Ask Dr. Ding

So there I was, on a well-deserved cruise. Americans, as I’m sure you’re all exquisitely aware, are granted the fewest overall # of vacation days compared to all other industrialized nations. What a revoltin’ development! No wonder we lead the world in chronic yet entirely preventable health problems such as high blood pressure, poor cholesterol ratios, type II diabetes, obesity, insomnia, and fatigue. Over the last several years, Dr. Ding has made a conscious choice to actually plan vacations where fun is to be had, no work is to be done, and no familial obligations are to be met. Being raised in a family where the mantra was “Work makes life sweet” created a great deal of difficulty in learning to relax instead of crashing, and to rest instead of waiting until sick.

This post wasn’t actually going to be about the joy of doing nothing, but there you have it. There’s a terrific Spanish proverb: “How beautiful it is to rest and afterwards do nothing.” My recent 6-day Mexican cruise was full of just this very thing; lounging in various locales such as the outdoor pool, the indoor pool, the beach, the balcony, the stateroom. Dr. Ding swam with dolphins on two separate occasions and even drank rum out of a coconut while puffing on a Cuban cigar. Marvelous!

Perhaps it was because of the relaxed, near-comatose pace of this vacation that I was able to notice some interesting things. First off, our Indian waiter’s name was Gabriel. I didn’t think anything of it until the next day, when we met a man named Uriel. Then, we had two dolphin trainers called Angel. One night, while enjoying a fruity cocktail, the bartender suddenly started singing “Angel of Harlem” by U2. The following day, we met a man named Miguel (Michael) while in Costa Maya, as well as a Raphael. Now, given that we were in a very Catholic country, it follows logically that there would be a lot of folks w/saints’ names and even angel names. However, it was uncanny how we kept encountering folks w/only archangel names. My friend kept having the Temperance card show up in her Tarot card readings, which, if you check it out, depicts an angel.
So there were all these continual references to angels and archangels. Carl Jung, in his musings on synchronicity, suggested that we discover these acausally events rather than seek them out. Other folks have since postulated that the somewhat mysterious nature of time itself may in fact account for this phenomena. Whatever the deal is, it started to fascinate me, and I began to wonder what it all meant. Were angels watching us? If so, were they trying to get us to switch from rum to tequila?

It may suprise you to learn that the slightly irascible, wholly irreverent, and generally gleefully scatalogical Dr. Ding has had some inexplicable encounters with angelic beings in the past. However, I certainly didn’t embark upon this vacation with them at all in mind, I must confess. Mostly I was thinking about the buffets, drink specials, and SPF level of my suntan lotion.

The whole deal leaves me with a renewed sense of wonder and even excitement, things I’ve not felt in a very long time.

Have you ever encountered an angel or observed a flurry of angel-themed synchronicities? If so, would you mind sharing them here?

Pax Vobiscum,

DD

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