Little Book
I once had a little red book with a picture of myself in it. It lived somewhere that was committed to memory and was taken out rather rarely to prove who I was or cross the occasional border. Ironically, when I needed to travel and take absolutely all of my belongings with me, I quite suddenly no longer knew where it was. And so, after cancellation and the completion of forms on a government website, a trip to London was required to collect a new one, this time, post Brexit and other political shenanigans, it would be a little blue book.
From a tranquil little Island beside the sea to the centre of London in an hour or so. As a lover of countryside and seascapes, and the seeking out of quiet places, the sudden exposure to people and huge buildings that soar like mountains is quite a baptism.
All of a sudden there are expressions, emotions, smells and sounds from each nook of the human experience; folk selling food and folk running for trains, folk shouting at phones and folk laughing pigeons. I needed to go underground.
Tunnels and a little train with many windows took me towards docklands, on tracks above the roads and beside the towering glass-clad mountains around and a Canary and its wharfs. I watched as shops sold coffee and people made money.
Across the River to the flats of Docklands
Great crested Grebe fishing around the the jetty near the Excel Centre
WHITEHALL & THE TOWErs
Exiting the Passport office a jolly soul said "see you again in ten years", and as we both chortled I made my way back to a bustling Elizabeth Line with a mind to find the South Bank. I'd walk through Whitehall, I thought, and find the river at the end. Navigation of market stalls and food venders that put me in mind of the streets of Istanbul brought me out alongside the Gherkin and it's sister towers.
'The' Bridge'
A blue and silver globally recognisable 'thing'. Fascinating to walk across and witness tradesmen in white vans screaming over it keen to get to the next gig, as well as folk in Lamborghinis stopping in the middle to take pictures and selfies, laughing at those who shout complain. Folk who cross it every day scamper over without a plane while those who visit take a thousand photographs of the bridge and themselves and linger for hours. I'm impressed, and get washed away into London's history grandeur. It's all rather overwhelming for a fellow used the fells of Cumbria for the past ten years.
A certain something...
Further along the South Bank, past the Tate M. and near Shakespeare's Globe, my feet and I paused for a wee while. I'd passed a sign earlier that simply said 'And Then?', and couldn't help ponder my own future after some significant challenges and self-imposed destruction of recent times. I'd just meandered through the bustle of Borough Market which surprisingly had failed to excite despite its plethora of life. I think the woman I found myself summed up my mood, with a vacant, almost melancholic gaze over the most dramatic sights in London and the river, and her bag saying 'Tenerife', which spoke to me of past adventures that were now memories being clung to, or perhaps wishes for the future - somewhere 'to get back to'. A felt a weight of mind and emotion, but realised, so do we all.
A 'Gent', Borough Market
London Eye
Perusing Words
Sat for some time watching folk come and go through the South Bank Book Market, underneath Waterloo Bridge. Fascinating watching folk some gems, chatting about various finds, topping off old books already read. I thought for a while and how important the written word is, and how paper and ink still remain dry much alive, swimming in the digital.
A selfie by Big Ben
Glance along Parliament Square
Among Others
Little Blue Book
A new little red book. I feel a fondness for the old one and the memories it allowed to me create. A hope it remembers as much as I do. It'll turn up next week and my memory will ping above with the words 'of course'.
A new book, for new chapters.
The end of a walk
I've finished walks here before, even come to stare when I've been in the hospital nearby or working in the centre. Westminster Bridge and its view offer goose bumps to those who see value in the history, pomp, wisdom, and sophistication of our England and United Kingdom. In our days where we face AI, globalisation in our bedrooms thanks to social media, and the sheer unpredictability of politics, the shadows that fall on the ancient walls of parliament scream a steadfast resolve, that I hope will endure though the twenty-first century's latest set of problems.
