In the soundtrack of our lives–I believe one exists–sometimes a word or phrase from a conversation with a friend or acquaintance stops us in our tracks.

That happened for me recently while wearing my Writer in Residence hat at the Scottsdale Public Library in a one-on-one meeting with another writer. She looked at me with kindness and said with a warm smile:

“I’ll bet you’ve had lots of angels in your life.”

My response? “Yes, I have!”

I am not a religious person, but most definitely spiritual. So, I took her observation to mean there are unexplained positive forces at play … weaving in and out of my life with love.

I have definitely had my share of “guardian angels” in my sixty-eight years.

Some have appeared at my side for long stretches. Tom (my husband), Helen (my mother), and Valerie (my therapist years ago) have been visible angels in my life with lasting influence.

Others, like Rachel–a nurse at Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis who floated in and out of my room in the middle of the night–helped keep me alive after I suffered a mild heart attack in 2017. She was mostly assuredly an angel.

Then there are the non-visible angels with wings that take flight in unusual ways. For instance, the serendipitous feelings of warmth and safety I feel when I am gardening, or singing, or swimming, or writing, or walking in nature.

Whenever this happens, I feel like angels are watching over me.

I’m a believer that whatever energy we spread in the universe in our everyday lives–good or bad–it eventually finds its way back to us in waves that envelope us.

As I get older, I find myself pondering these metaphysical or philosophical questions more closely. I’m more open to the idea of forces at play that don’t always add up mathematically or logically.

Certainly, at the end of the day–at the end of my life whenever that may be–I’d rather be held up by the wings of an angel for the love and goodness I’ve brought to the world than destroyed by the deleterious effects of a devil for the havoc I’ve caused.