Everything happens for a reason they say...

I'm struggling to understand synchronicity today. Last night I watched Gus Van Sant's hauntingly realistic film, "Elephant," a Columbinesque peek at a school shooting in fictional Watt High School in Portland, Oregon, and I hardly slept afterward. Watching the 2003 Cannes Film Festival Award winner in the last hours of April 21st didn't help. Van Sant filled my head with images that shouldn't float about your psyche at midnight, let alone into the early morning hours. I had to be at a school less than eight hours after the film ended. I didn't necessarily want to.

June's father, Gerry, introduced me to the notion of synchronicity several years ago. I hadn't thought much about it before our conversations turned the phenomenon into a recurring discussion. If I didn't believe in synchronicity before, I wholeheartedly did afterward.

Then I watched Elephant.

Then I stumbled upon this today and suddenly realized that April 20th, just one day prior, was the 11th anniversary of Columbine.

There was no particular reason why I decided to finally watch "Elephant eight years after it was released. There certainly was no reason I decided to watch "Elephant" a little more than 24 hours from the anniversary of the most infamous school shootings in history. Similarly, there was no reason for me to stumble into