The word coincidences starts with a coin.

After my fiancé Chris died, I found coins everywhere. A dime in the middle of a hardly used sidewalk, between the weeds that sprouted in the cracks. In the alley, heavily encrusted with dirt. On the stairway to the L, surrounded by pigeon crap. In the middle of the fake-terrazzo floor of my work hallway.

At first, it was mostly dimes, silvery and small. Then I found pennies, some bright and some gnarly and patinaed. I’d look to see if the dates on them were significant, or arranged in a certain way, or if the dirty pennies meant something different from the shiny dimes.

Every time I’d pick one up, I’d say, “Thanks honey.” I kept a crystal bowl filled with them, then I transferred them to a larger one, and when that overflowed, I put them in an even larger bowl.

I gave up counting. I gave up looking at dates. I just saved them.

Then there were the feathers. Of course, when I was getting on the L at a stop with a lot of pigeons, I expected to see some. But I’d find them everywhere I went--in the park, in front of my doorstep, in a hotel room. Coincidences, maybe, but I’d take the time to say “Thanks, Sweetums.” It was always an invitation to re-experience the miracle of the man. I’d be thinking of something else, like was I wasting my life in this job, or whether my socks had holes in them, or did I like the toffeenut or hazelnut syrup better in a latte when some new feather appeared.

“There you are, honey,” I’d say. “Thanks for showing up.” And I’d go on with my day, while my heart glowed through my cold grief.

When I first went into grief therapy, I asked my therapist about the coin and feather coincidences. “Are they real? Do they mean something?”

Deb had a soft energy and fluffy blonde curls that she would toss as she made a point. “Sure,” she said, “they find a way to communicate with us.” I wasn’t convinced, but I desperately needed a little magic in my life. While I seemed normal to the outside world, on the inside I felt dark and frozen.

I told her I saw cardinals everywhere and then red-winged blackbirds in the park near my house. She nodded, calm, eating a bite-sized Snickers.

“Sounds like Chris,” she commented between chews. 

I had butterflies follow me around when I was near a garden. Monarchs mainly, keeping an eye on me. Flying into my personal space, never landing, but making sure that I could see them as they flew around my head. Hummingbirds, my favorite birds, always buzzed near my head on their way to a flower.

Last spring, I found a dull old dime wedged into a crack in the blacktop in my alley. It couldn’t have been in a less glamorous place, unless I had seen a rat drop it there. I pried it out of its hiding spot, said “Thank you, honey!” and put it in my pocket while I continued my dog walk. Sure, these things happen more in spring after the snow has melted and the loose change finds its way into sunlight. But it feels like someone is still shining a dime-bright light on me.