Because it takes so long to get everywhere in London (partly because of its sprawl and partly because of its appalling public transport system), I'm in the habit of vastly overestimating how long it will take to get anywhere. Today I left 45 minutes to travel via public transport from Capitol Hill (where my sister lives) to the eastern edge of Georgetown – a distance I probably could have nearly walked in that amount of time. So I got off the Metro midway and walked half of it. After years of visiting palaces and stately homes in England and Europe, the White House looks so tiny! Quaint, dare I say – though I hesitate to use that word since an old editor of mine cringed when I used it to describe DC itself.
Certain parts of DC hold memories for me in every step, from the White House itself (special tours with friends who worked for various administrations) to the walk across Lafayette Park, where I caught sight of the Hay-Adams Hotel (where my sister and I stayed the night before we left DC to drive cross country in 2000 – and also the night we in the wedding party stayed the night of her wedding. The hotel is also home to the Off the Record champagne bar, one of my first "friend dates" with one of my now-best friends – we went there because I was reviewing it.)
I passed places where I used to binge, coffee places I frequented, and bars where I behaved badly. On I walked, past Taberna del Alaberdero, where I went for lunch once years ago with an august journalist who died recently.
After lunch – with a (now wildly successful) old friend who always manages to make me feel like I have made his week by letting him know I'm in town (and who comes up with a ludicrously inappropriate imaginary job title for me so that he can justify expensing the lunch) – I walked up New Hampshire Avenue, passing the apartment building where I crashed on my sister's sofa for the first month after I graduated from college... Ah, I could go on.
About a year ago the counsellor I saw said my childhood and my mother's long illness had given me little faith in the world, and that I needed to trust a bit more. He suggested that if I did, I would see that I wouldn't always get what I wanted, but that I would get what I needed. Despite the fear of an empty weekend this weekend and of BN2 (not fear of physical harm – just fear in general), on Tuesday I was wanting to get back to London; wanting to start the almost-certain-to-be-messy business of getting used to life on my own again. (I have always liked to get unpleasant things over with as quickly as possible.) But instead I've gotten extra time with my sister, who will almost certainly on bedrest the next time I see her – if not already the mother of three. The chance to reconnect with some friends I missed when I was here last summer, and to feel a bit more a part of my old friends' new lives (Sunday before the airport I'm attending friends' daughter's first birthday party).
It feels like a gift, and I am ridiculously, hug-a-stranger and smile-at-the-world grateful for it.
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You are going to be Aunty of triplets? That's really cool, you'll love it. I became an Aunty very unexpectedly 5 years ago and it's been the most fun thing ever, even though I'd been completely ambivalent about children to that point. Also, having a little person watching me gave me the final push to kick my eating problems. One more thing to be grateful for.
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