It never fails . . . especially when you live in a small town (!) such as Honolulu. You simply cannot go anywhere, the grocery store, the gas station, Ala Moana, etc. without running into someone you know.

It has happened to us all over the world. In 1992 when we were standing “in the queue” at Kings College, Cambridge, England to attend the famous Christmas carol service, a man walked by. It turned out to be Carl’s roommate from the Church of the Advent choir trip to Venezuela some six months before!

Then in 2005 when we were in New York City for the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians conference, we were coming out of the Guggenheim Museum and started to walk up Park Avenue. All of a sudden, we heard a man calling, “Carl! Carl! Carl!” and I thought, well, who knows we are in New York City? But the calling continued, “Carl! CARL! CARL!” We turned around, and a taxicab had pulled alongside on the curb. It was McNeil Robinson, the organist from our wedding, who just happened to be riding in a cab! Neil told us later the taxicab driver nearly had a heart attack for all the commotion he made trying to get the driver to stop. And it also happened to be the day of our 29th wedding anniversary! We had not told Neil we were in coming, and in fact had not corresponded with him in years.

We went back to New York City for Carl’s 60th birthday, and again we were at the Guggenheim Museum, and there was Pastor Don and Ruth Johnson! Of course we didn’t know they were going to be there, and vice-versa.

Well, on the flight from Honolulu to San Francisco, we flew on the same plane as LCH parishioner Akiyo Takamune!

Then, on our return to Honolulu, we saw Seth Lilley from LCH on his way to New York City!

As I said earlier, it really is a small world after all!