London October 2019
Tag: London
Boxed In
My fourteen year old daughter took this photo of her old man in one of London’s iconic red telephone boxes.
I do look just a little trapped!
We do it to others; we do it to ourselves mostly.
Put them, us, into boxes of our design.
Labels are for jars, and boxes, well, boxes are the caskets that we will go out in.
Pigeonholing and stereotyping behaviours kill the hope of the different and the unique.
In venturing into blogging , I am trying to think outside of a box I have spent years carefully constructing.
In expressing my creative side, I bury the negative self-thought (and perhaps the thought of others), that tells me that is not what I am, or do.
That final box can wait for now; I have a few more I need to tick…
Not A Christmas Song (Thankfully)
Over Christmas music yet? Well, may I give some respite from the sheer awfulness of most of it – here is a prime cut from my album of the year, Devendra Banhart’s ‘Ma’.
A typical offbeat piece of Venezuelan/American Banhart’s warm songcraft, enhanced by a surreal video. Enjoy! If it’s not your cup of tea ,it could be worse (‘Little Drummer Boy’ anyone…?).
(By the way, the recent photo features a community piano in a central London shopping mall . Some outstanding young talent created amazing sounds for free – I love community pianos for their surprise element!
Link to the DB song below:
Criss Cross
Spectacular curving, criss-crossed ceiling at London’s King’s Cross Railway Station.
So elegant with its purplish backlighting, and just vast as a piece of design
Even I hadn’t been hanging around for the train north to Edinburgh, this would have dragged me in to admire it.
Lines crossing over and over again, like the passengers scurrying to their trains, heading to different destinations.
Indeed, the kinetic and life energy in the place is amazing – all those journeys, with their beginnings and endings ; those unknown (to each other) plans and dreams – in the one place at the same time, intersecting for the briefest moment and then arching out and beyond, perhaps never to cross over again.
And when you board the train, it’s a little simpler – you’re away again on your own trajectory and at least the tracks run parallel !
Victoria Blushed
An optimistic view of London’s Victoria Station on arrival by train – looking up at the glassed roof stretching forever (or so it seems).
Well, an optimist always looks up – always.
And sees the view through rose-tinted glasses.
In a way this picture captures the hopefulness that travel brings to me – the pursuit of the new and the dream of the possible.
Bespoke
Spokes in the big wheel – the London Eye from below – always turning…
Nevermore
” Quoth the raven -“Nevermore”.”
Edgar Allan Poe, ‘The Raven’
One of the famous ravens at the Tower Of London – darkly majestic avians that rule the roost and would seem to know all the secrets of the place, secrets that, erm, might otherwise be nevermore…
Great Northern Hotel
So, this morning I was waiting around at King’s Cross Station in London to board a train to Edinburgh.
Stepping outside the station for a final,slightly desperate,vape before heading off,I looked up at this rather striking hotel set against swirling skies.
I admit to accommodation envy after having to spend four nights with my family in a tiny and inadequate studio apartment in a part of the city I had never heard of, following a booking screw up which became apparent only at the last minute.
I guess, though, you don’t come to London for the room you sleep in between taking in the events and sights of an undoubtedly great ,northern, city…
On The Promenade
Dusk at London’s South Bank and those who stroll on the promenade do so with the expectation that everything is possible and nothing improbable….magic will occur tonight.
To Trains
The pace on the London Underground is relentless.
In the odd quiet moment however you note that some of the stations have their own beauty and elegance.
Easy to miss when concentrating on getting to your next destination…
ebb then flood 