Tony and the Trickster

The Trickster is a Jungian archetype. One of the best examples is the sneaky, lurking Gollum character in Lord of the Rings, orginally named Smeagol. He usually had an agenda of one kind or another that prompted him to mislead the hobbits on numerous occasions and to trick them into believing he could be trusted. The Joker in the Batman movies is another example. But when we encounter a trickster synchronicity, it’s as if the universe is playing a joke on us.

When Tony, a retired accountant, was in his late eighties, he moved into an assisted living facility in Georgia, where one of his daughters was director of nursing. A short time later, a high school classmate from Illinois – from more than seventy years earlier – moved in across the hall from him. When his daughter marveled at the synchronicity, Tony remarked, “The universe has a twisted sense of humor. I don’t like her any more now than I did back then.”

But in a sense, the trickster had brought his life full circle.