Strange and Funny Life Coincidences

[InCognitus]

I thought this might be a fun topic for a thread:  Strange and Funny Life Coincidences

This theme is on my mind again today because of another experience I had this morning that I'll share in a moment.  I've had lots of funny coincidences like the ones I'm sharing below.  But I hope others may have similar experiences they could share.  

I'll share two past examples from my life first, and then I'll recount the experience I had this morning:

1.  In 1976, I was preparing to go on a mission.  Part of that preparation included getting my wisdom teeth pulled.  That involved getting my wisdom teeth pulled on one side of my mouth in one visit, and then on the other side of my mouth in a second visit.  I was given only lidocaine to numb my mouth for the procedure.  At the end of my first visit, I went to the receptionist desk to check out and to get the information for my next appointment (my cheeks were swollen and my mouth was numb from the lidocaine).  The front office had music playing from a local radio station (I presume), and as I stood at the receptionist desk the song, "Tryin' to Get the Feeling Again", by Barry Manilow, was playing.  I started laughing, and the receptionist asked me, "Are you feeling OK"?  (I think she was concerned because of what I just went through).  Her question made me laugh even harder.   I said, "It's the song!"   She was clueless.    

2. About 15 years ago, I was driving back to Phoenix from a client I visited in Tucson, on the I-10 freeway.  I had my CD player going with a mix of songs I had prepared from MP3 files.  The song "The Way it Is", by Bruce Hornsby and the Range was playing on the CD.  While I was listening to the song, I looked ahead and saw a mini-van pulled off on the shoulder, and a little boy was standing at the side of the van, peeing.  I saw this at the exact same moment the second verse of the song began playing, which says:   "Said, 'Hey, little boy, you can't go where the others go... 'Cause you don't look like they do".   (It was a hilarious coincidence).   

Now the one that happened to me this morning...

I try to walk at least two to three miles every morning.  I mostly listen to the scriptures while I'm walking and the Come Follow Me lessons using the Gospel Library app on my phone.  Lately I've been listening to Isaiah (I'm really getting into Isaiah).  Sometimes I listen so intently that I hardly realize how much ground I've covered.  But occasionally I stop to notice things I see along the way.  This morning, as I walked, I got up to Isaiah chapter 66, and I was listening intently.  As the last verse was playing in my air pods, I looked down at the ground in the middle of the verse at just the right moment:

Isaiah 66:24:  "And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: [I looked down at my foot right at this moment] for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh."    It's a good thing I didn't step on the worm   I wouldn't want to mess up the fulfillment of Isaiah.  

 

[InCognitus]

Am I really the only person who has these strange and funny things happen to them?  Maybe I'm just strange, and that's why I notice them.  My sister tells me that God knows my strange sense of humor, and sends things like this my way just to let him know he's there (maybe she's right).

Please, someone, share a strange coincidence (funny or not) from your life so that I know that I'm not alone in these things.

[Calm]

That kind of strange coincidence hasn’t  happened to me, the running into people on the opposite side of the world are the coincidences I remember most…my husband’s first crush was the RS President in Moscow while we were there on a Fulbright grant for my husband to teach at one of their universities; running into a woman from our branch in Moscow in the Provo Library shortly after we moved back down here; he ran into our neighbours here in Utah on the street in New York or Massachusetts, can’t remember which, he was there for a conference and they were visiting family, neither knew the other would be there, running into neighbours from Canada we hadn’t seen for years at a store as they were down here visiting family; my husband has met one of my old home ward members, I am not sure how my dad’s name got brought up, but they found they had him in common (Dad was his home teacher and I found out through this meeting that Dad took him to buy a suit for his mission, his own dad had severe MS iirc and Dad had gone and done  stuff for his family and apparently others in our ward in need without saying anything to anyone about it, Dad never went looking for recognition he was a good guy, it was great to find out that side of him).

 There has been weird things like coming across an item I had completely forgotten we had because I had put it away years before only to find it very handy later that day, including some important items. 
 

 

Edited October 11, 2022 by Calm

[Rain]

I have them too, but not a single one came to mind.  But calm reminded me.

We moved to AZ on a Dec 22.  It was quite a time to move - soon after my incredibly busy time of the year, my husband leaving before us, the kids trying to finish the semester so they could get credit for a quarter that would end 3 weeks after we moved and then I got sick on the trip south. All our belongings were in another state in route to us.

So we had not much to do and on Christmas Eve we walked to the movie theater. While in line I heard my name called. There in line behind us was a woman from the ward we just left. It was like having a little peace of home.

In 8 years she is the only person from our former lives that we have seen here that didn't come down specifically to see us or my husband's cousins.

This reminds me of another one.  Years ago I was on a message board.  A group of us got close and chatted a lot.  Several years we got all together.  Those from far away would stay with those close by. 

One year Mary stayed with me.  Things happened with the group and after awhile I didn't participate any more.  We moved to AZ and lived here a couple of years.

In our stake we didn't all fit in the stake center for stake conference.  So we did the satellite thing in the other ward buildings. Several conferences into moving here the chorister got up and it was Mary! I had no idea we had moved into her stake! 

[bluebell]

10 hours ago, InCognitus said:

Am I really the only person who has these strange and funny things happen to them?  Maybe I'm just strange, and that's why I notice them.  My sister tells me that God knows my strange sense of humor, and sends things like this my way just to let him know he's there (maybe she's right).

Please, someone, share a strange coincidence (funny or not) from your life so that I know that I'm not alone in these things.

If I have them I guess I never noticed. 😁

[bluebell]

55 minutes ago, Rain said:

I have them too, but not a single one came to mind.  But calm reminded me.

We moved to AZ on a Dec 22.  It was quite a time to move - soon after my incredibly busy time of the year, my husband leaving before us, the kids trying to finish the semester so they could get credit for a quarter that would end 3 weeks after we moved and then I got sick on the trip south. All our belongings were in another state in route to us.

So we had not much to do and on Christmas Eve we walked to the movie theater. While in line I heard my name called. There in line behind us was a woman from the ward we just left. It was like having a little peace of home.

In 8 years she is the only person from our former lives that we have seen here that didn't come down specifically to see us or my husband's cousins.

This reminds me of another one.  Years ago I was on a message board.  A group of us got close and chatted a lot.  Several years we got all together.  Those from far away would stay with those close by. 

One year Mary stayed with me.  Things happened with the group and after awhile I didn't participate any more.  We moved to AZ and lived here a couple of years.

In our stake we didn't all fit in the stake center for stake conference.  So we did the satellite thing in the other ward buildings. Several conferences into moving here the chorister got up and it was Mary! I had no idea we had moved into her stake! 

That happened to me with my MTC companion.

I hadn’t seen or talked to her since the MTC 1998. She was from Utah and I was from Montana.

We moved to Idaho in 2005 and she was the speaker our first sunday in our new ward!

Edited October 11, 2022 by bluebell

[InCognitus]

8 hours ago, Calm said:

That kind of strange coincidence hasn’t  happened to me, the running into people on the opposite side of the world are the coincidences I remember most…my husband’s first crush was the RS President in Moscow while we were there on a Fulbright grant for my husband to teach at one of their universities; running into a woman from our branch in Moscow in the Provo Library shortly after we moved back down here; he ran into our neighbours here in Utah on the street in New York or Massachusetts, can’t remember which, he was there for a conference and they were visiting family, neither knew the other would be there, running into neighbours from Canada we hadn’t seen for years at a store as they were down here visiting family; my husband has met one of my old home ward members, I am not sure how my dad’s name got brought up, but they found they had him in common (Dad was his home teacher and I found out through this meeting that Dad took him to buy a suit for his mission, his own dad had severe MS iirc and Dad had gone and done  stuff for his family and apparently others in our ward in need without saying anything to anyone about it, Dad never went looking for recognition he was a good guy, it was great to find out that side of him).

 There has been weird things like coming across an item I had completely forgotten we had because I had put it away years before only to find it very handy later that day, including some important items. 
 

Your post, and Rain's, reminded me of similar experiences.  But people from the other side of the world and across the country?  That's pretty amazing! 

[Chum]

I've had a lot of coincidences. Some are weird stuff that lines up against all odds and some are where I have a need and then stuff drops in my lap. One of my kids is feeling that too. Example: he needed to learn welding and within a week, found a welder on the side of the road.

In the broader sense, there's this weird ongoing story with my father. At this point, it's got me equally divided between revulsion and fascination. I've touched on a lot of it before but here's the whole potato.

Dad was a legit monster. I didn't know him and am the only child he didn't hurt directly. He left our family (VA near DC) when I was an infant.  When I was 8 or so he briefly visited. When I was ~12 my mom tracked him down in WV; she took me and my oldest brother to confront him about something. Neither time did dad ever look at me. When I was 14 we got word he died but not where.

I grew up, met my wife (inactive member) at 23.  At 25 we moved to be near her family in FL and I was baptized shortly thereafter.  A few years later I started poking around family history and discovered my father was baptized (in VA) when I was 11. As I was raised Catholic and we had never had heard of the Church, this was fairly odd. Almost certainly, his baptism was part of manipulating someone but I don't know who. 

Fast forward 10 years. I help my oldest brother move down to FL near me. He's not the best person but we got on and you help family. At the same time, I'm poking around family history again. I locate and pull my father's death certificate - from Florida. It turns out that he died at the VetAdmin center in Tampa, an hour from my house. This is how I learned he lived in FL.

My paternal grandparents moved to Tampa about 1960 and grandfather died in the late 1980s so the coincidence here is that I wound up in the same area.  My brother and I visited the crappy ½ trailer that was dad's final home and visited my grandparents Tampa grave site. Later, my brother told me a story. Our uncles came to FL from OH, got my father's ashes, snuck into the grandparents cemetery at night and dumped dad into a hole they dug on their plot. To me, this is the least surprising part of the story.

Fast forward again to 8 years ago. My oldest brother died in 09. I'm ego searching my last name in county records and find a marriage certificate for my father. Apparently, the year before dad died, he lived in my town and had a courthouse marriage, across the street from the office I worked at. He married someone named Rose but I haven't looked past that because I never really wanted to know any of this.

It is endlessly strange to me that I have spent my life unwillingly stalking the one person I've most tried to avoid.

[bluebell]

9 hours ago, Calm said:

That kind of strange coincidence hasn’t  happened to me, the running into people on the opposite side of the world are the coincidences I remember most…my husband’s first crush was the RS President in Moscow while we were there on a Fulbright grant for my husband to teach at one of their universities; running into a woman from our branch in Moscow in the Provo Library shortly after we moved back down here; he ran into our neighbours here in Utah on the street in New York or Massachusetts, can’t remember which, he was there for a conference and they were visiting family, neither knew the other would be there, running into neighbours from Canada we hadn’t seen for years at a store as they were down here visiting family; my husband has met one of my old home ward members, I am not sure how my dad’s name got brought up, but they found they had him in common (Dad was his home teacher and I found out through this meeting that Dad took him to buy a suit for his mission, his own dad had severe MS iirc and Dad had gone and done  stuff for his family and apparently others in our ward in need without saying anything to anyone about it, Dad never went looking for recognition he was a good guy, it was great to find out that side of him).

 There has been weird things like coming across an item I had completely forgotten we had because I had put it away years before only to find it very handy later that day, including some important items. 
 

 

We ran into friends from our ward at the gate of Disneyland a few years ago.  It's not that exciting, since almost all of Utah is at Disneyland at some point during the year, and we were there during a school break in January so people are on vacations and all, but it was still a little shocking to run into them out of the blue in another state at a place with thousands of people milling about.  I can only imagine how weird it would be to do that far from home or where you knew the people from.

[Chum]

A few other coincidence stories.  Me and best friend are all-night bicycle riding though old town Alexandria Va. This was a regular thing, we did. We'd drive somewhere, drink, smoke pot, ride all night and drive home sober-ish.  One night he popped a rear tube, miles from our truck. We had a few tools but no tube. For no reason I was dead certain what we needed was around the corner. We turned it and found an old bike and air pump laid out with the trash.

Another night, same deal. It's 2am in DC and we're playing 10-speed peekabo with the park cops at Haines Point. At some point we're thirsty and after a long time find enough change to buy a couple of sodas. We pull up to the stupidly long line of soda machines, I deposit my coins and nothing. Machine ate my money and I'm really angry about it. Again, for no reason, I reach up on top of the machine and grab a hacksaw that happened to be sitting there. I climb up, look L to R and there's nothing else on any other machine. But now I have a hacksaw. Except there was no way I was getting thru that lock with that saw. Not knowing what the universe expected me to do, I pulled the power cord and cut the end off. I took my petty win and went home.

Once I was in my hometown helping a friend move. My pickup is loaded with his furniture and we're doing a good clip down the windy road. At the bottom of the hill is a small wooden bridge on a curve. The bridge is exactly wide enough for two vehicles and the scenario sets up like this. I enter the short bridge the same moment a loaded dump (also speeding) truck enters from the other direction. Turning to align myself to the opening, a tooth breaks off in my steering box and my steering locks up in the precise spot I need it to, to not die. A half second later I force the steering free in time to straighten out the pickup and not roll the truck down the embankment. After that the road is mostly straight and we're able to drive the last bit. However, I'm not able to make the right turn up his steep driveway. I was able to back in however.

I have more but they generally all read like this.  Were any of these blessings? If so, it kind of confounds the good deeds while smoking/drinking/fornicating equation. My life is full of examples that a righteous, struggling member could look at and say "Really God?" Ultimately, I gave up drawing conclusions because none of them seem useful. I can do grateful tho. That's simpler.

[bluebell]

I finally remember one!

The first area of my mission was practically in Sacramento, so the interior of northern California.  I was there during the summer and it was so hot.  We would frequently end up tracking in 110 degree weather or more.  I remember one day we were at an apartment complex looking for someone and it was so hot and my companion and I really really wanted to go get a pink lemonade slurpee from the local 7-11.  But, we were both basically out of money at that point so couldn't really justify it.  

Well, as we were walking back to the car we found $5 in the grass next to the sidewalk.  No one else was anywhere around to see if it was theirs, and it was enough for both of us to go get our slurpees.  Best surprise ever. 

[Tacenda]

2 hours ago, Chum said:

A few other coincidence stories.  Me and best friend are all-night bicycle riding though old town Alexandria Va. This was a regular thing, we did. We'd drive somewhere, drink, smoke pot, ride all night and drive home sober-ish.  One night he popped a rear tube, miles from our truck. We had a few tools but no tube. For no reason I was dead certain what we needed was around the corner. We turned it and found an old bike and air pump laid out with the trash.

Another night, same deal. It's 2am in DC and we're playing 10-speed peekabo with the park cops at Haines Point. At some point we're thirsty and after a long time find enough change to buy a couple of sodas. We pull up to the stupidly long line of soda machines, I deposit my coins and nothing. Machine ate my money and I'm really angry about it. Again, for no reason, I reach up on top of the machine and grab a hacksaw that happened to be sitting there. I climb up, look L to R and there's nothing else on any other machine. But now I have a hacksaw. Except there was no way I was getting thru that lock with that saw. Not knowing what the universe expected me to do, I pulled the power cord and cut the end off. I took my petty win and went home.

Once I was in my hometown helping a friend move. My pickup is loaded with his furniture and we're doing a good clip down the windy road. At the bottom of the hill is a small wooden bridge on a curve. The bridge is exactly wide enough for two vehicles and the scenario sets up like this. I enter the short bridge the same moment a loaded dump (also speeding) truck enters from the other direction. Turning to align myself to the opening, a tooth breaks off in my steering box and my steering locks up in the precise spot I need it to, to not die. A half second later I force the steering free in time to straighten out the pickup and not roll the truck down the embankment. After that the road is mostly straight and we're able to drive the last bit. However, I'm not able to make the right turn up his steep driveway. I was able to back in however.

I have more but they generally all read like this.  Were any of these blessings? If so, it kind of confounds the good deeds while smoking/drinking/fornicating equation. My life is full of examples that a righteous, struggling member could look at and say "Really God?" Ultimately, I gave up drawing conclusions because none of them seem useful. I can do grateful tho. That's simpler.

If there's a will there's a way! Throughout my life this motto has increased my ability to make things work out and a few but can't remember, remind me of what you've said here. My husband on the other hand seems to think the negative at all times. He'll say something bad is going to happen before it does. Or  thinks things are not going to works out such as "We aren't going to make it in time", and I usually prove him wrong. Or one time we're on the lake in a rented boat and it suddenly quits and I know without a doubt that it was because of him and his negative attitude and he didn't try hard enough to make it start back up. He just gives up and thinks the worse will happen in a lot of situations. He gives up without first trying to make things work. I think attitude helps so much in this life. 

[InCognitus]

My wife reminded me of two strange coincidence experiences, one that happened to my dad, and the other is my own experience (with a funny twist). 

First, the one that happened to my dad:

#1.  When I was young we lived in Arizona in the Phoenix area (east valley), and we used to go to Mexico a couple of times a year to a place near Rocky Point (Puerto Peñasco) to go fishing and spend time in a cabin there.  Our extended family was also often involved because my grandparents had a cabin there too.  We had a boat, and my dad would take Scout groups from our ward and family members on deep sea fishing trips.  On Easter week in 1981, my dad was in Mexico with family members, and he took them out on the boat to a place near Bird Island, nearly 30 miles south from Rocky Point on the ocean.  Late in the day the boat developed engine trouble, and they were dead in the water.  All the other boats had gone in except for one far ahead of them on the horizon, and it was heading in towards the bay, away from them.  My dad and the family members feared they would be stranded out in the ocean for the night.  But suddenly the boat ahead of them changed its course and came back toward them.  The boat pulled up to them and they explained the situation, and it turns out that the man driving the other boat was a member of the Church from Mesa, Arizona.  He said he had a feeling that they should look back away from their direction of travel, and that's when he saw our family's boat and came back to check on them.  The other boat towed them back in, but the going was slow due to the drag from the boat.  But they made it back to shore well after dark.  

Fast forward ten years.  My dad was back in Mexico with a group of Explorer Scouts from the ward's priest quorum.  After some members of the group returned home, he was with one of the other men in the group and they loaded up a motorized rubber raft on their truck and drove 30 miles south of Rocky Point along the shore toward Bird Island to do some fishing.  They stopped on an isolated beach and found a good place to launch the boat.  There were no other boats in the water, nor was anyone else on the beach.  Suddenly they saw a Jeep with two men in it driving toward them.  When the Jeep pulled up, the men in the Jeep asked if they were planning to go out, and they said to my dad, "See that little speck on the horizon of the ocean?  We are wondering if that could be the boat with the Scoutmaster and Scouts in it that we came down here with".  They said, "They didn't come in last night, and they've been out there all night!"  After some discussion, my dad found out they were members of the Church.  My dad launched the rubber boat and headed out toward the other boat.  Sure enough, it was the crippled boat with a very tired crew of Scouts on board, and they were very glad to see my dad and his boat.  He hooked the boats together and began towing them in.  That's when the Scoutmaster on the crippled boat looked closely at my dad, and asked, "Don't I know you?  Aren't you the man I towed in from Bird Island some years ago?"  Sure enough, it was the very same man that had helped my dad tow in his boat from practically the very same spot many years before.  So good deeds are sometimes repaid in THIS life!

================

#2.  This next story is strangely related to the first story (of course, that's what this thread is about).  Several years ago I was working as a consultant at a client's office in Phoenix, and I had been working with this particular company for about ten years (at the time).  I was sitting in the office of a man (I'll call him Ron - not his real name) that had a key position in the company, and I had worked closely with him on many projects that they wanted done in the prior ten years, so I knew him pretty well.  There was another employee in the office with me and Ron, and we were socializing.  Ron began sharing some of his wild and crazy experiences he had growing up in a small suburb west of Phoenix.  I mentioned that I didn't have a lot of experience with the town where he grew up in, but I did have some strong memories of the place because we had to drive through that town when we took our trips to Mexico (connection to the story above).  And I told him that on one of our trips to Mexico, we were driving through that town and someone turned left in front of us and we got into an accident.  So that town had made a big impression on me.

When I mentioned the accident, Ron's eyes got really big, and he asked, "Was that in 1969 by any chance?"  I said, "I don't know, that could be right, but I don't remember being as old as I would have been in 1969" (I thought happened when I was younger).  I said, "Why do you ask?"   He responded, "Because I got in an accident in 1969.  When I was 16 years old, I was driving past a Dairy Queen in [this town] and I was waving to my friends and not watching where I was going, and I turned left in front of a station wagon, and they crashed into me.  It was a family going to Mexico and they were towing a dune buggy or something behind them.  I ruined their trip."  I laughed at the possible coincidence, and we compared other details, and it sounded like the same event!   But I wanted to check with my family to see if they remembered any of the other details he shared with me, just to see if it was the same situation.  

I called my sister on the way home that day and asked her what she remembered about that accident.  The sister I called is the closest sibling to my age, so I figured she might remember some details.  She remembered a lot of details, many more than I remembered (for a variety or reasons), but she confirmed most of the details that Ron had shared with me about his accident, including Ron's dad driving us all home, and details about the car we drove home in and several other things.  I also talked to my parents about it, and they confirmed that it probably did happen in 1969 over Memorial day weekend.  My dad also shared that he was annoyed because he had just done some engine work on the station wagon the week before the accident, and a few other details.

The next time I visited that client, I shared with Ron what I had learned from talking with my family and confirmed, without a doubt, that Ron was the guy we crashed into on our way to Mexico some 42 or so years earlier.  Ron said, "Tell your dad I'm sorry!". 

When I'm sharing work stories with my wife and family now, if it's a story that involves Ron or his company, I refer to him as "that guy we ran into on the way to Mexico".     You never know who you might run into. 

Edited October 14, 2022 by InCognitus

[Calm]

Life is so bizarre sometimes with its twists.  It is like God is saying “just checking if you are paying attention still”.

Edited October 14, 2022 by Calm

[InCognitus]

Gotta love Utah....

This has nothing to do with life coincidences, but I wanted to write this down somewhere. 

Today for my walk, I decided to take the most direct route to each of the four Latter-day Saint chapels in my area.  The round trip took 55 minutes and I covered 3.44 miles (according to my phone), and I touched four different chapels, and one of them was even in a different stake!