I/we had another ioL day today which felt very good as a way of saying goodbye to a tough year. We went for a lovely lunch at our friend Lala's place in North London and she cooked us up a kind of pie (she called it) with puff pastry and veggie toppings of asparagus, red pepper, tomatoes and goat cheese. I was so hungry I dove in forgetting to take a picture. It was lovely and turned out a lot better than the pizza I tried.
She also made a side of green beans, snap peas, and orange pieces with toasted hazelnuts. I did manage to take a photo of the lemon cheesecake. We loved the crust which was almost as thick as the cheesecake part and she told us it was crumbled up digestives (oaty cookies) with butter and some honey—it was divine.
After a few hours playing with her friends daughter who was Gryffin's age, Carrie took G home and I went to try and weezle my way into see the sold out artist talk at the Hayward Gallery with my favourite author, Jeanette Winterson and contemporary artist Tracey Emin...and I got IN! These two female artists are an amazing gift Britain has given the world. It was so validating and timely for me to hear them both talk about how important the “self” is in their writing/art.
Then after that---there's MORE—just a ways down the Thames I got to go and experience a contemporary art event—The bombing of London with poems! It's called “Rain of Poems, and is created by the Chilean arts collective Casagrande who fly a helicopter and drop 100,000 poems over cities that have been bombed. According to their statement, “this performance creates an alternative image of the past and is a gesture of rememberance as well as being a metaphor for the survival of the cities and people.” It was amazing to see the hoards of people get so excited to try and catch the poem bookmarks out of the sky.
Walking home along the Thames I was pensive reflecting on how different this “trip” has been from my semester in college. I knew a different London then. It was the fall of 1992 and I was working for a solicitor's (law) firm four days a week as an internship and going to class on Fridays. What I knew of Central London wasn't art galleries but various court houses where I attended as a solicitor's representative in my black Jones of New York business suit and pantyhose! I took notes on the cases for our firm and passed notes between our clients and the barristers who tried the case (with wigs and robes) and the barrister couldn't speak to my client without me present. I even had to bow to the Queen every time I entered and exited the courtroom because I was a “member of the court”. My social life, was well, social past 7pm and involved lots of pub nights and hanging out with college friends. I was, get this, IN the closet with my girlfriend who came with me and we manage to hide our relationship to our other three flatmates. I remember feeling very isolated going to “work” four days a week on the tube where no one made eye contact and I was often on my own during court days. And again I find myself feeling isolated without a community of close friends or family to support us. And yet, I feel glad that I've known London in the ways I've come to know it. It has become in a way a part of me in the same way that living in New York City has. I have come to know these two places from a lived experience and with that feel as if I have this access card to them that I can use whenever I choose. So here's to London...I'm sure I'll be back to see you through another set of new eyes someday, but for now you keep calm but I must carry on.
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