30 Sep 2009
Davis – Carlson Surnames Synchronicity I
March 31, 2008
I wrote this one up a few days after it happened:
My friend Jessi is getting into a lot of mystical stuff these days – experimenting with stuff like tarot, astrology, moon rituals, and, of course, synchronicity.
Jessi’s last name is Davis.
And when we went to the Roseville Goodwill on Friday and she found an $8 vintage wooden tennis racket with the name “Davis” emblazoned all over the handle and cover, she just HAD to have it, broke as she was – because it struck her as a meaningful coincidence.
On the ride from the Roseville Goodwill to the Coon Rapids Goodwill, Emilie was driving, I was riding shotgun, and Jessi was in back – excited about her find, thinking aloud of all the creative things she could do with the Davis racket and case.
Old habits die hard, and I’d spent many years building my mind into a rationalist, skeptical, deconstructing machine.
While I’ve recently found it possible to sometimes believe in ‘mystical shit,’ it’s usually hard enough to even believe in my OWN ideas – and it’s still nearly impossible for me to accept the validity of others’ magical thinking.
But even so, one of the things about myself I’m trying to improve upon is what I think of as “pissing on other people’s parades” – even if it’s not one I want to march in, there’s almost never any need to disparage the things that make other people happy.
So as Jessi talked, I watched the world go by the car window to my right – silent, but thinking that she was overreacting, trying too hard to find some kind of meaning in a coincidence that seemed pretty damn insignificant to me.
Maybe it would impress me if she was a tennis player, I thought, or if that racket had fallen off the rack and hit her in the head as she went by, or she found it somewhere more unlikely …
“Hell,” I thought, “what if I found it exciting and meaningful every time MY last name (common as it is) showed up on something!?”
And just after I finished that concluding thought – with uncanny, punchline-perfect timing – my last name, in huge black on white letters, glided into my framed view out the car window:
Carlson Toyota, Coon Rapids
“Oh, fuck THAT,” I exclaimed – and burst out in laughter.
synchronicity
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Nice one. As I read it, next to the monitor perched atop a fat candle is a baseball with the brand name MacGregor on it. Earlier, I’d moved it up from the back of my desk to a more prominent position, maybe hoping for a last minute comeback by the Twins.
Rob MacGregor
October 1st, 2009 at 8:19 ampermalink
I will admit, I doubt a lot of your stories have any significance whatsoever, and it even comes off as crazytalk. (yes, you.) But I must confess–when you told me this story not long after it happened, I was on the bus in Victoria, BC, thinking that you’re crazy (just as you thought it was nuts to randomly look up and see your name), and I had the same process and experience–“Yeah right what, I’ll just look up and see my name, whatever.”
Thing is, my last name–Holle–is rather rare and doesn’t show up on *anything.* But I looked up and saw a banner across the wide street (like announcing a street dance or benefit walk), and in huge block letters, it said, “Hello!” –an anagram of my last name.
OK, so on the surface that doesn’t seem that special. But “Hello!” also happens to be something of a catch-keyword between mr. carlson and my myself. When he first started emailing me about his synchronicity experiences (which I understand was the first time he was writing about them, putting it altogether, period), he would end his emails with “Hello!”
To see this randomly (after challenging the Universe)–this what is the closest reasonable approximation to my name that is also an insider connection to Mr. Teapots… well. It was rather unsettling.
Not *convincing*… but unsettling 😉
megh
October 1st, 2009 at 9:46 ampermalink
Yeah … I know the feeling.
Interesting though that our first response to this kind of thing can be feeling unsettled .. it seems that I’ve moved to a place over the last few years where my first reaction to strange coincidences – time and time again – is to burst out into laughter – a deep belly laughter that I usually cannot attain, and can never force or fake.
Thanks for the comment – and keep in mind I don’t think every coincidence is necessarily meaningful or indicative of anything … but once I open the door by admitting that ANY of them are (which I cannot rationally deny – the teapots, for example), it becomes pretty much impossible to deny the possibility that many – or even all – coincidences are, in some way, meaningful, or potentially indicative of connections and structure deeper than I am capable of understanding.
teapots happen
October 1st, 2009 at 11:44 ampermalink
Oh yeah – and don’t forget the Chocolate Cross you brought me – that was pretty weird, especially embroiled as we were in synchronicity discussions at that time!
teapots happen
October 1st, 2009 at 9:15 pmpermalink
I still find the teapot story amazing.
I have heard people comment that they often say or think something and immediately hear the word or idea on TV or the radio. I myself have had this happen quite a few times this week.
I wonder if the occurrence is synchronicity or precognition. Maybe we are mentally anticipating the word or idea before we actually see or hear it. It feels like coincidence.
Can’t say this applies to the above incidents though. Seems like real synchronicity.
Barb
October 1st, 2009 at 12:04 pmpermalink
Surname synchronicities, as in the test they give newborns at 2 and 5 minutes into this world. Or maybe since the family got me gambling very young and then brought me into a card room at 19 (didn’t even know they existed). Had myself barred at 28, then at 29 only sibling lands in hospital for life, so I started playing again, person who brought me in, Uncle, never returned. Synchros clinical cause excess emotion, but point is wish I had spent much more time in National Parks, check synhro with name of test and visitor center at GlacierNP. Another nature synchro, got pulled from river (after heavy rain) by police and ropes at 13 years old. google last name from NB test, first page of fam. bio. mentions the name of a small river from back about 1740. 100 stories like this, to stressed to write it, hlp.
simon from caly
October 1st, 2009 at 12:41 pmpermalink
100 verifiable stories, envolving politicians, sports icons, lotto numbers, earth quacke, horrendous individual acts from 1000+ plus away, big screen movies, hurricanes, literay gods, etc, etc. [email protected]
simon from caly
October 1st, 2009 at 12:55 pmpermalink
my only surname synchronicity is when i was going for my library lucky dip (i let the library choose for me…just wander and stop…what have i got to lose right?)…
one day i was walking in to the library, ready to start the lucky dip wander when i see a big fat tome with a lusious picture on th front with author
“Elizabeth Cunningham”
Elizabeth=my mother’s middle name
Cunningham is my surname
these books, a trilogy have changed my life
and if you go to Elizabeth’s blog(yes i am stalking her in a besotted fan kind of way)
her latest post involves synchronicity too
http://elizabethandmaeve.blogspot.com/2009/09/nashville-here-we-come-words-music.html
jane aka faerian
October 1st, 2009 at 3:33 pmpermalink
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Carlson – Davis Surnames Synchronicity II (April 28th 2008) « teapots happen
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