1) I spent the morning in bed writing, but about 12:30 I turned left out the hotel door and proceeded down Upper Woburn Place, past Tavistock Square and Russell Square, and a little further beyond to Lincoln’s Inn Fields. At 2:30 a high school friend would be joining me to tour Sir John Soane’s Museum.
2) Because it was too nice a day to stay in, and because I had stayed in, I felt like it was important to go early and just be in London. And Lincoln’s Inn Fields was the perfect little London park for a Sunday afternoon, picnickers sitting in circles on the grass or on the rows of benches.
Morris dancing!
2a) By a gazebo there was even a group morris dancing, under the direction of a couple people playing woodwinds. There they were with bells on their toes, capering about and clashing sticks. Because of course.
2a) Believe it or not, my last semester in college I took morris dancing for four credits. I’ve never had such deep blisters in my life.
2b) The little café was closed on Sunday, so I could use one of the picnic tables to sit and jot some notes. Though a malevolent crow kept eyeing me from the roofline above, ominously clawing the gutter before swooping down to another table. I waved him off, but after awhile, I packed up and took a stroll around this beautiful little park.
3) From one of the naughty little books in my library there was a little poem that I kept trying to recall. (I had to look up the text below, so you have been spared several instances of “blabbity blabbity”):
The dainty young heiress of Lincoln’s Inn Fields,
Brisk, beautiful, wealthy, and witty.
To the power of Love so unwillingly yields.
That ’tis feared she’ll unpeople the City!
The Sparks and the Beaus all languish and die:
Yet, after the conquest of many.
One little good marksman, that aims with one eye,
May wound her heart deeper than any!
4) The museum didn’t seem to be getting much traffic this Sunday, but 2:30 seemed to be the time people had chosen to visit there. I got in line (well early), but by the time I got to the head of the line (earlier than expected), my friend had not appeared. So . . . how wonderful that the nice young lady said “Just wait right here and we’ll let you in directly she gets here.” Wasn’t that nice?
5) And then there she was, my favorite mudlark, Andi! Just as two years ago, coincidence united us in London. And so . . .
6) . . . we entered Sir John Soane’s, a maximilist Paradise. Our high school friend Hilary first steered me there in 2019, and I loved it. Andi had never been, and her astonishment was delight to behold throughout the house.
6a) The user experience had changed in more ways than no advance tickets. To my surprise, photographs are now allowed inside! Risky in a few very tight, very full spots, but so welcome.
6b) The one place things felt really crowded was the Picture Room. Sir John planned it ingeniously with multiple sets of panels so that he could hang two or three times as many paintings in the same space. It’s probably the most popular room in the house, and the guide stationed there had to rope off the entry until a few people were — hmm, I don’t know — encouraged to decide to leave. But we did get in, and the panels were opened to the window of the Monk’s Parlour below. It was pretty amazing!
6c) A friend of mine, vexed with the needs of influencers, has coined the phrase “Tyranny of the Pretty Lady” to refer to everyone having to stay still until her boyfriend Gets the Shot, generally in some inconvenient place. I witnessed this a couple times in Portugal last fall. At Sir John’s it only happened once, on the staircase, but it could have had a dire impact elsewhere in the museum.
7) Afterwards we settled in at a nearby Caffé Nero for a happy hour to catch up on All the Big Issues.
7a) Caffé Nero is the Starbuck’s of the 21st century, isn’t it?
It’s a bug hotel!
8) And then we wandered through Bloomsbury. In Russell Square the roses I admired so much two weeks ago (three weeks ago?) have withered and gone. Andi, however, discovered the Bug Hotel, which I had completely missed on my earlier walks.
8a) In Tavistock Square we witnessed a group of Indian businessmen or diplomats gathering near the statue of Gandhi for what looked like it might be a photo op. One of them was carrying a wide shallow bowl of deep pink rose petals.
9) I escorted Andi to Euston Station, and bid her a fond farewell. And then I had to think about dinner. Having learned the day before that today was the anniversary of the Marchesa Casati’s death, I figured an Italian meal with cheap wine would best honor her final years in London. Long story short, I ended up at the same place where I’d had lunch with Ernie and Kevin a few weeks before, and had a wonderful dinner reading Queen James.