A curious thing happened to me this week. My brother is getting married and I had to buy tickets for us to go. Going was easy, but the return was difficult. One of us had to get back early, but we would not want to have to wake for the flight at 4 AM, and as it turned out, the cheap flights were either early or late. There really was no choice - we would have to get up really early. So I booked the flight, and then was informed - right at the point of putting down my credit card - that the early flight had suddenly jumped up in price, and all my previous information was lost. A quick look again showed that there was another flight at almost the exact time and at the cheaper price, but it was late. I would put buying the tickets off for another day.
A few days later and I was on the computer again, not thinking of booking a flight. But then it occurred to me, got me worried over losing cheap seats, and I went to do it again. The one flight that had its price bumped up was still there - and now my memory begins to fade - but I did not pick it, either because the price had gone up, or the seating wasn't up for choice. I cannot recall why (this is not usual for me) but saw the other flight at nearly the same time and clicked on it. It had plenty of cheap seats, and I went for it. Looked everything over three or four times, then booked and paid for it.
After, a car rental deal came up and I checked that out. When clicking on it, I saw that the car would not have to be returned until that evening, not the morning. Suddenly, what I had done began to click - the flight at nearly the same time was NOT at the same time, but rather had the same numerical time with a "PM" attached to it. I had gotten us an evening flight, nonrefundable, exactly what I had wished to avoid. I am now the official family moron.
Looking back on it now, though, the oddness of it becomes clear. Why had the prices suddenly gone up just as I was about to buy? It had been OK'd all the way through, including choosing the seats. And why had I not clicked on that flight the next time? Why, that is, can I not remember clicking on it? Why I got the second flight in the PM is clearer - the last time, I had concluded it was another morning flight, and so did not look at it closely - although I triple checked everything else. As for the real morning flight, when I looked it up to see why the heck I had blundered, there it was, clearly stating "3 seats (what we needed) left at this price, " the price I wanted. What had happened?
I'm sure this kind of thing has happened many times to me before, but of all those other times, there is only one other that I can recall because it had such consequence. I have written an essay about it - it is how I did not see a certain woman sitting next to me in a car, which made me not to talk to her until a certain time in which it would be certain that I would ask her out, and she would say yes. The woman would become my wife, and it remains the oddest thing in memory to have happened. This flight thing, at least at this point, does not - the only consequences I can see from it is that some of us will be getting very little sleep and have a lot of driving for one night in store. But who knows? The change will give me more time to see people at the other end of the flight, and it will change driving times and all sorts of other things. Who knows what it will change - and if I'll ever know of its importance, or lack of it.
My mother has Alzheimer's or something like it, and she is constantly being surprised because she cannot remember. Perhaps this was only that - a simple memory glitch, or glitch of some sort, with little or no meaning - or perhaps an initial sign of my own withering mind. Regardless, we are told by everyone from button-down Freudian psychologists to far-out West Coast New Agers that we do not really forget anything (I think they would have to make exceptions for disease) but rather, hide certain things to continue the drama that we have chosen for life. Perhaps there are times when the forgetting would not normally happen, but that in remembering we would ruin the plan, our plan, whether made in heaven or during childhood formative periods. And so we have these odd occurrences that should never have happened, and then find that these lapses have led to important consequences later. Or we don't find out, and can only think - did they and we don't know?
This is not an example of paranoid thinking, given the varied proofs we have that forgetting is a nearly conscious procedure. Such open forgetting as the examples given do lend credence to the idea that these were or will be important in my overall life story. But, for all except the most materialistic psychotherapists, these cases show that we all have a drama to fulfill - that is, that we have a story, chosen in advance, to tell through our time in our bodies. The key to that drama would tell us a lot, and guide us through the most difficult times, but do any of us know? Do any of us, as the Greeks said, "Know thyself"? I am certain that we contain within us this key to our story, and that we can find it. It is, this key, not fully deterministic because, once known, it can be consciously altered, but it is, like a river bed, an indicator of the most likely direction of our efforts. Another reason, again, to listen for that distant inner voice. FK
A few days later and I was on the computer again, not thinking of booking a flight. But then it occurred to me, got me worried over losing cheap seats, and I went to do it again. The one flight that had its price bumped up was still there - and now my memory begins to fade - but I did not pick it, either because the price had gone up, or the seating wasn't up for choice. I cannot recall why (this is not usual for me) but saw the other flight at nearly the same time and clicked on it. It had plenty of cheap seats, and I went for it. Looked everything over three or four times, then booked and paid for it.
After, a car rental deal came up and I checked that out. When clicking on it, I saw that the car would not have to be returned until that evening, not the morning. Suddenly, what I had done began to click - the flight at nearly the same time was NOT at the same time, but rather had the same numerical time with a "PM" attached to it. I had gotten us an evening flight, nonrefundable, exactly what I had wished to avoid. I am now the official family moron.
Looking back on it now, though, the oddness of it becomes clear. Why had the prices suddenly gone up just as I was about to buy? It had been OK'd all the way through, including choosing the seats. And why had I not clicked on that flight the next time? Why, that is, can I not remember clicking on it? Why I got the second flight in the PM is clearer - the last time, I had concluded it was another morning flight, and so did not look at it closely - although I triple checked everything else. As for the real morning flight, when I looked it up to see why the heck I had blundered, there it was, clearly stating "3 seats (what we needed) left at this price, " the price I wanted. What had happened?
I'm sure this kind of thing has happened many times to me before, but of all those other times, there is only one other that I can recall because it had such consequence. I have written an essay about it - it is how I did not see a certain woman sitting next to me in a car, which made me not to talk to her until a certain time in which it would be certain that I would ask her out, and she would say yes. The woman would become my wife, and it remains the oddest thing in memory to have happened. This flight thing, at least at this point, does not - the only consequences I can see from it is that some of us will be getting very little sleep and have a lot of driving for one night in store. But who knows? The change will give me more time to see people at the other end of the flight, and it will change driving times and all sorts of other things. Who knows what it will change - and if I'll ever know of its importance, or lack of it.
My mother has Alzheimer's or something like it, and she is constantly being surprised because she cannot remember. Perhaps this was only that - a simple memory glitch, or glitch of some sort, with little or no meaning - or perhaps an initial sign of my own withering mind. Regardless, we are told by everyone from button-down Freudian psychologists to far-out West Coast New Agers that we do not really forget anything (I think they would have to make exceptions for disease) but rather, hide certain things to continue the drama that we have chosen for life. Perhaps there are times when the forgetting would not normally happen, but that in remembering we would ruin the plan, our plan, whether made in heaven or during childhood formative periods. And so we have these odd occurrences that should never have happened, and then find that these lapses have led to important consequences later. Or we don't find out, and can only think - did they and we don't know?
This is not an example of paranoid thinking, given the varied proofs we have that forgetting is a nearly conscious procedure. Such open forgetting as the examples given do lend credence to the idea that these were or will be important in my overall life story. But, for all except the most materialistic psychotherapists, these cases show that we all have a drama to fulfill - that is, that we have a story, chosen in advance, to tell through our time in our bodies. The key to that drama would tell us a lot, and guide us through the most difficult times, but do any of us know? Do any of us, as the Greeks said, "Know thyself"? I am certain that we contain within us this key to our story, and that we can find it. It is, this key, not fully deterministic because, once known, it can be consciously altered, but it is, like a river bed, an indicator of the most likely direction of our efforts. Another reason, again, to listen for that distant inner voice. FK
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