Heidi Bolema:
In 1994, I was touring Europe with the Blue Lake International Youth Symphony. I was 18, and it was the summer after my senior year of high school. At this particular stop, we were staying with host families in Bad Kissingen, Germany.
The day after we arrived, some of us decided to look around downtown at some of the local shops. After turning my back to look at some of the architecture surrounding me, I turned back around to find that everyone was gone. I looked around me, hoping to find someone I knew, which shouldn't have been hard because we all were dressed in our uniforms, and still saw no familiar faces. I also realized I didn't have my host family's phone number with me.
I panicked. After waiting a while to figure out what I should do, I knew I would have to find my way back myself, even though I had no idea what direction we had come from or how we had gotten there.
So, I started to walk. For some reason, my fear began to evaporate, and I kept on walking. Things that I had never seen before all of the sudden felt familiar. I kept walking, and the good sense of direction I didn't even know I had began to kick in. After probably about an hour, I walked in through the door of my host family's home, completely relieved.
To this day, I don't know how I did it. A friend of mine who believes in reincarnation has suggested that I lived in Germany in a past life. I guess I'll never know for sure.
Krista Krueger:
When I was young I used to have this reaccuring dream. The content doesn't seem like it would be fightening in any way, but every time I had the dream, it really felt more like a nightmare. There were two basic scenes.
One of those scenes took place in a cave-like environment. All that was visible was the brownish-black walls looking like they were compacted sand or mud. In the center of the "room" there was a single spot light illuminating a circle of large boulders that were larger than I was. I would suddenly be placed in the middle of these boulders that would constantly keep rolling around me, slowly inching closer in to me - like I would eventually be squished, but it never happens.
The second scene took place in a bathroom-like environment in that the main object was an old-fashioned porcelain bathtub. But the walls were quite bazzare. They were deteriorating, thinly layered, dark brown, sedimentary rocks. There was a small indentation towards the foot of the tub. In that space stood a wedding couple dressed as if they were to be in the process of getting married. They just stood there and didn't move or speak. Accompaning this scene, there was the most awful high-pitched screech that I remember being so aweful, it made me cry to the point that I would eventually wake up.
This reacurring dream lasted forever, it seemed. It would just jump back and forth between these two scenes with no seemly connection.
I remember when I was about 12, I went to tell my mom about it in heavey detail. My explanation was similar to what I have just explained and astonishingly, my mom began to tell me that she used to have that dream all the time when she was young too. Isn't that just the most bazzare chance encounter! Kind of creepy?!
Jamie Kalinowski:
Well i guess that this applies, I had a dream on night that I had ticks on me. some of which were still on the surface--and were pulled off--but some had already gone under my skin. It was a really weird dream, in the morning I remembered this dream and notices some bite marks that were on my arm. The itched and were just weird seeing how I had a dream about them. Maybe i was getting bit and the dream came from that.
Kirsten Strom:
One Sunday morning, I got into my car to drive to the pool where I swim. As I turned onto Diamond Street, I noticed a woman standing in her yard with a tiny dog on a leash. They were both just standing there as if they were waiting for someone. When I got to the pool, there was a woman in the locker room trying unsuccessfully to open her locker in the locker room. She tried again and again, but it would never open. This struck me in part because I used to have a recurring about being back in high school and not being able to remember my locker combination. The whole time I was in the locker room, this woman was still trying to open her lock.
I swam for about 50 minutes; then when I returned to the locker room, the same woman was still trying to open her locker. I had no idea whether she had been there the whole time I swam, or whether she had opened it, worked out for the same amount of time as me, and come back to the locker room at the same time. But like before, she was trying repeatedly to open her locker the whole time I was there.
Then, when I was driving back home from the pool, when I turned off of Diamond Street, I saw the woman with her dog still standing in her yard with her dog on a leash. With her too, I had the exact same feeling: I didn't know if she had been there the whole time, or if she had gone and come back exactly when I recrossed her path.
Sierra Carter:
my chance encounter had to do with my boyfriend.
The first time I met his it was at an ice rink that I frequent. I have been going there as long as I can remember. On this one such day as I entered the doors, I looked up to see a man behind the counter staring back at me. After gaining a little courage I began to talk to him, asking questions, joking around, and just sharing.. It was very odd because I felt completly at ease. It turns out that he had been working at this very ice rink for about 7 years. I started to think about the trips I use to take there growing up and the people I use to hang out with, I remembered him. He use to talk to my older brother. I described the people that I use to go skating with and how I looked, and he remembered me. The more we talk the more things we found we had in common. Like since he worked for the ice rink in the city, part of the parks division, they wanted him to train to be a life guard at one of the local pools, the very same one I went to at the same time I would go there, and the one that I wanted to life guard at as soon as I was old enough. There were many other occurances like that, but the two last are one that really amused me. He had grown up in Standale and I grew up in Newaygo, my mother lived in Grand Rapids and up until these encounters all of the others had taken place in Grand Rapids. The school I went to was made up of three small towns, Howard City, Sandlake and Peirson,(parts of grant and newaygo too). One year after I graduated he took a job at the sandlake police department and was a leazon officer for my school. Also in the area of sandlake is another lake of Baptise lake, his parents own a cottage on this lake since about 1980. I grew up 7 miles down the road form this lake, living there since shortly after I was born in 1980 and I grew up swimming on that lake about 200 yards from their cottage. I don't know if those are encounters or near encounters, but they are pretty concidental to me.
Kevin Cole:
It was the summer of 2000. I had happened to partake in a study-abroad program in Tuebigin, Germany for a month; the university town was just about an hour south of Stuttgart, and I was to be learning the language(again-I am always forgetting the language), and to hopefully catch up with my two friends. This trip, as it turned out, was fueled by seredipity. While in the states, I had been working freelance for two days as a production assistant for a production company in Farminton, MI. One day, I happened to mention my departure to my employer, who immediately told me of a producer who was located in Stuttgart, and was looking to be in production around the time of my study. I was ecstatic; this would possibly be my first time to not only study in Germany, but also to work internationally! However, after visiting the production company, I became aware that if I were to work with this company, I would be unable to visit my friend Michael. For a reason unknown to me, the production had to be cancelled (insufficient funding), and by sheer chance Michael happened to be at a concert-festival the very weekend I had free time to do so. For about thirty marks, there is something called the weekend ticket, and one can ride the slow trains with this ticket for the length of the weekend- it was with this that I decided to take the 15 hour ride to see him. On the ride up, I ended up meeting a very nice girl named Petra, who was traveling with her band from Ulm up to the far North to play a gig. She was seventeen, dreadlocks in her hair, and seemed to just radiate a splendid personality. We chatted, smiled, exchanged pleasantries, and in the end assumed we would never meet again. At the stop, I switched trains and happened to meet some fellows who were going to the same festival- in fact, although many miles away from his home town, these fellows went to school with Michael. We ended up hitching a ride to the town, met Michael, enjoyed the festival for two days (it ended up for the most part being an 80's pop fest- rather banal acts, although there were some intriguing ones too). On the way back, I had a stop-over in Frankfurt (one of the largest train stations in Germany) and searched desperately for my connection- it was around 12 pm, so fortunately there were not many people there. Walking to the platform, I couldn't believe it - Petra was on the same 10 hour ride! In the end we exchanged numbers, met once in Ulm for lunch, and due to my horrible social skills ran out of conversation.
Brook Bitely:
I moved into the apartment in 2000. Our apartment was cheap, and so were we... We didn't even buy cable. We only had 3 channels, Fox, and two chruch channels.
I called my mom soon after I moved in. I was calling to ask for my friend Brent's number because I had forgotten it. I walked out into the living room and the television was on... And right there on the church talk show was Brett's Grandmother Genny! Just as I was talking to my mom about Brett!
Robyn Kane:
I was sitting in my math class on 5-5-95. Bored, because it is math class. I began punching numbers into my calculator, for instance adding each digit in my phone number to see what number it comes out to. (6+7+4+0+0+1+5=23) Then I added the digits of my address, 4+9+5+5=23. Then my birthday, 2+2+1+9+8+1=23. Very strange that they all add up to 23, and to make it even more strange, add the digits of 23, 2+3=5...I discovered all this on 5-5-95. Does that make sense?
Whitney Dittman:
Having the name "Whitney" my whole life has been interesting. There isn't one day that I don't have someone make a comment or wise crack about my name. One particular moment that is permanent in my mind was when me and my family were vacationing in Florida and I was about seven years old. We were at the Epcot Center and I remember freaking out cause some how I lost my parents in a huge crowd of people. I was walking around crying and suddenly I heard a women yelling out "Whitney where are you", "Come back here Whitney". I started running towards the voice and found my self running up to a women and grabbing her by the legs thinking this was my own mother. A young boy though did the same thing with me. I remember looking at him and saying "Get away". He said "This is my Mommy". We both looked up at her and she said "What's your name"? I said "Whitney" and she said well that's my son's name. He looked at me and I remember thinking "How can you have MY name"? That's when my Mom came running up and apologizing to the women. It was traumatic for me.
Brett Haberkorn:
I don't know if this is a chance encounter of just luck, but hear it goes.
About a 5 weeks ago I went to the pop machine and got a pop as I do every week and the pop top said NCAA on it ( mind you I never watch or even know anything about basketball) I looked under the cap and It said U. of Maryland. Huh what ever. So for some reason I kept the cap none of the other caps that I got later or any I had got earlier, just this on. Come to find out today Maryland won the NCAA so I frecken won. I guess I was just meant to win.
Brent Palma:
I had gotten a call from an older woman trying to get a hold of my girlfriend. Since she wasn't there I asked if I could take a message. The caller told me that her name was Denise and asked me to tell Christine (my girlfriend) that she couldn't do anything that night because she would be working late. This was puzzling because I didn't know anyone named Denise and wasn't aware of any plans for that night. What was even stranger was that my girlfriend did not know who the caller was either. We could only assume that the woman had dialed the wrong number intending to call another Christine and through a chance occurence had called someone of the same name.
Anonymous:
I recently found out about a sister that I have that is older than me and was given up for adoption. I told my friend about it and at the time he lived in Grand Rapids and I lived an hour away. It turns out that my sister got a job at the same place that he was working at, and he told her that we had been friends since we were kids. My family didn't even know that she lived in Grand Rapids. I talked with her and it turns out that we both grew up with horses, and the same kind of horses, and both of our families were friends with the same family in Ludington. We had shown horses with the family, and my sister had shown horses with their daughter. So it is possible that we unknowingly met a long time ago. I moved to Grand Rapids, and after talking to my sister I found out that I moved into the same apartment complex that she lived in when she was going to college. We also look very similar, and have some similar mannarisms. So that is the biggest chance encouter of my life so far!
|
Back to Main