Picture the scene…..you are walking between meetings in the City, take away coffee attached to one hand. Mobile to the other. If very clever, a sneaky fag in there somewhere as well. Suddenly, out of the corner of your eye you see it. A gaggle of school aged children in smart uniform, with a Vicar, and some other people in fur-lined robes, just there on the 
pavement. They seem to be singing. A hymn perhaps….and then you notice the sticks. The long sticks. In the hands of the school children. Who begin smacking these sticks on the ground in an enthusiastic manner. Have the post-work sessions in the pub finally rattled the brain, is this some sort of anger-management seminar, or maybe a new reality television nightmare??? Actually, the average City worker would think none of these things, would only nonchalantly move out of the way without breaking step, used as they are to crazy shenanigans in the City. Tourists, on the other hand, go wild. Cameras and phones whirring away. I would love to know how they try to explain it to the folks back home.
And here I am. In the mix. Because I do love a City ceremony, and this is one of the best. The Beating of the Bounds. Ascension Day. With All Hallows by the Tower. And St. Dunstan’s College. The Worshipful Company of the Waterman and Lightermen, as well (yes, them again, of the Knollys Rose Ceremony, post #48, a busy season!) A ceremony dating back to Anglo-
Saxon times, now just for traditional purposes, but in times of old to make sure, MAKE SURE everyone knew exactly where the boundaries of the parish of St. Dunstan’s in the East were…in case anyone got any ideas about pinching a few feet. We are a protective species, especially when it comes to land. Death by hedgerow dispute remains a reality. We like our borders and our boundaries (cue Brexit furor).
The boundaries are roughly that of the parish of St. Dunstan in the East, a beautiful 13th century church that survived the Great Fire of 1666, though Christopher Wren rebuilt the tower in the late 17th century. Today, only the tower remains as the rest of the church was destroyed in WWII; the former footprint of the nave is now a lovely, almost secret public garden. Following its destruction, the parish was amalgamated into that of All Hallows by the Tower, which is why the privilege of leading this ceremony now rests 
with them. The school of St. Dunstan’s dates back to the 15th century and when, by mid-19th century, the City had ceased to become a residential area, it was moved to Catford, SE London, where it remains. What an honour to be selected as one of the students taking part; proud parents are always an element of the procession. And what a great day off school for the kids, instead of double maths some public stick smacking. Nice.
The beating starts at the Tower and then moves to the river, because the south boundary is mid-Thames. In days of old, parish worthies would take a boat out and dangle a small boy upside down by the ankles over the water and let him give the river a good thrashing. I have seen pictures. Quite remarkable really. Sadly, health and safety no longer allow this kind of priceless photo op and instead the students (boys and girls) ride out an a vessel and tap the water, with their very long sticks, from a standing position. The procession continues on land, stopping at several points, including the tower of St Dunstan’s in the 
East, Planation House and Seething Lane before returning to All Hallows. A thoroughly satisfying afternoon. History, odd behavior, some old buildings, a little walk and men in costume. Instagrammers dream. What isn’t to love? And next year there will be a battle. With the Beefeater’s at the Tower of London….watch this space.
Many many many years ago, when my eldest was a tiny thing, I stood in a queue in an American shopping mall to “meet” Arthur, an aardvark off a children’s cartoon show. The queue was long and the other mothers were spiky, all eager that their little treasure have the best possible moment with Arthur. Unable to stand the tension, the frantic woman in front of me shouted to the girl managing the crowd, “will Arthur be signing autographs?” I will never forgot the sequence of expressions on the young handler’s face. From initial shock to bewilderment and then slowly, slowly, deep, deep pity. “Ummmm” she replied, speaking very calmly as if to an accident victim, “you are aware that this isn’t really Arthur. It is just a store employee in a costume.” Deep breath. “And he is wearing really big furry paws, so I don’t think he can hold a pen.” I dined out on this story for years. Yet, with each telling, I knew, in my heart, that it was only a very thin barrier keeping me from falling into this kind of insanity.
The story of Henry V, with red balloons as soldiers, all crumpling latex when killed in battle. And most recently, both stories in the Greek season. Minotaur, done in the round with many of the younger audience as noble youths. And My Father: Odysseus. A set littered with modern day toys, hip hop at sometimes earsplitting volume, with a fantastic use of ketchup at the end. What isn’t to love.
We all have hidden talents. I have many. And my skill at mini-golf came as a complete shock to my husband, when I finally revealed it after years of marriage. Ha ha, I know you were all hoping for something naughtier, but trust me, as someone with little concentration, less patience and absolutely no spatial relations what so ever, the fact that I am pretty good on a crazy golf course is a shocker. But I spent my adolescence in the mid-west where legal entertainment for teenagers is scarce. Putt putt, as we called it, was one of the few 
options. I suppose it proves that if you do something often enough you get good at it. I did and so I am. Mini golf has become a recent craze in London, but all courses are short term pop ups only (the exception being the soon-to-open course next to the Gherkin, which will be permanent.) And indoors. Always indoors. With bars. Certainly a different atmosphere to what I grew up with. I had to have a go.
So I convinced Alice, my full time working in the City friend, to spend a beautiful, sunny London Friday afternoon in the underground gloom of the Truman Brewery playing at the Junkyard Golf Club. Properly decadent really. And we had the place practically to ourselves, which made it 
feel even creepier and skive-ier. But the emptiness allowed us to wander through all three courses and admire the “junk” put together not just to create obstacles but make you laugh. And we laughed a lot. Along with cast off appliances and quantities of neon paint was a speed boat carrying mannequins that must have spent time in a porn shop, given their attributes…we particularly liked the one wearing a boa made of fake dollar bills. Classy.
Spring may be here. It is always a tentative thing on this fair isle. And it has been a funny year, weather wise. Balmy at Christmas, freezing winds and rain in the early new year, rain, rain, rain, rain, rain, rain, sunny in the mornings, ice cold by lunchtime, woolens, t-shirts, the full spectrum of British climate, and now a hint of spring. And daffodils. I wrote last year of my love for this most unique of flowers, with its funny happy face and sweet soft smell. It doesn’t offer itself year round, but jumps out, for a short time only, from what is oft unlikely and forsaken ground. Rarely alone, daffs like to sway in groups, not at all fussy about their surroundings. Gardens, traffic circles, tiny patches of earth between slabs of concrete. And then they go. But while they are here, I take advantage. I fill my house with them. I fill my milk bottles with them. Yes, I have milk bottles. Because I have a milkman. Who leaves pints of milk on my doorstep every morning but Wednesday and Sunday. He drives a funny, electric cart. I often hear it stopping, with a pnuematic whosh, on the road at some impossibly early hour of the morning. But sometimes the milk comes during waking hours. I could, if I wished, have a variety of items left with the milk: cheese, bread, vegetables, pretty much any cupboard staple. But the simplicity of the bottles, all in a row,
on a frosty winter morning has become too iconic an image for me to ever tamper with, even for convenience sake. The one draw back of delivered milk is that it tends to have a shorter life than grocery story milk. This means there is sometimes frantic expiration date checking and wasteful pouring out, especially when something has happened to upset the delicate milk-use balance. Occasionally there is a thick stopper of cream in neck of the bottle. A few hard shakes usually does the trick. When I first moved to England a proper country matron told me how she would carefully remove this mass and serve it up to her children with fruit as cream. Yikes. The thought still makes me feel vaguely sick. Rather like eating the freezer burnt scraps of ice cream in an empty tub. But to each their own.
My milkman is lovely. His name is Simon. He has never travelled to my country but would very much like to. He is knowledgeable about the current state of affairs there, always much to discuss with this presidential race going on. Well read too. He greeted me one morning with the question, “have you ever read Go Ask Alice?” Have I ever? A staple of my pre-teen years. How random. How divine. To talk about books on ones doorstep. I know his daughter enjoys outdoor adventure like abseiling and kayaking. He is always cheerful. And he delivers my milk. In gorgeous, traditional, glass milk bottles. Which, when empty, I leave out for him to collect….except for this time of year. When I keep back six, wash them up, and fill them with daffodils.
The choir filed on stage, robotic in a delightful 80s music video sort of way. And then began the ballad no one has been able to resist of late….Ground Control to Major Tom…..and we were off. Crooning our little hearts out to Bowie, and Elton John and anyone else who had had the good sense t0 write a song about space. The accompaniment was organized by a Prince lookalike with ultra cool demenour. In complete contrast to the conductor. Young, female and blond, she put an aerobics instructor (still in the 80s theme…) to shame. She was pure energy, leaping, arms pumping the air, barely contained on her little platform. 
And when she sang the opening lines of “Fly Me to the Moon” in a rich, soulful voice..wow, passionate and talented. Fantastic.
My first outing with SLR was on their Jack the Ripper night, a few weeks ago. A short run, in teams, through Spitalfields/WhiteChapel/City in pursuit of clues on the identity of Jack the Ripper. Actors (or long-suffering friends?) were scattered along the route, dressed in Victorian costume, ready to answer questions and direct or mis-direct inquiries. This should have been so my kind of thing. But at the very last minute, my only teammate and above mentioned Alice had a childcare crisis and couldn’t join me. When I finally arrived at the starting venue, a pub just off Petticoat Junction, the only other single runner was a woman who told me, but only once we were outside in the freezing cold!!, that she couldn’t run. Oh dear. Suddenly my running attire seemed woefully inadequate to cope with the weather. Because we walked. Slowly. It was bloody cold. I did try to get into the spirit of it as much as possible and, as we were now not really competing against other teams for times, I felt free to chat away to the Victorians as much as I liked. We were hardly going to get less cold or be any slower. This is how I know that the policeman at the Tower is from Ventura, CA and that pretending to sell oranges in front of the old Billingsgate Market is a cold and lonely prospect indeed.
We didn’t guess the correct villain, but I did get some lovely photos of London at night, never can have too many of those, and had my circumstances been different, it would have been a fantastic night. I had to try again.
One of the first stops was the ruins of Winchester Palace. London history can be dreadfully confusing, both chronologically and geographically. This is a good example. The Bishop of Winchester had his palace, not in Winchester (about 70 miles SW of London) but here on Bankside, between Southwark Cathedral and Clink Prison. The Bishops, down the ages, would have allowed prostitues to ply their trade in the area, but for a sizable fee. Extracting money from the desperate has always been a reliable money maker for those in power. But when they died, these same women were not given final rest on consecrated ground. Instead, they were buried at the Cross Bones Graveyard, along with plague victims and the general poor. A literal dumping ground for the unloved. A final insult to lives filled with injury.
The land was closed to burial in 1853 on health grounds. It retreated into folk-lore and was then forgotten. Until London Underground started digging around in the 1990s. And historians realized what they had found: a tip filled with the unwanted of ages past. A garden of sorrow, if ever there was. Now the gates are covered in ribbons and it has become a quasi-shrine to remember the outcasts and unwanted of society, though increasingly it has become a place for people of all traditions to show respect and remembrance. Today, many of the ribbons are for people who are deeply loved and painfully, achingly missed. 
A baby, a young mother, a son. It is a wall of collective grief atop bodies for whom no grief was shown. With the iconic Shard looming overhead. Circle of life at its most theatrical.
When the sun is shining there is no more beautiful place in the entire world than London. Perhaps it is because sunny days are not to be taken for granted on this northern isle, especially this spring. The weather has been fickle, to say the least. So, on Friday, when my frequent partner in adventure, Sara and I exited the Tube at Embankment, with the intention of visiting the Botticelli drawings at the Courtauld Gallery, we couldn’t bear to go inside “Let’s just stay outside a bit longer,” said Sara. So we walked through to the Somerset House terrace. The Thames was sparkling in the sunshine. The Eye was visible through the buds on the trees, framed by endless blue sky. London was aglow, as only London can be. Magic.
And there he was. Between the man blowing enormous bubbles and the musician. At his little table with his adorable green Olivetti typewriter sat writer and poet, Lewis Parker. I had heard rumour of him for years, but had yet to find him myself. His sign offered poems, stories and suicide notes (certainly not!), & more. We later found out later that the “more” tends to be resignation letters.
“There he is, there he is,” I shouted at Sara, grabbing her arm excitedly, like a crazed pop fan or royal family devotee. If she was surprised that the object of my enthusiasm was a young, serious man with typewriter, she didn’t let on. She knows me well, after all.
With the trees rustling and bending in the increasingly strong wind. Daydreaming. Nowhere else on earth I would have rather been at that moment.
April has arrived and with it the start of what is going to be a London love-in of all things Shakespeare. This month marks the 400
So large it could hold 4 couples at the same time. A faded painting on the headboard suggests what all those bodies could have been up to…coitus interruptus by means of Malvolio. He is horrified Maria is discussing this racy item and hurries us into yet another room, to show off a fireplace and a ceiling. But we don’t really get to admire these blander fixtures as immediately he is overtaken by Toby. And then the fun starts. A back and forth and round again between all 3 characters. A song. More badinage. The famous yellow stockings. No, they didn’t speak Shakespeare’s words, Yes, you needed to know the play to appreciate all the jokes, but it is such a playful and fast romp it didn’t require any in depth knowledge. Why do you tease me so, whinges Malvolio. Because “you delight in others misfortunes.” And this afternoon we also delighted in Malvolio’s misfortune. After being invited to join a lovely rendition of With Hey, Ho, the wind and the rain (a familiar ditty to any as dedicated to the Globe as me), Malvolio staggers off. Howling. In self-pity. A thoroughly entertaining 35 minutes. If only all museum tours could be so engaging. Shakespeare and the V&A. Great combination.
Some of the best ideas are the simple ones. Want to share a fav film with friends? Tack up a sheet in a London garden, crack open some beers and let Backyard Cinema be born. 4 years on, these are the perfect people to host Shakespeare’s classic tale reworked for the MTV generation. This spring not only marks the 20
Some Voices Sing Choir. Oooh what a choir. Backyard Cinema, you are genius. But then you are London.
And tonight we get it all, with a choir. As the previously boisterous crowd quiets, and the newscaster explains “In fair Verona, where we lay our scene…..a pair of star cross’d lovers take their life,” the choir, in red robes, holding candles, processes, and in full operatic voice begin “Oh Verona.” Mesmerizing.
The bleak midwinter was even more bleak this year by the loss of a dear friend’s husband. It was sudden. The circumstances were particularly upsetting. A terrible shock. The subsequent deaths of David Bowie and Alan Rickman, celebrities to whom we had such personal attachments, caught us all off guard and confirmed that things were definitely off-kilter. Death comes for us all, yet we are unprepared for it in people we know and love, still less for people we admire and respect from afar. We can be irrational in our mourning, not always able to understand the difference between genuine sorrow for someone gone and the fear of our own mortality. It stops us in our tracks. It makes us howl for our own days gone by. It makes us look at the world in a new, harsh, unforgiving light. It hurts. As well it should, because to be reminded that this is our one shot at life is a jolt. But for those of us on the edges of the grief, that jolt can be a chance to stop and think. So I took some time off. I retreated into my own kitchen and thought about friendship and heroes and family and how I spend my time, what I have done with my life. A pause after the shock to re-evaluate, reorganize, reflect, change, and then have another go. To restart. Like the crouch, bind, set formation of a scrum: Shock, Pause, Restart. Definitely restart, because, in the words of my beloved Frank Turner “we’re not dead yet.”
It was a memorable occasion not just because listening to Turner live makes me giddy with devotion, but because this concert was held on American Thanksgiving, 13 days after the Paris attacks. A time to be thankful and alive. Turner is an artist for whom the act of doing is essential. “No one gets remembered for the things they didn’t do.” I only had to hear that once and I was a true believer. His lyrics are frequently a call to action. To travel, to change, to grow, to get out there and meet the storm, if that is what’s coming. To live. On the night, he paused often to remember those who died at the Bataclan, one of whom was his close friend, the victims at the cafes, the narrow escape of the football fans, all people out for an evening of companionship and pleasure. The venue is standing only, the hierarchy one of timing rather than price, enhancing the atmosphere of togetherness. Together in raucous, defiant joy, “because we’re not dead yet.” I do not in any way mean to trivialize the horror of the Paris attacks by suggesting that singing along at a concert a few days later will in any way deter terrorism or heal the grief of the aftermath. Rather, I use it only as an example of London’s famous defiance, an attitude that has become a hallmark of Londoners through the ages. After the Great Fire of London, 1666, they rebuilt their city, shunning ideas of razing the remains to create a more elegant landscape of broad boulevards, on the old footprint. By 1672, only 6 years on, life and trade were pretty much back to normal, impressive even by today’s standards. Their stalwartness in WWII, particularly during the Blitz, a German bombing campaign that lasted from the 7th of September 1940 until the 11th of May, 1941, including 56 nights of consecutive bombing, has become something of lore. The outpouring of kindness and strength in the days and months after July 7, 2005, when terrorist bombs ripped through tube trains and a bus, is still a vivid memory for many. This past July, I was lucky enough to be invited to the 10th Anniversary Memorial Service at St. Paul’s Cathedral; I even made the BBC news clip, looking appropriately solemn, if rather stern. All the moving speeches mentioned the unquestioning help of strangers. How Londoners’ reputed standoffishness melted away; how emergency personnel worked without concern for their own safety; how ordinary people were able to do the extraordinary, often in little but important ways.
Thankfully, most of us will never have to test ourselves like this. But we can all try to scrape the gloom of winter away and get out there. Yeah, the weather is shocking, mornings on the Northern Line are a special kind of hell, the laundry never does itself, IS continues to threaten and sometimes very bad things happen to very good people. All the more reason, after the shock and pause, to restart. Get out there, have another go. Because we aren’t dead yet. Ok, I certainly won’t save the world (not clever enough) nor will I invent something that profoundly improves the lives of millions (really, really not clever enough) but I can live with a spring in my step, a curiosity that doesn’t know when to stop, a passion for this city I will never cease exploring and a desire to do it all in beautiful shoes. “And on the day I die I’ll say at least I fucking tried..” That will do, yeah, that will do quite nicely.
mylondonpassion 