Parallelograms

Geometry wasn't easy for me. I still remember the formulas, believe it or not, and you probably do, too. Once you learn pi times the diameter, you can always find your way around the circumference of a circle. Actually, math was never easy for me until I discovered trigonometry while doing premed studies. Trig actually made sense and it was a wonderfully validating experience.

Anyhow, back to geometry. The one figure that I liked the most was a parallelogram. Two line segments running parallel to one another, usually with legs that connected the top line to the bottom at equal, but not right, angles. They always looked to me like they were in motion. Squares, rectangles, circles -- those were either static or repetitive, but parallelograms were going somewhere.

I've noticed patterns may also parallel one another. What is taking place in one life occurs in another simultaneously, though the individuals may be unaware of it. The Austrian psychiatrist C.G. Jung used the term synchronicity to describe these seemingly unrelated elements that occur outside the realm of statistical probability. And what he meant was, things that are ascribed to chance, may not be due to chance at all. There are unseen connections, line segments that run off both sides of the paper before we see the vertical, angled legs revealing the parallelogram.

Was Jung talking about fate or destiny? I'm not certain he would describe it like that but the more apparently coincidental events pile up, the more likely it is they are not simply due to chance. He seems to suggest unconscious forces are at work and he's probably right. I just realize I'm not in Kansas anymore.

In any case, just because we can't see the connecting lines, that doesn't mean things aren't running in parallel. We just have to stick with them long enough to see how everything fits together in the end.