Crashes - Coincidence, faith or scripted?

I retired from the Canadian Forces after 23 years of Service at CFB Borden, Ontario and in 2015, I started working in Ottawa. While our house was for sale, I traveled every weekend between the two locations. I would leave Ottawa after work on Friday and return on Sunday afternoon. When the spring hit and weather got nicer, I started using my motorcycle; a bran new Ducati, it was a beauty! The winding roads through the Hastings region mountains between Renfrew and Orillia, made the rides so much fun.   The inherent dangers of riding were obvious to me and so, I remained conscious of animals and other hazards a might face during these long treks. Riding mid-afternoons would greatly reduce the risks…so I thought!

One beautiful Friday after work, I jumped on my motorcycle and headed westbound highway 417. Although it was a beautiful end of May with the sun shining and weather was warm, something did not feel right.  I had this weird feeling over me, the type of feeling you hear sometimes where someone was supposed to get on a specific flight, ended up on another one and that first flight crashed. I felt like something was wrong but could not figure out what it was. So much so that I kept asking myself if I should turnaround and return to Ottawa. In any case, I continued to Renfrew where I stopped to 30 minutes debating if I should go back or not. I remember saying to myself, I just need to take it easy, wear my motorcycle gear and everything will be fine.

 The ride was great, road was nicely paved and barely any traffic. I was going to be home in no time. As I am coming out of a tight curve with a steep decline, a deer jumps over the guardrail over the oncoming lane and lands right in front of me. Within the blink of an eye, I crash into the deer, hearing the front forks of my bike slam into the front of my engine below. All I remember is hearing the loud noise.  When I return to my senses, I am sliding on my back in the oncoming lane and once I stopped, I look up to the sight of my motorcycle sliding down the hill and collide with a small bridge below. I was badly burnt on my back and sustained other minor injuries. I am very thankful today for the lumberjacks who ran out of the woods to call 911 and provide first aid. I was in shock, badly burnt and no cell service (even emergency did not work). Let’s just say, I was in trouble.

 During the recovery period and years that followed, I sat there thinking of what happened that day, wondering if there was a part of me, someone out there or a force in the universe who already knew the outcome and was trying to prevent it from happening.  I am not religious or spiritual whatsoever, but still wonder to this day what that feeling was. I felt it several times serving in Afghanistan between 2005 and 2007, it probably saved my life several times.

The other thought that continues to come to mind is that the collision with the deer, though seemingly the result of coincidence, speaks to the complex interplay of chance, patterns, and environmental factors that shape our world. It’s a powerful reminder of how, even within vast and seemingly random spaces, events can align in ways that feel both improbable and inevitable.

At its core, the collision was the product of a convergence of forces: time, location, instinct, and circumstance. Nature operates on rhythms—deer have migratory patterns, feeding habits, and movements driven by their own survival instincts. The deer wasn’t at that exact spot just to collide with me; it was likely navigating a familiar trail, searching for food, or moving to avoid something else. Its presence at that time wasn’t random in the broader sense, but in the moment, it was one of countless unpredictable variables coming together.

My motorcycle ride was also part of a larger set of interconnected events: the road I took, the speed I was traveling, the time of day, the weather conditions—all of these factors play a role. The deer didn’t predict I would be there, nor could I predict the deer. But because both of us happened to occupy the same place at the same time, a moment of convergence unfolded. In a universe where so many things are moving, and so many decisions are being made in real-time, this kind of coincidence can seem strikingly improbable. Yet, on a long enough timeline, accidents, especially in the realm of nature and human activity, begin to feel almost inevitable.

The odds might seem astronomical. There are vast spaces for both humans and animals to occupy. But consider how often people pass through similar areas in the same ways every day, or how animals follow instinctual paths or react to environmental changes. There are patterns within chaos—be it a deer’s movement through the woods or my once-a-week route—things lining up in just the right way at just the right time.

From a broader perspective, it’s a reminder of how interconnected all events are. The deer wasn’t just a random animal that appeared in front of me; it was part of a web of environmental cues, instinct, and momentary decisions. Similarly, I wasn’t just a person riding through space on a motorcycle; I was part of a broader context of time, movement, and choice. In some ways, every collision, accident, or instance of “bad luck” arises from countless minor interactions that accumulate over time.

So why did it happen? Why did two seemingly unrelated paths intersect? Perhaps it's simply the nature of life: the randomness of existence, the way time and space work to create moments of chance, and the fact that in a world full of movement and unpredictability, the collision of seemingly impossible odds is always a possibility.