I decided to spend the long weekend in Italy this time. I went to see a friend in Milan and then I had to take a train to go to Padova, to visit the region in which my sister is currently living. My friend told me “yes, your train track is number 15”, or at least this is what I had understood. And it was right, but there was a trach change which happened last minute.
Unfortunately, because I live in Switzerland and the train tracks don’t change so often once they have been established, I just got on the train 😊 My train coach was awesome, I was alone, had place for my stuff and even wifi. Luxury for an Italian train! I kind of checked my ticket again and I was in the right coach and seat, so I started to relax and thought “this is great, I can even watch the royal wedding now!”
I look and I see the coach is not empty anymore, and a woman looking like famous actress Stefania Rocca is approaching my seat. Oh my God, she is sitting next to me. Fantastic! I can’t wait to talk a bit to her. She was so famous during my teenager years and appeared in real cool movies. So, I immediately introduce myself and I ask her: “So! Are you also going to Padova?” and She says: “actually I’m going to Rome!” (which makes sense. She is an actress, for heaven’s sake, what would she do in Padova?). I suddenly realize, there is no way this train is taking me to my destination, there is a geographical impossibility in all this. UuuuPs! So, the famous actress had to tell me: “look you are wrong. You have 10 minutes to get out. I’m sorry you missed your train!” I even had the time to take a selfie with her!!! All thanks to my mistake. I would have never met her if I had taken the right train.
Ok ok, I know what you are thinking. This created a discomfort in the situation. What if it was late at night and I had missed the train? Well, goodbye to the WHAT Ifs and live the NOW. I had to solve the situation. I had just had a selfie with an important Italian actress of the 90s, but I needed to get to my destination. I find another train, pay an additional fee because it was a different kind of train (!) but it wasn’t too much, so I could still cheer. Now that I am writing this piece of blog you will see in a few days, I’m thinking that thanks to this mistake, so much magic was created. The sequence looks like this in my mind:
Magic of a great night out in Milan with one of my most important friends – Wrong but beautiful train – met Stefania Rocca, had a selfie with her – managed to get to another train where I met an Argentinian guy and got to talk about Argentinian and Italian wines, watched the Royal wedding partially – got some extra time to myself.
All this was not gonna happen without this mistake. Make mistakes sometimes, get lost. Don’t feel stupid or bad about this. Do not judge it. It is OK, you have the best resource at hand: YOURSELF. There is so much magic in mistakes, there is so much magic in the creativity of getting out of a mistake. I am rediscovering my country: how luck am I?