Grow Up

I’m
not what you’d call a “Details Person.” Being a traveller, you’d think it’d be
the opposite- that I’d be all documents
folder this and estimated arrival
time that. But it’s the absolute contrary. There are some things that you
can only learn after being abandoned at a Vietnamese/Laoatian border control
office after a goat has pooped in your mouth, and one of those things is that seldom does life
on the road ever go to plan.

So I
don’t really plan.

(Guess
where this story is going.)

I was
off work on Friday, so Friday morning I slept in, had a lazy Skype date over
breakfast with South Africa, and pissed about the apartment moving shoes and
mixing pancake batter and positioning myself in various positions around the
flat, book in hand, intellectual gaze just
so. You know- in case the film crew of my life were taping at that moment
and I risked a double chin on the show reel of my existence.

As it
got to about one in the afternoon I thought, hmmmm, I’m going to Milan in about twenty minutes. I should pack.
When I went backpacking to India my boyfriend at the time said, ‘Okay, I think
we’ll head off to the airport in about five, that cool?’ and I replied, ‘Sure.
Let me just go see what I’m taking.’

To
reiterate: NOT A DETAILS PERSON.

When
I don’t have a lot of time I do things like spend seven minutes hunting out an
Italian plug-adaptor for my hair straighteners, but not, for example,
transferring the telephone numbers of the friend I’m meeting in Milan from my
email to my phone, or checking to see if my friend has messaged the address of
my final destination, as she’d promised to.

I
did, however, make sure that I was wearing very nice knickers.

I was
totally chill about this until, at the airport, with four minutes to go until
the gate closed, I realised I was going to get off the plane and not know what
to do next. I don’t have a smart phone with Internet, and Italy doesn’t
generally have wifi in public, so with three
minutes until departure I was crouched by the door to the plane, balancing my
laptop on my knee, using airport Internet whilst I could to Skype the only number I had for my friend- an American
cell phone number- and kind of freaking out when she didn’t pick up even though
it was ringing out AND WHAT THE FUCK MAYBE I SHOULD HAVE PLANNED THIS BETTER.

Alma
had mentioned the name of the metro stop in a Skype message last week, so I
checked my chat history to at least get that. That would be a small victory. From there, I'd probably remember from last time where to go. But my Skype message history was gone- OF COURSE IT WAS- and the name of the
metro stop I was to go to gone with it. Any small clue as to how to navigate my way across the city was totally unavailable.

By
the time I landed in Milan and took the hour-long coach ride to the centre, I
was shitting metaphorical bricks. Alma hadn’t called me, as my voicemails had
requested, and Alma always fucking calls. Alma is responsible. If Alma tells
you she’ll meet you at the bakery at two fifteen, the second coming of Christ
could signal apocalypse now and Alma will still text at ten past the hour to
let you know that she is early, and waiting with a brioche.

I did
the only thing I could think of: text everyone at home who might give a shit,
demanding they access my Facebook for me and report back as to what Alma had
said.

Are you awake? I NEED HELP. Am stranded
in Milan- can you log into my fb and see if Alma Rada has sent an address?
Password is vagina xx

My
password isn’t really vagina.

ANYWAY
then I had a barrage of texts from friends WHO WEREN’T GIVING ME THE ANSWER I
WAS LOOKING FOR because no, she hadn’t emailed. Also, I could hear their
judgement. Dear my friends: thanks for loving me in spite of my fucktard-ness. Also number two: shut up.

I
didn’t know what to do. At midnight, in the dark, and the cold, with tears
stinging in my eyes, I literally just stood on a street corner for the longest thirty-three
minutes of my life WILLING my phone to ring. Like, holding it in front of my
face and saying over and over again DEAR UNIVERSE. I WILL LEARN HOW TO PLAN
THINGS IN ADVANCE IF YOU GRANT ME JUST ONE PHONE CALL FROM ALMA TO TELL ME
WHERE TO GO.

She
called.

Her
phone had died and, as she’d been in transit herself, she couldn’t charge it. I
told her I thought she had died. She’d
just arrived at the apartment herself, she said. The kettle was on, and she explained
to me that mercury was still in retrograde- we’d been fighting a losing battle
all along. It was always going to be like this. The planet of communication in
reverse meant crossed wires were inevitable.

BECAUSE OF COURSE MERCURY IN RETROGRADE WAS THE REASON I HAD THE MOST STRESSFUL SIX HOURS OF MY LIFE.

Not my fault at all. 

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