Serendipity

Last night I was sitting at the bar at Rio Café all by myself for a while. I had dropped in after rehearsal and didn't have my standard crossword puzzle with me. So to pass the time while Eduardo was fixing my appetizer of bacon-wrapped dates, I started going through my wallet.

I was actually looking for the phone number of a coworker. She had given me her personal info just before we all moved from building 9022 to building 9032. She is a fellow beader and we wanted to keep in touch. While looking for her number, I explored every nook and cranny of my wallet. As I was examining each card, I discovered a card for Acura Roadside Assistance. I bought my Acura TL in 2004 and had completely forgotten that this feature was part of the purchase.

I also have roadside assistance as part of my Verizon cell phone package, but don't have any idea how to access it and had been thinking recently that I needed to research that and make a note of it. So I was thrilled to see this Acura card.

Guess what? I walked out of rehearsal tonight to my car, parked on Church Street in front of the Tucson Convention Center. And it wouldn't start. Dead battery. I whipped that card out of my wallet and quickly dialed Acura Roadside Assistance. A nice young man was at my side in 15 minutes and fixed all my problems.

The whole time I was waiting for him, I was thinking how grateful I was that somebody or something, God or the Universe or my karma or whatever - something was looking out for me. For me to have discovered that card last night after it's been sitting in my wallet for over three years, and then to have needed it tonight.

Believe what you will. I'll believe what I will.

And to put the icing on that proverbial cake, when I started the car and turned on the radio, the Fauré Requiem was playing. You believe what you will. I believe John was telling me he was watching out for me.

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Oh, I forgot to tell you the funny/annoying part of the story. I had just come out of dress rehearsal with the Tucson Symphony Orchestra Chorus. We're performing the Beethoven Choral Fantasy on Thursday and Friday nights. If you're not familiar with the Choral Fantasy, it's basically the same tune Beethoven used for the chorus in the Ninth Symphony. It goes around and around your brain, pedantically driving you crazy. I picked up my iPod so I could listen to something else and get this Beethoven drivel out of my brain while I was waiting. And my iPod battery had run out of juice right alongside my car!