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50 Days ‘Til 50Day 27In TriplicateThe phone rang yesterday and it was my partner Jeff’s friend letting us know that he was in town from LA to see a specialist for a problem with his knee. Swollen and infected has him now walking around on crutches and staying with us for a few days until the antibiotics kick in. I was loading up the trunk of my car after working on a wedding today. I lifted my case of supplies into the trunk and my forehead made contact with the trunks latch causing two small tears in my forehead, which I only noticed when the blood dripped into my eye while I was driving away. After coming home from the supermarket to make dinner this evening Jeff’s friend came running out (well, limping out) to tell me Jeff had just slipped and fell getting into the shower. We have one of those “two steps down showers” in which he hit the first step and landed on his side on the shower floor. He seems to be ok and sadly it’s not the first time this has happened to him. My first thought was we need to sage this house and give it a good cleansing from any bad energy that’s floating around in here. I then said to myself, “well, this has to be it for now, no more bad things as everything happens in three’s.”My Moms’ (yes, I have two) dog, Rosie had been facing some old age and old man problems and finally succumbed to it and passed away the other day. I was at a meeting and one of the men was sharing that his dog has passed away in his arms the night before. Lastly that same night a girlfriend of mine was leaving a restaurant to be greeted by a very amorous and needy stray dog. She brought him home and put out pictures and messages on social media to see if she could find the owner. Again, it all seemed to happen in three’s. I’ve decided to dig a bit deeper into this common belief that bad things happen in sets of three. From natural disasters to celebrity deaths to household mishaps, the idea is embedded in the Western cultural psyche and in mine. Here’s some interesting information I came across. Thank you to Scott C. Gruber for his words on Hub Pages that shed some light on all of this.“Why we have an affinity for the number three is a mystery, but it may be due to our natural tendency toward narrative. This is more than just a societal trait, but is wired into the cognitive processes of our brains. Three is an important number in the Western literary tradition. Aside from its religious significance in the Christian concept of the Holy Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost) and in Hebrew Numerology, the number three is at the root of the narrative structure. Most Western literature follows a three-act structure, introducing characters and concepts in Act I, developing the plot through conflict in Act II, and resolving the conflict in Act III. In addition, the Rule of Three is a key rhetorical device used in children's literature, comedy, and public speaking. Fairy tales such as The Three Pigs, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, and The Three Billy Goats Gruff invoke this rule by setting a pattern in the first two interactions between characters, then breaking it in the third. The wolf blows two houses down, and then fails on the third. Goldilocks finds the bears' porridge too hot, too cold, and then just right. The troll passes on eating the first two goats and gets soundly beaten by the third.This format is also at the root of many jokes, setting up a pattern with two anecdotes and delivering a punchline with the third. Public speakers will also employ it when using three points to make an argument, or three adjectives to describe something the speaker wishes to emphasize. With this tradition of threes so deeply ingrained in our literary culture, it is little wonder we look for patterns of three in random events such as the aforementioned celebrity deaths and natural disasters. Alas, these patterns only exist in our minds.”I had always thought my lucky number was 7 and even 13. I'm not sure I can handle things happening in 7’s but I’ve learned it doesn’t much matter. For whatever comes along and there has been and I'm sure will be many things that come along, all I can do is try and smile through the bad times. To know on the most fundamental level that even the bad times are good. I avoided full participation in my life for years out of fear. Fear of failure, fear of success, fear of the unknown, fear of people, fear of what may or may not come. To practice the opposite of fear, or faith, continues to be an ongoing challenge for me and takes a lot of practice. I’ve learned with every yin there is a yang so if it’s the bad that will come in 7’s than I believe that there will be some good 7’s just on the other side. The universe will look after me, and you. 3-fold.jf