Write a novel in which
the plot is dependent on a coincidence and every creative writing
teacher, editor, and critic will gleefully shred your work. And
yet...coincidence is so much a part of life.
A number of years ago,
I was standing on a line with my sister, who was enrolling at
Georgetown University. We struck up a conversation with the girl
just ahead of us in line, and she said she was from Argentina.
"Oh," I said without thinking how silly it was, "I know a man
from Argentina." I mentioned his name as my sister said, "Don't
be ridiculous," as the girl said, "Oh, I used to date him."
A few years later,
my husband and I were attending the Orange Bowl game in Miami,
in which Nebraska (his alma mater) was playing. Waiting for the
game to start, we began talking with a couple sitting next to
us. Bill explained that he was from Nebraska, and one of them
said they were from Michigan. "What part?" I asked.
"Oh, it's a very small
town. You'd never have heard of it."
"But what's its name?"
I pressed.
"Capac."
Capac, a town of about
1,500 people, was my sister-in-law's hometown. It turned out the
couple sitting next to us knew my sister-in-law, and had had her
parents as teachers in high school.
But the biggest coincidence
in my life is far more complex than that.
It started in 1962
when I was scheduled to go to Colorado over the Fourth of July
weekend to take an economics seminar. That spring, I developed
abdominal pains. I thought it was appendicitis, and the doctor
concurred. He put me in the hospital and operated only to find
a healthy appendix, but an benign ovarian tumor the size of a
grapefruit. He removed my appendix, the tumor, all of one ovary,
and most of the other. I had to postpone the seminar until the
Labor Day weekend; had I not, I would not have met the man I later
married.
In June of 1972, my
25-year-old sister had a complete physical examination and was
pronounced in perfect health. In August, she began having abdominal
pain and severe indigestion. She had never looked better in her
life, but she was feeling rotten, so she went to the same doctor
I'd seen 10 years earlier. He diagnosed a tumor and said surgery
was necessary. She had no health insurance, so she sought a second
opinion from a gynecologist, who confirmed the diagnosis and operated
on October 11. She had an ovarian tumor that was malignant, and
she died on May 7, 1973, three years and one day after my father
died (May 6, 1970).
My husband and I had
been trying to have a baby for seven years with no luck (not surprising,
given my medical history), and in June, I went to the gynecologist
who done my sister's surgery for a test to determine if I could
become pregnant. It was one of those tests that shoots dye up
through your plumbing and shows what's inside on a monitor. The
test clearly showed a blockage that would make it impossible for
me to get pregnant.
In August, I missed
a period. I dismissed it as a result of the emotional upheaval
of losing my sister. But I missed in September, as well, so I
decided I'd better see the gynecologist. I took the first appointment
that was available, which turned out to be October 11. I didn't
realize the coincidence of the date until my mother pointed it
out later. The doctor confirmed that I was pregnant (apparently
the test itself had cleared the blockage) and went running through
the office shouting, "It's a mitzvah, it's a mitzvah." October
11 was a Jewish holiday.
He gave me a due date
of May 4, which meant my pregnancy would parallel my sister's
illness of the previous year. I knew, however, there was no way
that baby would be born on May 4. I was convinced it would be
a boy born May 6 and be my father reincarnated, or a girl born
May 7 and be my sister reincarnated.
Johnny was born May
6 and is very like my dad in the way his mind works and in odd
little gestures he had never seen.
If you wrote that as
fiction, you'd be laughed out of the business. But, then, as someone
once pointed out, fiction has to make sense; life doesn't.
