It's a small world after all

This is the house in which I grew up, located in Endwell, NY.  We moved in when I was 1 year old, in 1951.  My father, grandfather, and uncle built this house by hand.  It was a solid, cozy, comfortable home, and I have many happy memories associated with it.  My mother sold the house to a family in 1972 when she, my siblings, and I moved to Florida upon my graduation from college.  In the years since, whenever I've visited my hometown in upstate New York, I've always driven past the house and sometimes dropped in on our former neighbors, but I've never been back inside the house.

Fast forward to the present.  I work out at Curves in my current town in the Dallas area.  I also work there as a circuit trainer 1 Saturday every month.  My last shift was a week ago.  As I was performing my Curves duties, one of our regular ladies, Marge, came up to me and started chatting.  One thing led to another, and she told me she had recently returned from a trip to New York, where she had visited the gravesite of her late husband.  Marge is nearly 20 years older than I, but she's a tiny bit of dynamite.  She's funny, smart, active, and a joy to know.  She's originally from Vienna, Austria, so the adorable accent only enhances her charm. 

As we narrowed down the parameters of Marge's NY destination, it became apparent that we shared many common links.  She had actually been in my hometown!  Now, New York State is nowhere near as large as Texas, but it's not a tiny state.  She could have been anywhere, but she was in lowly Endicott.  Crazy!  We spent the better part of an hour talking about favorite restaurants, shopping, churches, schools, people, etc.  Then Marge mentioned a cousin who lived in Endwell, the small town abutting Endicott where my house is located.  Narrowing down the location even more by using Google maps on the computer, we soon realized that Marge's cousin lived on the street where I grew up.  (cue music from "The Twilight Zone")  I asked her which end of the street--there is a flat end and a very hilly end.  She said the flat end.  Okay, this is getting freaky now, because I lived on the flat end. 

At that point I told her the actual house number, and Marge got out her address book.  Yep, you guessed it.  Her cousin bought my family's house all those 38 years ago, and she still lives there!  You can imagine how Marge and I looked, with our jaws scraping the floor.  Incredulity doesn't even begin to describe it. 

Think about it.....2 virtual strangers living in north central Texas, and 1 of the strangers' cousin lives in the other stranger's childhood home in upstate New York.  What are the odds? 

I can't wait to have more conversations with Marge in the future.  Who knows what other odd connections we might discover?!!