Coincidence or Psychic or...?

A couple of nights ago I was sitting on the couch, eating my Orville Redenbacher lime popcorn and watching the TV show ‘Fringe’ recorded on DVR.  A commercial break came on and instead of fast forwarding right through it like usual, I looked over at my 2 year old daughter Autumn’s baby monitor and marveled at how she has slept through the night every single night since last July, never making a sound…and at EXACTLY that moment Autumn cried out and the monitor lights flashed red and I was like “Holy sh*t!”  Did that just happen or am I dreaming?!  Complete silence for a couple of seconds, but then in answer to my question she cried out again so I ran upstairs and picked her up and she immediately fell back asleep in my arms. 

Was that an extreme ‘coincidence’?  I suppose it is entirely possible for something to happen for the first time in 7 months at the exact moment that I was thinking about it.  We have all had that experience where you are at a baseball game or some place talking about an old friend and then suddenly you see them in the row in front of you.  Or was it some kind of ‘psychic’ thing?  I’m sure it happens to everyone now and again where you see or predict something happening and then it happens.  Like when you are rolling the dice for a board game and you suddenly see the number 7 in your head and then you roll a 7.  Or was it somehow ‘intuitive’?  Where you know something is going to happen before it happens due to some barely noticeable clues in your surroundings that you subconsciously pick up on.  Like maybe Autumn was abnormally fussy when going to bed that night and giving little clues that she was going to have a bad night. 

About 5 years ago me and my then-girlfriend/now-wife Nadia were at a Minnesota Timberwolves basketball game.  The game was kind of boring and we were only half watching it while talking about stuff.  For some reason we started talking about Saturday Night Live and the funny skits that we had seen on that show over the years.  One of us mentioned the classic skit with Patrick Swayze and Chris Farley where the two of them were auditioning for the last spot to be one of the Chippendale dancers.  As we were laughing about that one suddenly Nadia happens to look up at the huge 4-sided scoreboard hanging over the basketball court (the same scoreboard where I watched myself wrestling with the Celtics fan in my 1/9/12 blog).  Her eyes were huge as she jabs me in the arm while pointing up, and that same SNL Chippendale skit was just starting to play on the scoreboard!  We both stared and watched it with our mouths hanging open.  “No way that just happened.”  I said to Nadia.  There had been a time-out on the court and for some reason they were playing the Chippendale skit!  I had never seen them play that there before and had no clue it was going to be played, much less right at the exact moment that we were talking about it.  What a weird, random, incredible coincidence…or something.

Another time, exactly 5 years ago today on 3/29/07, I was on a flight to Las Vegas to meet up with a bunch of friends and see my favorite band ‘The Radiators’ who were playing 3 nights of shows there at a hotel called The Aruba.  As my plane landed and was taxiing up to the gate, I suddenly remembered that my oldest friend Cire Wonhsak’s birthday was the next day.  My birthday is 2 days after that so for as long I can remember we have a tradition where I call him on his birthday and we wish each other a happy birthday.  So I was making a mental note that no matter how hung over and spacey I was the next day after my first night in Vegas, that I needed to remember to call Cire.  Then for no reason at all the thought popped into my head of how cool it would be if Cire was here in Las Vegas.  Maybe celebrating his birthday or something?  I had not talked to him in a year and had no idea where he was or what he was doing, but for some reason the mental image of him being here in Vegas was strong in my head.  I of course dismissed the thought as I was getting off the plane and then headed through the terminal to meet up with another friend who was arriving at the same time at a different gate from a different city.

As I was walking through the crowds of people I suddenly hear my name and get a tap on the shoulder.  I turn around and it’s Cire’s wife Shauntee.  No…f*cking…way.  Seriously?  Shauntee and Cire’s mom Marshelle (who was like my 2^nd mom when I was growing up) are suddenly standing there in front of me.  I could not believe it.  I managed to sputter:  “Is Cire here too?”  Yep.  Turns out he was in Vegas celebrating his birthday along with his brother Jerry, Shauntee and Marshelle.  They had been there for a few days and were now at the airport heading back home to San Francisco.  Cire was back at the gate getting ready to board his plane and I did not have much time, so after finding my other friend I ran back to Cire’s gate hoping to say hi.  After getting word I was in the airport and despite the protests of the flight attendants, he de-boarded the plane to come out and say hi.  We chatted for a couple minutes until they dragged him back on the plane and then it was over.  Did that really happen?  Did I just happen to think about Cire being in Vegas and then moments later I run into him at the airport? 

Again, what a weird, random, incredible coincidence.  Or can it be explained by quantum mechanics?  Einstein did not approve or subscribe to quantum mechanics theory, but it appears to be the only way to explain some of the things that happen on a microscopic level.  If you really get into it quantum mechanics is weird, crazy stuff.  For example, based on the laws of quantum mechanics it is possible to walk through a wall.  You may have to try it several trillions of times, but there is a slight probability that it could happen if all your electron particles are primed for ‘tunneling’ and everything is lined up perfectly, then the object of your body could theoretically pass or jump through the object of another body like a wall.

I just watched a show on PBS’s ‘Nova’ about quantum mechanics, and the ‘Fringe’ TV show that I watch every week is about parallel universes which ties into quantum theory…the theory being that everything that happens is based on probability.  Like if you roll one dice, there are 6 possible outcomes…and when you do it, there are 6 parallel universes where each of the 6 possibilities happens.  I love my life and my universe, but I also love the idea that based on different probable outcomes there could be other universes with me in them living different lives.  Like maybe in one universe I am an airline pilot, and in another universe I am a wide-receiver for the Minnesota Vikings, or a movie star who occasionally gets invited to the Playboy mansion, or a guitar god, or the guy who invented the cure for pancreatic cancer.

So maybe when you think of something and then BAMM it suddenly happens, maybe you could think that thought a million times and only once will it then actually happen, but there is a slight probability that it could happen and when it does is when we happen to be in the right universe for it to happen.  So maybe I just happened to be in the universe where I thought about Autumn crying out for the first time in 7 months and then it happened at exactly that moment, but in all the other parallel universes that did not happen. 

Is it possible to skew the odds in your universe by your actions or even your thoughts?  Like positive thinking?  Or possibly the ‘Law of Attraction’…that is, what we think about we bring about?  Maybe we can make the universe work for us by thinking positively instead of negatively, and just let the good stuff happen.  Good things seems to happen more often than not when you visualize them happening and believe it is going to happen…like maybe if you believe it then the universe does too and then it happens.  And conversely bad stuff seems to happen if you are negative and expect it or visualize it.  I don’t know, okay, I’ll just close with the wise words of Bill and Ted:  “Be excellent to each other.”

Taking Myself Out Of The Game

As I mentioned in my 12/15/11 blog entry, I have been playing soccer since about the 3^rd grade, both outdoor and indoor.  I have been injured and had to leave the game many times with sprained ankles, a broken nose, tweaked knees, pulled hamstrings, etc, but only once have I had to pull myself out of a game for a non-injury related reason.  It was in the mid-1990’s while living in Madison, WI when I was on a cool indoor coed team called the Sharpshooters. 

We were all close friends who got along great both on and off the field, plus we were pretty good.  We were short on players one week though and needed a body so I invited my friend Mitch Manson (who had never played soccer in his entire life) to sit in and play with our team that night.  Since Mitch had no idea how to play the game we decided to make it doubly interesting by cooking up a strong batch of mushroom tea over at our friends Bonnie and Clyde’s apartment about an hour before game time.  Mitch and I, along with a few friends who wanted to come watch us play, slurped down the gloppy mess and then we headed over to the indoor soccer arena.

When we got there I gave Mitch a quick crash-course lesson on how to play soccer, but by game-time things were starting to get weird and the hallucinations were setting in.  Mitch and I out on the field (as well as our shrooming friends watching from the sidelines) were all giggling in anticipation to see how this was going to go down.  As a forward I was the guy whose job was to do a lot of the scoring, but before long reality had deteriorated to the point where the soccer ball had become a living, breathing mass of energy with a mind of its own.  It always seemed to be traveling at high speeds, just over the ground, and always out of my reach.  My confused teammates who were not aware of the ‘situation’ would pass it to me and as it would go whizzing by I could not seem to stop it…much less control it, dribble, pass it, or take a shot on goal.

I was just running around out there on this huge, beautiful sea of fake green grass laughing helplessly and watching everyone else running around kicking this living laser.  I would poke my leg out and take a stab at the ball as it would come careening towards me but I could never seem to make contact with the actual ball, just the visible trail of balls it left behind which was fun too.  The one time I did manage to get a foot on the ball, I kicked it so hard that it rocketed straight up into the ceiling and hit one of the huge sodium pressure light-bulbs 50 feet above us, causing it to explode in a loud shower of sparks.  “Did you SEE that?!” I yelled out to nobody in particular while I stood there and watched the electrical shower in awe.  I could tell my now extremely puzzled teammates were staring at me while I ran around melting with laughter, but it didn’t matter.  We were all close friends, we were winning, and I was having a blast.

The final straw though was towards the end of the game when we were awarded a penalty shot.  “Let Mitch take it!  Let Mitch take it!” I screamed.  Mitch smiled and nodded in agreement, not having the slightest idea of what a penalty shot was.  Through my tears of laughter, he listened intently as I explained to him that the ball is placed in front of the opposing goalie at the penalty shot mark, and then he gets to run up and try to kick it past the goalie into the net.  He thinks about it for a second, surveys the field, and then leans in close and whispers:  “Watch me juke him.”  Um, okay. 

So the referee places the ball on the penalty mark and Mitch walks up to it and stops.  He is concentrating intensely now as he eyes the ball…eyes the goalie…eyes the ball…and then he backs up 10 yards.  He pauses in thought for a second, and then backs up another 10 yards…pauses and backs up another 10 yards…then 10 more…then 10 more until after awhile he is all the way back on our end of the field by our mystified goalie.  Everybody in the building is watching now and thinking he has completely lost his mind.  Finally he stops his retreat, looks over at me, smiles, winks, and then starts a loooong slow weaving path back up the field towards the ball.  Left, right, left, right in a huge snaking S-curve while their goalie is just standing there with his hands on his hips in bewilderment.  Also, and this is important, Mitch’s body kind of resembles the Grinch…skinny arms and legs with a big round buddha-belly, and when he runs his arms and legs pump up and down but his head remains perfectly stationary with his eyes on the prize.  By now everybody is pointing and laughing and I’m crying and when Mitch finally reaches the ball he actually gets a really good smack on it, but alas it misses just wide left.

At this point I was done for the night.  I could deal with the fact that everything was melting around me, but my stomach and face hurt so bad from laughing that I could not have possibly attempted any more soccer and I took myself out of the game with an ‘ankle injury’.  I joined my friends on the sidelines and had a beer and enjoyed the rest of the game.  As per usual the team went out to the bar for post-game drinks where we came clean and revealed the reason for our condition.  Our coach wasn’t mad and actually just wanted to know if we had some more shrooms.  Lesson learned:  psychedelic drugs and competitive sports do not mix (if you want to actually be competitive).  Unless of course you are Doc Ellis, who pitched a no-hitter for the Pittsburgh Pirates on 6/12/70…while on LSD.

Another Confession

Okay I have another confession to make.  I actually wake up each and every morning ecstatic with anticipation of what the day will bring.  Before I get out of bed I think about all the cool things that happened the day before, and I think about all the cool things that might happen this coming day.  I imagine what new things I am going to learn, and what new things I will be able to teach.  My state of exhaustion is nothing compared with my state of excitement, and I would not change my life for anything in the world.  Contrary to what my last blog entry may have led you to believe, I do not have sleep apnea, I am not depressed, and I am not a drug addict.  Hi.  My name is Sneaky Sweets, and I have...a 6 month old son and a 2 year old daughter.

My buddy Mitch Manson inadvertently introduced me to the pure joy of parenthood long before I had a clue as to what it was about or was even close to understanding.  About 5 years ago we were standing in his kitchen talking about our local basketball team or something like that.  I was probably making some important point about how we needed to draft a power forward when I realized with some annoyance that Mitch was completely ignoring me.  He was looking down at his 2 year old daughter Savannah laying on the floor.  She was doing absolutely nothing as far as I could tell but laying there staring up at us.  Mitch said quietly to himself:  "Oh my God you are so cute."  I looked over at him and he had this look on his face that I had never seen from him before.  I did not understand it, but I filed it away in my memory banks as one of those 'moments' that you never forget. 

I am not going to gush on about how awesome my kids are, but I will give you one of my own examples of what a kid can do to you.  A couple of days ago my 2 year old daughter Autumn and I were driving to the store and listening to the Grateful Dead on Pandora radio.  The song ‘Crazy Fingers’ comes on and as per usual Autumn asks me who is singing this particular song.  (She does the same thing with the Beatles…not only does she make me explain to her what each song is about, but she also wants to know which Beatle is singing each song.  Ringo is her favorite Beatle, and the Beatles are her favorite band.  We have some goldfish named Paul, George and Ringo, and the porcelain turtle in the tank is named John.)  So anyways, I tell her that for this song it is Jerry Garcia singing.  The guy who’s picture we have hanging in our front hall.

“Is he a nice guy Dada?”

“Yes, very nice.”

She listens and thinks for awhile and then says:  “I really like this guy Dada.  I think that when we see him we should tell him that we love him.  That would make him feel so happy.”

Through my glistening eyes due to my mixture of extreme happiness and sadness, I tell her that that is exactly what we will do the next time we see Jerry, and that yes that will make him very happy.

Yes Mitch, I get it now.