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| Arbuthenot Road |
In the park on Telegraph Hill, the young man next to me on the bench says he’s on half a pill of LSD. We’re both watching the tennis game. The tennis courts are for free on Telegraph Hill. My neighbour says he can recognize good from bad tennis players as soon as they enter the tennis court. “How is that?” I ask. “Those who bring water, are mostly good players” he says.
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| View on the city from Telegraph Hill |
My bench neighbour shows me the book he's reading. "Unlikely Stories, Mostly" by Alasdair Gray. It reminds me of "Misadventures" of Sylvia Smith.
I'm reading the Kate Atkinson book "One Good Turn." Atkinson describes “afternoon tea” as two words that together sound better than on their own. A. comments that the same goes for “morning coffee.”
At the Tate Britain there is a William Blake exhibition. I only get really excited afterwards when I visit the bookstore. I buy a postcard of a watercolor titled "The Sea of Time and Space" and a children booklet by William Blake called The Gates of Paradise. “I want! I want!” a man calls out in 1793, trying to climb a ladder to the moon. I didn't know the distance to the moon was already an issue back then.
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| The Sea of Time and Space |
My favorite is “The Traveller hasteth in the Evening”.
When I take the ferry on the Thames, a man in front of me explains to his visitor that when you go “down the river”, you move towards the sea. When you go “up the river”, you are city-bound.
To get to New Cross I switch trains at London Bridge where I see The Shard, the tallest building in London, also called The Shard of Glass. I have moved on from reading Kate Atkinson to Patti Smith’s dark novel "Year of the Monkey". It says: “Shards of love, Patti, shards of love.”
Near New Cross, in Nunhead, there is the 19th century Victorian All Saints Cemetery. It is huge and since the 1960s it has no longer been maintained and it's now a heaven for wildlife. It's a nice example of how it's often better for humans to be inactive rather than active.
It's the first time I visit the V&A. My favourite object: the “Stay Alive In 85” T-shirt by Katharine Hamnett.
At the Tate Modern I can see the importance of Kara Walker’s monumental fountain but I’m much more charmed by the poetry of Lygia Clarks Matchbox Structures, small enough to be held in the hand.
