There is a subtle kind of faith, which is like connective tissue, which under-pins my life and spreads a growing sense of ease and harmony through my days. It is a simple belief that even though I can’t see it immediately, things are always working out for the best. It is a form of relaxing into whatever is going on around me, and trusting that everything will work out. It is a humble faith in the unknown, in the unseen, in the supportive arms of the universe.

This is how it works.  When a problem crops up, I assume that it is taking me on a journey that will be even better than the one I had planned.  When we arrived in beautiful Taormina, Sicily, mum couldn’t walk up the vertiginous streets from the historic center to our apartment.  So I decided to risk driving here.

In Sicily, the streets are like spaghetti, thin twirling strands that are hard to comprehend and often hair rising to drive along, and nowhere is more torturous and complicated than Taormina.  Fortunately I had already scoped out a ‘safe’ parking spot in the center and how to get there.  But nothing went to plan. I couldn’t park and I couldn’t return, so the only way forward was to plunge down a tiny side road heading away from the center. I took a deep breath and thought, ‘This will work out!” –  even though that idea seemed to defy logic. Fortunately the detour turned out to be the best route past the three places we wanted to visit; the public gardens with their phenomenal views of the bay, Trattoria da Nino with its mouthwatering truffle pasta and the ancient Greek amphitheater. The journey was a little nail biting at times – especially when my 88 year old dad had to use a lifetime’s parking experience to shoehorn us into a space with only a few millimeters leeway, but this unplanned adventure was one of the highlights of our trip.