As a non-religious, but spiritual [insert yogi-minded] person, the idea of fate is a tricky one. I know that there is no god up in the air manipulating my marionette strings to do and say certain things. I don’t believe that my life’s plan was already written before I was born. But, this idea of fate – yes the idea of fate, not the pre-determined by god, supernatural definition of fate – has always been very striking to me.

I truly believe that things happen for a reason. Not because they were “destined to” or because someone wrote it in the “book of Ashley”, but because life is mysterious. Life works its way so that when one event happens it changes the course of future events. Or maybe because an event happened, you’ve learned this grand (or small) life lesson that’ll inform how you lead the rest of your life.

When I was in Toronto recently a guy I knew in college posted online that he was also visiting Toronto. I wrote, “I’m here, too! Enjoy!” Immediately, he messaged me: let’s meet up! I was with my parents and figured that leaving the house at 10pm to meet up with a bachelor party wasn’t the best idea. He lives in Chicago, though, so I suggested we meet up when we both returned stateside. We made plans for the following week, and continued to talk throughout the whole weekend.

Tuesday came around, and even though it had been 11 years since we’d seen or talked to each other, we talked for SIX HOURS like we were best friends. Honestly, we talked more that Tuesday than we had during the four years in college. Since that day, we’ve seen each other many times on a non-stop gab fest.

Is fate responsible for bringing us together? Did we both end up in Toronto at the same time so that he could write that post so that I could comment on said post so that he could message me so that we could make plans so that we could meet in real life and find this amazing connection? I’m gonna throw this out even further. Did we both go to the same college so that 15 years after freshman orientation we’d meet up when the timing was right in both of our lives? I knew from the moment I set foot on my college’s campus that I’d be going there; I couldn’t articulate why exactly but I just knew – was it fate?  Our school was the last college he’d gotten an acceptance from, but he was drawn for some unknown reason – was that reason fate?

Clearly, we will never get an answer to the fate or luck question, and maybe it doesn’t matter how or what brought us together. What’s most important is that we found each other. No, my avid readers and loyal fans (hi mom!), this man is not my boyfriend and we’re not in love (yet), but, y’all, this chemistry is real. And maybe, just maybe, we have fate to thank for that.