One Whole Year

A lot can happen in the space of year to make you question your motivations, your priorities, and your insights. I can't say truthfully that I am an entirely different person this year than I was the year before, but I do know that I have changed immensely. Exactly one year ago yesterday I sat anxiously on the plane to England. I sat next to a girl named Jasmine, a stranger, who I now know to be one of my closest friends. I haven't anything eloquent to say about it all really, except that I miss it a lot...more than I thought possible. Somehow, despite the fact that everyone keeps telling me I will start to miss it less and less, my need for England, for it's people, it's gothic buildings, it's uneven cobbled streets by the Bod, a cup of tea from Combibo's, or a chicken strips meal from Branos.

Thankfully, after the agony that was yesterday I received two items in the mail today, marked by the Royal Mail. One was a parcel full of Party Rings and Tea, accompanied by a note from Alice. The other was a note from Rob. And despite the utter agony that is going about my day to day life without these people and so many others in it, there are small reminders that I will have them with me forever. And sometimes that's all you can really ask or hope for.

I can't really say it any better than Bill Bryson:

"Suddenly, in the space of a moment, I realized what it was that I loved about Britain--which is to say, all of it. Every last bit of it, good and bad--Marmite, village fetes, country lanes, people saying "mustn't grumble" and "I'm terribly sorry but", people apologizing when I conk them with a nameless elbow, milk in bottles, beans on toast, haymaking in June, stinging nettles, seaside piers, Ordnance Survey maps, crumpets, hot-water bottles as a necessity, drizzly Sunday--every bit of it.

What a wondrous place this was--crazy as fuck, of course, but adorable to the tiniest degree. What other country, after all, could possibly have come up with place names like Tooting Bec and Farleigh Wallop, or a game like cricket that goes on for three days and never seems to start? Who else would think it not the least odd to make their judges wear little mops on their heads, compel the Speaker of the House of Commons to sit on something called the Woolsack, or take pride in a military hero whose dying wish was to be kissed by a fellow named Hardy? ("Please Hardy, full on the lips, with just a bit of tongue"). What other nation in the world could possibly have given us William Shakespeare, pork pies, Christopher Wren, Windsor Great Park, the Open University, Gardner's Question Time and the chocolate digestive biscuit? None, of course.

How easily we lose sight of all this. What an enigma Britain will seem to historians when they look back on the second half of the twentieth century. Here is a country that fought and won a noble war, dismantled a mighty empire in a generally benign and enlightened way, created a far-seeing welfar state--in short, did nearly everything right--and then spent the rest of the century looking on itself as a chronic failure. The fact is that this is still the best place in the world for most things--to post a letter, go for a walk, watch television, buy a book, venture out for a drink, go to a museum, use the bank, get lost, seek help, or stand on a hillside and take in a view.

All of this came to me in the space of a lingering moment. I've said it before and I'll say it again. I like it here. I like it more than I can tell you"

--Bill Bryson (Notes from a Small Island)

A Brief Return to the World of Dreams

I recently opened for the first time a book, given to me by my roommate, entitled Oxford Revisited by Justin Cartwright. I'd been meaning to begin the book all summer, but, having left Oxford only two months (is that all?) before, didn't think I had the mental strength or emotional capacity to return to that place that gives Cartwright the Jerusalem syndrome. I had returned often enough in my dreams, but to actually enter into an Oxonian world, brought to life with impressionistic language was more than I thought myself capable of. And indeed, that was the case. Only a chapter was read before I had to put the book down. I was overwhelmed by a sense of emptiness, that only one who has experienced Oxford can fully understand. How a city could have such an impact on our lives, how we could ache for the feeling of the cobbled bricks by the Bodleian beneath our toes, the smell of old wood in our college's libraries, the harsh (but ever polite) signs imploring that we stay off the grass...that is something an Oxford alien will never be able to fully understand.

And so I felt compelled once again to write. This time not out of a sense of duty. No longer to eager relatives across the pond await blog posts (sorry for the small quantity), for I have bitterly left that aspect of my life behind. And as I said, what remains is some type of emptiness. A void that cannot possibly be filled. No amount of brick buildings, hours in the library, or forced academics can recreate in my body the delight in which Oxford filled me every morning when I walked to breakfast in the Worcester College Hall. No amount of imported PG Tips or Heinz Beans can bring me back to that place. But for a moment, I'd like to pretend...

I remember walking into the Eagle & Child, the smell of four hundred years of spilled beer and wood easing me immediately into a sense of comfort and ease. I had four friends beside me, a month and a half at Oxford under my belt, a crumpled fiver, and the prospect of two more terms on me. Nothing can really describe the demographic at Oxford. The strange jumble of people all work together to create a highly unique mix, and on this day, there was no one more unique than David Kirk. He stumbled down the step from the back level to where we were sitting, his almost 66 year old bones keeping him surprisingly upright, and began chatting up one of my friends. This old boy had game. After making it through nearly 3 bottles of wine with his two chums, he was clearly eager to open up another, and was looking at us as if we were the perfect ones to share it with (although I'm not sure how much sharing would have actually happened). He spoke of himself rather confidently, but without giving us too much information. He wrote a note and left it on our table, one which we immediately began to attempt to decipher. Although we failed in discovering the majority of the contents of the note, we did walk away with his name. David Kirke. I googled him and discovered an alarming number of interesting facts: one of the founders of Oxford University's Dangerous Sports Club, first man to perform the modern bungee jump, and apparently frequenter of the Eagle & Child.

Now, sitting here in my dorm room, waiting for a night of work, meetings, perhaps a few drinks, and monotonous chats with fellow students, I can't stop thinking about this mysterious old man. In his time, he has probably stolen more from life than I can even imagine. And he hasn't stopped. Just because he has graduated, retired from bungee jumping (or so I assume), and grown up, he hasn't left Oxford. And I realize, despite all his adventures, perhaps there was never a greater thrill than walking down Broad Street on a sunny afternoon in Trinity. There certainly isn't for me.