THE UNIVERSE AND ITS MYSTERIOUS WAYS

I am, for the most part, a believer that the universe does not give a rats ass, one way or another, about me in particular. Regardless of the number of lemons tossed my way in the last few years I do not hold the "Universe" responsible...and I like lemonade anyway. Good things, bad things, neutral things; it's just stuff that happens to everybody all the time. The idea that some force in the universe has singled me out for some reason just does not make sense to me.

However, (there's always a "however" ain't there?) an interesting series of events did occur this past weekend that did give me a moment of..."Hmmmm, I wonder"...

The lovely Explorer is celebrating a milestone birthday this month so we decided to throw a party to commemorate on Saturday the 10th. My parents are also celebrating a milestone wedding anniversary this month and decided to to have formal(ish) pictures taken with all the kids, grand kids, spouses and partners as well as a dinner after; all to be done on Sunday the 11th. All good so far...except...

Our favourite second born son, who lives out of town, was able to make it down with his fiance to the Explorers birthday party on Saturday but had to leave Sunday morning to drive back home for work on Monday. Needless to say he would miss out on the family photos with his grandparents. We all understood, but sad nonetheless.

Then it happened.

At some point during Saturday evenings festivities the favourite second born's vehicle license plate disappeared. Was it stolen? Did it fall off during the day and just now noticed? Did wild, drug addled biker squirrels steal it for the thrills? We shall never know. What we know for sure is you do not want to make a 7 hour road trip on major, very busy, highways without a plate. The police...they do frown.

So, plan "B". A quick Internet search showed a nearby registry would be open Sunday; so a plan was hatched to swing by the local cop-shop to report the missing plate, get a case number, pop over to the registry to get a new plate then off they go, homeward bound. Well...nope.

As luck would have it, come Sunday, every registry in Alberta was closed, this one day, for system wide updates. The kid was stuck in town until Monday. Grandma and Grandpa were thrilled that the whole family would be together for pictures but now the kid is worried about work on Monday. He did not want to make that call.

But call he did. The boss said to him this could not have happened at a better time. As busy as work was it had just finished dumping a crap load of rain and all the job sites they needed to be at were complete mud bogs and he was going to spend Monday napping instead.

Families were gathered, pictures were great, and dinner was delicious. Was the universe actually throwing me a bone? Did it actually play a part in all this coming together so well? Or, did I just see my Mom, with a mischievous grin, slide what looks like a license plate a little deeper in her purse?