I’m pretty sure I have another post entitled, “This Thing Is Not Random”. I’m too lazy to go back and look, or try to find it and then link it up {I need to get better about that}.

So I’m not trying to capitalize on past titles, but there is no better phrase that comes to mind, than “this thing is definitely not random.” Maybe I should add in “most” in front of definitely. In fact, I just might have to have a couple posts continuing on the “not random” theme.

Now.

To get to the story …

I spent quite a few hours looking at Parisian apartments for Maman and I to rent. I lost count early on just how many and how many emails were sent — all you need to know is that it was a lot. A hell of a lot.

I finally narrowed it down to two. Maman wanted one, I wanted another. However, I kept coming back to this … to our 93 Boulevard Raspail. I even said, I don’t know why, it just feels right. Even though, we both thought the other place was in a better location.

When I arrived, a bit hazy and dazed almost four Sundays ago {how has it already been so long?!}, any and all concerns went out the window.

Prior concerns being the following :

Noise level of  a major Boulevard. We love the activity. Not close enough to the places we enjoy frequenting the most. Everything is within a 15 minute walk — if that. We even have three métro stops {on three different lines, which really makes things easy} two blocks apart.

Not to mention, I’ve got Gertrude right around the corner and the Luxembourg Gardens. Hot damn. Oh, and the organic market on Sundays, the charming flower shop, numerous cafés and brasseries. Hot damn again.

The other week, Maman asked me where I lived and studied during study abroad. Now I have one hell of a memory. I think anyone who knows me can attest to my mad memory skillz. Which I totally give Maman credit for, because she got me hooked on the game when I was little. How I could and did play that for hours. Oh, the thrill of a Memory match!

I had to admit to Maman, that for the life of me, I couldn’t remember either place. And the kicker of it all is … you know when you have a really monumental and wonderful experience or time in your life happen … how you think, you’ll always remember it — where you were, all the details, etc? Well, that’s what I thought. That there was no way I couldn’t not be able to recall it at the snap of a finger.

I even remember when I lived here during that time, thinking, how I could never forget it. And now here I am {“some”} years later, and I have. It made me feel so old! I get now how Seniors completely blank on details. I used to wonder, how could they forget something like the day they day got married … yeah, I get it now and I will not judge.

The thing is … I can see the places … I see the street I lived on … where I’d eat lunch … all the little things, but for some reason, I can’t think of where that was.

So I emailed my French professor, who had organized the study abroad program, hoping she’d remember me {hurrah, she did} and asking for specifics.

Color me every shade of shocked when I found the address of the “sister” school I studied at … wait for it …

101 Boulevard Raspail.

Here I am, at 93 and a hop, skip and a jump up the street, there’s the place I spent a few months at, five days a week.

What’s funny is, I had walked by once, and told Maman, “that looks so familiar.” Um, yeah, because it freaking is. It amazes me, that still my mind had not triggered a memory {granted, they had done a fair amount of construction, but still}.

What are the chances, {my} people? By the way — I’ve decided that ya’ll are My People, too … you simply have to be. If you’re here reading my words and putting up with me, then hell yes, you are most def one of My Peeps.

Of all the thousands, because there are thousands of apartments I had to choose from to rent, I pick this one.

Seriously, chances of me choosing this place and ending up on the same side of the street, one minute away from my old schooling days … that’s got to be slim to none on the chance front. Let’s weigh it more on the “none” side.

Absolutely incredible.

Of course, I get that this might not seem to be all that big of a deal to some of you, okay, make that probably a lot of you, but it is to me.

These sorts of happenings, there is a synchronicity in them that I find … though I don’t really know what that means or what to make of it … I just know somehow that …

This thing, this life thing that we’re doing day in and day out … that can be a real damn drag and real sucky at times and then so so wonderful and precious and all things good … it’s not random, afterall.

There is a place and a time for our experiences, and they are unfolding just as they should be.

People talk about all the disorder and chaos in the world. I don’t see it that way. I see that it’s happening exactly on its own schedule, even when I don’t understand it one little bit and feel betrayed by The Universe.

Then something like this occurs … it’s not anything super big or all that mind blowing … but it’s all the confirmation I need.

There is order. All is well. Especially when it seems anything but well. A balance does exist.

It’s okay if you disagree with me. I understand. I’ve disagreed and then agreed and then re-agreed to disagree many times on all sorts of subjects … but … I have to hold onto this knowing within myself … and I hope whatever knowing you hold within yourself, you don’t stray from that either.

Even if it’s completely opposite from what I believe.

This is what makes our beautiful world go round, and when we can acknowledge that we all carry our own truths and realities and we need not feel threatened by that … then peaces comes … in this thing of not randomness.