Last Week in London

LONDON

Yesterday morning I took my final Monday commute to the Bloomsbury campus. It was the first time I saw frost on the windscreens of the cars parked on Boundary Road—we have had a long and record-breaking warm autumn in the UK this year.  (I’ve only used my umbrella once in three months as well.)  I pulled on my gloves and secured my new hat (birthday present) as I walked to the Turnpike Lane tube stop.  Finally, all the sycamore trees have shed their leaves; bits of trash blown from the wind also line the street.  This is not a tidy neighborhood. 

Still, there are always signs of vibrant upward moving life.  A few of the terraced houses on the street are being renovated; passersby rush by our house late night and early morning, heels clicking on the pavement, the wheels of their suitcases roaring behind them.  At the station, I skip down the stairs, grab a copy of the free morning paper, the Metro, and dash for the train just pulling into view. 

London is a reading town.  Almost any time of day on the tube, I see people leafing through newspapers or reading books either real or electronic.  I’ve become very attached to the free newspapers distributed at tube stops every morning and evening.  I find more and more of the gossipy or gruesome stories engaging—one sure sign of my acculturation here.  This morning I sit next to a young man listening to music on his earphones.  The sound is so loud I could dance to it.  A girl across from us assembles her mascara and eyeliner to apply as we travel.  As I arrive at the Russell Square stop, I check for my Oyster Card in my handbag, and join the throng of commuters rushing to catch the next elevator to street level.  We jam ourselves into the elevator.  I’m next to a short black man who holds the hands of his two sons wearing school uniforms and sporting wonderful dreadlocks.  One boy snaps his chewing gum and flashes a secret smile at me.  More headphones leak music on the ride up. 

Back out on the chilly street, I wait for the walk sign at the crosswalk to Russell Square.  Few pedestrians wait for the light to change—they dash across in front of turning taxis, which used to surprise me in September. I thought Londoners would be more cautious and law abiding.  As I reach Malet Street where the AIFS office Dilke House and the University of London Union are located, I notice that workers are still digging up the street several hundred yards away.  The first month of class, they were drilling and pounding right below our classrooms. 

Before I enter Dilke House to print out the final exam for my Novel students, I pause to look down the street.  I’m feeling wistful.  My “borrowed” life as a study abroad professor is coming to an end.  I’ve enjoyed it—preparing for class, teaching, exploring London, all the travel to European cities and the English countryside, our family adventures and routines, my colleagues.  At the moment I’m a bit disillusioned by some of the students who’ve opted for more play and less work and haven’t performed to their potential. . .but that’s to be expected when London, like a candy shop full of exotic sweets, beckons daily.  I’m savoring what I didn’t really expect to love: the daily commute, the new but now familiar routines of living in a giant city, lugging home groceries from the shops on the Wood Green High Street, turning on the kettle for a warm mug of tea in the fading four o’clock twilight. . . I will miss these little details even more than the spectacular sights we’ve seen.

Beth