21 December, 2005 | Leave a Comment

I’ve had a lovely birthday today. Thanks to everyone who sent well wishes! I feel so loved – on two continents!

I ended up staying in London and going to the theatre. Everyone I know in London (other students, mostly) has fled for the holidays, so I ventured out alone – but not lonely, if that makes sense. If I feared being alone I wouldn’t have moved to a foreign country where I knew a total of two people. I needed to be alone today. It was a day that called for that sort of introspection.

I saw As You Desire Me, starring Kristin Scott Thomas and Bob Hoskins. It was wonderful. The play was written by Italian writer Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936). I’d never heard of him, but he won the Nobel Prize in 1934. The play was made into a film starring Greta Garbo in 1932. As You Desire Me is drama with a capital “D” – lots of screaming and the waving of pistols. I expected to be entertained but not moved, so I was surprised when the play spoke to me in a real way. The play is about identity and memory. Only a few days ago I wrote that I sometimes felt like a tabula rasa, and this is exactly how Thomas’s character – who has amnesia and doesn’t know who she really is – describes herself in the play. It gave me chills.

After the play I walked along the Golden Jubilee Bridge and saw Big Ben, Parliament and the London Eye all lit up (I was still too terrified to ride the Eye). It was lovely to walk along the pedestrian bridge on such a mild winter night and hear the Thames splashing below. If you must know, it felt like a dream.

I walked through Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square and Piccadilly Circus. I had dinner at Mildreds, a veggie place in Soho. I had a very English dinner – mushroom, porcini and ale pie with fries and mushy peas; for dessert, fruit crumble with lovely English custard. And all of this was vegan! I normally can’t eat traditional English food, so this was a real treat. People who eat in vegetarian/vegan restaurants are so wonderfully dorky – great fun for people watching.

Now I’m home. Will curl up with a good book. It’s the longest night of the year. Enjoy!

P.S. Same-sex civil partnerships became legal in England and Wales today. Unlike when same-sex marriage became legal in my former state of Massachusetts, people in this country haven’t become unhinged. Mazel Tov to Elton John and his new hubby.

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