Certain Death or Coincidence?

Raikus — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 17:36:00 GMT

Signs. They're everywhere. They tell us what to do, who people are and which way to go. Sometimes we see or hear things that can be interpreted as signs -- gentle nudges by nature or God (depending on your beliefs) that help us make a decision. Humans, for the most part, are a very introverted race. We look out for ourselves and don't expect many others to look out for our best interests. So most of us find it hard to believe that there is some force out there providing us with Cliff Notes to life or small hints that may lead to second chances. Even when we do take in the signs and make a decision based on them, we're always left with the question of was it the right decision or was it simply coincidence? The hard answer is that we'll never know.

I was faced with just such a dilemma last week.

First off, let me reference a movie that some of you may have seen. It's called Final Destination. The movie, in a nutshell, is about one teenager who correctly interprets signs that their plane is going to crash on takeoff. He panicks and, as a result, gets himself and a few of his fellow classmates kicked off the plane prior to departure. Then, just as the signs have led him to believe, the plane explodes and kills everyone on board. The rest of the movie is Death trying to reclaim his victims. The signs are still there for the kids to interpret, but they're never clear. Eventually Death claims most of his original victims.

So here I am with my wife, freshly boarded on a flight from Atlanta to Jacksonville and waiting for take off when an odd song comes on my iPod. The song is by Wilco leadman Jeff Tweedy (written by Woody Guthrie) called "Airline to Heaven." I've listened to this song off of his Sunken Treasures album many a time, but never on a plane pre-departure. The song starts: "There's an airline plane. Flies to Heaven everyday past the pearly gates." After the first line it occurs to me that this could be one of those Final Destination-ish times. Someone or something is providing me with a sign of my potential death.

"You can get away to heaven on this aeroplane. Just bow your head and pray. Them's got ears, let them hear. Them's got eyes, let them see. Turn your eyes to the lord of the skies. Take this airline plane. It'll take you home again to your home behind the skies."

At this point I'm still leaning towards coincidence with good comic timing. I turn to my wife, remove my ear bud and say, "You'll never believe what song came on." As I do, I'm already staring into a bewildered face. She takes her earbud out to talk to hear what I'm saying and she says, "Yeah, me too."

We're both listening to our individual iPod Shuffles. Random songs, random play times and odds around 300:1 that the same song would be playing. I don't know what the odds increase when you try to factor the same song, playing at the same time but I'm pretty sure they're a high number.

We've now just crossed from minor signs that could be read as a warning to vacate our flight to HOLY HELL WHAT ARE WE STILL DOING ON THIS PLANE?! But we're sensible people. It's not an impossible scenario, just an unlikely coincidence. Still, it's being heavily weighed in both of our minds that this could be one of those times when there are signs given to people that allow them to change their destinies and that we may simply be ignoring them. And let's be realistic. If people do commonly get warning signs about upcoming tradgedy and ignore them, no one would know how common they are would they? Maybe it happens much more than we think, but humans being the ignorant species that we are, choose to go on our merry old way until it suddenly becomes non-merry and more of a stop.

"Well a lot of people guess. Some say no and some say yes. Will it take some and leave some behind? But you will surely know when to the airport go to leave this world behind."

We sit through the rest of the song in silence. We later arrived in Vegas without any issues other than a harder-than-normal landing. Thankfully, this time, it appears to be merely coincidence.

The Wastebucket : shuffle

Certain Death or Coincidence?