Food For Thought: What Just Happened?

What happened? Have you ever asked yourself that? What happened to an item that went missing or an event that took place. We ask ‘What happened?’ more often than we think. Life happens to us daily, accidents on the highway happen, someone bought a random QuickPick and happened to win the lottery. Happens all the time.

Happened. It is a pretty big word. Think about it. You happened! Isn’t that something to consider. Numerous events happen all over the world on a yearly, monthly, daily and hourly basis. In fact, every minute something happens. Current events are happening and the second the event has drawn its final breath and has been concluded- it happened.

You wake up, you have about six tasks that need to be accomplished for the day. The alarm goes off (or you automatically wake up from it being hardwired into you), and you rise to the smell of coffee that was pre-set the night before. The coffee kicks on- that is now happening. You rise to the shine and hop into the shower and turn on the hot, then the cold and get it just right. As you shake off your final rinse, and turn those dials (that you are thinking about replacing) to the left, the shower is over. Your shower graduated from happening to happened.

The first task of the day is to organize the remaining five tasks. You set it up in your head on the execution of the plan that makes sense economically. ‘Ok, I may as well go to the Big Eddy first, once I am done there I can stop at the health food store, and then to Save-On Foods for items- A,B,C and then to Southside for D,E,F the post office after that and then to RCU and deal with that banking issue I keep putting off and if I have time I will stop at Ray’s Butcher Shop on the way home.’ During that time the lines blur between happening and happened, because as life likes to throw unscheduled curveballs, the order you set in your mind may not pan out which might leave a task in limbo. So it has not quite happened but yet, it is not exactly happening. You headed out to the Big Eddy but Bolton tells you, as it happens, the car is not quite ready- within the hour. So now you jumped the gun on your schedule.

You follow through with the grocery store tasks where you happen to run into Roma. You chat about this, that and the other and happen to bring up a funny article you read on the Current,  as it turns out, she happened to read it too and now we are at a cross road of happened x2. See what I mean?

A man and a woman are walking along the shoreline of a rippling creek, some say it happens to be up on Cripple Creek, which also happens to be a popular song from 1969. The woman wraps her arm around his and leans in, he completes the lean by acknowledging her touch of sentiment and tilts his head to hers. They stop at a peak in the waterline and enjoy the sunset. The water is flowing by their feet. This is the place. This place is as good as any other place because it doesn’t matter where he asks, as long as it is her. He turns, takes a knee and he asks.

‘Is this really happening?’ The response happens. Now, the proposal has happened and the planning will soon be happening.

A series of events, some may be unfortunate while others may be delightful, but throughout the day you are entering, have entered or have completed a series of happenings… or happened.

What just happened?