One Never Knows, Do One?
If we were to know at age ten what would happen to us later in life, would we believe it? In some cases, yes; life can be very predictable for many of us. For others, no; fate takes us on journeys we never expect.
For instance, my mother was probably looking forward to life as a nurse, something she wanted to do, or perhaps working in an office. She never expected she would be visiting an Eskimo village north of the Arctic Circle at age 82, or with a bush pilot landing on the water after flying over a glacier the size of Rhode Island.
Friend of mine was born and raised in Indiana. He never believed in fortune tellers and especially if one told him a giraffe in Africa would kick him into Kingdom Come. It's a long way from farmland to veldt, one which he had, at ten, no plans to make. Those plans changed, as did how he cashed in his chips.
I don't know what my brother's plans were at ten, but I'm fairly sure they did not include marrying a girl from some one-cheval town outside Quebec City, learning French and building Great Lakes ships.
A very nice, gentle person decided to become a priest and was probably tossing the idea around when he was ten, no doubt an altar boy at the time. In his retirement years, he filled in during the summer at a parish about twenty miles from here. Couple of years ago, the pastor told me the priest told the parishioners in 2001 it had been revealed to him he would have a violent death in September. He was on United 175, the second plane into the WTC.
A quiet teen was cutting the grass at a local radio station, not sure what he wanted to do. The owner asked if he'd like to try doing a show. "I guess so." He started taking classes at our college, got excited and is now the top newsradio anchor in the country.
As the great Fats Waller used to say: "One never knows, do one?"
For instance, my mother was probably looking forward to life as a nurse, something she wanted to do, or perhaps working in an office. She never expected she would be visiting an Eskimo village north of the Arctic Circle at age 82, or with a bush pilot landing on the water after flying over a glacier the size of Rhode Island.
Friend of mine was born and raised in Indiana. He never believed in fortune tellers and especially if one told him a giraffe in Africa would kick him into Kingdom Come. It's a long way from farmland to veldt, one which he had, at ten, no plans to make. Those plans changed, as did how he cashed in his chips.
I don't know what my brother's plans were at ten, but I'm fairly sure they did not include marrying a girl from some one-cheval town outside Quebec City, learning French and building Great Lakes ships.
A very nice, gentle person decided to become a priest and was probably tossing the idea around when he was ten, no doubt an altar boy at the time. In his retirement years, he filled in during the summer at a parish about twenty miles from here. Couple of years ago, the pastor told me the priest told the parishioners in 2001 it had been revealed to him he would have a violent death in September. He was on United 175, the second plane into the WTC.
A quiet teen was cutting the grass at a local radio station, not sure what he wanted to do. The owner asked if he'd like to try doing a show. "I guess so." He started taking classes at our college, got excited and is now the top newsradio anchor in the country.
As the great Fats Waller used to say: "One never knows, do one?"
posted by Tom Carten at 2:41 PM
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