Knowing

Part of my morning routine is to walk Danee to her summer school located around three blocks away from where we live. Hubby and Bianca are still very much asleep by this time, unwilling to trade off their pillows and blankets to a brief walk under the early morning sun. That is just fine, as this is is my moment to bond with my youngest daughter and to have brief time for solitude as I walk my way back home, alone, undisturbed.

On my way back today, I took a different route for a change. Having negotiated the same familiar pavement for the 9th time, I looked forward to a new path this time. Once in a while, it feels good to stray away, knowing that you will always find your way back. This was one morning that I felt different, and the prospect of getting lost but finding my way back somewhat thrilled me.

No sooner than I started traversing the pavement to my right was I led to a beautiful scenic place that had me repeatedly muttering “ohh and ahh!” What with a quiet small lake surrounded by lush of green where ducks and wild geese congregate, a beautiful park where colorful flowers abound, and a quiet and well-landscaped community with neat bungalows lining up the pavement - enough to take my breath away. Before long, I started to dream living in that community and enjoying every moment of it.

After an idle time at the park, I lazily inched my way back home, running a mental note of the many chores waiting for me. I was nearing the intersection of a busy traffic and had in fact stopped to pave the way for the rush of incoming vehicles when my heart suddenly froze. There in front of me, at the other side of the road, was a toddler running so fast towards the traffic, with only about a ten-meter distance between him and the edge of the road. Trailing behind him - about fifty meters away - was his mother with another toddler in tow, screaming, yelling at her child to stop running. The child, oblivious to the impending danger, seemed to be enjoying the “chase” game and henceforth continued running with all his might.

I was closer to the boy than the mother was but the endless surge of traffic prevented me from crossing the intersection right away. Time seemed to stand still as the distressed mother's cry echoed so loud in my ears. With the “go” signal still on, I instinctively braved the traffic with the hope that I could outrun the boy. I didn’t know how I did it but in the next moment, I saw the little boy making a 180 - degree-turn towards his mother, scared at the sight of me, a stranger, looming before him. The poor mother could only mutter “oh my God, oh my God" in between sobs as she held her precious boy in her arms.

On reflection, I was amazed at yet another powerful realization. It wasn’t an accident that I took a different path that morning, sat idly for five minutes at the park, reached the intersection at that precise moment in time. It wasn't ordinary that I felt differently that morning and took the unexplored path hoping to find something new. I did find something - an affirmation of a higher truth, at a different realm, about how perfect strangers are connected to each other in the overall scheme of things. The timing is perfect, not one second advance nor delayed. Another person may not be able to see the connection in those series of events. Someone up there orchestrated them to be so.