LONDON DIARY
2002-02-24/26
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
B. 8.5.1809 Somersby / D. 10.6.1892 Alworth
House, Surrey
Gout
I've been suffering
from a touch of post-trip malaise I'd have to call
it—blues and symptoms all weekend accompany me to
the theater and back to bed again. Of course I've blamed
air travel in general, due to the flashbacks of being
strapped at the precise center of Kennedy-bound steerage
with a three- behind four-seat row view all the way to
the front of the cabin—a liquid panorama of child
and adult sneeze-puffs wafting, wafting closer. What did I expect?
But I should also admit
this whole return to ME bit has come as a letdown,
low-lighted by my disappointment in myself and
happenstance for combining AGAIN and with such unseemly
haste to ensure that I just don't feel BETTER. I seem to smell of
perfumed sable—but I can't be sure.
Yes and meanwhile
lingers the slow-burning question of how much despondency
stems from my spirit which pines, undoubtedly—yanked
away from its engagement list who knows how far from the end?
Did I, my SELF, while inside my spirit mingled gaily,
spend quite enough time on a coat-check peg outside the
reception halls of London's illustrious dead? Or did I keep intruding? I'll take another
Advil.
:::