Remember that scene in The Matrix where Neo and his team are frantically searching for an ‘exit’ from the Matrix when suddenly a brick wall appears out of nowhere blocking their path? Well, I had a similar experience today at the mall.

I parked my motorcycle, as I always do, in a “No Parking” zone right by the front door, knowing that I would be in and out in a flash, went up the escalator to the second floor, took care of my business, and when I returned to the down escalator I had hit my brick wall. Though the escalator was still running, strangely, it had been roped off and blocked by a potted plant both at the top and the bottom. There was no work being done, it was just blocked. I wasn’t irritated, just a bit confused and disoriented; I tend to get lost the moment I walk into any shopping mall even when there aren’t obstacles blocking my path! 

As I began searching for another way down and out, I began to realize that this slight shift in the sequence of events could have literally changed the course of my life’s history. Who knows what good (or bad) could have (or not have) come had I immediately left down that escalator. There’s no way to know. What I do know is that during the extra 120 seconds it took me to exit the mall a beautiful Lamborghini Spider was pulling up outside my house and got the chance to drool over it for a few seconds just as I was arriving home.