Closing the Door

There are any number of quotes about London that come to mind as we leave.  But this best represents the sentiment:

"If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast."--Hemingway

London is the new Paris.

It was before seven in the morning a few weeks ago and the captain said we were landing at Heathrow. He said it in the way they say it, two words, Heath--Row. And my stomach was excited in a new way, all the thrill of going home coupled with the anticipation of being away.

We would only be in London for 10 days, some final clean up at the office, pack up the apartment, attend the Olympics.  And ten days later the call from the stewardess was "We are arriving in Dulles Washington" as she called it.  It didn't have the same appeal.

I’ve tried to identify the emotion we are experiencing.  Why can't I put my finger on what it was that I felt when I closed the door on that house and this year?

It is an ending.  It’s not a movie or a vacation or a restaurant we can return to.  It's most akin to the end of college.  

I can go back to Ann Arbor, but not as an 18 year old. I can walk down State Street but the bars are filled with different students making their own memories.  There isn't a Sammy house full of brothers, those aren't my books, my beer, my teachers or my first taste of freedom. They now belong to someone else.  Only the memories are mine.

So yes, we’ll go back to London.  And we'll even return to 9 Abbey Gardens, but not as a resident.  We'll never stay in that neighborhood as a neighbor.  And in the end that's what makes me long for it, as I did when I left anything for the last time and it was termed a Commencement:  Because you can go home again, but sometimes the home isn't there, just the house is.

Thoreau said when he left his cabin on the shores of Walden Pond: “I learned this, at least, by my experiment; that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours."

And so we return to the common hours.

Small Town, London Town

The town is festooned in a pinky-red color that is officially magenta-pink or Olympink as they call it.

"It's a great time to be British" screamed the newspaper headline, "The Greatest Show on Earth" another shouted.

The world is coming to London and what they will find is a small town.  The little island that it is.

When Bradley Wiggins won the Tour de France there was discussion of him being Knighted, how much he should make and the pride of the country.  A cabbie remarked to me the other night on a ride home:  "You know Wiggo is from around here.  Just over by Maida Vale."  The Queen wrote him a note.  He is part of the family.

The context for the Olympic newscasts is based around the weather and the UK medal count.  There are countdowns and medal watches as the Brits claim their first medal, or the heroes that are born:  "This is the first gymnastics medal since Stockholm 1912."

It is all about Team GB.

There is pride at the Summer they have had with the Queen's Diamond Jubilee, The Premier League finish, a good run at the Euro Cup, and now the Summer Olympics.

After the opening ceremony all the Brits wanted to know what the visitors thought.  And inevitably non-Brits expressed their enjoyment of it, but questioned certain parts:  The bouncy hospital beds?  An ode to the NHS? The Arctic Monkeys?

The Brits enjoyed the confusion.  When you express your skepticism they smile and say, "Yes, it was all very British."

They are very pleased that London is the center of the universe.  Again.