The vagaries of luck

Mark always says he used up all his potential good luck in finding me. We don't really care about 'luck' so much any more. But sometimes, in the middle of waves of bad news (real estate hassles, a 20% increase in our apartment rent already, the damage done to our furniture and the necessity to go through an amazing number of hoops to claim on it...) we think that there couldn't be two more unlucky people. But perspective is everything, even in 'luck assessment.'

On Sunday it was supposed to be cloudy and rainy and, indeed, even by mid-morning the sky was completely gray. So we decided to do some 'street walking' in downtown Seattle to see some of the big indoor shopping malls. We are still a little unsure of how to get around in downtown, but we just randomly pick an exit from the freeway, and then try to figure out where to park. Every skyscraper has a parking garage underneath and they seem to wind down forever under huge pillars and improbably low concrete ceilings so they always feel 'risky' to us to even enter. But we found a garage with unusually high clearance, found a parking space just inside the entrance, took the elevator back up and ended up right in the middle of one of the malls we were looking for! And when we emerged onto the street, the clouds had parted and the sun was shining.

Williams Sonoma had just taken some samples of a wonderful peach bundt cake out of the oven and it smelled (and tasted) wonderful! The sunglasses store had a funny and elaborately gay guy who knew a lot about sunglasses and with whom Mark shared lively opinions about designer Michael Kors and the last season of Project Runway. Eddie Bauer actually HAD sunglasses that I could wear - along with some stylish shorts for Mark and a whole crew of salespeople who were willing to jump into the joke and tell Mark, every time he turned around in the store, that the 'short' shorts he wanted to find are hopelessly out of style and the longer ones he was trying on looked fabulous on his great legs. Crate and Barrel had wonderful things to look at, the sun was still shining when we left the mall, the Market had incredibly fragrant lilac cuttings in their flower displays, the cashews were fresh roasted and warm, we didn't have to wait to be seated in our new favorite restaurant on the waterfront and we managed to actually find our garage and car again when we were ready to go home. AND - there was a Sunday special at that garage so parking only cost us $5 instead of $17!

The sun shone all the way home and when we got there we took a nap. By the time we got up it was cloudy and gray again.

Luck? You'd think we could win the lottery.