Library Time Capsule

In all my enthusiasm (?) about the election results yesterday, I forgot to mention Bonfire Night, which was Wednesday night. I was concerned Olga would react negatively to lots of neighborhood fireworks. But as it turned out, the only fireworks we heard were distant pops, not even visible from our garden. So it all wound up being rather anticlimactic. Certainly nothing like the displays we used to see in Notting Hill.

I finished that Whistler biography yesterday. Woo hoo! Elohim! It was interesting and cleared up a lot of misconceptions I had about that artist. I'm glad to be done with it mainly for practical reasons -- it was a big ol' book and not the easiest thing to carry around.

Speaking of books, I found one the other day while straightening the library shelves that still had a checkout card in a pocket inside the back cover, stamped with checkout dates going back to 1968! Do you remember when library books used to have cards in the back, and the librarians would stamp and hold the card while you read the book? Before computers, that's how they kept track of who had what. Anyway, I hadn't seen a card in years, and I was impressed that this one had survived all this time. Assuming the kid who checked out that book in 1968 was 12 at the time -- and he was probably older, given that it was the James Fenimore Cooper novel "The Pioneers" and probably not the easiest reading -- he would be about 58 now.

We do "weed" the collection from time to time, as I've written, but the librarians tend to keep the classics. That's why old books like that one occasionally survive.

(Photo: Shepherd's Bush Market, Oct. 25)

Post-Election Blues and a New Typist

We've had a cold snap here, and last night the sky was so clear and the moon was so full and blue that I left the bedroom drapes open to enjoy the moonlight. Unfortunately, I felt like I was sleeping in front of an oncoming train. I probably should have closed the drapes.

So, of course, the American elections were a disaster. I was surprised to see even unpopular politicians reelected for yet another term. Mid-term elections often seem to swing against the incumbent president's party, so that's no surprise -- but why on earth did voters keep Florida Governor Rick Scott, who is liked by no one as far as I know? It is honestly a mystery to me. I guess the oligarchs that run the United States using massive infusions of cash to spread their poisonous misinformation must be beside themselves with joy.

I mean, I'm gay and somewhat left-wing and living in Europe, so I know I'm not your typical voter. But I don't feel like my views are that far out of the mainstream. To me they feel fairly moderate. I'm always surprised when an election swings so wildly in another direction and I am once again reminded that I think so differently from many voters. It's alienating, frankly.

Why are people so angry at Obama? Despite problems, Obamacare has "largely succeeded." He got Osama bin Laden. Is it just about racism?

Indeed, I suspect that when the election demographics are broken down we'll find that lots of older white people voted -- probably especially older white men -- and other groups, like minorities and young people, failed to turn out.

There's an undercurrent of fear in so much of modern politics. Fear of immigrants, fear of change. We see it in England, too -- although unlike in America, it's not shrouded in religious language. Here it's more a question of national identity. The right-wing political party UKIP has been gaining power with a campaign to get Britain out of the European Union, which some argue has left the country with borders that it can't control and a weakened economy.

Europe does have immigration issues -- just like America does -- but locking down borders isn't the answer. We have to help improve people's lives in the countries where they live, and give them a reason to stay. But god forbid you should suggest -- in America at least -- that we spend any money at all on foreign aid. The right-wingers would go nuts.

Anyway -- I wonder if Skeeter won his seat on the Mosquito Control Board in Pasco County?*

At left, only tangentially related, is a copy of a newspaper article I wrote when I was a budding journalist in March 1989. I found it online last night. My friends and I always laughed about this article, representing as it does the nadir of my young journalism career. Can you believe I cranked out eight paragraphs about a tiny Florida town hiring a new typist? I attended the Town Council meeting where this was discussed, and the discussion was contentious -- hence my decision to make it a story. But I remember my editor circled the story in the next day's paper and wrote, "This could have been a brief." Which helped teach me that just because elected officials talk about something for hours doesn't mean it's important.

Something to keep in mind during our post-election hangover.

(Photo: A sign in a shop window in Barking, East London.)

*Addendum: Yes, with 62 percent of the vote!

A Short Wednesday Post

Tonight is Guy Fawkes Night, also known as Bonfire Night, which we have yet to experience in our new home. I'm sure Olga is looking forward to it. She loves explosions. (NOT!) We've been hearing select pops and crackles over the last several nights, and apparently many people celebrated Bonfire Night over the weekend -- but I expect plenty of activity tonight, too.

It's also another practice day for the faculty/staff chorus, so I am zipping off to work early in order to practice this afternoon. Our performance is on the 20th. I am not crazy about this going-to-work-early thing, so I'll be happy when it's past! I do feel like I am finally learning my parts, though, so hopefully I won't sound like a wounded moose when the time comes to sing in front of people.

(Photo: The Baker Street tube station, early Sunday morning, Oct. 26. The plaque on the left is a memorial to 177 Metropolitan Railway employees who were killed in World War I.)

Another Brush With Fame

Remember me writing a couple of weeks ago that I saw Emma Thompson? Well, I saw another of our street's famous residents on Friday morning -- the guy who plays Mr. Carson, the butler, on "Downton Abbey." I was walking to work when he crossed the street in front of me. I'm embarrassed to say I don't even know his name. I suppose I should look it up in case I ever meet him, so I can greet him with something other than, "Hello, Carson!"

(I'm sure he loves that.)

We're doing Movember at work again -- growing mustaches to raise money and awareness for male cancers. I shouldn't say "we," because I'm sitting this one out. I was happy to grow a mustache once, as an experiment, but I definitely don't want to have to do it every year. I'll make a donation instead.

Oh, and by the way, I wrote in yesterday's post that James Abbott McNeill Whistler never married, but that isn't true. He married later in life, at 54 or so. (I just got to that part of the book yesterday!) So allow me to correct the record.

(Photo: A colorful wall in Chadwell Heath, east London.)

Birthday Exclamations

You know how I often say "Woo hoo!" as an expression of excitement or joy when I'm writing? I'm sure I've done it many times here on this blog. It's something I picked up years ago, I believe from my Peace Corps friend Liz -- and it is such a handy exclamation.

Well, I discovered that if I type it into a text message on my iPhone, the spell-checker turns it into "Elohim!" Which isn't quite the same thing -- the Hebrew word for God. Do I have an Orthodox Jewish iPhone?

We had a quiet day yesterday. I got out and did some gardening -- weed-pulling, blackberry cutting, leaf-raking -- before the heavens opened and we got a good, drenching rain. Then I sat inside and read my Whistler biography, and made a good dent in that. An interesting character, that Whistler. Somewhere I developed an unconfirmed suspicion that he was gay -- maybe from his over-the-top aestheticism and dandyism, the fact that he never married, and/or his adulation of his mother -- but on the contrary he kept a series of mistresses and fathered several children. He was also eternally in debt and a pain in the neck to many people. And even though he spent most of his life in Europe, he was a Confederate sympathizer in the Civil War. Fascinating.

When the rain let up I took Olga on a long walk to Fortune Green and the cemetery, where she imperiled the lives of several more squirrels among the gravestones. We came home in time to Skype with our friend David in New Jersey, and then spent the afternoon watching "Out of Africa," which remains one of my favorite movies ever. Yes, I know -- it romanticizes the evils of colonialism, and doesn't depict Isak Dinesen's real life, blah blah blah. The fact remains it is a beautiful, moving film. I always cry at the end, when the lions lie on Finch-Hatton's grave, and Meryl Streep does those fabulous, poetic voice-overs taken directly from Dinesen's book. "If I know a song of Africa..."

In the evening we had beef stroganoff -- my birthday dinner request, because it was always a favorite meal when I was a kid. Dave adapted my mom's recipe, substituting creme fraiche for the sour cream and adding mustard. I'm not sure about his adaptations, but overall it was yummy. As I was doing the dishes I realized that I had failed to eat a vegetable all day, which is very unusual for me!

And finally, Dave revealed my birthday present -- not one but five massages at a local salon.

Elohim!

(Photo: A car antenna in Becontree, east London. I learned that this photo, which I took for Bleeding London, was the 30,000th upload to the online gallery!)

Olga's Day in the Sun

Olga finally, finally got a long outing with me in Hampstead Heath yesterday. The weather was a bit gray when we set out -- gray enough that I tucked an umbrella in my bag -- but before we even got to the Heath the clouds had magically dissipated and the sky was bright blue.

We walked all the way around the park, from Parliament Hill with its skyline views to the quiet woods around Kenwood House.

We saw signs of the strange magic that sometimes shows itself in Hampstead Heath, like a forgotten series of bright fabric flags...

...and a strange pair of -- I don't know -- sculptures? One hanging, one lying on the ground.

Someone was completely blissed out by the sunshine, the crisp air, the hours running off leash after squirrels real and imaginary. Oh, and Olga had fun too.

Then Dave and I left Olga to snooze in the evening, heading out to Covent Garden for the Bleeding London wrap party. I discovered yesterday that I made a terrible mistake -- the photos I chose to be printed were actually part of an exhibit shown Friday night at a prep school. They weren't for the party at all. So basically, I missed the first exhibit of my printed work! I couldn't believe it.

The party was fun anyway, though, and there was a large TV screen showing a rolling series of BL photos. I could only glance at it now and then because I was simultaneously having conversations with people, so I only saw one of my own shots -- but there was enough evidence that when it comes time for an exhibit and/or book, we have lots of good options.

There were also tons more people in costume on the tube last night. This is like the zombie Halloween that wouldn't die! Whatever I've said about the British not being big on Halloween, I now hereby take it back. I saw hordes of trick-or-treaters in St. John's Wood on my way home from school Friday -- probably lots of American expats -- and Dave said one person even rang our doorbell. We've never had trick-or-treaters in London and didn't prepare at all, so Dave hid at the back of the house and they went away. We have not yet been egged!

Take the Phone Outside

At last, a free weekend! Well, more or less. We do have the Bleeding London wrap party tonight. But otherwise I am uncommitted, and I'm looking forward to taking the dog for a long walk and maybe finally making a dent in the Whistler biography. (I'm about 130 pages in after, what, two or three weeks? And he's already painted his mother, so I'm wondering what on earth could happen in the rest of this book.)

I blew my stack at a kid in the library yesterday. He was walking around the room talking on his cell phone -- and phones are not allowed in the library. So I asked him to take it outside, and he nodded at me and continued walking around the room. I asked him again and got the same nod, and he circuitously took the phone back to his table and sat down, still talking. He hung up as I approached. I told him in no uncertain terms that I was not making a mere suggestion and he needs to LISTEN TO ME when I tell him to do something. "But I hung up," he kept saying, like he just didn't get it.

I hate it when I have disputes like this with kids. I keep replaying them in my mind, wondering if I handled the situation well or could have done something differently. In this case I could have knocked the kid over the head with his phone, but I don't suppose that would have ended well for any of us.

Oh, and speaking of work, I volunteered for a new challenge -- I will be a chaperone on a fifth grade field trip to the British Museum on Nov. 11. Am I crazy? Probably.

Also yesterday, a coworker made me a terrific carrot cake for my birthday, and we had a little intraoffice celebration. The big day is actually tomorrow -- I think it will be a fairly low-key day, especially because it's going to be rainy. Dave suggested going to a movie, but you know, I am feeling more and more like I may be done with movie theaters. Why pay an outrageous amount to sit in an uncomfortable seat and be barraged with 1/2 hour of loud commercials, when we could stay home, rent the movie for $2.99 on iTunes, watch it whenever we want, watch it commercial-free, and pause it when needed? I used to mourn the potential death of movie theaters, but now I'm not so sure it would be a bad thing. It's not like people would stop making movies if there were no more cinemas.

Or maybe I'm just an ornery almost-48-year-old.

(Photo: Near Finchley Road, West Hampstead, Oct. 2.)