Stranger than fiction

I worked a symphony tonight. The crowd was almost entirely the retired community and a good portion arrived together on buses from retirement communities. I was managing to keep cool while the normal ups and downs of running an event took place. Then life reminded me than it is profoundly more ingenious than anyone's imagination.

I happened to glance at some of the people arriving and noticed a large body of people marching together with banners. I stepped outside and heard them chanting. They took up the entire sidewalk for an block at least, perhaps more. Then they stopped and my imagination ran wild. Are they protesting the theatre? Are they enemies of symphonies? Do they hate old people?

It was AIDS Awareness Day. A bulk of people chanting in unison about it stopped to allow the old folks to cross the walkway towards the theatre. So picture a couple hundred elderly getting an earful about Aids from a couple hundred young people with signs and banners.

I quipped to someone that the people arriving could likely not make out the message being chanted and they quipped back that they would not care in the least even if they did. Ironically, old people in retirement homes are a feeding ground for the illness these young people were bringing to the forefront. Literally on almost deaf ears. The same ears that needed to hear this message.

I was happy that I did not have to stop a riot against the theatre. It was such a candid moment that I wished could have been captured on film. A moment to appreciate that the randomness of life and the colliding spheres within it.