A Veteran's Day Coincidence?

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boing
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A Veteran's Day Coincidence?

#1 Post by boing » Sat Nov 12, 2022 10:14 pm

I wasn't sure where I should post this but I feel it is so worthy of viewing that I include it here.

As some of you know the date of 11/11 in the US is Memorial Day, the equivalent of UK Remembrance Day but on a fixed date each year. There are the usual celebrations and events as you might expect including many US flags along the roadside and many "Thanks to Veterans" signs. Regardless, it is still a day of work except for government workers.

As it happened I had been looking for a certain item of agricultural irrigation equipment and I could not find it in stock anywhere in the big city so I was thinking that I would need to order it for delivery when I had the idea of checking cities further south in the more agricultural areas of the valley. Sure enough someone had the item in stock in a small community about 25 miles to the south. Off I went.

Now, this is an old farming community that has grown up and one of the problems was that the main street through the centre of the community could not handle the amount of traffic anymore. The solution was to expand a small community road parallel to the original main road and make both roads double width but one way only. The two roads are only about 200 yards apart and the store I needed to go to was a large agricultural/hardware store situated between the two parallel one way streets.

Remember we drive on the right here. Entering the community I was on the right-hand parallel street heading westbound so I made a left turn to enter the store parking lot. I made my purchase and left the store, this entailed simply leaving the store on the parallel street heading eastbound by making a left turn onto the parallel street. I had reversed my direction of travel and was on my way home but for some reason I changed my mind, I chose to go home by the rural way rather than the more built up way so, as soon as I could, I made a left turn on a joining street between the parallel streets and then another left turn put me back onto the original street travelling in the direction I had first entered the community. Hope you got that.

Here came the surprise. After I driven for not much more than half a mile I saw a large illuminated sign on the right side of the road AND IT WAS SCROLLING CHURCHILL's SPEECH ABOUT "THE FEW" (excuse the capitals). I drove past the sign but as soon as I could I made a couple of right turns so I could pass by the sign again. I stopped intrigued and entered the business where a met a great old gentleman who told me the sign was the work of the business owner who really supported veterans. Unfortunately he was away.

What were the chances.
a. I found the item I wanted in this community so fate had me go there.
b. On a whim I changed the way I was going to drive home.
c. This happened to put me on the street with the sign.
d. Why would anyone in a small American farming community decide to display part of Churchill's speech about "The Few" on his company billboard when everyone else was thinking about Iwo Jima and Dunkirk

Indeed a strange collection of coincidences and quite emotional.

.
the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.

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