A Twist of Fate

So, the blog, a bit quiet lately. You may have noticed. Or not. Since I don’t track numbers, I never really know who’s reading. 

Or not.

 

But there’s a reason for the silence. Of late, there have been several deaths—all unrelated—that have knocked the wind out of my sails and the “get up” from my “go.” Weekends normally reserved for Sunday brunches or leisurely walks with the dog have been spent attending services. Sharing the grief of friends for the passing of their elderly parents, feeling their pain while remembering the passing of my own parents, long gone.  

Over the past six weeks, I've also mourned the loss of two younger lives whose deaths-- again, unrelated--were shocking and unexpected. Out of respect for privacy, I won’t go into detail, but it’s been a lot to absorb. 

This kind of stuff gets you thinking.

The fragility of life. The randomness of events. How a routine visit to the dentist can turn into a raging infection that cuts short a life. Or how someone who is fit, vibrant, and athletic unknowingly harbors a fatal heart condition. 

Maybe this is why I’ve always been intrigued by the 1998 movie, Sliding Doors starring Gwyneth Paltrow. The movie uses parallel time-lines to explore the different paths a woman’s life might take if she does—or doesn't—catch her London train. In one scenario, she makes it in time and in the other, the doors slide shut right before her nose. How her future unfolds, based on each perspective, is the premise of the plot

The movie was billed as a “romantic comedy” but I found it much deeper than that. Ever since watching it several years ago, I always find myself contemplating chance delays or inconsequential events. How they could, without my knowledge, alter the very course of my life’s journey.

My Teamster dad, who drove for a living, never complained when he was delayed by something annoying like a flat tire. Instead, he embraced it as a sign. “I’m obviously not meant to be on the road at this particular time,” he would say. “God stepped in and stopped me.”

Maybe. Yet I also remember the Bay Area banker who was living in Germany during the time of the 2004 tsunami, one of the worst natural disasters in recorded history. The young man was supposed to spend his Christmas vacation in Southeast Asia, but his girlfriend convinced him to join her for a ski trip in the Alps, instead. As a result, he missed the tsunami. Whew.

And was subsequently killed in an avalanche.  

Sliding doors. Would he have survived the tsunami if he hadn't gone skiing? Or was it simply his time, no matter where the location?

What I found most interesting about this movie (warning: SPOILER ALERT) is the ending. Although Gwyneth Paltrow’s character takes two entirely different directions, each one circles to reach the same final destiny, regardless of the journey.  Suggesting that, no matter what path taken, the destination remains the same.

Sealing your fate whether it’s a random flat tire or trip to the dentist. They’re all just sliding doors.