Hello! I am writing this post winging my way back across the Atlantic on American Airlines, reclined across 3 seats near the middle of the plane. It’s glorious, because the plane is mostly empty so we all get plenty of space. And, the flight attendants are so much nicer because they’re not nearly as busy. Makes me wish that air travel was always like this - but of course the catch-22 is that if airline travel was always like this, then it would either cease to exist or cost 10 times as much. There’s some sort of lesson in there, which we’ll get back to in a moment.
But first, a quick word: I haven’t been updating the blog. That sucks. Now I’m going to update the blog. Which will be good. There - quick word over.
Anyway - London. Awesome place. Definitely a cool place, glad I visited. I was there just not quite long enough to get over the jet lag, so all 3 days were kind of a blur - but a good blur. First things first: there a approximately - by my scientific estimate - 807 million billion people in London. I have never seen so many people try to occupy the same place in space and time, and this is coming from someone who lived in New York City for a year and a half. In one particular scene etched into my mind, Katie and I were trying to get someplace and were transferring between Central and Picadilly lines, and the tunnels were so full of people we were crawling along like sheep. Amazingly, though, everyone was so well-behaved. And quiet! It was alsmot peaceful, but also very, very claustrophobic. Every restaurant we tried to go to was just packed full of people - until Sunday, when things started to empty out. Apparently Thursday/Friday/Saturday is kind of the high time, then Sunday people just lay off.
More on this subject later, but along the lines of my empty flight - I wanted to mention how awesome the hotel room was. It was the Hoxton in Shoreditch - sort of a Mission-esque neighborhood, very trendy and hip - and the hotel room was just great. What impressed me was how they managed to do so much with such little space. With an almost Japanese-like precision, items folded down or out of the walls, and everything had its place. No square inch was wasted. In particular, because the room was smaller, the appointments could be so much nicer. Little touches, like USB and international power outlets, or a tiny cupboard with 2 wine glasses, or a cutout for your pencil in the desk. Everything in its place, and a place for everything. Not in an anal or neat-freak way, but just in an efficient, space-saving way. This synchronized with my personal life, in that I’ve recently developed an interest in tiny houses, in particular www.tinyhousebuild.com. The concept of doing less with more really appeals to me, on both a practical (think of the money you’d save!) and a philosophical level. I really think it would reduce my personal anxiety to live in a small but exceedingly well-arranged space, and I’d like to make that happen someday in my life. It’s also become increasingly clear that it’s a metaphor for life - that what makes life tick along smoothly is really what we choose *not* to do - the clutter we clear out of our lives. All those objects that are not worth the time and space it takes to keep them have an analogue in our daily life; hobbies, activities, maybe even acquaintances that are serving as a drain off of our primary priorities. But, again, more about this later.
