Quel Coincidence!
I’ve been noticing coincidences a lot recently, and noting some of them down. Mainly of the type where you hear a word for the first time in decades and it comes up again the same day.
But today I had a cracker. I went to Church Hill near Letterkenny to visit Glebe House and Gallery. As luck (or the tourist season) would have it was closed so I contented myself with hanging out in the gardens by the lake, which I had entirely to myself in strong spring sunshine. I laid on the damp lawn and took out my two books. The first one I opened was ‘Human Chain’ by Seamus Heaney, a book of poetry my Other Half gave me for Christmas 2010. I’ve only ever read a couple of the poems so I brought in with me for this Derry-Donegal trip. I read a bit of it last night so it was parked up randomly in the middle wherever I happened to get to.
As I opened it and started reading today stretched out on the grass like a dying naturalist I wrote a note at the top of the page in pencil as a souvenir of where I was:
16.3.16 Church Hill – Derek Hill’s
Derek Hill was the artist who used to live in Glebe House and bequeathed it.
The poem I had got to last night was entitled ‘The Baler’, about a mechanical hay baler. When I got to line 19 who, of all the people in the world, is mentioned?
Derek Hill. I’m not sure if it’s the same one but it probably is.
But what I also remembered
…
Was Derek Hill’s saying,
The last time he sat at our table,
He could bear no longer to watch
The sun going down
What are the chances?
I finish the night before at that particular poem
I decide to go to Glebe House this particular day
I write Derek’s name
The name is printed on the very page
Doesn’t that mean there must be a God? 😉
Simple Pleasures part 4 
[…] from Glebe House garden. Not a soul was in evidence all morning. Plus I had the pleasure of some magical synchronicity. I left on a […]
[…] showing up at his death place on the day of his birth delighted me as I have been much taken with coincidences in recent […]