What Would We Be Without Wishful Thinking?

Tonight is my last night in London. I get to leave the hostel at 4:45 tomorrow morning to take the Underground to a bus to the airport to Madrid to Toledo to a house that I rent. But there await me my guitar, my harmonicas, and my toothbrush. I have missed all of these terribly.

Kidding on the toothbrush. I don't even own one!

Being in England has been odd, to be sure. It was a good trip, but I confess that I am tired in body and spirit and am looking forward to resting back in Sonseca. But there are little moments here that felt weighty, that felt significant. Little glimpses of beauty like seeing people spray champagne as fireworks marked the transition to 2009 or drunk people yelling and congratulation strangers, or walking past a young man that had too much to drink and lay on the street in a pose utterly unfaithful to his expensive suit and expensive haircut. Or a girl whose friends were trying to convince of her inebriety and offered to call a cab as the poor rich girl stared off into space with the most depressingly lost gaze I have ever seen.

Or sitting in a bus coming back from Stonehenge and reading Old Testament prophets, and wondering how to show to same love and fidelity that the Israelites refused to accept. Or looking out the window in the same bus and seeing no landscape, only fog. A deep fog like the night I left Searcy for the last time, praying earnestly for engine failure before I left the state.

Or this very night, going to see a show. (God once again blurred the lines between his sense of humor, irony, and cruelty in that one of the only shows not sold out [and in the end the one we saw] was: The Mousetrap.) It brought back a lot of memories of when days and thoughts and feelings were brand new.

Or watching Trafalgar Square erupt with cheers over nothing more than a page turned on cheap wall calendars and being glad in my heart. Just an hour before these people were shoving each other aside, shooting untrusting glances at others standing too near, and booing the police. Now they were united in an optimism that many people need desperately. The foolish ones drank away their chance at sharing this joy.

Those of us who remained sober and smooch-less were caught up in something magical. This was far from home, but this was a time of hope. And I leave with memories of seeing Abbey Road, of winding my way down Baker Street (thinking of Gerry Rafferty makes me long for Colorado mountains, though), of exploring and getting lost and wondering and loving. Yes, this was a good trip.