little miracles (part II)

Have you ever run into, crossed paths with, chance encountered an old friend or a family member you haven't seen in ages? Maybe you had been thinking of them and then ran into them...or maybe they hadn't even crossed your mind in quite some time and out of the blue a chance encounter! How about when you're about to pick up the phone and call someone and then the phone rings...and it's the person you were just about to call! I LOVE those little miracles that so many people just enjoy a chuckle over or shrug a shoulder at...the little miracles all have significance!

During my last year of college my fiance's (now husband) parents let me live in their home so that I could save money by not paying for college housing or rent (Dan had already moved out and begun work a couple hours away). They lived about 25 minutes from Kent State and I guess about 40 minutes away from my waitress job in Streetsboro. So I would commute both to school and work on a daily basis.

It was my last semester, maybe even my last couple of months, in school and I knew I was going to need a nice suit for "grown up" job interviews. I went to Aurora Farms outlet mall after work in Streetsboro one day to see if I could find something nice. No problem at all - found a very nice suit pretty quickly. I was so excited! Resume's were out, graduation was approaching, I'd be getting married soon after graduation, and I found a great suit to interview in...I was sure to get the first job I interviewed for with that suit!

On my way back to the May's house (home at the time) I needed to stop for gas in Rootstown...sort of half way there. There are I guess maybe 4 gas stations in Rootstown so it was just a random pick over which one to stop at. I got out of my car, went to the pump, and who should pull up to the same pump on the other side? My parents. Yep, my parents. My parents who lived 2 hours away. In the car with them was my younger sister who was going to school at the Pittsburgh Art Institute at the time. What a chance meeting. They had gone to Pittsburgh to pick up my sister to bring her home for the weekend. They knew of course that I was staying at the May's, but never traveled to the May's via route 76 so did not know it was the exit leading to me and had not planned on coming to to visit me. Actually they were going to drive right by where I was (should I be insulted?), but they needed to stop for...you guessed it...gas. In Rootstown. At the same moment and at the same gas station. Not to age me but this was before cell phones so believe me there was no way to set this up.

I got to show them the very cool interview suit that I had just purchased! It made the whole experience of buying that suit even more exciting!!

You know, I've actually run into my parents several other times since then. I know that they pray for me and my sisters all the time so I really think that God helps to arrange for times that they can see us or hear from us when we really weren't even planning on it. I hope that God will do the same thing for me and my husband with our children someday when they're grown up and much too busy to see us as often as we would like.