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04/01/11
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04/01/11
October 23, 2012
I was trying to find a quote from Horace Walpole, the great English author, on another topic.
My search proved to be quite serendipitous.
It turns out in one of the 3,000 or more letters he penned, he was considerate enough to give me the idea for this post on serendipity.
Since he not only invented the word, but coined its meaning.
In a letter of January 28, 1754, Walpole says, "This discovery, indeed, is almost of that kind which I call Serendipity, a very expressive word."
He based the word on an old name for Sri Lanka, Serendip. He explained that this name was part of the title of "a silly fairy tale, called The Three Princes of Serendip.”
The plot? As the highnesses traveled, they were always making discoveries, by accident, of wondrous things they weren't looking for in the first place.
It is how I strive to live my life.
Serendipity has another distinction; a British translation company has voted it as one of the ten English words that were hardest to translate.
(In French, it’s sérendipicité or sérendipité but also heureux hasard, "fortunate chance." Italian serendipità; Dutch serendipiteit; German Serendipität; Swedish, Danish and Norwegian, serendipitet.)
So, in case you want to impress someone in your travels, you should know no one is going to understand you.
I have that problem anyway.
There's an art to finding something when you’re not looking for it.
You can make it happen by getting off the highways, once in a while, and discover something you weren't expecting. A yard sale where you might find a Walpole letter, a classic diner...a gigantic maple.
Sure, you could read newspapers on line, and I do (it's difficult to get the Tasmanian Mercury delivered) but usually you only find what you’re looking for. There's nothing like leafing though a good daily newspaper to find all sorts of unexpected nuggets.
Alberto Eco, in The “Search for the Perfect Language” explains, “In linguistics, as in other sciences, there are serendipities... and even the most lunatic experiments can produce strange side effects.”
Everything from Penicillin, corn flakes, Scotch Guard, LSD and America were discovered by accident.
What do you say? What gifts have serendipity bestowed on you?
still thinking about today...
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03/12/11
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04/01/11
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Paul Geller
03/21/11
My Guardian Angel is named Sara N Dipty.....and so far I have come to learn that the things you are searching for are usually in the last place you would look....
And as for trying roads you've never been on, well, trying to turn a 38foot RV,pulling the little 4x4,in the rain,at night, in a residential culdesac....some times it's just better to stay on the route, especially at night in the rain...but during the day, "Another Roadside Attraction" has proven to be some great moments in adventure- - in food, wine, and Americana...and meeting some truely interesting people...they just got fed up and moved to??? and then we found them...
As I age I find a tendency to resist the magic of serendipity and fall back on old reliable haunts. It is a dangerous path for me to allow my magic to give way to Madison Avenue comfort and Star dust kismet to arranged safe mediocrity. God wakes me up most nights when the busy-ness abates and it is there in the darkness I find that most of my planning and many of my games are my attempts to forget that I am on a spinning ball with a molten center and this changing form called me is held down by invisible forces and I am surrounded by billions of peeps all created by the copulation of others and this current crop of miracles are making their own plans while dodging weather and earthquakes and the nuclear devices of others with itchy trigger fingers as they journey around fueled by dead dinosaurs rolling on synthetic rubber seeking a normal that in its purest form does not exist. My faith was born and is reborn in those late moments when I hop on the Huck Finn raft with God and my Guardian Angel Vince and let the river take me Somewhere somehow and with no real clue what lies around the bend.
Why Mr Peterman, what a delight to hear you take time to explore my part of the world. Did you find The Mercury a little too provincial? You might find the magazine Tasmania 40° South more interesting; back articles are free online. And if you ever want to make a trip, you must look me up!
http://www.fortysouth.com.au/drupal/
Serendipity is one of my favourite words but I do think it often works with synchronicity. I imagine two separate events synchronously sailing through the great cosmos, seemingly causally unrelated, and then by some fortuitous fluke, they serendipitously collide into each other, it’s like Columbus’s landing in the New World, what a happy accident! People roll their eyes and tell me they are mere coincidences when I tell them of some of the incidents in my life, but I am convinced there is magic in the air, you just have to look for it, embrace it.
If I share some of my life’s events will you share yours too, my serendipitous friends? For Bert and I actually collided on the internet and he brought me here
My career in investment banking was launched because I had a free half hour one lunch time at the commercial bank I was training in and I decided to fill in an application form with JPMorgan. I put it in just before 1230pm, and was told I was the last applicant to meet that deadline. I also happened to be one of very few shortlisted, and eventually hired
I thought that career was over when I moved to Tasmania but for a chance meeting with one of the partners of the current firm I am with now. He didn’t buy my property which I was selling but he offered me a position, partly because he was intrigued that my last post in Singapore had a common joint venture partner as the firm here
About two years ago, I was sharing a dream in a Christian house group. I had dreamt the same dream two nights in a row and was disturbed it could be an omen predicting the death of my dad. A very quiet man, who didn't come very often suddenly spoke, interpreting it; it was one of incredible blessings. But I also learnt later that he had been suffering depression because his church had tried to shut his gift so in fact he felt blessed that day
I think one of the major reasons I married who I did (a Malaysian Chinese) was because I came into the life of a little girl when she was four, she is now 25. She was adopted by my sister in law and horribly abused through the years; I was truly, the only adult in their huge family who was kind to her and so, when I left for Tasmania, she was a very frightened 14 year old. To cut a long story short, she ran away from home, was in desperate situation and though hounded by her mother, refused to give in. Eventually, with the help of my family in Singapore, we found her, put her back in school and supported her through university. She calls my family her family and visits regularly. Even she is awed by how her life might have been so different if I hadn’t married who I did.
The idea of serendipity is admirable and desireable. Has anyone seen the movie Serendipity?
dvdI did Spring Rain! I love it! In fact I bought the DVD :)
Some words in English are simply fun to roll off our tongues. It is fortuitous when we discover them, often gratuitous when we season our sentences accordingly, and magnanimous when we freely & generously share.....
Seren-dipity: The Welsh word for star is seren, so I think of it as a lucky dip from the stars.
Serendipity led me to this page.
Even if serendipitous fortune described our discovery of our combined resources, nothing prevents us from becoming an eleemosynary institution. Perhaps it's just me, but today I'm feeling a sense that when we freely share with each other in this venue the whole becomes much more than merely the sum of it's parts, and furthermore we each tend to grow.
Serendipity was a major factor in getting my first book published.
One of the most satisfying chapters in my life was as Editor-in-Chief of my high school yearbook which was called "Serendipity"
Wasn't Susan Serendipity that hot babe in Bull Durham?
My musical productions, Pittsburgh Victorian Gibson Girls & Gentlemen, were heaven-sent...serendipitous acts of magic, a Victorian theatrical dream that became a reality of performing Victorian enthusiastic artists showcasing their inborn talent of excellent works!
Lately most things that seem serendipitous to me just end up kicking me in the pants later. So my new motto is: never a look a gift horse in the mouth, at least not until the giver has his back turned. Some gifts are too costly to accept.
"careful what you wish for" . "No good deed goes unpunished"
That bolt out of the blue that many folks ascribe to serendipity is often the result of the good hopes, dedication, and hard work that must take place before it occurs so that it is recognized and you are ready for it.
I may be wrong and it is only a random shift that alligns the tumblers so they click together and turn the wheels just right. Naybe just being in the right place at the right time.
Is it just all part of the plan or does the plan require our involvement and dreams.
Either way it is a nice word that bodes well.....
"Have you ever been cubed??" Serendipity seems something to not happen to me. . . . I wish it would.
Spring rain, it seems that you are overdue. I hope unexpexted delights come your way soon. It is often when you least exoect it so be sure to act surprised when it happens to you.
I got nothing...Enjoyed everyone else's comments today. Lovely day here. going to the pillows.
You were all serendipitous gifts to me when in my delight at rediscovering a much-loved old friend, I walked through a new door and found you.