The second day was St Paul's Cathedral which I think we ubered to after another hotel expensive and iceless breakfast. I'm not sure why we ubered everywhere, ubers were used for emergencies afterwards but I think with 6 of us and our hotel being far from the tube, uber we go.
St Paul's the big dome mushroom just hurtled up toward the sky and us dwarfed beneath. I had only walked by it back in my 20's, listening to music (which is how Bess would probably liked to have done it right now) but we go in this time and lofty and echo were created here. I see why people like churches like these. Lots of room for god here, but you don't even need god, the thing is god. The beauty.
We explored all the nooks and colorful panes and carved details and then climbed the stairs to the dome. The inside balcony was closed cause someone killed themself but the outside was open so we decided to try our luck.
This staircase I have seen in my dreams. It starts out wide and wooden and spirals up a fat stone column in the middle and you could imagine monks or hunchbacks climbing these stairs to ring the bell even though that's notre dame sorry anyway the stairs start out fat and smooth and ample so we're walking side by side and joking around and then the stairs start to get skinnier and they're stone and the ceiling gets lower and then it becomes like that dream I have always. Where I'm too big and I can't fit and then suddenly water is rushing in filling it up. It isn't rational, I also have dreams that I can't remember my high school locker combination. I like to hang on to things I'll never solve. Anyway, the worry that the whole thing will flood and I will be trapped, why? I can turn around and walk down. Also where is the flood coming from? I notice the worry but keep going, there are other people and the kids are there, they're real.
We get to a landing that is not the top, but aims you into a tight tunnelway to another staircase and there is a guy standing there halfway through just sort of pointing left to keep going. He has to STAND IN HERE, in a windowless stone tunnel, in a cramped nook acres above the solid ground like a gargoyle with khakis on, pointing to anxious breathless people to keep going. This guy might actually BE god. Damn I should have asked him a few questions. Why are you always so busy when you meet god. But I was so happy to see that HE was trapped in here, paid to be trapped in here really, and he didn't look worried. I think he was put there just for that purpose. Cause if you were actually freaking out, he would escort you down but this is not an easy escort, the stairs are skinny and people are coming up, what he really would need is a special door to a cool colory spiral slide for wimps like me who would enjoy sliding out of claustrophobia and fast rejoining the wide open.
Anyway, this part of St Paul's, this tunnel where the walls are thick stone like wedges of giant stone cheese blocks, built by who builds things like this someone sweated to put these stones in like this to give me this incredible feeling of being trapped, and I just focus on Nathan in front of me ducking under arches and we're going up even skinnier stone stairs and we just keep climbing and climbing and finally we aren't quite there, that's just a landing, but then we are there. Outside around the dome, you can't really see much but you can see air. They've blocked it so you can't throw yourself off, which makes it hard to take pictures without an iron girder blocking the view but we're happy we did it. The girls sat on a bench and were on their phones and Nathan got mad at them for being at the top of a monument and being on a phone but really we took a few pictures, we did it, have a seat who cares. At the top we get a text from Bruce who says how is it, should he come up and we know this will add an hour + to our trip the way he takes his time so we tell him man don't do it, the stairs are scary and you can't see anything.
On the way down anytime we passed anyone coming up Nathan would say MAN, that's a long way, I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT TOOK THREE HOURS, or other things to alarm the people coming up, and once we get to the wide stairs again we're actually skipping so happy and then we're barfed out onto the floor of St Paul's and it's never looked so immense. Maybe that's why it's good to do the climb, praise god and empty vast checkered floors.
We can't find Bruce so we assume dammit he went up so we sit down right in the center of St Paul's and then a priest comes and talks about sending prayers to those who are sick so we bow our heads and think of Moose and then he blesses us all which is a bright stained glass blanket across our trip, I'm glad for the blessing with this crew. I'd wait for his noon blessing just for safety but we got other stuff to do. We keep texting Bruce because we've been waiting awhile and then he says he's been downstairs in the crypt this whole time so we skedaddle down and out past tombs and stone deathbeds which look cool, secure and comfy. At least you always know where you are, in one of those. And your requirements for doing stuff all wrapped up.
We swarm out of there and take some hovering in the background expansive dome pictures while Emma sees that the tube will take us to hell and back from here before getting us to Paddington so we should jump in a big uber but then we see a taxi and the price is 14 bucks so we cram in and head to the train to Oxford.
This is where the trip goes well, where we have our prepaid prethoughtout train tickets, we know where we're going, we're all in the same place and running the same speed, and we all aren't hungry or thirsty or tired. I'd say around 11:30 am each day, we were at our best, clockwork precision, mission impossible clarity, for half an hour we were doing the trip of our dreams with no human breakdown. Chalk that down for your future travels. Expect a half an hour of perfection each day and not a penny more, and that is international family trip success.
Oxford has changed since the 30 years I last saw it. It is bigger and there are more people and alot more heat. I tell the kids that not ever again will we travel in August, I don't care who has school and who has to stop learning, but we are traveling in November or January and you can write your senator if you have issues. I also inform people as we leisurely walk that I will no longer be solely in charge of supplying everyone's water and having to run into every bathroom to refill the water for 6 people. I have this breakdown early, and yet I am still the water person as I know I will be because I am the mom. Emma has a similar breakdown later about always being the map and uber person but we have these breakdowns because we know there will not be a change and in fact, god has ordained these tasks to us. So suck it, Says god. Privately. Usually in a train bathroom.
We finally wander down the main the street and Oxford again is fake movie set #50, a crumbling old prison, a church that looks like a castle. Cobblestone streets that like to gobblestone Barry's suffering legs. At least we're downhill.
Then people realize they're hungry and we have our first fight about just getting here and wanting to look around vs sitting inside a restaurant and eating. Nathan, Bruce and I leave to keep walking and the girls and B opt for the inside one restaurant tour of Oxford.
I just can't sit still in a new place, what is the point of sitting inside? We keep walking and I see a place to get a piece of pizza and walk through an archway into a side alleyway that opens into a tiny plaza and the boys keep walking looking for coffee and boba and I stick my head out the top of the pizza place window while I'm waiting and Bruce reappears down there in the courtyard and he says there's a whole maze of places back here hidden. So I get my pizza and traipse out there and they're both waiting for their separate drinks at places and there's this whole hidden stone alleyways of a farmer's market type place, where it opens into different areas and stores and fruit stands, all half indoor and outdoor, and I buy a peach with a 50 quid coin and then forget to take it having to run back later. The boys and I eat the ice cream and pizza and fries that they found (our English diet) and sit at a metal cafe table in that hidden courtyard and this feels like celebrating Europe to me. We're all happy, and there's ambiance, and space. I may have some spatial problems.
We reunite with the other group and I point at the secret alleyway and say heyyy you should see that it's really cool and know that there is not enough time to share every adventure and they believe me but they're stepping into a Harry Potter Store, which is also a godlike experience for the girls.
We all go into a Tesco to find a bathroom and soda and candy and there is Craig at the counter who suffers greatly at not being allowed to let us use the bathroom, he is so funny and shows us the back room where he'd have to leave the register to walk us through and wait for us while we go back in the dungeon back there and we say it's ok we can pee off the dock down on the street below.
We wander down to the bridge and find the place to rent a boat and there's rowboats and motor boats and it's a billion degrees but since we have 6 people we have to take a motor boat which isn't the most idyllic and feels a bit like 6 people in a hot bathtub with a plastic cover on top, but once we're going, the breeeeze down this green river with the countryside on either side and the water and no one's wearing a bathing suit otherwise we'd be in, baby. Emma tells me not to climb to the front to sit but I do and we can take off our shoes and feel the breeze and see old stone houses and empty fields of flowers, little wandering bicycle paths by the river and the big blue sky and a colorful stone building where someone looks out on this river and it's nothing to them, this pretty green and water, it's just like a regular day out their window, in Oxford, everyday.
All the kids take turns driving the boat which is pretty easy to get off course, and we manage to get it back within the hour to the red headed Ron Weasley boat renter dude who rents boats to college students behind the pub (which gave me a plastic glass of just ice, even though the girl behind the bar with the scottish accent said just ice? with a confused look on her face) and then back up through gobblestone streets and all the way back to the train station.
When I took the train back in my 20's with my friend Dave, the train was always about looking out the window restfully, contemplating or daydreaming, or sleeping. These trains with the fam seem to be about plugging your phone in, wiping off sweat and being glad to sit for a goddamn minute. Family tears the pants off of life like a mad dog. It's total tumult, these past 22 years. Like when we're in the hotel room and piled on top of each other, it's sort of the same on the train, or walking down a street seeing something miraculous. There's yelling, there's comfort, there's awe.
