The World Is Too Much With Us

The continual changing scenery can be slightly overwhelming at times. Mostly,

as I say to everyone, it’s like I’ve been gone for 10 minutes. Not

even ten days to the Med with holiday snaps to prove. Ten minutes or a really

long and pleasant coma.

As expected, daily life and daily people have changed very little and I slipped

back into a routine of work and play like I’d never left it. I have however

met two eight-month old humanoids who hadn’t even been conceived before

I left and found good friends in new homes without a moving box in sight. My

dad is no longer in his job and has retired via a fairly nasty legal case, two

close family friends have been through cancer therapy and recovered, my brother

has got engaged and bought an apartment. These are all events that I would like

to think I would have been more of a support through had I been here.

Instead, I have been living in a wonderfully simple bubble. One life. Time

moving at exactly the speed it’s meant to. Or rather, people moving at

exactly the speed of Time. Back in the ‘Real World’ (as locals like

to call it), we cram in far too much and rarely appreciate the clouds. It’s

obvious, of course, but all this juggling is exhausting.

I don’t even mean high-pressured jet setting or living the high life.

Kensington-Victoria-Dulwich-Brixton-London Bridge-South Bank confused me enough.

We climb into a transport time capsule and emerge in a whole new place, scenery,

and social dynamic. Add to that the mobile phone that instantly transports you

to some entirely other place, and I feel torn apart. At the pub I meet distant

friends who I haven’t seen for eight years coupled with those I have thought

of regularly during the last year. This weekend I have met up with people from

seven very different but fundamental times in my life. Most Londoners do this

happily within a day, every day. So, the multiplicity of our lives, that is

something, though known, that has surprised me. I can do it… but I don’t

particularly enjoy it.

Other things I have noticed, in the 10% of the time that everything isn’t

really normal.

• The world has a lot of glare. I wear sunglasses on cloudy days (and other

  ex-winterers report the same).

• I have lost my social filter. Talking to strangers or friends is fine but

  people-I-don’t-know-but-should-show-an-interest-in (i.e. friends of

  friends) is a disaster.

• So much consumer choice is just silly and doesn’t give you any more

  freedom.

• Cash and pin numbers are both wonderful and ridiculous.
• I can only do about three things in a day before losing interest in everything.
• Stars are still beautiful, even in the northern hemisphere, even in cities.
• When it gets too much, turning off the mobile phone and not answering the

  door is liberating.

• I can’t tell a story without it taking at least half an hour via

  twenty three amusing (to me) diversions and at the end there is generally

  no punch line. Or point.

• I don’t think I’m any different from before I left but I’m

  going to milk this bubble for as long as I can.

• Shoes are torture. Even the most crunchy granola brands. Birkenstocks and

  Ecco have both led to pain. Tell me, is it my foot breaking the shoe in or

  the shoe, the foot?

• Faces are fascinating. Especially twins or any familial resemblance for

  that matter.

• I feel colder on wet, miserable days in Britain than I ever felt in Antarctica.

  It’s true: there is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing.