London 6

June 15, 2013

Long walks through Soho and beyond yesterday, just drinking everything in, acquiring the images I’ll carry with me as “London, 2013.”  About midday the sun came out, a little, and endures now in a marbled blue agate sort of way. Hiked in the evening to the Old Vic to see Williams’ Sweet Bird of Youth. It was beautifully designed, almost adequately acted, well directed- though sometimes there was acres of space between people who were talking to each other. It simply isn’t a very good play. It’s clearly by a very good playwright, though, with enough success behind him that he can say, “I can indulge myself here, I can cut corners there, I can present this without thinking it through.” It is a little horrifying to watch one man’s fantasy life unfold so little mediated by contact with general human experience. It could not hold the stage today without that great name attached to it. I left disappointed, but had another chance to cross Waterloo Bridge with Parliament and the towers laid out to my left, the dome of St. Paul’s, oddly dainty at that distance, and the new skyscrapers to my right. Drinks at the Axis, though I failed to find Lorenzo. The waiter who was there chased me out into the street to get me to sign my bar tab, not having noticed I left money under my glass. Hope it was as embarrassing to him as it was to me.

Aislinn reports more standing ovations, more wildly enthusiastic crowds for Lincoln. Am I resentful or grateful that I’m not there to witness it? Grateful, I think, as though the hovering specter of my neediness would have bitched it all.

Sick last night, well in the morning. It is a kind of a pattern.