The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
The complex nature of a simple twist of fate
In a city of millions or the isolated Scottish countryside, what are the chances you will meet someone you know, Fiona wonders
Acoincidence is a chance. It is an accident, a twist of fate.…
This week I am in London for a meeting. A quick in and out. No need to see friends and family for lunch – or even to let them know I am there. I am rumbling along on the rackety northern line. Minding my own business. When a hand touches my shoulder. ‘Mum?!’ Surprise, surprise, it is my daughter, now working in the British capital. But our delight at seeing each other is mixed with some no small shock.
What are the chances of such an encounter? On this, one of the world’s largest underground railway networks.
Millions of people use the tube. They pack in like sardines – and they can take their pick from 11 lines covering four hundred kilometres of track.
With trains pulling into platforms every three minutes or so, and six to eight carriages per train, this is a place to be utterly anonymous.
In this sprawling grid of tunnels there is a fat chance of running into a work colleague, never mind finding yourself sitting opposite a close family member. But a coincidence is meeting someone you know in an unlikely place. It is improbable but not impossible.
A colleague of mine once had a dog he was forced to rehome. Scottie was a TV cameraman. His work regularly took him away from base so he reluctantly decided it wasn’t fair on the animal.
Therefore, Rosie – an unlikely name for an aggressive-looking Alsatian – was packed off to live with a nice family in deepest Wales.
And that, my dear, should have been the end of it.
Until six years later. When I was working with Scottie in Ayrshire. We were filming in the wilds, taking shots of an ancient Scottish castle, when a large hound bounded up and began to bark joyously.
‘That’s my dog!’ Scottie shouted. And so it was. The four-legged visitor was delirious with excitement, standing on her hind legs and licking her former master’s face.
It turned out that Rosie was on holiday with her new family. And somehow she and Scottie had ended up in the same remote place at the same time.
Other folk will tell you other stories, possibly apocryphal.
A baby that fell twice from a first- floor window. Each time the infant was saved by the same man who just happened to be walking by below.
Or the three shipwrecks. Each was a century apart. Each time there was just one survivor – and his name was always
Surprise, surprise, it is my daughter, now working in the British capital. But our delight at seeing each other is mixed with some no small shock
Hugh Williams.
In the meantime, my daughter asks first how the MacNaughties are. Then she inquires about the chief.
I tell her we are all well. And that while the hot weather has made the doggies lethargic, it has given the MacGregor a boost. Because he loves the warmth.
But he would not like the heat of this London underground. There are big family hugs but I count the hours before getting the train back north.