What is fate or destiny? Does everyone have their own map? Was Cleveland in my own personal star map?

By Greg Evans

I grew up on Cleveland Drive. The last baseball game I saw live at the old Yankee Stadium was against the Cleveland Indians. The city of Cleveland was founded on my birthday, July 22. Years later, I would write a monthly column for a Cleveland newspaper, The Plain Dealer. And there were other subtle signs that popped up over the years.

I have always been a spiritual person. There’s more to this world and its energy than we think. I’ve often wondered about destiny and fate and even luck playing a role in our lives, if it even does. How does it work? Why can Michael Jordan fly? Why were the last billion dollar Powerball tickets bought by people in faraway lands like Missouri and Texas. Was it just random luck, or was it something else?

Is fate or even destiny real or just a figment of our imaginations to give this weird world a sense of meaning?

Though often used interchangeably, fate refers to predetermined events beyond our personal control, such as not being able to throw a 99 mph fastball no matter how hard I try; whereas destiny is a predetermined outcome that we can actively pursue and shape. Then there is also biological determinism, a person’s behavior and characteristics are primarily shaped by their genetics and environment, which therefore manipulates their destination.

If you ask me, biological determinism resembles an ingredient in potato chips or plastic, like Butylated Hydroxytoluene, or Tetrasodium ethylenediaminetetraacetate.

I recall a specific time discussing this strange aligning of my stars with Cleveland, with my then girlfriend, “maybe it is some kind of weird destiny thing?” I said.

We were in Miami, and an article was about to go live with the Plain Dealer. It was a good article. I kept checking my email every five minutes for confirmation it was published. It’s always a rush, every time, seeing my words in print. It’s like a first kiss, over and over, and over again. While I waited for it, we had a deep conversation about destiny and signs that you are on a some predesigned roadmap, albeit, often subtle signs. The name of the street I grew up on was the first zinger for me, but was there more to it?

But then I got to thinking about it. Cleveland Drive is a long road.

It went across the entire town. There were a lot of kids that grew up on that street (or drive as it was labeled) over the years. I know a bunch of them that went onto interesting careers in different places, but none ended up in Cleveland. Cleveland wasn’t part of their star map. Why not?

Have you ever wondered about the differentiation of street vs. avenue vs. drive etc.? Could this offer any clues? A street generally runs east to west and is lined with buildings. An avenue generally runs north to south, is wider and may be lined with trees or medians. A drive, is often a winding or scenic road that is residential and its name influenced by the surrounding environment. There, you learned some useless knowledge unless you become an urban planner. But from what I can tell, not even they care about that.

Cleveland Drive is residential, somewhat winding, I guess scenic if you like real estate, and the environment, based on the definition, must heavily resemble the city of Cleveland. That’s good enough for me. But I think in this case its the name that is important.

So far, any roll of the dice for destiny being on the table based in events, places, or things in my life has been 50-50. And if I noticed anything in such a way that it could be considered destiny, it generally wasn’t expected.

So, when it comes to some weird mystical unexpected link to Cleveland, it is quite compelling. Everything else, not so much.

An example of what I thought was destiny, but wasn’t, was when I was in elementary school, middle school, and high school, I was positive I would marry this blond girl named Caitlin (who actually looks like she could have stepped off a boat from Poland, and lots of Poles settled in Cleveland, but I didn’t think about the Polish link until now); anyway, back then, I was sure it was my destiny to end up with her. That didn’t happen. God, did she dodge a bullet there.

By the age of 10, I did want to be a journalist, writing for a newspaper, but I also believed I was destined to play for the New York Yankees and hit homers, including against the Indians in old Yankee Stadium and then at Cleveland Municipal Stadium, or Jacobs Field, or Progressive Field. Nope. Those are just two examples of many times I believed destiny was involved, and was wrong.

There were numerous bumps in the proverbial “all roads lead to Rome,” which wasn’t true. But in essence, on the flip side, each decision led me eventually to Cleveland. Therefore, maybe that was destiny all along. It’s a tangled web. More confusing than the final level of Legend of Zelda.

But I must say. Writing columns for the Plain Dealer was a lot of fun. I was happy, having a good time. Destiny worked in my favor. Or maybe I am reading too much into this? I am a July baby after all.

Have you ever taken a step back, away from Instagram, Facebook, X, or one of the zillion other distractions to ponder how your stars align or have aligned? If you are not there yet, maybe you are on the way? Look closely at the signs. Take a trip for a week in Cleveland for a spiritual pub crawl awakening to figure it out. Destiny might be a map, but at least you get to choose which way to go.