Ramblings

I know I promised to write about all the crazy people I’ve met here, but I’m tired so I think I’ll leave it for another time. It takes work to think of those loonies again.

It’s another gorgeous day in London, and I just want to sit on a bench and look at 600-year-old buildings. That’s become my favorite past-time. Really, you can’t imagine it. When you see places in pictures and films, you automatically assign proportion and proximity to give it a sense of reality. When you finally see the object as it stands you realize that all of your preconceived beliefs are wrong. So, you have to go back and rearrange everything in your mind to fit reality.

It’s more exhausting than it sounds, especially if you’ve given these objects and places a lot of thought throughout the years. You have to sift back through the mountains of pictures filed away in the dark corners of your brain and change them. All of the boxes labeled “London, Eng-a-land” have to be pulled off the dusty shelves and its documents redrawn.

I’m reminded of The Alamo. Remember The Alamo. All my life I imagined that the crumbling building was located in some vast field with only the wind and the tumbleweeds to keep it company. When I made plans to see it for the first time, I imagined a long, bumpy bus ride to a lonely desert somewhere. It was a total shock to discover that the Alamo was located in downtown San Antonio, surrounded by modern buildings that overshadowed it with 20 stories of steel and glass. It still boggles my mind.

It will take time for me to rearrange all these places in my memories...and I still find myself feeling shocked every time I get off the bus and see Big Ben by the river - I imagined that he would be smack in the center of town, surrounded by “Ye Olde Arms” and “Queen’s Arms Inne” and people dressed in frocks and powdered wigs. I know, I know...but that’s how I imagined London.

I love sitting in St. James Park with the spun sugar steeple of Westminster Abbey peeking out over the trees. It looks like a fairy tale...I can squint my eyes and imagine what it would have been like for a maiden 500 years ago taking a break from scrubbing the stone floors of her thatched-roof house. It’s easy to go back through time in this spot I’m sitting it...but I have to block out the tourists with my hands.

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Big Brother Shocker - Housemate Dennis was booted out for spitting in the face of another housemate. It might be the accepted way of saying, "You're a twat" on the streets of London, but Big Brother didn't find it as effective.

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Lesson for the Day - Buckingham Palace, while being the “Official Royal Residence,” has only housed the Royal Family for less than 200 years. It started out as some guy’s house. All the cool stuff happened in other castles.

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