London

There's this Regina Spektor song that I listened to a lot last summer. I listened to it a lot. I listened to the whole album a lot but that song in particular. Driving through the rolling green fields of Wisonsin, windows down and music up, it took every ounce of willpower I had to keep from jumping out of the car and dancing on back country roads. That song felt like something in the inner recesses of my soul had been plucked out and set to treble clef and bass clef.

I haven't heard that song since last summer, I don't think, but I heard it a few days ago. I was stirring my coffee when it came on the radio and I thought how funny if someone had told me, while I was driving through the rolling green fields of Wisconsin, that the next time I'd hear this song I'd be stirring my coffee in the kitchen of someone's East End flat in London. And I wondered if some people are never surprised by where they find themselves.

I hope that all of you have the opportunity to surprise yourselves.

I'm staying with the nicest boys in the world. I met them in Berlin through a mutual friend (who I hadn't even seen in probably three years) and they're putting me up for seven whole nights in London. They're actually cat-sitting for a friend and the cat's staying with them the exact same dates that I am. They've put up a survey on the message board: "Which new housemate do you prefer? (please tally at will)". So far I'm winning by a landslide but then I clean up after myself and the cat's a bit ornery.

So far:

• trashy British television (a close relative of trashy American television)
• falling asleep on a double decker bus
• oohing and ahhing over baby farm animals
• fantastic exhibit at the Tate Modern
• brownie-baking and tear-inducing Noel Coward film
• frozen pizza on living room floor watching Sex and the City
• people-watching on a wall in Soho at twelve in the morning
• getting lost in Hampstead Heath Park (which, in addition to being the loveliest place imaginable, also has the cleanest park restrooms I've ever seen)
  

It's nice to be with people again.

I was thinking yesterday that there are so many people in the world who I love, love, love and who love, love, love me, too. I bet you have a lot of them, too, and isn't that the nicest thing in the world? It's nicer than sunning yourself in a park in Amsterdam, toes buried in the grass. It's nicer than strolling down a wide, tree-lined boulevard in Paris with flowers up and down the sides. It's nicer than watching the sun set over the Charles Bridge in Prague, city lights painting the sky one by one.

All of those things are very nice, actually, and they are experiences that I hope each of you can have someday if you want them but I was thinking today of that quote from The Wizard of Oz, the one that I never really liked: "If I ever go looking for my heart's desire again, I won't look any further than my own back yard. Because if it isn't there, I never really lost it to begin with."

I never really liked that quote but there's something to be said for it, I think.