Saturday, September 27, 2008

All the Lonely People

27 Sep 2008

In our temporary life here in Oxford, there are no deadlines, no obligations, no worries. I walk around, enjoying myself without a care. (And I don't want to go home!) But as I observe other people, I realize many people around me have anxieties, griefs, and perplexities. There are new students getting oriented to the university and accustomed to being away from home for the first time. There are young people at the point in their lives where they're looking for a loving and lasting relationship. Older people have family troubles, illness, economic woes. I see people at church who are in intense prayer as if they're wrestling with difficult problems that may not have good solutions.

We can see a homeless shelter from our window. Since the weather has generally been nice, the homeless people hang out in the alley-way. Some are too hung-over or damaged to do much more than sit or lie, but frequently arguments errupt among them. We hear shouting and cursing. Sometimes there are fights. But there's seldom serious trouble. These unfortunate people seem like mal-adjusted young adolescents.

Normally there's a gate between the homeless shelter and the parking lot behind our building. Apparently it's not working at the moment, because it stands open. This gives me a convenient short-cut to town, one I especially appreciate when I'm carrying groceries home. But it also allows the homeless people to wander about our building. Don was surprised one night when arriving home after dark, to see a prone figure near the outside door. When I opened the Daily Bin Store (the place where dumpsters are kept), I almost stumbled over a heap of blankets covering a sleeping form. I figured they were less eager to see me than I was to see them, so I went ahead and deposited my bag of garbage. I notice more trash strewn around the place.

I suppose the gate will soon be fixed and the homeless people will be shut out once again. But I don't find them frightening. They're more pathetic than dangerous.

Driving a Bus

25 Sep 2008

Being one of the first to get on board, I rode the bus from London to Oxford sitting in the left-front seat. (That put me just behind and above the door --- the driver, of course, was on the right.) With an unobstructed view of the road, I could appreciate the driver's skill, manuevering the huge vehicle though heavy traffic. Sometimes it seemed that there couldn't possibly be room to get past another large vehicle on the right,especially since there was a cyclist close by the front left corner of the bus. But we made it without a scrape or scratch or without even killing anyone.

It seems to me that all bus drivers go awfully fast, especially when they get to an unobstucted straight-away. I suppose it's a relief not to be hemmed in, and they have a schedule to meet.

I do worry about the motorcyclists on the highways. They zoom in and out between the cars and busses, and I can only guess that they have a high fatality rate.

The Colors of Habitat

25 Sep 2008

The big Habitat store on Regent Street in London is featuring dark colors for home furnishings. Set against a background of light black or dark charcoal (however you want to think about it) are dark purple, dark wine, dark rust --- dark shades of all the colors from blue to purple to red to orange on the color wheel. No green or yellow.

Some rugs and upholstery are patterned with large-scale floral silhouettes, usually dark on dark. The only enliving touches are accents of bright red and orange.

Note: on the other hand, Aquascutum displayed clothing in the most intense colors possible, coupled in striking contrasts: a day-glo pink coat over a red-orange-red dress; a BP green skirt and BP yellow top with a red hat; an olive-green coat over a passionate purple dress.

Thursday, September 25, 2008

Saturation Marketing

25 Sep 2008

I walked from Marble Arch to the British Museum along Oxford Street. This is the "high street" or main shopping street of London, where you find the flagship stores of the big retail names, notably Selfridges, and John Lewis. In addition there are many of the smaller chains. What surprised me was the fact that the smaller chains have stores every five or six blocks on the same street. Even Marks and Spencer had two establishments six blocks apart. In what is clearly a high-rent district in central London, I wondered about this marketing strategy. Obviously large numbers of people pass through this district --- it's sometimes hard to walk along in a straight line without dodging through the crowd. Do they provide enough business to justify the multiple stores? Is this practice a left-over strategy of placing stores where people without cars can reach them, or a new strategy of saturation marketing?

The same practice holds true, but to a lesser degree in the high-end shopping districts in the neighborhood of Regent Street and Picadilly. There I saw only one each of Liberty of London, Fortnum and Mason, Habitat, Dicken and Jones and the like. Here also you find the small, exclusive independent shops, places that descreetly advertise "bespoke" services. In King's English, that means custom-made. If you're a gentleman with unlimited resources, you can procure a bespoke suit, shirt, belt, shoes, hat and even an umbrella.

Scones with Clotted Cream in the Crypt at St. Martin-in-the-Fields

25 Sep 2008

They've cleaned St. Martin-in-the-Fields! I first heard of this church as the home of the orchestra directed by Neville Mariner. From the name, I imagined a picturesque building situated in a green meadow dotted with wild flowers. When I first saw it, I was dismayed to see a dingy, crumbling old church at the edge of congested and traffic-filled Trafalgar Square. In addition to it's music program, the church has an outreach to the homeless and is the center of a ministry to Chinese residents of the neighborhood. The present project has not only cleaned the church, but has also built a substantial undergroud facility for it's work.

I had tea in the old crypt, an underground area with many brick arches. Arriving warm and thirsty, I'd hoped for an iced drink; but eight ounces of a cool but not iced bottled soda just wouldn't do it. So I ordered hot tea along with a scone and clotted cream. Then at the table where I picked up a knife and a napkin, I spied a bucket of ice! So I filled my cup, sat down and poured the hot tea over the melting cubes. Ah! A satisfying draught of really cold, strong tea!

I sat in the company of the Misses Oliphant, spinster sisters who has died in the 1830s. Their grave marker was embedded in the floor at my feet. I felt they wouldn't mind that I was alive and enjoying my tea on top of them. Someday, I'll be dead, too, and I hope someone from the future can think kindly of me as I was thinking of them. There was a jazz concert scheduled for that evening in the crypt. Will the music wake the dead?

Now I Know a Little Bit of London

25 Sep 2008

I've known isolated neighborhoods of London from past visits, but this time I finally connected them. Now I know an area of central London bounded by Marble Arch, King's Cross Station, St. Paul's cathedral, Westminster Abbey and Victoria Station. Of course I don't know the area in detail, but well enough to find my way around and know which direction I'm going. My sense of orientation has been delayed by the Underground map. It's a great map and the Underground is the best way to travel any distance in the city, unhampered by congested surface traffic. But because it's a schematic map, the real relationships between various neighborhoods are distorted. Only by walking and traveling by bus, can you understand the geographic reality.

Yesterday, I had a ticket for entering the Queen's Gallery at 4:30. I found myself in Trafalgar Square with 20 minutes to get there. I soon realized that I couldn't make it by bus because of heavy traffic and because the bus routes don't go there directly. Instead, I remembered a pedestrian staircase that led directly down from the end of Regent Street to The Mall. I made it to the gallery on foot, only ten minutes late, and still in time to enter and view the exhibit.

Sunday, September 21, 2008

Last and First

21 Sep 2008

We went to church this morning at St. Barnabus in Jericho. It's an Anglo-Catholic church in a dramatic Italian-style building with a grand square tower. It must have one of the most highly decorated interiors of any church in Oxford, if quantities of gold leaf count for anything.

The sermon text was based on the parable of the vineyard. Laborers who began their work at the beginning of the day had agreed to work for a penny. But they were angry when they learned that workers hired near the end of the day were also paid a penny. The priest pointed out that if the full-day workers had been paid first, they would have gone away without knowing that the late-comers got the same wage. But the first were paid last, making the point of the story: that grace and forgiveness are available to all believers in equal amounts no matter how good or bad our lives have been. We can't earn grace.

I commented to the Priest afterward that this was a good sermon for us Lutherans since Martin Luther had stressed the free gift of grace in opposition to the Roman Catholic practice of selling indulgences. Then the Priest pointed out that the Sunday School children had unexpectedly demonstrated the point very well. At the end of the service, the school-age children explained their Sunday School project: a vine hanging with paper leaves and bunches of grapes, bearing names of good qualities and names of people for whom they wished these good things.Then the pre-school children showed us their Sunday School project: they'd "picked" paper bunches of grapes and put them into paper baskets they'd colored. It was revealed that they'd each been "paid" two Smartees for their "work". When the older kids heard about the Smartees (pieces of candy) they cried, "It's not fair!"

Life often isn't.

What the Wedding Guests Wore

20 Sep 2008

As I walked past Town Hall this afternoon, a wedding party was just coming out. I stayed to watch and made the following observations:

There were 60--70 guests. Only five or six of the older women wore lamp-shade hats. The most dramatic was that of one of the mothers who was noticable in what looked like a leafy cabbage in an intense shade of yellow-green. The other mother and five or six younger women wore net/feather wisps. Older women wore transparent stockings in flesh or dark tones. Younger women, even in very mini-skirts, had bare legs. Older women wore classic pumps, younger women wore chunky heels with straps high over the instep.

The bride wore white: a strapless dress with shirred bodice, and a smooth skirt and train. There were tiny buttons all the way down the back. An abbreviated shrug of white lace covered her shoulders. She wore her blond hair swept up with a narrow, bejeweled headband.

A couple of 30-something guys wore kilts.

General fashion notes: Young women wear short, little-girl dresses or flippy skirts --- fitted at the hip, flared below --- over opaque tites. The dresses are usually made of a soft fabric and may be trimmed with limp ruffles. Skirts are often decorated. There is an interesting mixture of patterns and textures. For example, a heavily textured, tweedy or knit jacket or coat over a soft dress.

The form-fitting, low-necked, layered t-shirt look with push-up bra seems to be going out.

Things are Not as Far Away

19 Sep 2008

We're in Oxford now. This is our 11th visit to our flat, North Light. Before, it has seemed like a mild effort to walk uptown, and it took at least a week to get used to four stories of steps up to the flat (especially when carrying luggage or groceries!) But for some reason, even though I'm seven years older than I was when I first visited here, things don't seem so far away. The center of town is just a stroll and although I still wish our flat was one story lower, I can make it up 56 steps with only one pause. By the end of the week, I'll be able to make it all the way without stopping.

Am I in better shape physically or is it less of an effort psychologically since it's now familiar?

Sky Mall

16 Sep 2008

I hadn't looked at a Sky Mall magazine for several years. This is the catalog in the seat pocket of most airlines, offering all kinds of mostly useless, but often expensive gadgets: kitchen ware, health-care, safety and fitness equipment, ugly personalized items.

As I'd expected, there were more electronic items than there used to be. But I was surprised to see how many pages were devoted to pet supplies. Pet needs are now almost equivalent to baby needs. There are several kinds of beds: krypton beds, beds for hot weather, beds for cold weather. There are training aids to keep you pets OFF the furniture and steps or ramps to help aged animals get ON the furniture. Electronic devices keep stray animals out of the flower beds in your yard. There are grooming tools. What about a decorative litter box to insure privacy for your cat, or a special tray with plastic turf for the relief of your dog? (I wondered how this one was emptied. I can't imagine carrying a shallow tray filled with two liters of urine, the advertized capacity.)

If you have an indoor pet, there are all kinds of gates to keep it from going into forbidden parts of the house. Most amazing was an end-table that also served as a cage. Under what circumstances would you want to cage your pet in the living room? If you have guests who don't like dogs, put the animal in another part of the house! If you travel with your pet, you may need a barrier to keep them in the back seat of the car or a harness (like a seat belt) or a booster chair so they can see out the window. If you're walking, take your pet in a special stroller. But then the darling might need a special diet to keep from gaining too much weight!

The people who write the descriptions of the items in the catalog must be encouraged to use adjectives in the titles. Some describe a functionality of the item: wireless, telescoping, configurable. Other adjectives describe a superior quality: corrosion-resistant, unbreakable, reusable. But most of the adjectives have no direct relationship to the item they are supposedly describing and are employed only to create a desire for the object: genuine, original, superior, natural, ingenious, exquisite, understated, serious, stylish, luxurious, collectable, unique, magical, exclusive.

The wording in the descriptions of personal care items went far beyond using meaningless adjectives. It was very carefully crafted to AVOID any claims about what a particular device would do. Instead, if you bought the device, YOU would be empowered to promote, improve and support well-being, and to relieve, chase and eliminate whatever problems plagued you.

I suppose people buy things from the Sky Mall catalog, or they wouldn't continue to print them. At best, they provide some ironic amusement for bored passengers.

BMI, Where are You?

16 Sep 2008

I had booked our flight to England on British Midlands Airline, or BMI. I knew this airline flew routes within the United Kingdom, and perhaps a few from England to the continent, but I was surprised that they had service to the U.S. Anyway, I got email confirmation with the flight number, time and terminal of departure. When I tried to print boarding passes at home, I constantly got error messages. That was a bit disconcerting, but sometimes for international flights, the agents want to see you in person, check passports and the like.

When we got to the international terminal, there was no sign of BMI. It was not listed on the directory, and the man at the information desk knew nothing about it. Then I spied a United Airlines flight departing for London at exactly the same time as our BMI flight was scheduled to depart. So on the chance this was a code-share (though there was not a word about such an arrangment in the information BMI had emailed,) we got in line at United.

When we got to the front of the line, I handed over the information I'd printed from BMI. The agent hardly glanced at it, handed it back and asked, "London?"

"Yes," we replied.

"Passports please," she demanded. She never batted an eye or gave us any explaination about BMI. We received boarding passes and proceeded to the gate for the United flight.

BMI is known as a discount carrier. I have a theory that United, which does not want the reputation as a discounter, sells excess seats to BMI. That may be why we were seated in the middle of the very last row of the very large plane. But we got to London a half hour early.

Note: If you Google "MBI" you'll get several sites about body mass index before you'll find British Midlands.

Nail Salons

16 Sep 2008

While riding on the bus to the airport, my husband said, "I'll have to get my nails done." He was not serious, but the remark was prompted by all the nail salons he was noticing along our route. I educated him to the fact that many women have their hair done every week and their nails done every couple of weeks or so. I do get my hair cut about once every three months, but I've never had a manicure or pedicure. However I know women who consider the services of a nail salon and a hair dresser essential to their well-being. And they're often women who don't appear to have a lot of money and who seem to struggle to make ends meet.

That led to a discussion of luxury goods and services. I've noticed that since the economic down-turn, places like beauty spas are suddenly offering specials. Marginal businesses are closing. This will hurt a lot of people in the short term, but maybe it's time we re-evaluate and figure out what's really essential for a good life: simple shelter and clothing, healthy food, exercise, love, freedom.

Waiting for the Bus

16 Sep 2008

At the beginning of a trip after doing all the things that need to be done at home, I feel keyed up and unnatually alert. That's why waiting for the bus to the airport this morning was a bit of an adventure.

First of all, I was surprised to see that the taxi that picked us up at home was a brand-new Prius hybrid, painted bright orange. The Yellow Cab company seems to have shifted one step on the color wheel.

When we arrived at our town's Transportation Hub, the new name for the bus stop and train station, we were accosted by a little woman with a red roller bag. I thought she was also headed for the airport. She asked us in a very friendly way where we were going. Then she pitched her appeal for money supposedly to support a non-profit organization that publishes photos of missing children. I told her I didn't give money to charities I knew nothing about. She persisted, telling me what a good cause it was, how she'd been kidnapped and raped as a child and how worthwhile this work was --- for the children.

I responded respectfully. But she wasn't about to give up. I replied that maybe she was more suited to another kind of work. She said Women didn't get any respect. I proposed that she try to figure out why people did not make contributions when she asked. She said it hurt her feelings when people didn't respond to her appeal, how everyone else who worked for the group gots lots of contributions (not donations, she informed me) and she didn't understand why she didn't. Older people like her didn't get any respect.

She finally simmered down when I asked if her organization had a website. She gave me a brochure with the URL and wrote her name and ID number on it so if I made a contribution (not a donation) later, she'd get credit.

While this was going on, a police car pulled up behind us. I could hear a big dog bark, and when I turned around to look at the patrol car, it was marked K-9 Unit. The officer was checking out a sleeper on the bench behind us. He woke the guy up, looked at his ID and asked some questions: Where did he live, where did he sleep, where was he going? There have been three day-time muggings in our town this week. Maybe the police are stepping up surveilance of suspicious people. Apparently this guy seemed OK, and the policeman told him he couldn't sleep there and directed him to move on.

Another waiting passenger asked if we were waiting for the airport bus. When I replied affirmatively, he said we'd just missed it. I countered that we were actually early for the next bus, which was true.

Once our bus arrived, we had an uneventful journey to the airport, in company with a Chinese couple about our age. They were headed for Hong Kong, we were headed for England, and when we got off the bus at the International Airport, we went our separate ways.