Adventures in London

As anyone who knows me can tell you, I love to travel. In fact, one of my greatest fears when considering retirement is not being able to afford to travel.

While I enjoy seeing the world with my husband, Blue Scream of Jeff (shameless blog plug), there are countries I want to explore repeatedly, and in detail that he isn’t interested in revisiting, namely, the British Isles.

He has nothing against Great Britain and Ireland except his concept of their weather. He’s been there, so he’d rather go elsewhere. And it’s not his heritage.

While many people I know consider London the ultimate British destination, for me it’s just a place I can get a direct flight to from the East Coast. Even traveling to Dublin a few years ago, the airline with the best price had a layover in London.(I know; it makes no sense to me, either.)

I don’t hate London. I’m just not a big city person. That said, I usually wind up spending at least a day in London before going to another destination. I did that a few years ago before taking the night train to Edinburgh for a week in Scotland.

I started my day touring churches I’d never visited. Since most weren’t open, I decided take in a bit of Dickens’ London.

No, I never expected it to look as it did in Dickens’ day. I simply wanted to see some of the places he’d mentioned in his novels. I couldn’t believe, in all of the times I’d been in London, I’d never been to Covent Garden or The Old Curiosity Shop.

Off I went to Covent Garden. A cobblestoned square, surrounded by buildings that were mostly restaurants, and an open air market, I began snapping pictures and looking everywhere but down.

Suddenly, as I walked across the square, my foot jolted down unexpectedly, and I fell.

What the hell? What just happened? My camera!

These were the thoughts that went through my head as I got off the ground.

The camera was a relatively new DSLR. I only hoped it hadn’t broken in the fall.

Looking around the ground, I noticed a curb I hadn’t seen. I had thought I was on the square, and hadn’t noticed this bizarre peninsula of slightly raised walkway jutting into the square. Maybe jetlag could be blamed for my not noticing it.

A young man who appeared to be a waiter from one of the outdoor restaurants dashed over to see if I was all right. I thought it was sweet that someone cared enough to ask, but I was embarrassed that it had happened at all.

I assured him I was fine, and had only hurt my pride and maybe bruised my knee.

He brought over a chair and called someone else over while he had me sit down, right in the middle of the square. Now I was embarrassed, imagining various diners wondering why that woman was just sitting in the middle of the square.

Enter a gorgeous young man half my age who looked like a young, slender Russell Crowe. He was the man the waiter had called over.

He was apparently a medic. He asked my name, where I was from, when I’d arrived, and what had happened. He wanted to know how I felt, whether or not I’d hit my head and whether or not I was hurt anywhere else.

I assured him I’d only bruised my knee. He offered me ice, but I declined. This was really much ado about nothing. I just wanted to be on my way, even though the scenery he was providing wasn’t hard to bear.

We chatted for a while, although I couldn’t imagine this young man was interested in my touring plans.

Of course, I realized he was only doing his job. He needed to make sure I really wasn’t injured. It wouldn’t do to have an injured American wandering around. Everyone knew how litigious we are.

What I didn’t realize until, while talking with a friend sometime later, was that his questions were a subtle attempt to assess if I’d had a stroke.

Me? Well, yes, I was of an age that it was possible, and I had fallen for seemingly no reason, although that wonky curb would have caught up anyone, especially someone who was jet-lagged.

Once I had spent the requisite amount of time for him to determine I hadn’t had a stroke, he let me go on my way.

Careful not to trip over any more curbs, I resumed my explorations.

While I didn’t get to all of the places I wanted to see, I’m sure I’ll be back again on my next trip to somewhere else.