicated to him.

I knew the chance of my running into him at my local yarn shop sooner or later was high. I hadn’t given much thought, however, to what I’d say to him when that day actually came.

Today, I’d tell him this:

Dr. Socks, I think you are a good gynecologist. However, you are not a fertility specialist. And you did me quite the disservice by not sending me to a specialist straight away. You should not have performed any test on me for which you needed the expertise of another doctor to interpret the results.

You relied on the radiologist’s results of my hysterosalpingogram. You admitted to me that you never looked at the HSG films yourself. You based your diagnosis of a very serious condition on that film without setting your own eyes on it because you told me you trusted the radiologist to know what he saw. Radiologists aren’t fertility specialists either. You should have had a fertility specialist look at those films before you gave me the results. Or better, you should have had a fertility specialist run the appropriate tests and not you. You should have had enough confidence in your own practice to know what you didn’t know.

But, Dr. Socks, I forgive you. Because you taught me to trust my own medical instincts. My broken wrist taught me to get a second medical opinion. You taught me that doctors won’t tell you when they are in over their heads. You taught me to be more assertive about my medical care; to question; to follow my gut and KNOW when to seek another’s professional advise. You taught me that I cannot rely on my doctor to refer me away, that I must be hyper-diligent about my own medical treatment.

And best of all, Dr. Socks, your being wrong was the best mistake for me. It FINALLY got me to the specialist that could get me pregnant with my daughter. But still, in the future, tell your patients that there is a place for fertility specialists; that women shouldn’t be reluctant to seek expert advise about an area of medicine that is highly technical and very specialized; that there is no shame in having a fertility problem. And remember, first, do your patient no harm, and that includes giving medical care beyond your expertise.

What did I actually say to him? I’ll post that tomorrow.

I mentioned in my last post my being a patient of Dr. Socks and then sleeping with a lesbian and getting pregnant. I am sure The Google will send all sorts of disappointed visitors to my site with this post, but here’s the rest of the story.

If you did not evacuate your home, your life, for a month or more following Hurricane Katrina, you cannot understand my sense of community upon my return. We had little actual damage ourselves, but the devastation was so vast that all of us were deeply impacted in many ways. And for me, like many of us, I looked for unity, community, continuity.

When I learned my OB/GYN wasn’t returning to town, I was really upset. He worked out of Memorial Hospital and that whole situation was quite distressing. I am not one to just pick any ole doc to be my OB/GYN, so losing my doctor, the doctor I’d used for over a decade, really wigged me out. I asked girlfriends who they used and whether they liked their doctors and I got a lot of lukewarm responses.

One day, I went to my favorite local yarn store. Think of “Cheers” but with yarn instead of beer. I opened the door and heard, “Noooooola!” The shop owner was helping the sole customer in the shop–a man. The one thing you see little of in a knitting shop is the male customer. You will see sad male friends and husbands looking bored silly but few actual male customers.

They were in the needlepoint section of the store looking at the needlepoint canvases and threads. Their conversation, which they included me in on, was about the sad state of medical affairs in the post-Katrina NOLA; the lack of doctors and the high need for care. I mentioned my situation with needing a new OB/GYN. And the proprietor said, “Well, Dr. Socks here is a gynecologist!” [If I told you his real name, you'd pee your pants. Trust me.]

It was a sign.

Here I was struggling to find a gynecologist I could trust and feel comfortable with. And here he was–a fellow customer of the yarn shop! It was meant to be.

So I made an appointment with him. As soon as he saw me he said, “You’re the girl from the knitting store!” His remembering me filled me with confidence in my decision. We talked about his current needlepoint project and my current knitting project. He wore pink argyle socks. Always.

At that first visit, he saw the Anthony Trollope novel in my hands and commented about his love for his work and his disapproval at Trollope’s descendant’s (Joanna Trollope’s) less high-brow work—I hadn’t know Joanna and Anthony were related! [It was at this point that I began to suspect that he was gay. Yeah, I'm slow like that.] Needle arts and Trollope? Really, it was too good to be true.

You can click here to read more of the specific details of things going wrong. Suffice to say, things went really wrong. And against Dr. Socks’ advise, I ended up seeking the help of a local fertility specialist.

Skip ahead five months later.

We were scheduled for our second in utero insemination. CS and I drove in separate cars because afterwards I was driving out of town for an overnight convention. I got to the doctor’s office first and signed in. They called my name; CS hadn’t shown up yet. I went to the exam room and CS showed up about one minute before things got underway. Four minutes later, I was lying on my back giving CS’s guys a fighting chance. CS had brought me a lemon Hubig’s pie (part of the reason he was late).

I munched and watched the clock. After 20 minutes, I jumped up and hit the road. Then I sat in a conference for the next eight hours. No lying around all day for me like I’d done the first time.

That night, I met a fellow attendee of the conference—a very good friend of mine who is also a lesbian—and one of my oldest friends. The three of us had drinks and a rich dinner. Then I went to my hotel room, the room I was sharing with my friend also attending the conference. We had asked for two double beds; we got one king. We were confident enough in ourselves, our sexuality and our significant others to know nothing would happen. So we shared a bed.

She warned me that (1) she snores loudly and (2) she has the tendency to have women who are trying to get pregnant that are near her find themselves pregnant. “One night with me, you’ll be pregnant,” she exclaimed.

That night, she did not snore. But I DID get pregnant.

co·in·ci·dence /koʊˈɪnsɪdəns/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation(koh-in-si-duh ns) –noun

syn·chro·nic·i·ty (sĭng’krə-nĭs’ĭ-tē, sĭn’-) -noun

1. The state or fact of being synchronous or simultaneous;
synchronism.
2. Coincidence of events that seem to be meaningfully related,
conceived in Jungian theory as an explanatory principle on the
same order as causality.

* * * * *

I was watching a murder mystery show the other day and one of the detectives said about clues, “I don’t believe in coincidence.” And that got me thinking. Do I, really, believe in coincidence? In synchronicity?

This past Monday and Tuesday, I posted about a senior partner that died over five years ago. He isn’t mentioned much at my firm these days. Wednesday, while at the office, one of the attorneys I work with brought him up—he’d gotten a piece of mail addressed to the deceased partner on Tuesday.

Or the day of the deceased partner’s funeral, when I was stuck recalling to the IRS how I had calculated this crazy tax loss deduction for a client and after eight hours of not recalling it or being able to get my math to work, I asked the deceased partner to give me the answer and within minutes the answer came.

Or post-Katrina when I needed a new OB/GYN (mine fled to Atlanta never to return) and I found myself in my favorite knitting store and was introduced to Dr. Socks, an OB/GYN. I saw this as a sign. I became a patient of Dr. Socks, and it was the biggest mistake of my life. Or was it? He misdiagnosed me (or the radiologist did and my doc didn’t actually look at the films himself to realize the radiologist was wrong) and sent me down a spiral I wish I never see the depths of again. But that led me to the fertility specialist that gave me Sun.

Or the first date I had with Captain Sarcastic. He saw Hunter Thompson’s “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” on my bookcase and asked me to marry him. I said no. Two years later he’d ask again and I’d say yes.

Or the night I slept with a lesbian and got pregnant.

As a student of law, you learn to look for the “but for” in strings of events. As a genealogist, you look for things to ring a bell: a name on a gravestone, a date on a ship’s log. As someone who is logical and methodical, I tend to look for threads. But, to be honest, as I get older I tend not to give meaning to coincidences. I tend to be of the persuasion that if you look for some “deeper meaning,” some “sign,” you’ll usually think you see it. But that doesn’t give things independent meaning. Sometimes two roads intersecting are just two roads intersecting and not a sign to take a turn.

And I also think that believing in synchronicity discounts a person’s ability to discern. Like that dead partner giving me the answer? A miracle? Or just me finally giving my mind a rest from the stresses of that crazy week for me to refocus and see things clearly? Or my journey with getting to the fertility doctor? I’d already been referred to that doctor and even been to his office but I hadn’t been ready to accept that I had an “infertility problem.” By the time I had dealt with the aftermath of Katrina and the debacle of Dr. Socks, I was in a different mental and emotional state. I was ready to be rational and seek help for a physical problem. CS asking me to marry him on our first date? Frankly, it creeped me out and made me think he was a bit desperate. But I liked that he at least liked HST and I kept an open mind about him. Me sleeping with a lesbian and getting pregnant? Well, that one really is just a coincidence as I’d had an in utero insemination earlier that day. Don’t get worked up—we shared a bed, not sex, at an out of town conference. But.

But what do you feel? Do you believe in coincidence or synchronicity? If so, what’s the coincidence that convinced you they have meaning? If not, why not? Post about it and leave a link to your post here with Mr. Linky so we can all read about it. Don’t let me hear the crickets on this one! I’m really curious.