Week 1 | Recap

The first full week is in the books.  Somewhere in the neighborhood of 47 more to go.

Some observations.

⇒ There is no half and half in London.  Not even at Starbucks.  Should you desire milk, you must ask for your coffee white.  I invite you to imagine the horror when the Jojo requests a “large white American” from the coffee purveyor.  Who happens to be French.

⇒ You can get salty or sweet popcorn at the movies.  As well as premier seating.  Which, by the way, isn’t.

⇒ Not sure who started the whole “British food is terrible” thing.  It’s bullocks.  Don’t like fish & chips and good old meat pies, well there’s Thai, Lebanese [twice], Italian [twice], burgers [more times that I’d like to admit].  How about global street food at Southbank Centre Market [pistachio baklava, banana, strawberry + honey crepes, curry jambalaya, handmade tortellini or a duck confit and truffle oil burger]?  Lunch at the Victoria and Albert cafeteria included items such as chicory, Stilton & walnut salad; Parma ham, roast peppers & olive tapenade bruschetta; and broccoli & smoked Applewood cheddar tart.  Yes, the cafeteria.

⇒ I feel cool riding the bus.  What?!

⇒ Brooklyn lager is everywhere.  And so is a strange infatuation with New Orleans-named entrees.

⇒ Londoners are a patient lot. T hey love the queue.  They stand and wait for the light to change, rarely jaywalk.  I’ve heard but a few irritable horn honks.  New Yorkers they are not.

⇒ When someone calls you love, you swoon a bit.

⇒ Museums are free.  Let me repeat.  Museums are free.

And then there’s this.  A different place doesn’t magically make you a different person. You still get cold and moody, feel inadequate, impatient, unprepared.  You snipe at your girl, shoot your man more than one eye roll and complain about wearing the wrong shoes.

Ten times a day something happens to me like this – some strengthening throb of amazement – some good sweet empathic ping and swell.  This is the first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness. – Mary Oliver

But you open.  Your body moves, instinctively.  Curiosity returns and the doorway to awe and discovery opens.  All the time I spent trying to chase mindfulness.  It was there all along.  Just pay attention.