I couldn't help but wonder...

Thanks to its compactness, New York is a hotbed of coincidences. One can only go so long before running into a familiar face unexpectedly, on the street, in a store or, in this latest case, on the subway. I was waiting for the train at a stop I rarely use after dinner with a friend, and as it pulled up I noticed a pair of turquoise shows in the seat nearest the door I was about to enter. The doors slid open and I just about walked into Julia, who was in the car and had gotten up to switch seats. I hadn’t even known she was out that night and we spent the rest of the commute chatting while intermittently commenting on the unlikelihood of the situation. Being on the same train would have been strange enough…we’d been at the same door.

Several nights later, fate laid another concurrence on us. I was out with my buddy S and her friends, and Julia was out on a date. At a certain point in the night she said good-bye to the fellow and called to see what I was up to. She also knew that her good friend from Philly was in town, but she doubted she’d see us both.

When she called, I was walking with a gaggle to China One, an Oriental-themed bar with a dance space in Alphabet City. I gave Julia the details in case she wanted to join, and she said she’d check on her friends whereabouts and then report back to me.

“You’re not going to believe this,” she said when she called back. “L is at China One as we speak.”

So, what followed was a happy happenstance reunion of sisters, friends, former coworkers and new friends-of-friends. Again, we couldn’t help but comment on the unlikelihood—of all the bars in Manhattan, of all the places we could have gone, my friends and Julia’s friend chose the very same locale.

And, as Carrie Bradshaw would say, that’s the thing about New York. Sometimes it feels like a lonely place, but really, there are friends around nearly every corner.