Life is a Cycle...Or Is it a Recycle?

Life is a cycle -- or is it a recycle? I have been catapulted lately into a different zone of thinking. Because of several life experiences, I have come to the conclusion that life may also be played out in a cyclical, repetitive format.

I need to preface my first experience by taking you back to the year 1975 when I was in high school. I played the piano for the youth choir for my church. One of the Sundays I was playing, the minister was performing a baptism. It just so happened to be for the son of my geometry teacher---no pressure there?!?

I was asked by the choir director to play an interlude during the ceremony after the minister said, "Let us pray." However, I misunderstood the instructions for when I was to begin playing. I had made a mental note to begin after the minister said the first, "Let us pray." In actuality, she had said I was to begin after the second, "Let us pray."
Soooo -- .after I heard him say the first, "Let us pray," I began playing a soft little tune. However, it was bad timing for a melodic interruption. The choir director turned toward me with her hand out and said quietly'"but with a definite firm tone---"Stop -- right there!" So, I invented a chord that would have made Bach roll over in his grave and I ended the musical catastrophe.

Through the years, when my embarrassing goof-up would fleetingly cross my mind, I would cringe. I did hear that this "little baby" had graduated from Duke Medical School and is now a practicing orthopedist. What a relief it was to know that my musical mishap didn't jinx his future. Whew!
Now, let's fast forward to last October -- a mere 34 years after my mess-up. I went to my mother's hometown to celebrate her birthday and to accompany her to church. As I was reading the bulletin before the service began, I noticed that there was to be a baptism that day for a doctor's son.

I sat there in disbelief as I visually witnessed the baptism being performed on the baby son of the man whose baptism I had screwed up "oh so" many years before. I told him about it after the service and we had a nice healing type of laugh over it. Ah, the beauty of the recycling of life!
The next recycling of life event happened when I was doing a book signing in Clemmons, N.C. A lady sat down and wanted me to tell her about my books. She was with her teenaged grandchildren. I dedicated my first book, "The Everlasting Snowman," to my father following his death as a gentle explanation for the cycle of life to help children with grief resolution.

The lady happened to mention that she had lived in my hometown. I said, "Well, I grew up there!" She asked me my name while looking through "The Everlasting Snowman." After I told her my name, a stunned expression came over her face and tears welled in her eyes. She said, as she was pointing toward her grandkids, "Your father delivered my daughter'"their mom!" I got goose bumps at the mere thought of the recycling of life being confirmed yet again.

I have one more story to prove the point. Let me preface this story by saying that I was a student at Meredith College from 1976-1980. My friends and I spent countless hours in the cafeteria eating, laughing and continually catching up on each other's lives. Now, let's recycle forward to the present day, as my son is enjoying being a North Carolina State student across the railroad tracks from Meredith.

I received a text message from him last year that simply said, "I just left Meredith. I was doing the salsa in the cafeteria!" It was the strangest feeling that "30-some" years later, my son was dancing in the cafeteria that had once hosted my friends and me on a daily basis'"proof, yet again, of the great recycling of life. I suppose the only residual question is, "Why and with whom was he doing the salsa in the Meredith cafeteria?" The answer my be fodder for another article. I'll keep you posted!