Recently something incredible happened to me and it would have never been possible if I'd not been a member of our town's Buy and Sell community.
Saturday: I was cleaning the house when I accidentally hit a figurine I had bought over sixteen years ago for my life partner Jay as a reminder of the love we share. This name of this figurine was "Promise" which at the time it was purchased seemed apropos. I often clean the house so it's not like I was doing something to strange to my nature that it brought out my inner klutz. Yet here I stood jaw down to the floor as my mind worked ferociously trying to figure out what the hell just happened.
As it hit the floor, both heads went rolling and my daughter, seeing the look on my face, offered to try and glue them back on. I did not know whether to cry or laugh so I did a bit of both. I am not one for symbolism so the broken Promise figurine did not signify anything other than a treasured item being lost. I did not think it a portentous sign of a dark fate waiting on some distant horizon nor curse of some impending doom. It was however, a physical reminder of a love that was shared between my partner and I for over three decades. In it's simplicity was the shape of our love story. Through all life's challenges we always understood that we'd be there for each other and through every single one of those challenges...we found comfort in each other's arms.
No!
Losing this was not a sign of things to come, it was losing a reminder of the things that were...and that was heartache enough.
Sunday: While sitting reading on my tablet, a notification came up that something was posted to my town's Facebook Buy and Sell site. Not thinking anything of it, I clicked on the link. What came up on my screen made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. M, a new site member, had just posted an unopened figurine for sale...and it was the Promise. Once or twice in our lifetime, we are afforded the opportunity to glimpse the resplendent tapestry that weaves through the fabric of all our lives and this, to me was one of those times. My partner and I understood that the original thing that I purchased that cold snowy day in Calgary ( I don't actually remember when I bought it, but figured that since Calgary was cold and snowy at least 80% of the year I'd be safe to assume it was cold and snowy at the time) was just broken, could never be replaced. Yet here we saw Fate's tender hand move M to post something with such exquisite timing, and then moved me to see it at that same time...and that was a new story to add to the existing story of our love.
That a Promise once broken was restored by a stranger who did not even know they were doing that and the way it was restored made the painful loss into a poignant discovery lending even greater value to the treasure.
Is there something to learn from this?
I will leave that to greater thinkers and deeper minds. For me it was a story of how intertwined our lives really are. I don't know if I will ever meet M and his partner ever again, although I really hope to; yet in one simple twist, Fate weaved out a the flaw and created symmetry.