Wednesday, January 25

January 25, Wednesday

Activities:  Daytime temp broke the 50 degree barrier today with only scattered drizzles. It almost felt like spring. But something happens every early afternoon so far: a cold wind blows in causing a bone chilling freeze and making everyone bundle up tight and rush about quickly.

We have faculty meetings on Wednesday that include the London consortium faculty. Afterwards, we all attended the British Life and Culture lecture in a modern auditorium with all 90+ US students.  The lecturer gave an interactive lesson tracing the changes in British pop culture to post WWII developments in the socio-political UK.  Very interesting to me despite the room being way overheated.

Street life.  The street conversations continue to amaze me.  Stopped several times on each outing, I can’t get over how people engage conversation about serious issues.  A couple solicitors for charities and businesses approached, I tried to brush them off, but when they hear the American accent they want to discuss politics, California, and other things that we Americans do not brooch with strangers.  Seems many Brits I meet have visited So Cal.  For some oddball reason, they know Huntington Beach.

It’s a Dog’s Life.  There are lots of terriers of all breeds everywhere and it seems that labradoodles are a particularly popular choice for big dog. Rather than make me miss my Oz Dog and Ne Ne Darryl, it is actually very nice for me to be relieved of taking care of them.  Not that I don’t enjoy and care about those two—but it is really liberating to have to care only for me.  Down side, of course, is nobody is waiting in the flat to wiggle with glee that I have returned.  No jumping for joy when it is time to go to bed. Still, and all, I believe it is the end of my acquiring puppies.  Once Ozzie makes it over the final hill, that will be the end of my pets until I get to that age 20 or more years down the road when I am cooped up at home most of the time.  

Oddities:  There is less and less that strikes me as odd.  “Fresh” is the other word used frequently to describe the weather.  I gather it means cold and nippy.  “Soft” is word they use that my Gramma O’Donovan also used to refer to drizzle—as   in, “What a nice, soft day.”  That means it is wet, but the air and rain are kissing your face not bombarding it with burning wind or harsh drops.

Thanks to my niece, Joanna, for passing on her glove and cold weather strategies gleaned from having the second half of her life in New York and now Chicago.  Good advice.

Reflections:  I am already realizing how quickly these weeks will fly by.  In a snap, it will be time to come home.  I just got here and yet over a week has passed.  There is so much to see and do that I could get frenetic, but I prefer to sink into the everyday reality of just being in London.  I miss Heisler Park, Crystal Cove and my garden.  Not enough to want to trade places, but enough to recognize how extraordinary my life is.  How truly fortunate the planets aligned and the universe guarded me from harm and guided me to this.  How does a girl from an immigrant Irish family in the colonia of Lincoln Heights in East LA end up living in Laguna Audubon with as many opportunities as I have?  Stunning.  I am overcome with gratitude.