Aberystwyth
Beach at Aberystwyth
London Lives decamped for a 36-hour jaunt to lovely Wales last weekend. The journey was in honour of a good pal’s significant birthday. Boo to not being able to have more time off work for the visit to Aberystwyth; I had to shoot there and back over a very short period of time. But what’s not to love about a long train journey, complete with coffee, iPod, book, writer’s notebook (always…)
There were football fans travelling up to Birmingham where I had to change. Good-natured banter, thankfully. Even when I noticed they were cracking open cans of Stella Artois at 11.00am. Then there was a very pretty journey on the section to mid-Wales.
Aberystwyth was beautiful. My first visit there and I was excited to see the sea for the first time in ages. There were walks along the seafront, new buildings to look at, introductions to new people, the pebbled beaches to explore. And great tapas and good wine with pals old and new. On to a pub for more wine, then we ambled back to hotels long the seafront, a brilliant and huge moon hovering over black sea.
After breakfast, another walk far along the seafront; far along past the university, the war memorial and on up to the marina and the river Ystwyth. Then we walked back along the beach, with its smooth grey pebbles. Splendid dogs roaming over them, their owners calling them back. And then I had to go back myself, through the pretty countryside, the occasional wind farm and hillsides of shaggy cows. Back to change at Crewe and a straight run to London Euston.
I picked up a beautiful smooth grey pebble from Aber. It rests on a cabinet in my bedroom, next to the conkers I picked up from Hyde Park last week.
Above is one photo of the beach. And I’m fond of a nice building with a date on it (below). More Aber pics to follow.
Led Astray
I met up with a good friend today (yes, you know who you are) to mooch to Muswell Hill for food and natter. It was fairly blustery walking weather and he suggested walking there instead of getting the bus (it’s probably about two miles).
It was indeed good walking weather as we made our way over Crouch Hill and into Crouch End, only to find our path halted by the large Oxfam bookshop there just past the church tower. Our plan to get there in half an hour was immediately cast aside in favour of a browse among the sections. This place manages to be neatly organised while offering promise in each section. Philosophy, thrillers and contemporary fiction all reside here. And there are vinyl albums with lurid covers and singles for fifty pence. What’s not to love? A charity shop hasn’t been this seductive for a long time.
Now, one of my reasons for increased use of public libraries is to borrow all the books I want and to avoid coming home with armfuls of them from charity shops. I didn’t come out with armfuls, but did manage to spend a fiver on two of them: Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine is always a good read (and a great study for plotting and psychological characterisation for other writers). I’ve also been looking out for Andrew O’Hagan’s The Missing for some time; I enjoyed reading his related articles in The Guardian in the nineties.
In truth, I could have spent at least twenty pounds on books from there today, but managed to restrain myself. My friend bought some books too and we continued on our way, ambling on up to the higher ground of Muswell Hill. Nice food in the restaurant and a small jaunt in another bookshop (just minutes from early Sunday closing, saving us from being led even further astray…)
Then the bus home and a drink in the sprawling pub nearby. Real ale in a proper speckled glass with a handle for him and a lush Rioja for me.
There’s a good sniff of Autumn in the air now.
Ever Stumbling
Walking through from Oxford Street to Edgware Road today took me along Wimpole Street, cutting across Queen Anne Street and New Cavendish Street. This is proper Marylebone; the Howard De Walden estate covers the entire area.
I’ve walked up Paddington Street from Marylebone High Street before, but managed to miss Paddington Street Gardens, which were once an additional burial ground for Old St Marylebone Parish Church in the 1730s. A useful information post at the gates mentions the nearby workhouse built in 1750 (enlarged 1775). This is just the kind of thing I am looking into for my novel, so was delighted to stumble across the very site quite by accident.
The area closed as a burial ground in 1814 ( a new one had opened at nearby St John’s Wood), although is still consecrated ground. There are – quite startlingly – probably 80,000 graves on the site of the gardens although most of the gravestones have now been removed and an archive of the records is kept by Westminster City Council. The Gardens contain many trees, including that staple tree, the London Plane.
From Edgware Road, I trundled along Harrow Road for a while. This is a great artery running along and under the Westway from Paddington. I’ve found out that this is the way to get to Kensal Green Cemetary (1833). This isn’t meant to sound morbid, but it’s a place I want to visit at some point. The history and statuary are quite something.
I got the bus back into central London from there. Near Knightsbridge I looked out of the window at a smartly-dressed young woman walking up to the traffic lights with her shopping. She had some kind of injury to her legs and walked with difficulty. She must have to do that every day. She walked with an awkward dignity and waited patiently for the lights to change. From the bus window there is often something to make you feel humble.
Hares, Mayfair and Paddington
For it was written that There Must Be Hares at the Royal Academy’s Summer Exhibition. It’s the law. These are by the late Barry Flanagan RA and are wonderful.
Lots of splendid stuff as usual (the Weston Rooms are my favourite; packed with smaller pictures of all kinds). Familiar favourites were there too (Bill Jacklin and Ken Howard), along with loads of new people to look up. In one of the main rooms, David Mach RA exhibited a piece called Silver Streak: a fabulous gorilla made of wire coat hangers. Stunning and clever.
Afterwards I wandered through Shepherd Market, a smart little enclave of restaurants in Mayfair. The area was still waking up at 12.30. These shabby old buildings (below) are nearby. An amazing contrast.
Later, I walked from Maida Vale to Paddington. Not in a very ordered or direct way, but along streets of mansion blocks overlooking Paddington Recreation Ground and others with semi-detached houses and smart cars outside. There was almost no one about. I’ve said this before, but sometimes London’s silence is astounding. It was like a silent suburban street from another time.
Back in Paddington, I ambled around some streets getting background for my novel. It’s not enough to look at maps on the internet or wade through archives (useful those these are). It’s important to walk it and to feel it. My brother said recently that I was having a big love affair with London. He’s right.
Dalmatian
Someone has left this model of a Dalmatian in Holloway Road. I’m sure sure why, but its expression is great.
Magnificent Maps
Maps are rarely just about geography…
So says the pamphlet for this is free exhibition at the British Library and – even sweeter – I had the afternoon off work to have lunch with a pal and to see it.
There are plenty of early maps of the world with beautifully-inscribed names and others which were displayed to convey their owners’ power. There were re-imagined maps of London as well as UK county and parish maps and a lovely Victorian schoolroom map of Europe with the names of countries and places carefully picked out in clear font. Some of those names and places shifted in early 20th Century Europe and then shifted right back again as the century closed. There were great propaganda maps, too.
The BL has a splendid philatelic collection too, displayed in pull-out glass cases. I could do with some of those at home to put things in.
On the way home I see a woman on the bench outside Tesco’s clutching a can of Special Brew and carefully writing inside a birthday card. In the next street to mine, the kids from the flats rush out into the road (no checking for traffic – they rush fearlessly out). Chasing and chasing one another, bikes flung down in the road as they rush along the pavements with sticks. I’m listening to The Smiths’ How Soon is Now.
Nathaniel Bryceson Lives On
I was very pleased to see this earlier today about Nathaniel Bryceson:
http://wcclibraries.wordpress.com/2010/07/21/nathaniel-bryceson-lives-on/
I wrote about his diary in my Research in Westminster post (7 Feb 2010)
All Our Fathers
The man who lives opposite took his dog out for a walk yesterday evening. It was not yet dark but the day was still blustery. The Springer Spaniel strained at the leash, pulling him along, then stopped suddenly to sniff at something on the pavement. I haven’t seen the man very often; he is thin with glasses, perhaps in his seventies. He waited patiently until the dog finished its explorations. Then the pair moved on. Seconds later, the dog stopped to sniff at something on a wall. Again the man waited patiently, the strong breeze blustering around him. And on they walked, stopping along the road as far as I could see.
I wondered what he was like as a young man and whether he’d always had such patience or if it had arrived with age.
This man is all our fathers.
Election Result: all three parties lost
Nope, I don’t know quite how that happened either. The Tories (shudder) haven’t got enough seats to form a majority government and Labour and the Lib Dems together can’t manage a majority via coalition. And we enter the territory of a Hung Parliament, last seen in 1974.
Other things last seen in the UK in 1974: lots of strikes and financial austerity. So, the current political crowd are in good company. We don’t really do coalition-type things here, so at the moment there is that curious British awkwardness going on. Whatever, the election has really gripped people’s imaginations and the café this lunchtime was full of people loudly proclaiming what they thought should happen.
And the latest is that the curiously shiny-faced Tory leader David Cameron is apparently reaching out to the Lib Dems, leaving Gordon Brown out in the cold.
The Queen has gone back to Windsor and appears to be waiting for the boys to sort themselves out.
Gordon Brown was pictured looking mightily peeved on the BBC and is probably plotting to change the locks at Number 10 at this very moment.
Obviously, the crowded polling stations I mentioned yesterday weren’t good news for everyone, particularly if they didn’t manage to vote. We don’t usually do that here either. The results for local London borough elections are due, too. Let’s hope they are a bit more straightforward. Watch this space.
Here we go, then…
Right. I’ve been along to vote on the way home from work and it was crowded. This is A Good Thing.
I love voting. I vote in the General Election (of course), the local elections (also today) and the European elections. There’s something special about General Election day: people trotting off to cast their vote in all manner of places (civic halls, local schools, portakabins, caravans, castles and others on the BBC here), all designated for the same purpose.
Yes, that’s all very rosy and no doubt we could end up with more of the same (although there’s still all to play for and I don’t remember an election being this close). But there is a shared sense of getting out there, polling card in hand, nodding politely at others in the queue, then being alone to make your decision.
There’s also something splendidly low-tech about voting: paper polling-cards, lists of names, rickety wooden booths, pencils on string. This morning on the way to work, I passed cheery women outside Friends’ House (the Quaker meeting house) in Euston, which had been open as a polling station for two hours.
I’m going to have a bath now. The polls close at 22.00. I’m trying to stay up as late into the night as possible to see the results (I’ll probably be snoozing peacefully on the sofa by 01.20…). Here’s hoping not.
