Feeling blue, lost, scared and insecure following a profoundly sad three-year separation and finally a divorce, I prepared to board a plane at JFK in Sept. 1977. Under the gloomy cloud of anxious pressures and emotional turmoil, I had not even cried when I left my Midwestern home city a week earlier. I was numb maybe. I was leaving the US, my father country where I had been raised and bred, and heading for an entirely new life -- back to the womb of family and my mother country, Brazil, the country I had left 32 years prior.

My parents and my sisters had already returned and were there to help me re-create a life, now as the "father" to my three adolescent children, ages 13, 14 and 15. They were already with my loving and supportive family in Brazil awaiting my arrival to celebrate my youngest son's 13th birthday. I had had to rush my children ahead in July, dissipating all my desire of making the change less traumatic, but I knew they were safe, embraced in love. Still, it was imperative that I be there for them as quickly as possible.

As the universe is always present presenting presents, my sister, her husband and I had been invited to a gala party at one of New York's plushest hotels the night before my departure. We carefully and happily prepared ourselves for the big occasion, and off we went to meet our friends. During the course of the evening, we ran into and visited with an old friend from Illinois who introduced us to his associate, Bettina, saying that they, too, were leaving for Brazil the next day. We decided right then that I ought to change my airline and fly down with them on theirs. I rearranged everything quickly, and we all met at the airport the next day for the 10-hour flight south, going to the lounge beforehand to await our flight call.

As we walked into the lounge, Bettina spotted two business associates of hers and went to greet them, finding out that they, too, were going to São Paulo and would be flying with us. She also discovered that they were looking for a bilingual account executive to handle the most important account at their recently opened office. Her big beautiful blue eyes lit up like sparking sapphires when she asked me if I had a CV she could give them. Coincidentally, I was carrying one to review on the plane. She immediately took it to them and returned saying they wanted to talk to me during our flight. And so it was. As far as they were concerned, I was hired, but the final decision would only be made by the São Paulo office's general manager. 

As my friend and Bettina disembarked in Rio, the two gentlemen and I continued to São Paulo, getting off the plane together to a wonderful welcoming committee of my whole family, my children -- and a young couple I had never seen before. 

With this swelling wave of love flowing toward our threesome, I figured that the couple and my family knew each other and went about introducing my companions to all until I came to the strange couple I'd never met, discovering it wasn't necessary. The young couple, who had just met my family, knew the two gentlemen, and much to my surprise, my companions introduced me to them! They were the new office's general manager and his wife, who had come to welcome the firm's international VP and controller -- the two I had arrived with. Cool: Small world indeed.

While I had set up other interviews before I left the States and honored them, it was certain that this was the job I was to take regardless of possible better salaries or conditions. This gift, literally made in heaven, was one I would not slight. During this whole period, I felt as if I had been led and now was being provided with the next step. I guess I had just been too busy to worry about my next step when the big wide wonderful Universe stepped in with this "small world" incident to remind me that, however small or insignificant I may feel, I am very much a part of the whole.