Archive for December 20th, 2007
It’s meant to be a penny, of course. A single bus ride in Edinburgh costs a pound. Inflation affects even the imagination these days.
Regular readers will know that buses play a fairly large role in my life, and I’ve just written the last entry all about buses, one way or another. But I did realise yesterday how much buses help me get ideas for blog entries.
The last couple of days, I’ve been at home for only short periods of time. I’d been out doing nice things, seeing people I love. But just sitting at home in the evening, thoughts were not really coming for writing the blog.
There seems to be something about bus travel, about glimpses of things, or perhaps the space to be on your own and reflect, that is conducive to writing it down. Just sitting at home may not do it. This is a little concerning for someone who a) wants to write more and b) wants to be at home more.
Of course, there’s nothing to stop me being around home more, but with a few bus rides here and there. Moderation in everything. But just as travel broadens the mind, it also broadens the input of information, stimulates you to make connections.
Trains work too, I have to say. Trains are especially good when they cross spaces where roads don’t run. Crossing fields, working through forests, seeing a house there, a car there, someone on a bike waiting at the train crossing for you to pass…All of these immediately suggest stories, worlds to step into, that can being as soon as pen reaches paper, or hands square up on a laptop.
Funny business, writing. We all do so much, live so much, in our days, that there is plenty to write about. Yet we live in an age where so many aspects of life are recorded more and more. There are plenty of others at the same task - security cameras notwithstanding. Is there a need for us to record?
Blogs suggest there is. The opportunity to record, but also to get others’ feedback, not just on your experience, but also how you write, is something above and beyond what’s been available before.
They say that both introverts and extroverts go to parties. But introverts leave earlier. They need to get away, to process what’s been happening. While the extrovert recharges their batteries through being with others, after a while, the introvert needs to do this by spending time on their own.
I wrote enthusiastically about yesterday’s party - and the party, the company, the chat, were all good in themselves, not just the food or the leftovers…Today, I am full on people, and ready to fill up on being on my own. But I do see that, while I long for time at home during busy working weeks, just being at home will not push the imagination.
I have to do a few things in order to write. Input leads to output. Writing is not so much of my life that I’m at a point of writer’s block. But I now understand the point of “digging ditches”, to requote Erica Jong from a recent post, in order to find the words again.
Even given that, words are elusive at times. Perhaps like being out in a boat, waiting for the fish. My discipline at the moment is to go out fishing each day, or at least most days. But sometimes, a shoal of words, of ideas, or memories, comes past. As this is the third post today, you can guess that I’m keen to keep dragging them into the boat while they’re still around.
December 20th, 2007
So, firstly, I’m on holiday (but I’m not allowed to be smug about it, given that others are still working). Which secondly means a chance to catch up on things that don’t often happen during ‘term time’ (despite the fact I’m not at school).
One of is the option of meeting up with family. Had the chance to meet Mum for lunch, look round the shops in Bruntsfield, then head on together to see Granny. Now I know you think I could be doing this at the weekend too, and that does happen too. But there’s something particularly nice about doing these things on a week day, as though you had all the time in the world, or at least enough to choose how to spend the day.
One way and another, the combination of buses to get around between these various points in town meant that I was travelling particular routes that I hadn’t done for a while. When we lived in Inverleith, we would frequently get buses that went up the Mound, so I was able to catch up on what has been happening up and down that route. I used to walk home that way when I worked in Bruntsfield, and you skirt the university area between the two, so got a glimpse again of that.
Bruntsfield itself is familiar from a couple of years working there, so the chance to go out for lunch in a familiar area, and see what had changed, was good. Discovered a new children’s book shop, Fidra Press, which both sells their own books - reissuing classic school stories, amongst others - and others. It has a comfy armchair in the window. I can only say it’s a good job for my bank account that I am no longer working in Bruntsfield…
Coming back on the bus from Juniper Green, happened to get one which goes through Colinton. This is the route of my memories as a little girl, visiting my grandparents in Edinburgh, and on occasion, going into town on a double decker bus. Colinton is a good place for overhanging branches, so if you sit upstairs at the front, they fairly thwack the top of the bus, which is exciting when you’re six, and still quite interesting when you’re thirtysomething…
All these buses pass through Tollcross, where we used to live when we were first married. Again, with the emergence of both German and Polish master baker shops, it is again helpful for my purse, and my waistline, that we are no longer living there…but worth a thought for a return visit.
Now I could do all this on a regular day, it’s true. But travelling at this time of year, with thick frost, with mistiness as you come down the hill into Edinburgh and see the lights below, with shop windows lit up and families out and about having pre-Christmas treats at the theatre or cinema…It’s not so different to being six again. The warmth of the bus, the extended journeys on each route, lull you into a state of observing, watching though drowsy, like a child on a long trip home.
This is my city. I may not always have lived here. But I have been here for over a third of my life now, and I love the fact that I have memories of it before that. I remember Slateford Road before all the new developments were built. When you could park on a muddy bit of land where the Western approach road now hums between banks and leisure centres in order to visit Princes Street. When there was still a cafe at the top of Habitat on Shandwick Place.
Yesterday, standing by Tollcross, waiting to change buses, a car swung by, and someone leaned out of the window to shout “Merry Christmas!” I can still feel the size of my smile about it, writing today.
December 20th, 2007
It’s confession time. I enjoy having people over, cooking for them…but sometimes I secretly think that the best bit about parties is eating up the leftovers afterwards.
The fact that this comes shortly before going away for Christmas means that there are all sorts of plans for how to use things up in a pleasing manner. It must rank reasonably high in my subconscious, as that was what I woke up thinking about, while trying hard to wake up enough to get up and see if I had remembered the contents of the fridge accurately…
Part of the thing with parties that makes this satisfying is where you have a party with different people bringing different things. Leftovers - with unplanned ingredients! It’s fairly close to Ready Steady Cook, but without the inconvenience of a studio audience.
To be honest, what was also exciting was seeing how well all the different things went together last night. Nibbles, mini things on french bread, a big vat of soup…I mention this as I am reminded of a similar party a few years ago where we decided we would all bring Christmas things from different countries - or at any rate, a dish relating to a particular country.
The only difficulty was that we had all thought about dishes containing potato, or so it seemed by what was produced. For one guest, fairly heavily pregnant at the time, this meant effectively eating a five course meal where every course included potato. Not great if you are working on a smaller stomach, and having difficulty digesting things…
But the second joy of leftovers is the potential to do things you might not normally do, such have coffee and cake for breakfast. (To be honest, cake for breakfast is such an exciting prospect that it’s just as well I don’t do this too often.) You can equally have things that you might normally eat - such as soup at lunchtime - but with someone else’s take on what that should be. (Three cheers for spiced parsnip soup, by the way.)
So hurrah for parties. And leftovers. In this day and age, in the West, we have lost the significance of feasting, because we are unused to the alternative - or unwilling to go there. We have to get our joy of providence through other means. Leftovers might just be it.
December 20th, 2007