How did we get here?!

By Rhiannonw

Wed, 22 Apr 2026
  • 190 reads
8 comments
 

How small a deviation
can lead you far away –
not to your chosen destination,
but to an unexpected place, astray!

*Once we missed our path
when from a hill descending,
took one angled slitghtly to the right
and when we reached the bottom we found
we were far from where we had been bound!

Another time our Satnav changed
the route we’d chosen to go home.
It proved a pleasant route to roam,
and, unexpectedly, we found we would pass near,
in fact right by the house of old friends, very dear
whom we had not seen for quite a while
– unplanned mistake that brought a smile!

*https://www.abctales.com/story/rhiannonw/lost-poetry-monthly
[IP: in an unexpected place]

Certificate U
Poem
Families
Inspiration Point (work that responds to our weekly writing cue)
Autobiography

Comments

Submitted by HarryC on

Ah, those unplanned journeys, serendipity, the frustrating joys of getting lost. No need for it to happen now - more's the pity. Life can become too predictable that way. Too deterministic for me! I still enjoy going out unguided and ending up somewhere I'd never seen before, and wouldn't have seen otherwise. 

Submitted by Rhiannonw on

smiley Of course ordinary maps can be useful then, and the skill to still know how to use them! Our grown-up children did, in alarm, get us a little hand-held satallite locator when they first came out as they were alarmed at how often we were getting (temporarily) lost on our walks in the hills!

But exploring new places is a delight isn't it, everywhere is so different from what you expect, when you get there!

Thank for read and comment, Rhiannon

 

Submitted by Di_Hard on

I remember your piece about stopping by to visit friends, I am so sorry, must have done a repeat IP!
A mobile sat nav sounds a really good idea :0) I remember we were out in the middle of nowhere and lost, and I grudgingly admitted that phones could be useful, only to find there was no signal :0)

 

Submitted by Rhiannonw on

thanks, Di, but, no, I don't think it's a repeat IP! I just thought of those two incidents as suited. I can't find the piece I wrote about visiting the friends on here, but the one about the walk seems to have been from a 'poetry monthly post' about 'roads'. Rhiannon

 

Submitted by Makis on

Apparently many sat nav's in Wales are now guiding hundreds of people to Pwllheli to watch Keith and Marge renovate the Capel Salem. The small town is now bustling with people and purpose.

 

Submitted by Rhiannonw on

There are some lovely homes from converted chapels, a friend had a pulpit in his living room, and the gallery was his work area, and I think he had to agree to look after the graveyard!

But it is sad to think of the love that built them, but no-one to use them for their original lively and reverent purpose. But some are used again for good purpose as new believers gather together.

There it another Capel Salem (Salem from the Welsh for Jerusalem) depicted in a famous painting of a lady dressed traditionally entering reverently into the meeting (high black hat and shawl, though I think the painting was staged with a much more ostentatious shawl than normally worn). Sadly it became famous as the creases in the shawl were said to look like the devil's face there. Of course his minions are often at people's elbows to tempt! Rhiannon

 

Submitted by Makis on

There's no doubt that the Capel Salem is bringing the community back together in Pwllheli, as the main chapel hall is becoming a community focal centre and had over a thousand visitors when the first community event was held recently.  

 

Submitted by Rhiannonw on

Intereresting! Rhiannon