"The Coldest Winter I Ever Spent Was A Summer In San Francisco"

I don't know where I read this quote, or who said it, but it loosely applies to my story.

I was thinking about a weekend trip that Becky and I took to San Francisco to see Wicked.  Becky was picking the hotel and making the reservations for this trip, and she picked  a funky little old hotel that looked like the kind of place we like.  It was light years from new, but looked clean, and the location was good. 

She picked me up at the airport in Sacramento, and as we drove into SF we found ourselves on one of their inevitable one-way streets.  After making a second loop around we found a parking place in front, checked in, and then took off to go see something (I don't remember what). 

As we returned, and found ourselves turning onto the street where the hotel was, I had a moment of recognition....

BACK IN TIME:  In the 1950s, our dad was transferred to Hawaii by the Marine Corps.  We drove to San Francisco from Pennsylvania, and then we were put up in the Marine Corps Hotel until the plane was ready. I remember how cold it was, how wet, and that because we were going to Hawaii (Hello...Warm?) we didn't have heavy coats.  I remember my dad taking us to a movie (Pete Kelly's Blues with Jack Webb), and the walk up the street leaning into the cold wind.

BACK TO THIS DECADE:  Our hotel was about 4 buildings in from the corner in front of us. Two buildings from the corner was the Marine Corps Memorial Club and Hotel. 

That moment of recognition still gives me what the Italians call "la pelle d'oca" (goose bumps).  It was one of those times when you are actually transported through space to another time and place; where later, when you have somewhat recovered,  you contemplate with amazement the coincidences in the world, and are they really coincidences or lovely little miracles God gives us to remind us how small the world is and where we are in it.

I can't help but think that somewhere on this trip we may stumble into another little coincidence that will again give "la pelle d'oca" and make another incredible, unexplainable  memory that will remain long after the others are gone.  I hope so.

Dee