The Right Place at The Right Time or is Called Fate

by Shannon Streno on Friday, July 1, 2011 at 6:24am

I have a very interesting story of my life to tell you about, I am a collector of books I collect every book I can find about the Bible. I go to yard sales the Good Will and New and used book stores, well one day I was miles away from my home working and out of the corner of my eye I saw this tiny little used book store so I stopped in and I search the store and found this really old worn out book from the 1950′s it was a red soft covered little book the tiltle read The Gospel of John. I thought neat I will buy this, so I bought the book and as years went on I would carry this book to work with me and read it often ,

Years and years later I open the very front of the book and I found a place were a person could right their name on a line and put in the Date on the very Day that That person Became a Believer in Jesus Christ .

Well when I read the hand written Name that was written in 1953 I hit the floor it was my Grand Mother Ruth She wrote her name in it. At the time I read this it was the year 2001 , so 47 years later I have a book that was lost and it belong to my Grand Mother at one point in time .

Ok heres the Kicker My grand mother Ruth has been dead for 20 years and I found the little book of John’s Gospel three towns away in a hard to find Little used book store Amazing !!

Wait it gets better. I have been reading this book for years and never open the cover I never really fully possessed the book I never really owned it because I did not read it cover to cover if you know what I mean.

My entire family never new that My Grand Mother Ruth was a Christian we have always wondered and now we know my whole family rejoiced when they found out that when we get to Heaven we will be with Grandma Ruth. Even though she was in Heaven the seed she planted many years earlier even after her death was still being watered from a little Red worn out book that she took the time to write her testimony in and proclaim she Believed In Jesus . Praise Jesus !! No one knows how many other people read the book and put their Faith in Jesus.

So you never know when you might be in the right place at the right time. I would say that it was the Lords will that led me to that little used book store at that very day to buy My Grandmothers book.

On the actual eve of my graduation from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, I sat in the middle of the campus with a few close friends and drank and smoked as we’d done a thousand times before. With no sleep, I dragged myself through graduation and, then, grabbed my bags and went home for good.

Jobless for months, I was lucky to have a sister who allowed me to live in her family’s home until I could get on my feet; unfortunately, with being unemployed, my presence became too much to bear and I was asked to leave. My mother, through a friend, was able to find me an apartment, so I avoided homelessness. However, this only added to the stress I already had become accustomed to, because, now, I would have no choice but to quickly find a job.

I bounced from one meaningless job to another—door-to-door phone-service salesman, temporary post-office work—until I, finally, found a temp-to-hire data-entry position at a reputable company. Not the sort of employment I expected for myself, considering I’d recently graduated, but it was a stable bring-in-money-for-the-rent income that I sorely needed at the time. And because it wasn’t a guaranteed full-time hire, I had to show everything I had in me to prove I belonged…and I did. Eventually, I was asked if I wanted to become full time, and of course, I responded in the affirmative. I was scheduled to take a drug test and was told that, following a negative result, I would be granted an official position.

A few days later, Human Resources called me into the office and informed me a background check had been conducted and that the findings were such that I would not be granted employment. I scanned the report she’d handed me and, in complete shock, I shook my head. I’d never even been in the back of a police car, never even seen a jail’s interior; I tried to convince her that the person on this sheet was not me (found out later it was my cousin’s alias)…but she, simply, instructed me to leave. As the security guard stood over me as I gathered my things, I cried.

At the time, that job appeared to be the greatest thing that could have happened to me. I would have been able to pay my rent; I wouldn’t have had to accept the occasional–yet helpful–eight dollars from my sister to help me eat; I would have, once again, had a sense of self—but, fortunately, even though things had not worked out, I was guided into an opportunity—again, a temp position, with the possibility of permanence—with a company that would encourage me to use all of my talents. This media company gave me the chance to utilize—and build on—various skills I’d picked up over the years–writing, proofing, background office work (something I’d done all through high school and college)–and I was happy.

And I remain so.

I have seen your cool idea and would like to contribute an artistic take with the wildest collection of chance art you will ever find. First, I would like you to see my new photographic technique- I have been working for almost 5 years to perfect this new approach to fine art composition using only moving water and a D300. My work is quite unique, and I have searched the globe for others who might use this particular aleatoric method, but to no avail. Every image you will see in my website is a digital photograph of moving water, and these amazing images are found on the roiling surface of my small Koi pond at my home in Houston. The magical fish have for years given me chance images that sometimes make the hair on the back of my neck stand up upon discovering them. This is truly an untapped well of creative freedom that I have literally stumbled on by chance in 2006. Please witness my madness at http://jcolemanmiller.com and let me know if you think this might be a good story.
I have also created a movement of chance based artists from around the globe who use aleatoric methods in the commission of their works, and have put together a web gallery featuring 21 of the best examples of chance artists in our time. I hope you will read about all of us at http://aleatoricart.com. We are intent on bringing chance art to the forefront of the collectors minds, and are passionate about educating and inspiring a new generation of artists with our modern takes on rarely discussed chance methods, which have been used for thousands of years in the creation of fine art. I have produced a nice coffee table book about these creative souls and have sold a whole bunch of them at $120! I can send you one if you like, as my gift to the movement.
I ask you spend a few minutes on my websites to catch my drift, which for you should be easy, and hope that you will enjoy what you find in my pages. This was a massive effort that came together in December when we debuted our group during Art Basel Miami at our hugely successful Aqua Wynwood show.
Thank you for your time,
J. Miller
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Please check out our “Godfather” at http://anti-theory.com

I wake up every morning thinking nothing is left.
I’m wrong our daughter is still here but the love of my life is not. He’s been gone for 8 months and still every morning its like a shock again that hes gone.
Had to leave the house, pack up and get rid of stuff there meant a lot, how do you move on from feeling everything is gone.
I wish i knew the answer and I wish I could tell our daughter IT WILL BE OKAY but I can’t say it and mean it.
There is just noting left NOTHING but sadness that is not gone.
Our daughter says mom is there anyway to bring papa back hate saying no baby it’s just you and me and all the memories.
Right now the memories are hard to deal with and she thinks i’m not sad because i try to be strong for her.
It seem like there is nothing left no love no joy and i no longer have no answers…. why is all there is left and that’s pretty much nothing…