Destiny's child -- The other one

I don't know if we each have a destiny, or if we're all just floating around accidental-like on a breeze, but I, I think maybe it's both. -- Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks)

Looking for treasures?  You might try the garage.

You know, lurking in those musty boxes weakened by time and multiple relocations over two or three decades

Digging through way too many of those boxes to admit we even had over the weekend in preparation for an upcoming garage sale, we came across my birth announcement from way back in 19-something or other.

 

I had no idea we even had it.  But there it was, waiting to be rediscovered amid faded receipts, ticket stubs, press badges to the Academy Awards, Cannes Film Festival, Sundance and Toronto film festivals and such.

"Hey, look at this," Suellen said.

"Yeah, cute," I responded.

It was the same feigned semi-interested tone I used when things like old business cards, lost shoes that finally completed a pair and a calculator I can use in the office suddenly emerged from Mount Rubble; the embarrassing result of years and years of unforgivable rat-packing.

Then we really looked at it and were stunned.  OK, maybe not stunned, but flabbergasted for sure.  "Announcing" is not an unusual word to be on a birth announcement.

Combine that with a sketch of a baby -- aka yours truly -- gripping a microphone and one (at least this one) can surmise that a future in broadcasting, public speaking and, yes even stand-up comedy is a done deal.

I had never known, or perhaps forgotten, how much I weighed at birth.  Now I know; 5 1/2 pounds.

I can't believe it.  I was a little baby!  That's odd because I've been fighting weight gain and riding the diet roller coaster for as long as I can remember.

There is no way to scientifically prove that a career in broadcasting, public speaking and stand-up comedy was predetermined.  I can say with total clarity that the "little baby" connection is real, though.

If I had a nickel for every time I've been called "You little baby" over a bunch of decades (mostly when there was some medicine that pegged the disgusting meter to take), I'd be a rich destiny's child.

I'm going with the destiny conclusion on all of it.  After all, who am I to question the revelations of Forrest Gump and Dr. Frankensteen (Gene Wilder from Young Frankenstein)?