Ships that sink in the night

In an earlier post, I joked about meeting a Radio 4-loving single girl at the airport. Well, when the plane came in to land at Stansted, the Polish young woman next to me noticed my abject terror (is this an attractive feature?) and we chatted until we'd collected our bags 20-odd minutes later (I didn't even pun). We exchanged names and talked about what we do, shook hands and said goodbye. Did I give her my number? Of course not. The very idea makes me sweat.

Decompressing from my trip was very strange. For four days, I lived in a bubble. I'd never met virtually all of the children on the trip, and we were placed in a strange relationship in an alien city. Over those days, I learned all their names, picked up on their personalities (who needs coaching, who doesn't, who's loud, who's quiet, how they respond to winning and losing), and spoke to very few other people. We explored this new city together (within limits) until parts of it became familiar, coped with victory and defeat - then dispersed again over a period of ten minutes, back to our ordinary lives. It was as though the trip hadn't happened: only my England shell suit says it did.

After four days of listening, talking, warning, entertaining, encouraging, advising, I was alone again, looking forward to a couple of days of my own company. The coach from Stansted (5 horrible hours) gave me time to listen mostly to downbeat music (Mazzy Star, Tindersticks, John Adams) and relax - until I hammered on the door for half an hour trying to wake my housemates after discovering I'd lost my keys.

Sunday was the day for buying birthday presents in Birmingham. I have to confess to purchasing a few little presents for me too. Largely, you'll be hugely unsurprised to learn, books. Then, finding myself outside St. Philip's Cathedral at 3.30, I went to Evensong. I know, I know, atheist Catholics shouldn't indulge, but the music's good, though I didn't realize I was letting myself in for more than an hour and a sermon (interrupted by the regulation drunk nutter). The sermon was kind of interesting: beautifully delivered and thought-provoking until he decided to reference Jade Goody and Murphy's Law in the course of his disquisition on Britain's pseudo-Christian culture. Let's be clear: fiction is written to make a specific point. It's constructed. It doesn't, therefore, prove general cultural truths for extrapolation.

After that - off to Wagamama for a solitary meal and read of the Guardian while being elbowed by beautiful couples. And so (as Pepys said, though not at 5), to bed.