An English Honeymoon: Day 2 (Part I)

Sunday, May 13, 2019

We woke up early on Sunday and we made our coffee from the little coffee machine in our hotel room (it was actually good, very hot, and strong) and munched on sweet English biscuits that lay next to the coffee machine. England, at least every place we ended up going to in England, does not use cream, or creamers, such as half and half - only milk - which was surprising and more than sufficient. (One thing that began to dawn on me during our stay is that despite all stereotypes of England, the place is really much, very much less extravagant than the United States. We, admittedly, are gluttons.)

Sweeping open the long curtains upon our awakening, the sunlight felt like it poured into our room, illuminating the whole of it in luminescent light. Our hotel did not have air conditioning (thank God, I hate air conditioning, usually) which Dan was worried about before we left (he loves air conditioning) but we ended up having the perfect weather for the entire duration of our stay. Every night the windows stayed open, letting in the most gentle breeze you could ever imagine.

We showered, got dressed, and stepped out into the busy streets of Kensington. Once out, we bought breakfast from a local restaurant. Breakfast consisted of baked beans, eggs, and sausage, but done up in a British way that we were not quite used to - we never really got used to that particular breakfast so I went on a Victoria Sponge Cake binge every morning (my fave!) and Dan ate probably a million wonderfully made fresh baguettes.

Kensington's streets are full of shops and restaurants catered, well, to everyone; I've never seen such a tightly bound mix of people: locals (the British of all races, aside from "white" and "black", namely Southeast Asian and Asian, who you could note by their voices (their accents, rather), immigrants, and tourists from all nations, who you could note by the language spoken: lots of French, Japanese, German, and Polish). Interestingly not many Hispanics or Spaniards, which Dan thinks is mostly due to geography (I'd add, perhaps culture too.)

We ate, then walked only a few blocks down to Kensington Square Gardens, which is now one of my favorite places in the entire world. It's a public garden, a royal garden, the garden in which J.M. Barrie met a group of three boys and their mother who inspired him to write the play Peter Pan.

Kensington Square Garden held all walks of life within, not just of the human kind, but all the four legged, webbed, and winged kinds too. One of the things I love, love, love about England is that all of the dogs walking the gardens, and this morning in Kensington, among the trees were unleashed. Unleashed, yes, that's the correct word. That is, the dogs were  relinquished into freedom and exploration because of this simple fact: they were gentle, tame, mannered, well-behaved dogs who did not require a leash, and who were all so dedicated to their masters or owners or caretakers that they would follow suit whenever they realized one or the other wandered too far. You have no idea how happy this made me... everyone and every animal strolling freely through this immense expanse of trees, flowers of all species, bushes, gardens, flickering sunlight. The chatter here was never loud, it was always a bright hush enveloping us in a kind of warm language hug that felt like a natural ecosystem all of its own. The birds sang - there weren't any "angry birds" here - they san songs; they were songlike, and seemed cheery and happy - not a note out of tune. I was, indeed, in some kind of wonderland, better, some kind heaven, which I knew was different than my troubled, haunted America in ways I was just beginning to understand.

Dan and I found a strong old tree, with one husky, tough arm laid out as if on purpose, as if for the sake of giving some travelers a bit of rest. We took advantage, humbly and gratefully, and sat. And smiled. It was a perfect morning in England, nothing like the nightmare of back home where happiness is a facade... it was in England where we began to feel the harmony within, a dream that was sync with its reality, with nothing to hide under a veneer, if there ever was a veneer at all.

Note: Dan was worried that I meant our life at home is a nightmare. No! That is not what I meant at all. Being at home with Dan is heaven. If I were Jane, he is my Mr. Rochester... What I mean by "nightmare" is something quite different, something about the direct contact with an inner terrain of this nation that has not yet been fully comprehended, and is still murky and muddy for many, including myself. 

More about Day 2 to come...

- F