My Cut-Rate Grand Tour, Day Twenty-eight

Monday, 2 January, 1989

WIEN-- Got up for the Kaiser rolls and jam. I asked for my tee "ohne Milch" but apparently my accent is really lousy-- the waitress brought the pitcher anyway.

Caught the streetcar that heads southeast from the central part of the city, to the Zentral Friedhof. It goes along the Simmeringer Hauptstraße. I don’t know why, but it felt very homely, in a good sort of way, to see this other part of Vienna, as well as the touristed places. The buildings and shops reminded me of places in Kansas City, like along Troost (though not so rundown) or up at 63rd and Brookside. One thinks of all these people going about their lives here, where Vienna isn’t important because it’s a world-famous city, but because it’s where they live.

The object of the morning was another musical pilgrimage . . . Not as easy to accomplish as at the Cimetiere au Montmartre. The Zentral Friedhof seems pretty orderly, in that there’s a monumental avenue leading from the entrance, to a great green-domed church. But as for finding anything . . . I asked a uniformed attendant, in my best fractured German, where Beethoven’s grave was located. He said, or at least I think he did, that it was along the first (or was it the second?) avenue "links" past where a white car was parked. All this in German, of course, so I wasn’t sure if I’d understood correctly.

The whole thing became moot, though, when the white car’s owner drove it away and I lost my point of reference before I got close enough to ascertain where it had been.

Went up and inspected the outside of the church and its flanking wings. There’s a kind of gallery along there, with memorial tablets along the wall. I wonder how one rates that, since I didn’t recognise any famous names.

One interesting feature near there is a plot set off for the graves of Red Army soldiers. It looked, from the dates, that these men hadn’t died in the war but rather were stationed here afterwards (as an army of occupation? Oops!) and it hadn’t been possible to ship their bodies back to Russia. The really sad thing was the near-certainty that most if not all of these men would’ve died as atheists. What a terrible thing, to have no hope!

I knew Beethoven’s grave was supposed to be east of the church, so I tried again to ask someone. Seems they should have section numbers or something. And I think they do, except my German isn’t anywhere close to being able to understand numbers (except for "zwanzig"-- 20-- on the streetcars when they call out the stops. I’ve gotten really good at that). And I could not make the man understand my request to write the number of the row and section down. So I was in for another hour or so of blind wandering.

Found Arnold Schönberg’s grave, though. It’s kind of a Cubist marble monument, very apt. And I came across Josef Hoffmann’s. He and his wife Karoline have a plain tall shaft with their names and dates inscribed in tall gothic lettering.

Finally, after more blundering about, I found what I was looking for. They have a kind of musicians’ Poets’ Corner there, with Brahms, a Strauss or two, little Franz Schubert, and Beethoven all interred in kind of a horseshoe arrangement, with a monument to poor Mozart in the center. Von Suppe had sneaked into the formation, too, though how I don’t know.

I’d been wondering if I should’ve brought Beethoven some flowers but I saw that plenty of other people had adequately supplied the gesture. And it really wasn’t the same as it was at Montmartre. Here, with Beethoven, I was paying my respects to a great man who lived a long time ago. But there, with Hector, it was like visiting the tomb of a dear and sorely-missed friend.

A gaggle of Japanese tourists were marshalled through as I stood in the little clearing. They disturbed my contemplations to a degree, but not to the extent they would’ve with Hector in Paris.

I sang "An die Musik" for Franz. But other than that, I hadn’t much time to tarry. Though I’d arrived at the Friedhof around 10:00 AM it was nearly 12:30 by now, and my Wien transport pass had expired at 12:00. And I still hadn’t figured out how or to whom pay paid your streetcar fare if you were using money.

So feeling rather guilty about it, I bootlegged the streetcar ride back to the Ring. Wasn’t made any more comfortable by the stickers in the windows that said, in German I could understand, that the transport inspectors would be around checking passes today and that yours had better be in order. I suppose I could’ve put some money in the little box, but I didn’t have the correct change and was feeling too straitened to overpay.

So I sat tight, deciding that those stickers probably are on the streetcar windows all the time-- I can’t see them sticking them on and scraping them all off just for one day’s worth of warning.

However it is, as soon as I got back to the Schwarzenberg Platz I walked down to the Stadtpark station and bought a fresh two-day transit pass. And the fact that I’ll only be able to use one day of it should amply make up for my contraband trip of the past half hour.

Went back to shoot a picture of the Konzert Haus where I heard the Beethoven last night, but returned to the Stadtpark U-Bahn station to catch the train for Heiligenstadt. One might suppose I was going to see the house where Beethoven wrote his Heiligenstadt Testament, and someday perhaps I shall. But the afternoon was to be devoted to Architecture, specifically Hoffmann’s Sonja Knips house.

Heiligenstadt is the end of the line. I made myself a satisfying and highly nutritious lunch of pastries there in the station, then set out to find Nußwaldgasse.

Very near the station is a housing project which interested me for a number of reasons, most all connected with its name. It’s called the Karl Marx-Hof (!) and has all these heroic Soviet-Realism-style statues over the major entrances. The amusing thing is that these figures are still enchained. The other irony was that, in the wide front garden of this memorial to the progenitor of Communism, two small boys, on this second day of January, were playing the good old American game of baseball. It was great.

To get to the Sonja Knips house you have a good long pull up the Barawitzka street before Nußwaldgasse veers off to the left. One can’t go into the house, of course, it being a private residence. But the gray exterior is all studded with a regular pattern of diamond-shaped castings, which look as if they should be structural, like the star-shaped tie rod heads on houses in Lawrence. Probably aren’t, though. These are set off by the diagonal mullions in the windows and the diamond coursing of the slates on the roof and the three chimneys. It’s deceptively simple but rife with subtle details like the scooped-in embrasures of the windows.

I managed to catch a bus back down to the station but had no intention of getting the train back just yet. Something important to do first. Made my way down the very warehousey-looking Mooslacken street to the Nußdorfer Lande, which runs along the Donau Kanal.

But canals don’t make it. I wanted the real river. And after awhile of getting mucked up in a small spaghetti-bowl of an interchange I found myself on the Nordbrücke, crossing the actual schöne blaue Donau.

There’s a lovely view of the church on the Kahlenberg from there. And I’ll have you know that in this afternoon’s bright sunny weather the Danube really was blue, if with a slight grayish tinge to it.

The river there splits into two parallel streams, with a long narrow island or something between. There’s a way down to it from the bridge, so you can stroll along the paths as many others were. It was so nice to see the people out enjoying their river on this bright January day: This taking, in the case of some young boys, the form of skateboarding (on their tails) down the smooth pavement.

I walked along the river awhile myself, admiring the fishing boats and the ducks and the views of the city far away to the south. I sometimes wonder what sort of travelling companion I’d be: I’m such a fiend for rivers and tops of towers and hills and things. Would anyone else understand? But it seems to me that if you’ve got a town on a famous river, you haven’t been there properly until you’ve visited the river as well.

Left there around 4:30 and caught the train back to the city. Changed at Schwedenplatz and ended up once more at the Stephensdom. You should see the absurdity that Hans Holler is putting up opposite it on the Platz. It’s called the Haas Haus (Rabbit Hotel?) and looks like a series of cans with their lids half off. Took a picture for Myron Davidman’s* [architectural employer back in the States] benefit.

Near there is a shop that sells some Wienerwerkstätte type things; I bought a deck of cards in that style as a Christmas present for Lynne* [my elder sister].

I saw a coffee mug at a shop along my route to Beethoven’s flat on the Mölkier Bastei the other day, one I thought might be fun to get for Daddy. Went back now but that shop was closed. But as long as I was along there, I stopped at one bakery-deli for something to do for supper, then went to Julius Meinl’s to stock up on bread and cheese and other provisions for the long train ride tomorrow. Stuck it on my Visa and probably spent a fortune.

Though I was cutting it close I tarried in the Opernpassage trying to find the shop where I saw those needlepoint-topped pill boxes. I thought it’d be a nice gift for Janie* [friend who was subleasing my Kansas City apartment]. But I couldn’t find the place again. Gave it up and dashed back to the hotel to change for the opera.

The Wiener Volksoper is the Viennese equivalent of Kansas City’s Lyric, meaning the works are done in the local vernacular; in this case, Deutsch. German, Italian-- in the case of Don Giovanni, it made no difference to me, especially as I’ve heard it in English at the Lyric and basically know the plot.

As I approached the theatre along with many others, I heard a boy of eight or nine a little way ahead of me notice the posters and cry out to his parents something like, "Oh, gut! Ist Don Giovanni!" I couldn’t tell if he was glad it was that opera in particular or if he was simply relieved to see the play was going on as advertised. Either way, it was charming to see the child’s enthusiasm.

I had been told day before yesterday that I’d been sold the last seat in the house. And now I could see why. It was a little stool in the corner of one of the stage right boxes. To see anything at all I had to balance on the very edge of my stool and crane my neck around the lefthand frame of the box. The other people there had real chairs.

But I noticed that there were plenty of empty seats in the balcony center and resolved to employ a little of my Folly Theatre ushering chutzpah during intermission and move.

It’s really hard not to compare this performance with the one I saw at the Lyric in ’79, so why try? In that one, Stanley Wexler played the Don as an overwhelmingly attractive cuss, the kind of man who wouldn’t need to seduce women, he’d have them lining up in the street of their own volition. The Giovanni tonight, a Boje Skovhus, played the role as a dark-minded cynic. You got the idea he seduced women not for the physical pleasure of it but for the vile sake of dehumanising them and messing up their lives. A valid approach, and I don’t think it was to blame for the fact that the performance of the ensemble as a whole never did catch fire. It all seemed rather secondhand.

There were some interesting pieces of business, though-- e.g., Giovanni and Leporello escaped from the avengers at the party by lowering a ladder into the orchestra pit, scrambling over the musicians, and out the other side. And they came back the same way, ladder and all, at the start of Act II. The backlit scene at the graveyard was very effective (and yes, I could see it decently since I did move between the acts). And Giovanni slid into Hell on his own supper table, which went into the depths with him.

I noticed that, as with last night, people were taking pictures all over. So I ventured to follow suit, not using a flash, of course, and waiting for loud portions of the music to cover the shutter noise.

Afterwards, it was truly a strange sensation, standing at the streetcar stop, waiting there at the Währinger Gurtel for the #40 streetcar to take me back to the U-Bahn at Schottentor . . . and over the street one could see signs directing drivers to the highways for Budapest, Prague (Praha), and Brno . . . my God, those cities are all in Warsaw Pact countries! Am I really that far east?† It seemed very mysterious and exotic, as if I were brushing shoulders with something I hadn’t quite believed in up to now. But those cities certainly exist and could be announced by something as straightforward and prosaic as blue and white highway signs!

Back at the hotel, the idea was to get packed up and in bed as soon as possible. 8:00 AM train out of the West Bahnhof tomorrow.
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†Yes, I'm aware now that my geography was shaky and that Czechoslovakia (as it was called then) is just to the north of Austria. But the point is the same.

My Cut-Rate Grand Tour: Day Ten

Thursday, 15 December 1988
From Toulouse to Conques & back to Toulouse again

Rented a car from Hertz and drove up to Conques today. Only way practicable to get there. Hertz was the only one with unlimited kilometrage for a one-day trip so they actually came out the cheapest. 490F, meaning about £49, meaning . . . †

Oh, well. Always wanted to go to Conques.

Kind of a dumb joke here: The rental agent at the Hertz place was the first one since I’ve gotten to France who has attempted to speak any English with me. And I suppose he thought he had to, since I was allowing myself to become self-conscious over the differences between the Toulousain accent and the Parisienne one I was taught and was mispronouncing things and generally tripping all over my mouth. And this guy had the charming cheek to say to me-- in English-- "You know, if you want to learn French, you just have to practice and just try to speak it!"

I refrained from telling him I have been speaking nothing but French for the last week and a half and that when I get into stressful states I can’t even speak my native tongue properly, let alone a foreign one.

Beside, I was going to have enough fun with the car anyway. It was not a Ford Fiesta, it was a mini-Peugeot. I never did get the trunk lock to come open--well, once, to put my stuff in, but then couldn’t get it out; had to get into it through the back seat, but never mind that.

First real issue was not being able to turn the key in the ignition. Clerk came out and showed me how the steering wheel locks and you have to turn the one to free the other. Oh.

Then I worked the little car out into traffic-- where it promptly died. Tried anew. Died again. At which point the clerk came running out and showed me how this car has a manual choke and you have to pull it out till the engine warms up. Oh.

By that time I had a nervous cramp and a bad case of the shakes in my left leg and it was dancing all over the clutch. But fortunately I’d worked out the route so I knew where I was going and knew that if I just kept driving I’d get over it. And out of the major city traffic.

This was not a good day to drive near Toulouse. Extremely foggy but try telling the truck drivers that that makes a difference. I got passed a few times. Great. Let them.

French roads really are those long straight affairs with ranks of trees on either sides, like you see in pictures. Plane trees in this part of the country. Pity I couldn’t see more than a few yards of them at a time. The fog was very poetic but I could’ve done with less romanticism and more visibility.

By the time I was driving through Albi, though, it was just gray skies.

I got a bit turned around there. The signage was great to that point, always telling you in each small town that the N88 traversed which turn to take to get to Albi. But once I reached Hereticville I lost my signs. Ended up in the middle of town, pulled over, with my Michelin.

Got out of there and on towards Rodez. Fog closed in again, as the road reached higher and began to curve around the foothills.

Rodez is very prettily sited, all on a hillside. Church prominent at the top (cathedral, maybe?) with all the buildings ranked down the slope at its feet. Kind of place you’d want to pull off the road and photograph-- if the whole town visible from the road wasn’t modern. Wonder if the Germans had something to do with that . . .

Found the D901 to Conques off the bypass; no trouble this time. Fog continued in drifts on up into the mountains. But it was the sort of thing that just maybe might disappear up higher and give place to sunlight.

Then I got to a scene I wish I could’ve captured on film, if I’d had a place to pull off. The mist became suffused with radiance, which glinted off the trees and hedgerows covered with white hoarfrost. And just a little farther on and higher up-- voilà! there it actually was-- blue skies and sunshine. Thank you, Jesus!

Whatever else that little car had, it had good interior acoustics. First time I’d gotten to do any real singing in a week and a half.

Conques, as I’d remembered reading in Gourmet Magazine, is on a switchback road. Paved, not gravelled, happily. Put her into second and had fun with it.

Conques was kind of strange, as a town. I got there around 1:30 and so it wasn’t surprising that everything was closed. But nothing ever opened thereafter. More people around than in old Carcassonne but nothing like the bustle of even La Côte (There’s a thriving village. They even have an architect’s office). One wonders what it must be like to live there. The major activity in sight was repair work. There were trucks back and forth all afternoon redoing the paving in la rue Charlemagne.

I approached the pilgrimage church of Ste.-Foi-de-Conques from the east side, having left the car at the carpark near the new cultural center (they have concerts there in the summer). It was below me as I came upon it and I could see the chevet and crossing tower. Steps lead down to the place at the west front, and there she was, that wonderful Last Judgement tympanum, with the antique polychrome showing pastel pink and blue. The sun was shining on just the lefthand side of the embrasure and I decided to hold off on too much photography there till the light was hitting the tympanum more directly, from the west.

Into the church through the westward side door of the south transept. First thing I noticed was the fresco that occupies a wall blocking off the far end of the south crossing arm.

The second thing was that the crossing itself was filled with scaffolding. They were repairing the lantern. Oh well. It apparently needed it. The vaults in the side aisles definitely do. If one had the money that would be a good place to throw some.

Even with the scaffolding in the way I could see up into the lantern. It was very beautiful and filled with golden light. And I could just see the carvings of the angels and apostles in the corners.

Walked around the ambulatory to the north transept. The apse chapels were filled with dismantled woodwork. But the transept was free of emcumbrances and yes, the Annunciation relief was where I’d guessed it was, in the center of the north wall.‡ It forms a kind of column at the meeting of the two blind arches under the tribune there.

The nave was radiant, especially in its upper reaches, with winter sunlight. And, more considerately than at some other places I could name, the historiated capitals are illuminated. You could actually see the carvings.

Unfortunately my Olympus battery had managed to run itself down again so I didn’t feel safe using that camera. Did what I could with the Minolta. Ate lots of film as the sun kept moving around and striking the sculpture and columns at new angles.

After I’d seen all I could inside, I went over and learned where to buy a ticket to see the treasury. You get it from an old Augustinian (Premonstratensian) monk, and I’ve never learned yet how one addresses such personages in French these days.

The treasury was certainly impressive, especially when you think of all the donations, all for the sake of that little girl named Faith martyred in the 4th Century. And for Jesus’ sake, too, one hopes. The funny thing is that the whole cult of relics got started because it made people feel closer to heaven-- here was physical evidence of someone who had lived a saintly life on earth and who now was united with God’s holiness in heaven. But it’s been so long since all that that it’s lost its power. The risen Christ seems closer.

From the standpoint of liking it, though, I think my favorite was the crystal on the back of the statue of Sainte Foi, with the Crucifixion showing through it. Rather ghostly, but effective.

The fee for the cloister treasury also affords one access to the museum in the Syndicat d’Initiative. Most of the work here is from a later date, except for the artifacts in the downstairs room which are fragments of capitals and other carvings salvaged when the cloister was demolished in 1830. Does that mean the cloister that’s there now is only 140 years old?

Otherwise, there was a great deal of 16th and 17th Century work, painted wood statuary and most importantly, a series of tapestries recounting the life and legend of Mary Magdalen. Like a lot of others, this artist makes her identical with Mary of Bethany, Martha’s sister. I wonder who’s right . . . I really liked the scene of the supper at Bethany with Christ dressed, from the waist down in the typical 1st Century flowing robe, and from the waist up in a doublet like a 16th Century noble’s.

Over to the abbey magasin after that and bought the obligatory postcards and guidebook. They had one in the same edition as that for St. Sernin. Does Dr. Gendle have one? Should I have picked one up for him?

Wrote him a postcard, at any rate. Don’t know his postcode but figure the British postal service can find Oxford . . .

Sunlight on the tympanum was better by now. The blessed look pleased as punch to be in heaven, though one little soul gives an apprehensive look over his shoulder at a leering devil, as the angel leads him into himmlische Reich . . .

The sun was setting all pale gold and I took advantage of the rest of the light exploring the town, with all its little cobbled streets and stairways. But damn! it was quiet! People were there, though-- you could see the smoke coming out of the chimneys. And occasionally someone would peer through a window as I passed.

Shot several very antique-looking houses. I realize that if I were being really scholarly I would’ve documented their general appearance and location, street and so forth, for future reference. But dammit, it was cold.

Ran out of slide film there. I mean completely. I’ve shot all ten rolls I brought already.

Decided to use the final frame on a view of the town from the west, with the light on the houses and the towers of the church. In order to save my feet and not lose the light, I made up my mind to drive over to that end of town.

Wrong. Got about three blocks worth and ran into the repaving work, blocking the way completely. Big red dump truck and a backhoe. No place to turn around so I had to take the car in reverse-- uphill-- all the way to the carpark (the black exhaust was shocking). Ended up walking back that way after all.

In the process discovered something else interesting about that little Peugeot. Not only will it not work if the choke’s off when it’s cold, it also won’t work with the choke on with the engine warm. Until I discovered that too much gas was the problem I thought I’d done something highly regrettable to the car.

The road from Conques looks west for awhile. And I was privileged to see a real live honest-to-God sunset, my first in a long while.

But, as didn’t greatly surprise me, the clouds closed in as I drove lower, and with dusk returned the fog. And if you don’t think that was enough fun on that curving mountain road you can also figure in the aggressivity of French drivers who don’t think 40 mph (or 65 kph) is half fast enough, even under those conditions. I had a whole string of tailgaters. They were perfectly free to pass if they dared but me, I was going as fast as I could.

I had gotten a taste of the daredevil passing habits of the French on the way up, so it didn’t surprise me greatly to come around a bend and see two pairs of headlights coming towards me in tandem out of the fog. I hit my brakes just enough to give the passer leeway to get back in and kept on singing Berlioz: "Elle s'en va seulette; L'or brille à son bandeau . . . "†† That’d be heart attack city in the USA, but here it’s business as usual.

Fog lasted all the way to Albi. If the drivers didn’t care for what I was doing, I wonder what they thought of the slow-moving trucks doing 20 mph? I know my thoughts weren’t particularly patient or kind.

Had hoped to go a different route on the trip back, maybe even make it up to Aurillac, but decided that under the circumstances I’d better go a way that was at least somewhat familiar.

Found the bypass around Albi this time. The way between there and Toulouse took a much shorter time this time around. I still didn’t go much over 100 kph.

Finally got back to Toulouse and the rental agency a little after 8:00, without having struck any dogs, pedestrians, trees, or other cars. Dropped the key in the slot after parking in the only available spot. Discovered later that I was supposed to drop in some copies of the rental agreement. Well, I’ll do that tomorrow.

Went over to a café at Jean Jaures and rue de Strasbourg and had cassoulet and an Abbaye de Leffe beer. The beer was good. I suppose the cassoulet was, too, if you like the idea of spending around $7.50 for what is essentially baked beans with assorted cured meats.

Well, it’s Famous and now you can say you’ve had it.

Back to the hotel by 10:00 and washed my hair. Stayed up too late waiting for it to dry. Which was dumb, because I do have my blowdryer and a converter with me.
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†The exchange rate at the time was around $2.00 US to the pound sterling.
‡This had been in question for me. The previous term in Oxford when I'd decided to do an essay on this church, the only book my Medieval Architecture History tutor could recommend to me was a 1939 guidebook held by the Bodleian Library. It was completely in French and had no pictures at all. To make things more interesting, some of the pages had never been cut and I had to get permission to do it with my new Swiss Army knife! You'd think I was the first one to read it in almost fifty years!
††Hector Berlioz, La Belle Voyageuse; words by Thomas Gounet, after the Thomas Moore poem "Rich and Rare." Literally (with poetic license), "Travelled she alone, with gold her circlet shining . . . "

My Cut-Rate Grand Tour: Day Nine

Wednesday, 14 December, 1988
Toulouse to Carcassonne and back again

Made the 9:06 train for Carcassonne this morning. It got in around 10:10. I bought a couple rolls for breakfast at a briocherie in the lower town then walked across the Pont Neuf over the Aude to the old city.

Reminded me somewhat of the village below the abbey at Mont-St.-Michel but with the cloudy weather the effect wasn’t the same. It wanted more people.

Went and saw the church of St. Nazaire first off, since I tripped over it. Romanesque nave and Gothic choir and transepts, almost all glass. Viollet-le-Duc hard at work restoring the vitrame, but at least that meant there was light coming through most of them. They had some rather nice large scale figure sculpture, too.

There were a man and three children in there hammering together the Christmas crèche. For that matter, all of Carcassonne, the Upper and Lower towns both, was decorated for Christmas.

They allow cars and trucks in the Cité. Rather anachronistic.

A great many of the of the shops were closed for the season but there were still an adequate number of tacky souvenir stands open. The forte here is hammered copper (or some facsimile thereof). I contented myself with a few post cards and a guidebook.

Took pictures of all the older-looking houses I could find, going on what I knew from Margaret Wood and that Wooden Houses book Eric* gave me. It was awfully cold and windy, though, and with no sun anyway I decided to take an earlier train than planned back to Toulouse.

But first I would make a circuit of the lists between the two walls. Went partway round before the cold north wind drove me back in to the shelter of the houses. But then the sun started trying to come out so I went back outside and walked along the outer fortifications, and looked at the countryside to the east, opposite from the city. Vineyards and hills, off into the distance.

Popped in and out as I saw a likely-looking gate. There were a few people around, mostly couples. Nearly saw an accident at the Tour St. Nazaire as two cars approached it from opposite directions at once. I could hear the car coming in through the single-lane gate and pointed it out to the driver of the exiting car and he stopped just in time. I can’t believe how closely the other one scraped by, though. Very French.

Back out into the lists, continuing clockwise around the citadel. It occurred to me how isolated it was through there and I mused that it would not be particularly romantic to "fall beneath the walls of Carcassonne," since for me at this time it certainly would not be in pursuit of some knightly deed.

Funny I should think of such a thing just then . . . funny-peculiar. Just about the time I passed this semi-circular cut in the earth (a drain of some sort?) just past the Tour de Cahuzac and the Tour du Grand Canisson I noticed a man, middle-aged, stocky and dressed like a workman in blue trousers and zipper jacket, standing looking over the battlements towards the lower town. From whatever conceit I decided to give him a wide berth. But as I passed him, he turned, came towards me, and demanded, "Donnez-moi votre main!"

Well, as far as I know this is not standard etiquette and I was having none of it. I said, "Non!" and drew away, but the creature tried to grab for my hand anyway! Over and over he babbled, "Donnez-moi votre main! Donnez-moi votre main!" Again I pulled away and began walking fast, whereupon the horrid person sped up, passed me-- and waited for me just inside the arch of the Tour Carrée de l’Evêque. The whole thing was unbelievably absurd and became even more so when, as I came opposite him within the tower, he again came at me and not only tried to grab my hand but also my rear end! I evaded contact and kept on going, while he started saying some other things that it’s just as well I couldn’t understand-- I wouldn’t want them rattling around in my mind.

I got out to the approach to the Tour de l’Inquisition, the creep still at my heels. I wasn’t scared, exactly, because the whole thing was so pointless. For what it was worth, I said sharply, "Laissez-moi tranquille!" as advised by one of the books I’d read on travelling in France. But he just grinned, kept babbling, and inside le Tour de l’Inquisition tried to grab me again.

No, I’m sorry. He did grab my hand. And began to pull it towards his crotch.

Well, that was enough. I was not being over dramatic, this was real and quite dangerous, especially considering the constriction of the lists just ahead between the Inquisition Tower and the Tour du Petit Canisson. Seeing it gave a whole new meaning to the expression "to be in a tight place" and I didn’t like it one bit. I snatched back my hand, gave out a shriek to show him I meant business and would really scream if his aggression continued, and took to my heels. I hoped my being younger would avail me if he came after; I couldn’t hear him following but I wasn’t taking any chances.

The lousy part was up the incline towards the Porte d’Aude. It’s rather demoralizing-- not to mention potentially petrifying-- to realize you can’t run like Thomas Magnum. I mean, if my accoster had really been trying I could’ve been lost right there.

Fortunately I knew exactly where I was, having entered through this gate in the first place. I doubled to the left and back into the cité to where the open shops and restaurants were. I have no idea if he meant me serious harm or if he’s just the kind of slime who likes scaring girls, but I wasn’t sticking around to find out.

My intention was to find a gendarme, or maybe report the guy at the post office. But the post office was closed for lunch and no policemen were to be seen. And my French isn’t good enough to make a random passerby understand what the problem was and help me do anything about it. So I decided to make myself scarce. I still didn’t feel safe-- what if he had followed me in? I didn’t want to hang around. So I found some other people, a couple, and began to follow in their wake. Fortunately they were going in the same direction as I’d decided to take-- towards the Porte Narbonnaise, opposite the side where the creep was hanging out. The carpark is there, and other people, and traffic. So I emerged there and circled round outside the citadel to where I found the way back over the river to the lower town. So help me, if I’d seen that jerk again you could have heard me all the way to Oxford.

Back towards la gare, bought some pizzas for lunch-- by which you may deduce that I was not terminally frightened. But I was impressed by the presence of evil in this world-- and moreover of the utter purposelessness of so much of it.

But it was "while we were yet sinners that Christ died for us" . . . And He knew about all this crap ahead of time!

Back to Toulouse by the 1:29 train. The sun actually decided to stay out so after resting at the hotel a little I took the camera and headed back to St. Sernin to see what I could see.

Much better than yesterday. I do seem to be having better luck with my Romanesque churches than with my Gothic. And today somebody went up and began practicing the organ! Maybe it was the composer chosen--Vierne or Messien or the like, but the playing didn’t seem as fluid and composed as that at Bourges. Still, it was a good thing to hear it. And it was audible out in the place at the west front, too.

Made a Decision and walked over to the rue Alsace-Lorraine and bought Marian*† a cloisonné box shaped like a quail, for Christmas. Around $13 US.

Got some orange juice and a chocolate bar at the Monoprix and came back to the hotel. Consumed much of that and the third 5" pizza from Carcassonne while playing with train schedules for the next week. Spent entirely too much time on that and didn’t get around to washing my silk blouse till after 10:00. Had it in the sink when I noticed the rules and regs notice saying that doing laundry in the room is "interdit." Oops! Well, tant pis, and if it’s not dry by morning I’ll hang it in the closet and no one’s harmed by the enterprise.

Wrote Mom and Janie*‡ postcards. I told them the gray weather is depressing but I didn’t admit I’m homesick-- for England. Kept singing the Simon & Garfunkel song "Homeward Bound" in my head today . . . Wish certain parts of it fit more than they do . . . and certain parts, less.
__________________
†My younger sister
‡The friend who was subleasing my apartment back in the States

My Great Britannic Adventure, Day Eighteen

Monday, 3 April, 1989
Holford to Minehead to Selworthy to Holford
Day Eighteen

The skies were clouded up again this morning-- yesterday was a special reprieve.

The important thing today was to do the laundry. Mrs. Ayshford directed me to the nearest launderette, seven or eight miles up the road in Williton.

Facility turned out to be on a side street with no parking. No parking anywhere around there. I dumped the car with the hazard lights flashing in a double-yellow-line zone near a driveway outlet across from a store, so I could run in and ask if they knew where I could park the silly thing. Before I got two steps away an old lady of the hard, trousered variety came up and told me I just couldn't leave the car there, that was a no-parking zone.

I told her I knew that but I just needed to know where I could put it.

Well, she didn't care about that, I couldn't leave it there. (It wasn't her driveway, incidentally.)

I'm not sure why but all at once I totally lost it. All the frustration came welling up and I exploded in tears and told her I didn't give a damn and I'd move it in a minute, thank you please, go away and leave me alone.

The clerk in the store suggested a place on the street a couple blocks away and I drove over there. In the end this was all in vain, since the detergent dispenser in the launderette wouldn't accept the coins. This, after I'd walked up to the bank for change (shop wouldn't give me change; no change machine in the laundry).

So I said to hell with this place and drove on to Minehead.

Asked at a Shell station where the launderette was. Ended up driving past both of the ones they recommended and having to ask directions again at an ironmonger's. They were very nice and told me which one was the cheapest, to boot. Left the car where it was and took my backpack full of dirty clothes back down the street with me.

Well. This laundry was definitely cheaper, at 80p a wash, than Williton's. But it had no soap, either. Nothing for it but to shoulder my pack, dirty socks playing peekaboo below the flap, and go down the high street and find a shop to sell me some. Located a discount store and bought the smallest size Persil they had. They didn't give me a sack to put it in, which is typical around here.

So I just brazenly carried it back exposed. It's not like anyone knows me here, after all.

And the machines worked all right, so the clothes were washed and thank God for that.

As long as I was this far west, I decided to continue over to Selworthy, which is a National Trust town. Some people might think it was terminally quaint, but I rather liked it. If Real Life means plastic signs and McDonald's wrappers in the streets, I'm for necrophilia.

I left the car at the carpark up the hill below the church and walked back down, and in and among the houses on Selworthy Green. White walls (cob?), good recent thatch jobs, spring flowers everywhere. Very peaceful. Down along the road there were some bits that looked to be very ancient, like an old stone barn that had been incorporated into a dwelling, but these structures were behind walls and very private.

I especially liked the wooden signs at the crossings of the footpaths, telling how far it was-- by foot-- to the next village. I followed one such path a little way. After a short time I came abreast of a house on whose broad front lawn a small flock of sheep, including several new lambs, were grazing. If these sheep had been told anything about being timid, they weren't heeding it. The ewes especially came up to the fence and bleated and bleated, telling me explicitly that there was going to be no fooling around with their lambs if they could help it. Yes, ma'am!

At the top of the little paved road, where it turns to go past the church and the carpark, was a gate leading to a dirt track and a hiking trail. This led up to Selworthy Beacon. It wasn't far, only a mile or so, so I unhesitatingly passed the gate and headed uphill.

The path goes through a wood and along a little stream for most of its way. But then you come out onto moorland, all clothed with an unfamiliar yellow flowering shrub that looked none too pleasant to wade into.

The path, or more so, the road, continues up to the north until you get to the windy cairn-marked top, the Beacon. On clear days, they say, you can see all the way into Wales. Today with its foggy overcast one could only view Bridgwater Bay, with the great oceangoing ships blending their gray with that of the water.

I couldn't help but think how good it would be to have someone with me now to admire the view, obscured as it was. But would anyone else ever be so impulsively passionate about indiscriminate hill-climbing? I almost wished I could have someone magically transported to the top for me, so I wouldn't feel guilty about making them do the walk, in case they didn't like the view. I tried to picture Nigel* there with me, but it wouldn't fit. Nigel*-and-Emily* would have been a painful redundancy. But Nigel* without Emily* in such a circumstance would be abnormal and anomalous.

There's a National Trust shop down in the village. I bought some Somerset postcards and a jar of elderberry wine jelly. There was also a place that served cream teas but it, alas, was closed Mondays.

I continued in my quest to partake in this most civilised of ceremonies when I returned to Holford. But there, too, the shop across from the cottage only kept their tea shop counter open till 5:00, and it was just past that now.

Braving the rather brisk wind in my tweed blazer, I walked up the road into the depths of the village, as far as the lychgate of the church. Very pretty and worth more exploration when the wind and I can meet on more equal terms.

Took the evening off, spending most of it in the downstairs parlour (marginally warmer than the room). Watched the 6:00 o'clock news but most wrote postcards and journal and read Walter Scott.

I asked Mrs. Ayshford about the heat. She said, well, she supposed they're country people and just don't mind the cold. So, she said, having a heater in the guest room just never occurred to them. It seemed unlikely to do so now and I decided, at £8 a night, what do you expect? I can perfectly well survive by wearing my longies under my flannel nightgown and keeping as much of me as possible under the two duvets . . .

My Great Britannic Adventure, Day Fourteen

Thursday, 30 March, 1989
Fitz to Shrewsbury to Caernarfon
Day Fourteen

Whole party assembled at breakfast in the main dining room in the morning, including Ted* and Susanna's* 17 month old baby, Timothy*. Intelligent child, even if not speaking intelligibly yet. The baby’s tone of voice and inflection made it sound as if he had something important to say, if only he could get his tongue around the syllables. Reminded me of the children at Coverdale*.

I thought about mentioning the mice, but refrained because I was only there the one night and Mr. and Mrs. Baly probably couldn’t do anything about it at the moment anyway.

After breakfast Harry* and Elspeth* and I adjourned to the sitting room to see a video on Shropshire the Balys had. It was a little boosteristic in places (I kept my mouth shut, though appallingly I was tempted to make cynical comments) but it did me the favor of showing me what Shrewsbury Abbey looks like.

Went upstairs thereafter and took a bath and all the rest of it, then packed up and was ready to go by 11:00.

I never know how it is with people. Last night Mrs. Baly was very kind and even motherly with me; this morning she was perfunctory and mainly concerned that I pay my £12.50 and let her get on with her business. I suppose that had something to do with it, since Fitz Manor is a working farm and they had had some Welsh sheep pastured on their land this winter, since Shropshire had grass while Wales (NE part) didn’t. And today the Welsh shepherd was come to collect his flock.

Still, my hostess’s change in manner had me wondering for much of the rest of the day what I could possibly have done or said. Maybe I’m oversensitive . . . but I’m afraid that if I blow that sort of thing off all the time, I’ll be in danger of being inconsiderate of someone I really have hurt. [I've recently learned something about the practice of overwintering the young mountain lambs on lowland farms and what a major undertaking it is to gather them all in to return them home. So yes, I was being oversensitive.]

Took off for Shrewsbury along the not-so-well sign-posted lanes. Arrived there from the north, driving in from the castle side and went round and round from awhile, trying to find a carpark. No luck, till I found myself on the Wyle Cop (familiar name, that), going eastward across the bridge over the Severn, and heading up the Abbey Foregate towards the red sandstone front of the formerly Benedictine abbey church of St. Peter and St. Paul. I haven’t read all those Brother Cadfael mysteries for nothing.

Located a free carpark south of the church, reflecting ruefully that this expanse of broken tarmac and its attendant fenced-in spare parts yards were once part of the abbey grounds and gardens. The Meole Brace, which still exists under a different name, was completely obscured among the jumble of decaying modern buildings. The millpond still exists as a stagnant pool next to some archeological diggings sponsored by the University of Birmingham, but looking long unworked.

The abbey church is a stout Norman building with a Gothic choir and narthex added at either end. Along the south side you can see the jagged masonry where the demolished abbey walls and buildings used to join its fabric.

The interior is of three storeys, with round piers with plain banded capitals supporting no-nonsense rounded arches at the nave arcade and triforium levels. Above that the clerestory is a mural surface pierced by round-headed windows.

As I passed through the nave, I constantly had to stop myself from saying things to myself like, "This is the part that Brother Cadfael knew." He is, after all, only an invention of the writer Ellis Peters. Still, it was helpful to think of his character as I walked through "his" church. Though sometimes perplexed by them, the sins and foibles of man do not shake his faith in God. Whatever evil man can do, Cadfael is assured that God can do greater good still, and he rests in the confidence that God can make right, here or beyond the grave, whatever messes we make of our lives and the lives of others. Only a fictional character, true, but when so many evil fictional characters are influencing people to the bad, why not rejoice in the fact that an author has seen fit to invent one who can confirm one in the good?

It was funny-- they had a supply of the Brother Cadfael novels for sale in the little postcard shop. I peeked in one or two just long enough to look at Peters’ sketch maps of the abbey and its environs to reconcile them with the 20th century cityscape outside. Actually, that’s why I stopped in Shrewsbury in the first place.

There’s a road running south of the church as well as to the north, now. It’s called the Abbey Foregate as well.

They had a little pamphlet there, locating the places around Shrewsbury that Peters features in her novels. But it cost 60p and that seemed a little steep for a mimeographed sheet that would only serve to satisfy a literary fancy.

Headed for the Severn, and walked a bit in a little garden that marks the approach to the Gaye. The Severn is a little river here, like most English rivers I’ve seen (when they aren’t estuaries).

The English Bridge as it stands is an 18th century production, reworked and widened in 1924.

Crossed it and walked up the Wyle to the main square and ye olde tourist information office. Needed to know where the local NatWest is so I could cash in some traveller’s cheques, and learn where I could find Butchers’ Row, to see the 15th century house I’d read of in Margaret Wood.

While I was there at the tourist office I, quite lazily, decided to make use of their "Book a room ahead" service. The man told me they’d find me a place in Carnarfon and would tell about it if I’d come back in a half hour. £1.50.

Found the NatWest, got the cash, and remembered to ask about the check I’d discovered missing the other day. The computer had a record of the amount-- £45--but none of the endorsee. I’d have to call Oxford for that.

So I went and found a phonecard booth and had the Cornmarket branch on the line, when it came to me that the check is one I wrote out of order before I left Oxford. So all is well.

Found Butchers’ Row. It has 15th century timbered and jettied houses at both ends, dragon beams and all.

Bought a cheese savory and a cream pastry at a baker’s shop and returned to the tourist office by 2:30 or so. They’d gotten me a place at a Mrs. Hughes’, in a house with a Greek name-- Pros Kairon-- and the man wrote out the directions for me.

Sat out in the square then and wrote the Mackintosh postcard to Jim* and Annie* [our brilliant furniture makers back in Kansas City]. Shrewsbury’s a pleasant town but could do with fewer agglomerations of foul-mouthed pre-teenaged boys. They’re on school holiday, too, and were hanging around the square trading insults and voicing threats of what they were going to do to some other gangs of boys, their chorus sometimes augmented by solos from one or two local drunks who found the square a convenient place to pass the time as well.

Posted the card, then went to the street leading to the Castle and stopped at Boots, for some vitamins. I’m out. And got some shampoo, as well.

Didn’t go into the castle keep (it’s a military museum now, which didn’t particularly interest me), but you can come into the walls and admire the garden and climb the tower all you wish.

The neck of land that falls between the two sides of the loop of the Severn in front of the castle is spanned now by the BritRail terminal and its platforms. It’s disappointingly, monumentally ugly.

Walked back to the carpark another way, more or less. Took note of the Norman south door on St. Mary’s. Then a little later, turned off the Wyle to follow the lane of St. Julian’s Friars. No remains of a friary to photograph, though, so I just walked along the Severn north to the English Bridge and back to the carpark.

Pulled out around 4:15. Back across the Severn, around the southern bypass (or what passes for one in this town), across the Welsh bridge and through Frankwell, and thence to the A5 and Llangollen.

Into Wales at Chirk. First thing you notice is that the Welsh are very serious about Welsh. I determined not to get into any accidents along these twisty roads-- I could never cope with an argument in such an unintelligible tongue.

But I had the fun of seeing the region for which so many Philadelphia suburbs are named. Passed by the turnoffs for both Bala and Cynwyd.

For one stretch I had the exquisite pleasure of forming part of a parade behind a very wide house trailer that was being moved. Police escort and all. They occasionally had to stop oncoming traffic so the trailer could go by.

After awhile the mist set in and it began to rain a little. Along the A4086, before the rail line for the top of Snowdon, I passed through a valley that was grand even in its grim bleakness. There was no vegetation to be seen, and great black rocks lay in tumbled heaps and spills along the mountain faces, below nightmarish crags. I said to myself, "Mordor. It's Mordor. This is where Tolkien got it for Lord of the Rings. It's Mordor!" And the mist made it seem bleaker-- and therefore more romantic-- still.

Into Carnarfon by 6:45, fifteen minutes ahead of schedule. Directions were fine-- to a point. Said take the second right after turning left at the firestation. Second right was a One Way Do Not Enter onto the motorway. Went back to the Shell Station near the firehouse, to ask directions.

Filled up the car while I was there, since the radio had said Texaco would be raising their petrol prices to £1.878, up by 7p a gallon, and I could just see Shell following suit.

Inside, everyone was speaking Welsh. Momentary fear: what if they’re so militant they’re not bilingual? But they were. I started to explain what my directions had said but the woman cut me off with a perfunctory "Listen!" which brooked no nonsense from idiot foreigners. In her opinion I was to turn left after the left by the fire station.

Tried that, and it ultimately worked, even if the street had no name plate, in Welsh or English, and I had to ask a passerby if I was in the right place.

All this is giving me an entirely new insight on Jonah 4:11. I used to think that bit about the people of Nineveh not knowing their right hands from their left was a metaphor for a kind of moral blindness. But now I see it simply means they couldn’t give accurate directions! It’s a good thing for them the way through the city was obvious, for if Jonah had had to rely on the directions of such people as around here, he’d’ve been preaching only in one small corner of the city those three days, not enough people would have repented, and Nineveh would’ve been destroyed.

Found "Pros Kairon" by parking the car and walking down and then up the street till I spotted a B&B sign. Mrs. Hughes, a little elderly Welshwoman, was ready to answer my ring; she said she’d been looking out for me.

Room was upstairs at the back, overlooking a bit of garden. Small, but nice, with an electric blanket on the bed and a space heater.

Since it was relatively early, I decided to be reckless with my cash and get a pub meal in the town center. The Hugheses directed me to a pub they recommend and I set off.

They live in a part of Carnarfon outside the Edwardian [Edward I--13th century] walls. The houses here are all pretty modern: Victorian or newer than that, marching in mostly-gray ranks up and down the hills.

To get to the town center you have to go down the hill, across the motorway via a pedestrian underpass, along a street or two, and then you’re in the castle square. The city still focusses there, it seems.

The castle, which I cannot do better than describe as a formidible pile (though Carcassonne on its hill is more aesthetically impressive), lies at the point where the River Seiont empties into the Menai Strait. The boats moored in the river mouth looked, in the mist-filled drizzly twilight, as if they were sitting on a water preternaturally calm.

There were many people about, even though not a lot of places seemed to be open. Everyone was speaking Welsh and most of the signs were in that language, or that and English both. I am beginning to pick out words here and there, written, but have no idea how the grammar works.

The directions I’d received at the B&B didn’t work too effectively, for lack of street signs. I finally found the pub, The Black Boy (and was it a racist act to go there?) via the offices of another pub, who weren’t serving evening meals but were happy to direct me to one that was-- the aforementioned B. B.

Ordered a plate of garlic mussels and sat down at a table to wait for them. The TV was on, showing some BBC evening soap opera, which soon ended. Then a program about some British man’s travels in Arizona came on. And I confess that the sight of all those cars driving on the righthand side made me a little queasy.

Pretty soon, the set was turned off and the juke box came on. It was highly incongruous, hearing the pounding background of those English rock songs laid beneath the general flow of Welsh conversation. You’d think they’d have some Welsh pop bands by now. Even funnier was when a Welsh tune did come on-- it was obviously meant to be some heart-stirring romantic or nationalistic ballad, and was sung dramatically by the Welsh version of Lawrence Welk’s inevitable Irish tenor-- and amongst the Welsh in the pub you could hear the very English expression from the brave young men of Wales: "Squelch it! Squelch it!!"

Some people don’t got no culcha.

One of the guys at the next table asked me, in English, what I was reading. At first my impulse was to give him the cold shoulder-- as in "I don’t talk to strangers"-- but decided not to be such a jerk. So we had a mild amount of chitchat, until he was called to join a darts match with some of his mates. The reason I felt odd about it is not that here I was an American in a Welsh pub, but that here I am 34 and surely he took me for someone closer to his age (mid-20s), or he wouldn’t have spoken to me . . . But why should I assume that? Maybe because I’m that way myself. Anyway, I felt odd, as if I were sailing under false colors.

The mussels were good, though they could’ve used a bit more salt. I had a half pint of Worthington’s bitter to go with them. Not the best combination, but the ale itself was palatable and not bitter to the extent of Guinness dark, say.

Satiated my chocolate craving with a bar bought at an off-license on the way back to the B&B. Went back without loitering or rubbernecking, because although it was hardly 9:00 PM, with the mist the streets were a little surreal.

Pros Kairon has a guest sitting room downstairs so I brought my journal down there to sit in front of the nice electric fire and work on it. But instead I talked to the other guests and let myself be distracted by the television. The others were a couple from Australia. They’d already been to Israel and Egypt before coming to England, and were labelling their photographs. We told trip stories, not neglecting ones about driving around the UK (especially in those winds last week), until they retired about 10:00.

I followed shortly, to work on the journal a little more but more to read Walter Scott.

My Great Britannic Adventure, Day Eleven

Monday, 27 March, 1989
Iona to Helensburgh
Day Eleven, Easter Monday

My attempts to get to sleep last night looked for awhile to be quite in vain, as Therese* contracted a bad case of diarrhea of the mouth. She started rambling inanely on and on about her adventures in prep school till I had a terrible case of the giggles and Marie* nearly came over and killed her. Still, in a perverse way it was nice, because predominantly it seemed hilariously funny and not a cause for rancor at all.

Dragged myself out at 4:15 nonetheless and got everything packed up in the nick of time. Marie*, bless her, got up and dressed just to see me off, though I nearly had a heart attack at the jetty when my backpack, which she had carried out for me, was momentarily nowhere to be found. I’m afraid I didn’t impress anyone with my maturity for a minute or two . . . All the suppressed stress threatened to come out at this least opportune of moments. Thankfully, it was found and all was well with the luggage.

Raining again, of course, and pitch black, except for the lights, so no photos of the Sound of Iona again.

Not a hell of a lot to say about the trip to Oban, besides that I’m glad to have a reasonable set of sea legs. Makes boat trips much more enjoyable. As for my hope of talking to Lukas* on the Mull bus, forget it. He was still thoroughly occupied with one of the girls from the abbey program. If I did fancy him I could’ve felt jealous, but as it was I was merely disgusted at his incredibly rude behavior at not even greeting me this morning, especially after what happened in Communion yesterday. I don’t know what he did on the ferry to Oban; he retired to the boat’s cafeteria for some breakfast and I ascended to the observation deck.

There I was kept amused by the Tzubekis’* little girl Tumelo* and her friend, the little son of another African family that had been on Iona, and was able to be useful in taking a picture of the two families out on the boat’s deck.

A short time later we docked in Oban and I lugged my stuff to the Astra, which thankfully was still there in the BritRail parking lot, undisturbed. As I was stowing my things in the trunk I thought about Lukas* and wondered what Jesus would do in this situation.

My inclination was to bitterly say to hell with Mr. Renzberger* and drive off. The positive and mannerly thing would be to go back to the train station and wish him a good trip. Who knows what Lukas* would’ve preferred, but as far as I could tell, Jesus would do the positive thing.

So back I went, to wish him well and to inquire civilly after his further plans. Well, said he formally and distantly, he’d be up in Inverness for awhile and then after that, who knows; he didn’t have to be back at Coverdale* when the regular students did and he might not return till after the 20th. Charming, considering he’d said before the end of Hilary Term that he’d definitely be back the week of April 9th and had accepted my invitation to dinner . . .

Hell, what would Jesus do in a situation like that? Jesus has the advantage of knowing that it isn’t any sin He’s committed that’s making another give him the brush-off. But I can’t help but wonder what the hell is it I’ve done to offend Lukas*, that he should treat me so badly.

My tiredness and lack of sleep and the stress of driving on wet, narrow, twisty, rock wall lined roads added no good to my state and the only thing that prevented me from breaking down crying right there at the wheel was the knowledge that if I was blinded by tears a serious accident could ensue.

But as soon as I reached Inverary I stopped and bought a pastry and a bit of bread and cheese to eat. And I got a postcard and wrote and sent it to Friedhelm* [a German theology student who'd spent only Michaelmas Term at Coverdale*] . Friedhelm*, to my recollection, though at times reserved, never acted like a jerk. I miss Friedhelm* a great deal.

After that I made it down to Helensburgh without having an accident, despite more rock walls and being stuck for a long time behind a trailer being drawn by one of those ridiculous three-wheeled mini-cars.

When I got into town I parked the car at the lot by the big Clyde estuary and went and got a cup of tea and another cake (just what I needed, more sugar). Back to the tourist office then and found out the way to Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s Hill House.

Still thinking about this thing with Lukas*, though. The only thing I can conceive that I could’ve done to offend him is to be myself, who I am. But you can’t go to another human being and say, "Forgive me for living"-- because that’s not your fault, it’s God’s. They should take it up with Him. Still, I don’t know what’ll be worse-- if we get along terribly once we’re back at Coverdale* or if he’s sweet and nice again and I suppress all my anger at him because I’m afraid this weekend was all my fault or because I don’t want to rock the boat.

The Hill House was swathed in scaffolding and translucent plastic, to repair the exterior surfacing. But it was still open inside. It was thoroughly a matter of "O Freunde, nicht diese Töne!" as in its perfection of proportion and decoration and detailing it is excruciatingly beautiful. Especially when I came into the drawing room, with that white bay window flooded with light, I just wanted to sit down and weep for the sheer loveliness of it.

But you can’t-- all the chairs say "Do not sit!" on them. And the place was flooded with other people, all talking in whispers as if they were in church . . . funny, when you consider all the children the Blackies had, and how they must’ve gone running and shouting up and down those gracefully-ornamented stairs.

Seeing all the custom designed furnishings and fittings, I had to think of Eric* [the architect I'd worked for for over seven years] and the work he does, that I used to do with him . . . And to wonder if the design I did for the Griffons* just before I left Myron’s* [the architect I'd been working for up to the time I left for Oxford] has been built, and if so, how properly.

Because although it costs more now and the craftsmen are hard to find, this sort of thing can still be done. Maybe not the amazing curves in the furnishings, but the inlays and repoussés, yes.

It’s good to have all the rooms I’ve seen in photographs now totally assembled and arranged in proper order in my head. It’s now a house, and not an artifact.

It’s hard to know what to say about it all; let the photographs I took speak for me. But it makes me what to get back to designing myself, and if my work should have a bit of Mackintosh influence in it, so be it. Originality cannot come to life fully blown, it must pass through many stages and influences first. (Or so I tell myself in resolved self-correction, for my lack of productivity as an artist is largely due to my feeling that if what I’m about to do isn’t going to come out a masterpiece it oughtn’t to be done at all.)

It is so wonderful to see how everything flows together to make a total design, and good to know that the clients do exist who are willing to help make it happen.

I wandered round the garden afterwards. The rose bushes were just coming into leaf. Stylized roses within, real roses without. But these were also stylized in their way, being trained to the lines that Mackintosh drew, as individual trees or as intertwined arches. I wondered about the suitability of this, but may not a cultivated rose, which is not strictly a "natural" object after all, rejoice to find itself accorded a part in a great artist’s vision?

Perhaps someday I’ll see it all in bloom. Then I’ll be better able to tell if he was right.

Thereafter drove back down to the city center and waterfront and got the lady at the Tourist Bureau to book me a room at a Helensburgh B&B. No way I was going to make it to Glasgow tonight. Too damn tired.

Before going over I found a place to sell me more 400 Ektachrome. Yes, I’m out again. Six rolls, another minor fortune on the Visa.

Had a dickens of a time finding the place I’d been sent to, and when I arrived the lady apologised but they’d just been painting the walls and her husband had vetoed the idea of taking in any guests till the paint was thoroughly dry. They’d already fixed me up at another place, though, and I set out in search of it.

More fun with that; had to stop at a gas station where one of the clerks called the place and got more specific directions.

So I finally landed around 6:30. Lovely house, lovely hostess, tea and biscuits on a tray-- but God, that room was cold. I suppose I was hungry but I was too exhausted to move. I just put on another sweater and sat huddled in a chair, trying to make sense of this weekend but unable to maintain a continuous string of coherent thought.

Gave up around 9:00 and got into bed but stress kept me awake quite awhile longer. The noise from the TV down the foyer made lightnings go off in my head, just like Daddy used to have after his head injury . . . I wonder if he knew a lot of that was probably stress.

I wonder if I was the cause of a lot of it . . .

My Great Britannic Adventure, Day Five

Tuesday, 21 March, 1989
Stamford to Lincoln to Durham
Day Five

Breakfast downstairs in the Anchor Inn hotel dining room (this being the fireplace end of the very well-tailored Georgian style pub) was pretty substantial, though it followed the standard menu of eggs, bacon, cereal, toast, and tea. Toast was burnt but I wasn’t up to complaining this morning.

I’ve also noticed the British aren’t very big on napkins. Even at Coverdale* they’re just put in a bunch in a glass at each end of the table, for whosoever will to take, and I’d say most don’t. But these places lately don’t have them at all, which means wiping one’s mouth on one’s sleeve. Not too charming of me and very odd on their part, not to have them.

Thank God the person I finally parked next to last night, apparently also one of the overnight guests, pulled out before I did, thus averting any more damage.

Got out on the A1 (I’m getting a little better at getting out of towns without getting lost) around 9:30 and headed in the direction of York. Around Grantham and Newark (on Trent, not New Jersey) I started seeing signs announcing the exit for Lincoln. I hadn’t planned to see that town or its cathedral but at the third exit notice I said, oh, to hell with it, I can take a couple of hours on those. So I headed southeasterly down the A57 towards Lincoln, winding around and paying a 15p toll on a bridge over the Trent. I suppose for the scenic value of watching the barges go by on the river below.

Lincoln is a city set on a hill; unfortunately the British highway department failed to supply the rubbernecking motorist with nice, good places to pull off and enjoy the prospect.

It is a place that once you get into town you can turn on the cathedral-detecting intuition and just drive till you find it, without worrying too much about spotting signs. Just keep heading uphill.

The signage comes in when you’re looking for parking. Found the official cathedral carpark. They wanted 50p for it. Not if I could help it. So I drove around still I found a free two hour place on the street on Drury Lane.

Following that downhill (on foot) past St. Michael’s church, I saw at the corner of Wordsworth (off Drury Lane) and Bailgate an ancient stone house that looked awfully familiar. Oh, goodness, it was one of the 12th Century Jews’ houses!

It’s now occupied (ground floor) by the thrift store of the St. Barnabas Hospice. They had a curious silverplate serving spoon in the window, with a bowl like a scallop shell. 50p, and I went in and bought it, thus making up for the savings on parking.

I also asked about the building. One of the volunteer ladies said yes, it is very ancient, and the subsurface cellar arch has 1106 carved on it. She couldn’t let me go down to see, because the bottom of the stairs was piled with filled trash bags. But I was allowed to step onto the top cellar step and look up and see the original wattle ceiling there.

She had some interesting stories about interconnecting cellars and secret meetings of the Jews prior to the Expulsion, but I wasn’t sure whether to believe them. I am sure she’s right in saying the ground floor originally had arrow loops and not the big shop windows of today. [The adjoining house next door shows evidence of having been a synagogue; this may be at the bottom of the woman's stories.]

Having now remembered why I was supposed to visit Lincoln, I walked down a very steep incline (aptly named Steep Hill) to the Strait where I saw the other extant Jew’s House. The first floor windows have been sadly jimmied with, but the general fabric looks good, considering its age.

Plowed my way back up Steep Hill and Bailgate to the cathedral. It’s set behind a gate, and too bad, but the righthand half of the west face was hiding behind scaffolding. Open to view otherwise.

I’m trying to think of what impressed me the most there, if only to keep myself from writing an essay here.

Lincoln is vaulted throughout, of course. Maybe the most curious things is the odd vaults in the choir, where the ribs transfer down to unexpected colonnettes. They say that was completed in St. Hugh’s lifetime. Wonder if it was his bright idea.

The transept rose windows were duly noted . . . Bishop’s Eye [the south transept rose] undergoing renovation.

Day was grey out at this point, but still all right for photos. I suppose one advantage of having the wideangle lens on the blink is that it forces me to use the faster standard f1.7 lens.

English cathedrals are different in atmosphere from those in France. Not as mystical-feeling. At least, it’s hard to maintain a sense of awe with a cavalcade of school children being ushered through.

Took note of the wall arcading in the nave. I don’t think I’ve seen anything like that in France.

Visited the cloister and the chapter house and all the other nooks and crannies that seemed interesting, in the process going over the two hours for the parking (not to mention for the side trip).

Moved the car, changed to the heavier coat, and walked back and visited Lincoln Castle, opposite the cathedral. Its walls are pretty well intact, as it was used as the county prison almost through the 19th Century. The Court buildings are still located there.

Got whipped around by the wind at the top of the Observation Tower and learned that is the vantage from which all the stock photos of the west front of the cathedral are taken.

Perhaps the strangest part was the Lucy Tower, the old shell keep on the original castle mound [2008 note: One of two, actually].

A long steep staircase leads up the green grassy motte. On either side the golden daffodils bowed to the wind and undaunted sprang up cheerfully again. The white clouds raced by in the blue sky overhead, the sun bathing mound and walls with flirtacious and recurrent light.

I climbed the steps and passed through the ancient stone arch into the keep. Instantly, it seemed a smothering hand had blotted out the sun. It wasn't merely the spreading yew trees that brooded over the scene. No, gloom and hopelessness--even evil--exuded from the cold embrace of those walls. Immediately I noticed the lichenous stone slabs sprouting like unhealthy growths from the black, infertile ground, some broken off a few inches from the surface. They seemed to be only about nine inches square at the largest. I looked and saw that the whole ones bore only two letters and a four-digit number. Absurdly, they reminded me of the plaques the gas company here mounts on walls to mark valve locations. No. Impossible here in these walls. Too many, too close together. What could those slabs be?

But I could not and would not stay to investigate. The sense of oppression and malevolence was too much. I took but a single picture, right where I stood, and took myself away.

In the castle shop on my way out I bought a guidebook and looked up the Lucy Tower. It said that is where they buried the executed criminals. I guess I should have known. If any place in that compound is haunted I’d say that’s it. I could feel it. Nasty.

Since it was trying to rain I went back to the car for my umbrella, then headed downtown (literally in Lincoln’s case). My camera meter had been acting dodgy so I found a photo store and had them test the battery. Yes, getting low (I hope not too low, or I’ve wasted a lot of film today). While I was at it I bought a replacement flash for £7 something. Not automatic, but what do you expect?

Next thing was a bit of food and a call to the car hire people to report the damage. Bought a banana for 17p to shut the stomach up, at the covered market. Lincoln’s got an extensive pedestrian shopping area down by their bit of river (covered with swans) and it’s very busy. Don’t ask me why Kansas City can’t manage that. Too much suburban sprawl, I suppose.

Located a card phone and reached Europcar. They said I needed to come get an accident report to fill in, and gave me directions on how to find their location. Fortunately, not too far off on my Blue Guide map.

After that, went round to where there was a cheap fish and chips shop and bought an order thereof. Tons of food for £1.23. The oil the fish had been fried in might’ve been familiar to Aaron the Jew, however, so I only ate of that till I wasn’t hungry anymore (I think my stomach is shrinking). Saved the rest of the chips for later.

Bought a half dozen hot cross buns from a bakery for 66p. They didn’t give me a sack but I’ve seen enough people carrying naked bread through the streets that I felt I needn’t be self-conscious about it.

The crosses on the buns here are in the bread, not in frosting. I wonder how they do it?

At the rental agency they gave me a form and said it was ok, that since I signed the collision damage waiver I’d waived responsibility over to Europcar. Sounds odd to me but if that means I shan’t be out of pocket, I’ll fill out the forms and glad to do it. Didn’t need to now, though. Later, when I return to Oxford.

They offered me another car, but I said no, this one has I hope been innoculated as it were. Unless I could get an Escort? No, none available.

4:30 or so, back up the A57 to the A1, toll bridge and all. Decided to give up York, as what I’d been intending to see there I’d pretty well covered in Lincoln, and so push on for Durham tonight.

So I did, calling a listing in the Let’s Go from a motel in Leeming to see if there was space. There was, and I was given directions.

But I got lost anyway. Kept trying to get to the City Centre so I could get my bearings and head out Crossgate as directed. But I kept losing track of the signs and ending up in all these impossible places. Finally I ended up on the riverside drive above the Wear to the west of the cathedral and thereafter I knew what I was about.

Staying in a place called Glück Auf, run by a German lady. Decent for £7.50, if you can deal with glass in the bedroom doors and little reed shades over the glass that obscure nothing whatsoever. But I suppose this has the salutary effect of making me get in bed and get the lights off early.

No central heat here, only a machine you’re supposed to feed 10ps to. But I used my last 10p on the phone at Leeming. So put another blanket on and stay under the covers . . .

The cathedral and castle here are lit up at night. Very imposing above the river.

My Great Britannic Adventure, Day Two

Saturday, 18 March 1987
Cambridge & Saffron Walden
Day Two

The day dawned cloudy, but with that thinness of overcast that allows hope for the sun’s breaking through eventually, especially with a fresh chilly wind that could move things along.

For breakfast Mrs. Payne served me a fried egg on toast, bacon (English style), sausages, two mushroom caps, toast, and cereal, with orange juice and tea. Considering my meagre budget for food, I scoffed the lot, cereal and all.

Called the Europcar agency in Cambridge and they told me certainly, I could bring the Maestro back and exchange it. Still not for an Escort; rather, for a Vauxhall Astra. But hopefully better.

Mrs. Payne gave me directions and a Xerox map of how to get to the correct street in Cambridge, but I got lost anyway. Overshot my turnoff due to not being in the correct lane and went blocks and blocks before I found a place to turn around.

But I arrived on Mill Street eventually and made the exchange. Man had to remove my Cellini tape with a couple of spoon handles. I tried it in the Astra’s player and it got stuck there, too. So maybe it’s the tape.

The stick shift is a little freer on this one, which is the main point.

Found the £1 parking garage opposite Parkers Pieces (a playing field), deposited the vehicle, shouldered my equipment, and set off to explore The Other Place. Headed for King’s College first as I wanted to check the chapel service hours.

The gatehouse tower was swathed in scaffolding, a common infection on this side of the world. And so were a couple bays of the chapel. The rest was visible, though, from the outside at least.

The chapel was closed to visitors today-- the choir was holding rehearsals. I stood on the lawn across the court and listened to the combined harmonies of men, boys, and organ drifting over . . .

I have to admit that Cambridge is a prettier college town than is Oxford. Not that the colleges themselves are nicer, but that here they are more open and hospitable to their surroundings. Oxford colleges tend to suffer from a siege mentality and keep their architectural beauties hidden within. Their Cambridge counterparts make more of a display on the street.

And then, due to the Anglo-Saxons’ original town plan, the colleges at Oxford are not strung out along either of the rivers (excepting Magdalen) and thus cannot boast anything like the Backs. Once I’d passed through King’s court I didn’t go back into the street in front for two or three hours.

Much of the work here is Tudor or Renaissance, in the Christopher Wren style. Clare College is entirely the latter, and despite a silly voice saying, "But it’s out of your period!"--me being a diehard Medievalist-- I rather liked it.

But then, I was disposed to like it; and the pretty bridge over the river and the clipped hedges in the private garden, and the daffodils and crocus all blowing in the breeze added to the happy effect-- but not so much as the knowledge that Nigel* [NB-- an Englishman for whom I bore a hopeless fancy; hopeless, as he'd engaged himself to his long-time sweetheart shortly after I met him. We were platonic friends nevertheless] had spent his undergraduate days here, that he had walked along these paths, seen these walls. This feeling of awe and exultation was not even dampened by my seeing Emily's* [Nigel's* fiancee] name and address on a list of graduate students at the Clare lodge. She is a part of him; any love I bear him must include her as well.

I saw the chapel, with its circular antechapel with the lantern above, and inside, the chapel itself with its classised furnishings, its two organs and choir desks. I found it hard to leave the place, as the sun peeked out and dusted the towers with light: it was like parting with someone I knew, met with again in a foreign realm.

I was not able to see the famous hall where Nigel's* friend had fired a table knife into a wall in a fit of anger (the friend is a now a clergyman, I believe) [I'd misunderstood. The student he'd told me about the previous autumn had been a member of Clare back in the 1700s], as it was already laid for dinner. But I could take pleasure in the smell of apple crisp wafting through the air, appealing to a different sensibility than had the King’s singers, but being no less enjoyable.

I went back and crossed and looked over more bridges, strolled along Burrell’s Walk and the University Library grounds, then came back and went through Trinity College.

The antechapel there is full of statues of Great Cambridge Minds, such as Isaac Newton (his academic robe enveloping him like a rather ponderous toga) and Lord Tennyson and Francis Bacon. The ceiling there is wooden, and Tudor in effect, though I believe the pattern currently there is of Victorian design.

Passing out onto Trinity Street I duly took note of Henry VIII’s chair leg sceptre in the hand of his effigy in its niche over the gatehouse entrance. Serves him right, most likely.

The weather had settled in to being determinedly grey, which was too bad. The Round Church (St. Sepulchre), an Anglo-Saxon edifice, really needs some light to model it.

The congregation seems to be a pretty live one, judging from the tracts and literature they had for sale on the racks. They had a guest book to be signed; I wonder if they have organised prayers for the souls of those who put rude comments in. (I was unable to add anything of any sort, the book being coöpted by a couple who settled in for a long look.)

After that I explored the shopping areas along Sidney Street and St. Andrews Street, stopping for a hot steak and kidney pie at a bakery along there. Ate it sitting on a bench at the east end of St. Andrew's church, watching the people go by. The Cambridge shopping area seems rather nicer and more interesting than Oxford’s, too, but maybe that’s because here I could bum around and explore and didn’t need to run down to Cornmarket then get my rear home.

I was on my way back to Kings Parade, as I hadn’t yet seen Queen’s. Passing through an arcaded shopping area I saw a man juggling flaming torches. This would make a great picture, thought I, and I raised my Minolta. And as I did, I realized that my mechanical crises were not at an end. My Vivitar wide angle lens had slid down as it often does, from its own weight, but this time was stuck both at 70mm telephoto and at macro. I couldn’t budge it from either position.

I do not think I can adequately explain what this does to me. Overwhelmed as I am with study and essays, I don’t get much drawing done these days. Photography is my only real artistic expression anymore. It is my way of seeing and also my way to describing what I’ve seen. You could almost say that without having taken a picture of it I haven’t seen it at all. And the whole point of travelling, of going anywhere, is to take pictures of it. That lens had become an important organ of vision for me and now, the first day back in service since getting it back from being repaired, it had become stiff and useless.

I didn’t totally want to believe this so I spent a great deal of time tramping around to camera stores to see if they could do anything. Sorry, no.

Saw St. Benet’s Church, another Saxon foundation. And went to Queen’s, but they wanted 40p for the tour and from what I could glimpse from the gateway I decided it wasn’t worth it.

Bought an apple and a card to send Mom along Regent Street then at around 4:30 got the car and headed back south, putting the old Rokker 55mm lens on the Minolta first.

Did not get lost this time. Congratulate me.

Drove past Little Chesterford and on down to Saffron Walden. The grayness was quite settled in and it began to rain a little, but I looked at the outside of the parish church and the Market Square and found the houses with the famous 17th Century pargeting on Church Street. And I in one blow negated all today’s economy on food by going into a used book and antique shop and coming out with leather bound and gold tooled editions of Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe and Heart of Mid-Lothian. £4 total.

Wandered around a little more, then retrieved the car and drove back to Bank Cottage in Little Chesterford.

They had a fire burning in the parlor; unfortunately sitting by it isn’t part of the B&B arrangement. I retired upstairs, planned routes for tomorrow, ate the apple (mealy, darn it) and some chocolate, then fooled around till 2:00 in the frigging morning reading the Country Living magazines that were sitting on the night stand and then a book there in the room called How to Be Oxbridge. The scary thing is that according to the author’s criteria I had many of the traits of this species before I ever came to England-- though it would seem the real "Oxbrites" don’t or didn’t share my delusion of Real Scholarship.

Or maybe it does go on but just has no place in a basically humorous book?