Kids These Days:

Sometimes there is no explanation for the things that happen to us — for those events that cause us to pause for a moment and realize that we have just participated in something very special.

A few weeks ago, my wife, Cay, celebrated our anniversary by giving me the gift of a future weekend in the Phoenix area to watch the Anaheim Angels (sorry, but I cannot bring myself to write “Los Angeles Angels”) and the Chicago Cubs play in a spring training game in Tempe, Ariz.

Cay had been in touch with Karol Nesdale, a former colleague of mine, to see if she and her husband, Mike, would be in Phoenix, as Karol and Mike have made the March trip for a few years.

Not only were they going to be in Phoenix, they were going to the same game, which took place Sunday.

We arranged to have dinner with Mike and Karol the night before the game and spent the meal catching up. The food and service at the Italian restaurant we chose was excellent. We could have eaten at McDonald’s and had a very good time, too, for it was not the meal that was special, but the company.

At the game the next day, we got a text message from our daughter, Kaitlyn, telling us that Geri and Mike Barr were also at the game with two of their three kids.

The Barrs are former Costa Mesa residents who were heavily involved in the community. Geri was a fixture at local schools, and Mike coached Little League and soccer, refereed soccer games and served a term as the commissioner of AYSO Region 120.

A few years ago, the Barrs packed up and moved to a town outside of San Antonio.

We connected with the Barrs at the game and discovered that the two kids, Katie and John, were both taller than me. I know that kids grow up, but that was a bit of a shock.

Not only do we miss the Barrs; Newport-Mesa misses them, too, as they are precisely the type of people we need to attract here.

We drove home after the game Sunday. On the road, we called Russ Zink to wish him a happy birthday. Russ and his partner, Sean Callaway, fall into that special category of people you know who are not family but are closer to you than most of your relatives.

Well, it just so happened that Russ and Sean are renting a house in Palm Springs this week, and because we were going to be driving only a few miles away on our way home, they insisted we stop by for dinner.

They did not have to insist too much and we told them we’d be by about 8:30 p.m. We stayed until 1 a.m. and drove home.

One weekend, three chance encounters with wonderful people in our lives. I don’t know what the odds are, but those meetings last weekend are something we will remember for a very long time.

Most kids go through a very long phase in life in which they look for happiness in the things they acquire. The phase can start at a very young age, then move through young adulthood to the “need” to have a certain car or perhaps clothes.

Trouble is, they realize too late that what will matter to us as we age are not the things in our lives that make us truly happy, but the people with whom we develop meaningful relationships.

It’s not very hard to teach this to kids. All we have to do is make sure they see us getting more joy out of our friends and family than our toys.

STEVE SMITH is a Costa Mesa resident and a freelance writer. Send story ideas to [email protected] .