A drey, or squirrel's nest. At least that is what I suppose it to be. For I have never seen a squirrel enter or leave it. I have an appointment with a friend and collaborator of several years standing. We have never met or even spoken before. Emails and blogs have sufficed as a basis for exchange of thought and sentiment. During four hours of talk, the person I am talking to stalks the person I partly knew; facts bow and dance. Threads are taken up and left fluttering in the wind; byways are entered and abandoned. "We'll be in touch." We, both of us disappear in opposite directions, into London's hustling present and nagging past. It is a beautiful thing to see you Lucy, surrounded and informed by different and unexpected dimensions.
From the train, I catch sight, in an office block window, of a woman alone at a table in a meeting room. I think to myself that she is waiting to be interviewed for a job. Through the window, behind which she sits, across the train line, over the graffiti, and through the train window, I sense with mixed feelings of dread and nostalgia, the world of business and competition.
9 comments:
How wonderful to meet the lovely Lucy!
Those threads in the breeze tickled me too!
Thanks so much, Joe.
Congratulations on harnessing typography as a means of describing your state of mind. When the typeface switches, mid-para, from sans-serif to serif it's as if something became clearer (or possibly more obscure) about the bowing and dancing facts.
As to the distant sight of a woman waiting to be interviewed, I fear for me she would helped feed my post-retirement schadenfreude. Here in Hereford the condition enjoys slim pickings. But when I visit London the sight of men in suits, carrying leather-clad laptops (they've replaced briefcases), with plastic dingbats hooked into their ears, elbowing aside tourists and generally radiating irritation - these sights remind me that getting old isn't all that bad.
Threads still blowing. The typography question is beyond me. There is nothing deliberate about the switch in typography from serif to san-serif. There is a font fairy at work which seems to take control despite my protestations.
I hesitate to offer a recommendation since I feel I've profited from this fault. However if you are inclined to extirpate randomness, approach your blog via the Google toolbar:
My Account>Blogger>Edit posts>Tick edit>choose HTML. Close inspection of the HTML should reveal the code for a changed typeface. If this doesn't provide a potential solution try first Bloggers FAQs. If there is no solution try Blogger Group Help: they've solved everything I've thrown at them. Or simply sit back and let it happen.
Oh wow! You've finally met!
I think I did what you have advised, BB. But could not restore the original font. As you will see it now seems to be back to normal so that we may all sleep peacefully. I quite like this serif face which seems to be called Font, which I suppose is like calling a pet cat, Cat.
Sometimes I see people in the windows of offices, having meetings. When I do the memory of those tedious occasions make me think that growing old, rather than a consolation, is a positive blessing
Well met in London!
A charming description of your meeting! It is strange (but gratifying) to fill in the shadowy outline of how you imagined the person to be.
I never realized that squirrels lived in nests. Which reminds me: I saw the most enormous squirrel when traveling up a ski lift in New York last week. It was as big as a good-sized cat.
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