How can you see a small boat with children and not think of that most famously inexplicable piece of cutlery, the runcible spoon?
But this boat is not going to sea, nor is it pea green; it is a ruin that has sunk to the bottom of the sky and settled on a seabed of leafy earth. Now it’s lying there while these two ransack it - or maybe they’ve been ransacking on shore and are desperately trying to set sail and escape.
Owen looked at the print of the picture on the table this morning, and just said:
“Sid is trying to go overboard.”
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“I need to take those chairs!”
Children know what ruins are for - playing in, same as everything else. Playing in, and leaving behind. There are entire days when parenting is just picking things up, because children make ruins every day; the Brio train track and the Lego set get torn down, the clothes are in piles, trailed by a debris field of single socks and the crayons are left when the drawing is done.
I walked through the house last night, up the stairs in the winter darkness, warm lamplight at the top pulling me up. And in that moment it all seemed so old and I realised these bricks have seen two World Wars and countless dead winters. Living in London is all about desiring to live amongst ruins. The house that people want, the areas that cost the most, the nicest places - they are the oldest ones. Housing is the only area of our lives where we desire the old knowledge, where our instinct to nest or to fortify pulls us back into the past.
I used to visit an office just off Queensway for a magazine I was working with, and there you could see some parts of London had it made to the 1950s - though never any further; West London, with its warrens of porticoed streets, the plaster chipped and the chill in the air, tweed jackets and talk about stamp duty. None of it quite Notting Hill. You’d overhear things like:
“You know they started Fourth Estate over there.”
“Oh, what happened to Tom? She's doing very well, but him…”
“I don't think he's worked in 20 years. I always see him in Kensington, sitting in the Cafe Anglais, reading the scoop from the Telegraph and sipping champagne.”
Now of course, I go nowhere near West London. In the lockdown year, we are surrounded by huge events but we live life in miniature. Like everyone else I count my steps, and sometimes at night I run laps of the tightly packed streets around my home. There, by the light of the moon, you can see it clearly: how living in London really is to live amongst Victorian ruins. Some of them are finely preserved shells around modern kitchens and LED spotlights, while others have overgrown gardens and bedsteads out front, and all the space subdivided into tiny little chambers, the renters camping inside. Through the curtains you can see a bed and a TV and a laptop, underneath thick painted ceiling roses and coving.
This is where city people are spending their time, quietly waiting. It’s as if we’ve all floated to the bottom of the sea, while we’re waiting for the lockdown to pass, a storm on the surface.
I hope you’re all keeping warm.
Thanks for reading,
Alex
PS The spot the bunny competition is up and running. It is an easy one this week.