538 PNJ

538 PNJ (with special thanks to ICBC's Tania!)

Wherever we go we leave our mark. Most places we land demand of us a record, a passport, an accounting of our existence. We need proof of our privilege to stay. We need the passwords in order just to pass through. So it becomes necessary to keep it academic, this multiple demands for identity verification and the subsequent search for age-old documents, or else one may too easily become quite frustrated. The necessity of address change, telephone change, driver's license change, vehicle registration change, health care change, banking address change, chequing account change, and then finding a new doctor, a new dentist, and even discovering new sets of contacts and making new friends all becomes part and parcel of the transition. And at each step of the way it is the helpfulness of yet another stranger, the considerations of unknown others, the happy co-incidences of the moments in the meetings that give the newcomer, the sojourner, the journeyer, and the neophyte to the new place the feeling that one is being accepted, that one is making the right choices, that the new life sought after is indeed headed in the right direction.

The smallest of gestures mean a lot.

Such was the helpfulness of Tania, of British Columbia's Insurance Bureau at the moment of my vehicle's plate-exchange. Her letting me choose the plate from those available meant a great deal. She might have just handed me one. I've seen plates on vehicles with all sorts of suggestive combinations, and there was a strong preference in me not to have my old steed saddled with such. After all, do not most people make inferences from letters strung together, such as 001 JRK, or how about, 000 SHT? And so, thanks to Tania, when flicking through the box of plates, I came across 538 PNJ.

538 PNJ: Five Virtues of Knighthood; Three Life Principles, and Universal Infinity, yoked to Pentelbury's New Journey. At least, that how I choose to see the new license plate. It inspires me! That one ascribes such sort of significance to things in the first place is somewhat silly, admittedly, but nevertheless, icons being what they are, symbols being what they are, I am grateful that I got to choose.

Courtesy, Compassion, Purity, Frankness, and Fellowship make up the symbolic old Pentacle of the Knights. Rightness of Mind, of Heart, of Body makes up the Triumvirate of Virtues. And as for the Unity of Eternity, always Contributing to the Health of the Whole becomes one's Holy Grail. Inasmuch as 538 then is attached to this new Journey of mine, here in Lala-Land (as my friends would have it,) so it is that my trusty old steed and I commit to carrying our new nameplate. Would that all one's baggage be so light!

Numerology, the Cabala, the Purple Meme, and Superstition itself shoved aside, we each are identified by a host of designated digits. Even one's telephone number may have significance. Interestingly, Canadians have to have a Social Insurance Number (a bona-fide SIN number!) And when I look at the nine digits of my own SIN number, I sure wish it wasn't quite so long! ha! Give me 538 any day! Especially on P's New Journey!