Serendipity

Today was one of those days.  One of those good days where everything feels good, you're in sync and nice little things happen along the way.

I woke up before the alarm went off.  45 minutes before I had planned and so was able to savour a little lie-in and the fact that I was already ahead of schedule.  I arrived at the train station and the train pulled in, on time, a couple of minutes later.  The journey to the city really did only take 12 minutes.  I arrived at my first gig of the day (I was volunteering as a roleplayer for people being trained as mediators) right on 11am only to find that everyone had already gone to their separate break out rooms.  I knocked on the first door I came across and that was the room I was supposed to be in.

During the morning I met a professional contact I hadn't seen for a while.  In the space of 5 minutes it became clear that we could be professionally valuable to each other.  I was able to give her one of my brand new business cards which has my photo on it.  She commented that the photo was a great idea, because she'd always be able to link my name and my face.  One of her colleagues then joined us and asked for two business cards because she could see a link that was valuable to make.

I skipped out of there and went to collect my mail.  There was a letter there addressed to my post office box number, but it wasn't for me.  Another man was returning a letter to staff that had also been put in his box by mistake.  As we left, he turned to me and said: "I hope that wasn't a cheque for a million dollars that you just gave away."  I laughed, but thought if it was a cheque for a million dollars, it wasn't mine anyway and I'd just returned it to its rightful owner.

Off to catch a tram for my next appointment.

I arrived at the tram stop and discovered I had a 14 minute wait and that would mean I'd be late for my appointment.  I decided to board the tram that was waiting and connect with a train down the road.  When the tram I was on arrived at the train station, the tram I needed was waiting at the red light.  I was able to change trams and arrived at my appointment with 5 minutes to spare.

My appointment was with the hairdresser.  I walked upstairs and was covered in capes and towels, when I received a message that a friend of mine whom I hadn't seen for a while was at the basin downstairs.  She had seen me as I walked up the stairs past her.  I went down to say hello while she was having her hair washed.

I walked out of the hairdresser and the tram was waiting for me.  I made the journey home without getting caught in the rain.

You might read this and think "so what?"  Well I think life is all about how you see things.  I choose to see today as a string of happy coincidences or discoveries - serendipity - which left me feeling good about the world.  Maybe it stemmed from the fact that I volunteered today and have given a lot of my time and skills lately to help others.

I logged onto my computer and checked in for tomorrow's flight.  I couldn't print my boarding pass because of some kind of error (I don't think the airline system likes the fact I use Google Chrome as my browser).  Instead of getting frustrated about potential hassles at the airport tomorrow, I'm wondering who I'll meet in the queue.