Ask and You Shall Receive?

21. October 2010 by Gore Wehner.

Two days ago I was wondering, “When will I receive my son’s school pictures?” Lo and behold, they showed up in his school folder today. Because I was busy sweeping the floor and had too much time to think (there was a lot to sweep), I began to consider all the times I’d wondered how a friend I hadn’t spoken to in months was doing when I’d recieve a phone call from her. Or the times I’d realize it had been awhile since anyone in the family was sick, and then my son would come down with a fever. Or countless other situations when I’d be one with the universe and make what seemed at the time like a prediction that came true.

Mark Twain wrote a wonderful essay based on this phenomenon, wherein he would think about what he wanted, and it would happen. And then a fellow writer of mine blogged about how if you tell yourself that the dog will pee on the carpet, he sure as heck will.

A friend of my mother’s, a soothsayer cynic, says it is mere coincidence. He used an example similar to this: Say you think about how nice it would be to enjoy a snow cone on a hot summer day. Yet, you have none stocked in the freezer. You hear the tinkle of a bell in the distance. It’s Scoops! The traveling ice cream truck, delivering all sorts of cool goodies for anyone with a yen.  And he is selling snow cones! This would certainly have you pondering if you’d conjured the Sccops driver up from thin air. Or perhaps he read your mind. Or you read his. But according to my mother’s friend, at any given time you may have wished for a snow cone, yet because no Scoops person came through the neighborhood, the thought (like most short term memory thoughts) was forgotten. So what seemed like foreshadowing was merely irony.

But what if there is something to be said for wishing and wanting hard enough, and the moon and stars lining up at that moment just so, and the desire is fulfilled. Simply because you wanted it. We all know or have heard of someone who was on their deathbed but received prayers and recovered. Can it be human will that changes destiny? Are we that powerful? Or narcissistic enough to believe we can move mountains?  And if you believe in God, why do some have their prayers answered and not others?

As I swept couscous and Play-doh from the floor, I couldn’t help wondering how much power do we hold in our own destinies? How much wishing and waiting does it take to get where we want to be? To enjoy that snow cone on a sweltering day, when the only noise you hear is the rustle of leaves?

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