None of us knows what the next change is going to be, what unexpected opportunity is just around the corner, waiting a few months or a few years to change all the tenor of our lives. ~Kathleen Norris

When the second semester of my junior year began in January, a new guy started showing up around our table to watch us play bridge in the student center, and after a while this “new guy” began offering to go get my food and soft drinks as well as my cigarettes. (Yes, sadly, after my father’s death I took up smoking, a bad habit which took me a long, long time to break.) My card buddies called him JP and said that he’d been teaching them to play pinochle. Since I was always up for learning new games, I asked if he’d teach me to play pinochle too, and he seemed to jump at the chance. So it was that I learned to play pinochle, and shortly thereafter one of the five most unexpected events of my life occurred. JP (AKA James) and I began dating that spring, and then we became engaged at the first of June and were married by mid-August. No, it was not a “shotgun” wedding. It was just as the line in the movie says, “when you meet the right person, you want your life together to start right away.” Yes, Danny, did ask me to fork over the $50.00 since our wager wasn’t due to be over until October.

Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen. ~Ephesians 3:20-21  ✝

**The two topmost images on the left of collage found on Pinterest, others are mine, and I created the collage