The Swiss philosopher and psychologist Karl Jung pioneered the field of “Synchronicity”, a term he coined to represent those meaningful coincidences that happen to most of us, where there seems to be no cause for events but they have significant meaning to those who experience it. Synchronicity allows for the unknown element that affects our lives and causes wonder – the inexplicable “other”.

I’m not sure if Karl Jung would have called an event that occurred to us last Monday Synchronicity but it was certainly wonderful. Because of the lovely sunny morning after days of rain and cold Chris asked me if I’d like a trip out to “Plants Galore” (about eleven miles away) to buy some yellow flowers to finish off the display on our terrace. I jumped at the opportunity and suggested that we could go also to Stover Lake for a nice walk, as we’d be in the vicinity. Naturally, we asked Mum if she’d like to join us and then my sister Mary said that she, too, would like to go (Geoff was going out somewhere with their daughter Katie and her children). After our fun in “Plants Galore” we had a pleasant drive in the countryside before wending our way to Stover Country Park. We were walking to the lake when who should we see but Geoff, Katie, James and Annalise coming towards us? Of all the places they could have visited… what a coincidence! But was it Synchronicity? Was there a special meaning? It was good to see them – and a great surprise – but if there was an underlying meaning I wasn’t aware of it. Not like another strange coincidence that happened several years ago…

I know it will sound a bit weird, especially as many people don’t know about such items, but at the time I was looking for one of those china things that you put inside a pie to let air out during the cooking and prevent the innards from boiling over the pastry – I think it’s called a pie funnel. I’m right. Here are some examples : –

Well, my old pie funnel had broken and the only place where I knew I could buy one was from a little china knick knack shop at Widecombe-in-the-Moor, on Dartmoor; the owner of the china shop made the geegaws himself for tourists visiting the village (famous for its fair and The Great Thunderstorm in 1638 which killed four worshippers and injured sixty during an afternoon service).

So on this particular day Chris and I drove the fifteen miles or so to Widecombe on this special errand. We had been searching through an array of novelty pie funnels, looking for a plain white funnel to no avail, for several minutes when who should come along but Mary and Mum! They were as surprised as we were, considering that neither party had any notion of the other’s intention to venture out into the moor and go into the china shop. Noticing that I had a novelty Old Uncle Tom Cobley pie funnel in my hand, my sister said:

“What do you want that for?”

“Well, I need one because mine has broken and these are all I could find. They don’t have any plain white ones,” I explained.

“You don’t want to spend out money on that,” Mary grinned, “not when I have exactly what you want in my handbag!”

Mary put her hand into the bag and produced a white pie funnel that she had picked up a little earlier at a car boot sale. Now that’s what I call Synchronicity!

And here are some photos of baby Annalise and my new flowers:-