What Are The Chances?

When I travel for work, the standard procedure is to leave on an early Monday morning flight and return on Friday on a late afternoon flight. When I was making my travel arrangements for this week however, the early Monday flight was booked solid. So, I actually came in last night.

My flight was scheduled to leave Cleveland at 8:40 p.m. I was early enough to the gate so I was sitting there enjoying my book. (This one’s about a bank robbery. In case anyone was going to lose sleep wondering what I am currently reading.) I noticed a woman sitting directly across from me that was almost the spitting image of my sister, Cathie. I mean this woman looked a lot like she should be Cathie’s sister than I do!

She and I ended up chatting for awhile, simply because she was terrified at the thought of traveling on a plane. I know all about fears, so she and I had a nice talk, mainly to help her focus on things other than the upcoming flight. I gave her a good pep talk as we were walking on the plane, told her what to expect in turbulence and tried to calm her fears. I think I did a decent job as we caught up again in baggage claim in the Kansas City airport. She thanked me for the pep talk and said she really appreciated it as she wasn’t used to traveling. I assured her that I am one of the most afraid people out there. I can almost always get someone to help me in my time of need (remember the dog on the plane a few weeks ago?), so it was my turn to return the favor. After I pointed her in the direction she needed to go to for her shuttle bus, I headed out to where I needed to meet my shuttle bus. I’m a sucker for happy endings.

Outside, there is nothing to do but wait. The busses come regularly, so it all depends on where they are in their rounds when you walk out. When the Enterprise shuttle showed up about five minutes later, there was one other lady already on the bus. I got on and I have to tell you, we had the greatest shuttle bus driver ever! He joked and had us laughing all the way from the airport to the facility. He was a hoot and I told him so. This lady and I got off of the shuttle bus still talking about him.

Once inside, we both registered for our cars. She was finished first and out of the door. I followed a few minutes later. It was now just after 10:00 p.m. local time. I’m tired, it’s dark and I still have almost an hour and a half drive ahead of me. I hit the road.

I’m cautious the whole way over here. I’m afraid of getting lost in the dark, since I do it so well when it’s light out. A couple of blocks from the hotel, I pull over to grab a sandwich to take to my room with me. I pull up to the hotel, just as a woman is walking into the hotel. I thought she looked familiar, but didn’t recognize her until I walked in to the hotel myself. It was the woman from the shuttle bus getting her rental car at Enterprise! I approached her first saying “I swear I’m not stalking you!” I mean what are the chances, late at night, that we are headed to the exact same hotel an hour and a half away?! We joked about that a bit, stating that we should have split the cost of the car and just taken one instead of two.

The more we talked, the weirder it got. I said this is my fourth week here with one more to go next week. She said it was her fourth week here and she would also be here next week! Now splitting the car was sounding even better! She was checking in first, and when they asked her what company she was with, she stated she was an independent contractor working for . . . yes! The same company I am here auditing! We were howling at this! I’m here auditing, she is here in Marketing, but what are the chances that we came from two different placed to come to the exact same place at the exact same time for almost the exact same reason. Serendipity.

So we decided to try to get together at least one night so we could go to dinner together. Here’s hoping we can make it happen!

That’s a lot of excitement for one evening. I think maybe I need to rethink my whole philosophy of leaving at Oh-My-God-O’clock on a Monday morning to catch a flight and just catch all of the excitement of leaving on a Sunday night.