Influential in Scottsdale

The Scottsdale portion of our visit was just as nice as the Tucson part, albeit in a different way. As everyone knows who has been to Arizona, the Phoenix and Tucson metro areas are very different in character. My aunt and uncle's place in west Tucson was practically a desert museum all its own. In contrast, Scottsdale felt almost like Miami, given all the water and greenness we saw.

We stayed two nights at the La Quinta, but on the afternoon of the wedding, we relocoated to downtown Scottsdale to the Saguaro, a boutique resort hotel that was literally within yards of where the wedding took place, which was in an outdoor plaza in the main public park near downtown. It was obviously an older motel hotel that had been renovated with bright southwest colors and hip decor. It reminded us both of the Jupiter Hotel in Portland.

The lovely ceremony was followed by a reception at the nearby AZ88 Bar, an elegant lively place which seemed the spot to be in Scottsdale on a Saturday night, given the groups of young women in short skirts that came in as we dined on the outdoor patio. One group looked like they had just come from a prom, although there were unescorted by dates. I made Red laugh by mimicking the way that each young woman seemed to adjust her short skirt as we walked up to the entrance in heels.

As we sat out our table, drinking cocktails and looking out at the public commons, I asked Red, "so did all this happen because of that night we went out walking here?"

"Pretty much," she said. She knew I was referring to the time a few months ago, when we were both down here in Scottsdale just after the new year, staying with her friends---the couple who had just been married. On the last evening we were here, when all four of us were in the car, I spontaneously asked our hosts if we might visit downtown Scottsdale.

At the time I felt a bit as if I were imposing on them, especially since it was late on a winter's evening, and it turned out to be quite a drive on the freeway from where we were at the time. But our hosts complied with my whim. After window shopping along the art galleries, I had spontaneously wandered off into the public commons, with Red trailing behind me. Our hosts had followed us and waited by a fountain while we walked around in the dark.

Later, according to Red, they decided to have their ceremony right beside that fountain where they had waited for us, and which was in view of the patio of the AZ88.

It occurred to me that the particular sequence events of the wedding and the reception were seemingly a consequence of my whim that evening. I had almost kept my mouth shut.

Frankly I'm not used to having such influence over other people's lives. Whenever I try to do so, it usually doesn't work out very well. But it seemed to work out this time because it was completely unintentional. I felt like a cog in a big cosmic machine, one that played a role without even being aware of it.

That's the kind of influence I can live with.