The Best Stories Rarely Send an Invitation · Week 39
By Luca Bonafede · September 27, 2026 ·
A lot can happen in a week.
Especially in a week that was never supposed to exist.
By then I was meant to have left Newfoundland. Instead I gave the island seven more days, and I could only explain one of them: the Terry Fox Run. The other six explained themselves later, with a house party, a song on a Wednesday afternoon, a cove at night, two anniversaries and a party I very nearly slept through.
First, the run. To me, Terry Fox is a true Canadian hero and a sports hero too, my favourite of them all. Running it in St. John’s meant something, because this is the province where he began a journey that became much bigger than running itself. I ran it alongside the Alt Hotel team.
That was the entire plan. The week was not interested in my plan.
From running through St. John’s, I found myself at a house party breaking the Yom Kippur fast, surrounded by great people and incredible food. Nobody plans a sentence like that one. It just happens to you.
That has probably been one of the recurring themes of my Life: the best stories rarely send an invitation in advance. You just have to be available when they arrive.
The quietest moment of the week is the one that gave it a soundtrack. Wednesday afternoon, after work, in my apartment, “Kids” by MGMT (2008) was playing. No event, no plan, nothing to tell. Just an ordinary afternoon, that song, and the clear feeling that Life wanted me right there, in that room, in that moment. Not a week earlier, and not already somewhere else. There was nowhere else to get to. That is why it is the song of the week.
Fittingly, this was also a week that made me think about time. I often think about time, but this week more than ever. September has usually been my month of changes and moves, and so many anniversaries collided within days.
Thursday the 24th marked two years since I stepped into Canada for the first time. It started in Toronto, Ontario, where I lived for my first year. Two years later I was on an island in the Atlantic, with no celebration planned at all.
The celebration found me anyway. Unexpected and very welcome: someone took me to their favourite spot, at night. A cove, looking out at faraway ships slowly getting closer to the Narrows, under a nearly full moon. There was nothing to do there but watch. Remarkable. Perhaps the most Canadian way possible to mark the date, and certainly one I didn’t see coming.
A few days later came the bigger milestone: 15 years since I first left Italy and started travelling.
A decade and a half of countries, cities, homes, jobs, friendships, phone numbers, addresses, arrivals and departures. Add love, lust, a few situationships and more plot twists than any scriptwriter would get away with. But who would want to live it any other way?
15 years behind me. And somehow, it still feels like the beginning.
Life has a strange habit of filling the empty spaces better than you could have planned them yourself.
Meanwhile, the goodbyes kept going. Colleagues who somewhere along the way became friends. An absolutely delicious dinner at Terre. Parties basically every night. And somehow, new memories still being created while I prepared to say goodbye to the old ones.
A haircut somewhere in between, because apparently even chaos requires maintenance.
And then there are all the stories I’m deliberately leaving out. The conversations. The new people. The ridiculous moments. The unexpected turns. The stories that wouldn’t make sense without being there, and a few that are probably much better staying exactly where they happened.
The week ended at a party with old and new friends, one I came very close to missing. I was food pregnant on my couch after the remarkable dinner at Terre, trying to catch up on some sleep. Then, at around 1 am, I stood up and went. That is the power and beauty of living so close to the party area: just like with the gym, I had no excuses. I am so, so glad I did. Not for the music, but for the people. And it was at The Space, the place with that amazing way to the washroom, so it seemed the right spot to party one more night, since most of my St. John’s memories sit within a few hundred metres of each other.
What a memorable week. Damn, I love my Life.
I thought I was simply giving Newfoundland another seven days.
Turns out, seven days had a few more stories left for me.
A lot can happen in a week.
Thank you, and ciao for now.
Luca Bonafede
St.John's, NL, Canada 🇨🇦
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