The only
responsibility I had to fulfill on Thursday was a fifteen-minute meeting with
Dr. Decker at 2:00 PM. It was to chat with him about my travel narrative, but
since I already had a decent idea of the direction I wanted to take it, I
wasn’t concerned with the meeting other than my need to physically be in Benson
Hall at the appropriate time. I slept in, at least as late as my body would let
me, with the light and noise of Cambridge drawing me out of my bed around 9:30
AM. I spent a better part of the morning on Facebook and Twitter, patrolling
the socializing of my friends from the night before. I tried to read and write,
but my brain was exhausted from the week of class, so I decided to simply
relax. Eventually I convinced myself to shower, and I decided to go do my final
bit of shopping for the trip.
Along my
way to the shopping area, I walked by Trinity College’s open gates. I hadn’t
been able to go inside yet since I had always either been in class or working
on one of Tom’s projects. I slowly walked
into the large courtyard of the college, being sure to take in my surroundings.
I only took about three pictures, choosing instead to simply experience the
beauty of the college’s well-groomed grounds. The walls were adorned with huge
statues of what I suppose are important people in the college’s history. I was
disappointed to see that the large dome/gazebo/monument type structure in the
middle of the common area was under construction. I stood and imagined what
this courtyard looked like in the height of the academic semesters: beautiful,
full of students and instructors, people busy with work and accustomed to the
intense beauty about them. On my way back out I stopped to marvel the large
wooden door at the gate that seemed to be extremely old. I looked it over
completely, and when I tilted my head upwards to see the top of hit, I lost my
breath. Above my head was a ceiling full of the crests of the colleges of
Cambridge. They were all painted and ornate, connected through fancy stonework
that gave the gate’s inner ceiling a feeling of a permanent tapestry. I sat
down on the floor of the gate and leaned onto my back so that I could get as
much of the ceiling into a photo as was possible. I didn’t care that I looked
ridiculous because it was the most amazing thing I’d seen in a college so far
and I was so struck at how it was simply the ceiling of the gate. And I’d
almost completely missed it. I strolled back out onto the streets of Cambridge,
smiling at the porters as I walked out of the gate.
With the
shop I was headed to in sight, I noticed that St. Mary’s church was also open.
I believe St. Mary’s is the University Church, though I could be mistaken.
Regardless, it’s really old, and a big part of the touristy activities in the
U.K. seems to be going inside really old churches. So, obviously, I went
inside. Climbing the spiral staircase to the tower was tempting, but the 3.5
pound price for admission turned me off, especially before my shopping trip. By
the end of my visit in the church, however, I had donated 3 pounds in an
offering box, so I guess it ended up being pretty dumb of me to not just put
that towards a stair climb, but whatever. The church was fascinating with its
stained glass and ornate alter. An old
man stalked around the church, eventually ending up in an argument about some
church business with the woman working the gift shop. Let me mention that the
gift shop wasn’t a separate room of the church but was in fact just a series of
tables and desks set up in the back of the church. They were raising money to
help wall off the gift shop. So… they were literally selling things at the gift
shop… so that they could… have a better gift shop. Not really sure what
conclusion to draw from that, but I definitely found it a little odd. I moved
about the church, again only taking a few pictures, trying to let myself feel
the experience of the church rather than simply recording it in photos.
My
shopping trip proved successful, and with a substantially smaller amount of
money, I returned to Magdalene. Renae, Andrew, and Kathleen were waiting
outside the Pick before it opened. They were going to eat lunch there so I
decided to join them. I tried to recruit Cam to my cause, but he was just
eating in his room. He invited me to go shopping with him and Jennifer. While
I’d just been shopping, the company sounded fun, so he agreed to meet me at the
Pick when they were ready to go. I had fish and chips at the Pick and laughed
that it was the best I’d had in England and had just been next door to
Magdalene the whole time. It was a fun and friendly lunch, with all of us
blubbering about how sad we were to be leaving each other. Kathleen and I also
talked about how fun it was that everyone in the U.K. actually says, “cheers”
when they finish a conversation or give you food or basically anytime. I said
it to the locals while I was there but have absolutely no intention to bring it
back to the U.S.A. It was fun in England, but in the U.S. I’ll just get odd
looks. Plus, I love telling people to “have a great day!” So I’ll stick with
that.
Shopping
with Cam and Jennifer was a fun little trip, but I had to leave early to meet
with Dr. Decker. We discussed the effects of travel and how odd it is to try to
track down a sense of place for yourself when you’re abroad. We also toyed with
the effect of a short travel, like this one. Two weeks is just enough time to
let you truly feel homesick, but is also just enough time for you to get
comfortable with your new “home” and “family” so that you don’t actually know
how you’re supposed to feel. I shared that I’d just decided to be homesick. Not
that it was a negative choice or that I’d chosen to be sad, it’s just that I
had chosen to embrace my luck in having a home and people who care about me.
Homesickness can be a joyful feeling when you understand how blessed you are to
have people and places that make you feel homesick. After my meeting I went
back to my room, where I spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing and writing.
At 6:00
PM our entire group met at the porters’ lodge. We all went out to The Castle,
the pub where we all spent our first night together. It was a joyful dinner,
with everyone joking and recalling stories about our short time that now seemed
so long and lovely. After we ate we went
back to Magdalene to receive our group photos taken earlier in the trip. I’m
not going to lie… our group is hot. Like straight up killa in the looks
department. I volunteered to take Dr.
Graalman and Tom’s copies of the photos back to OSU for them since they had
both already left. I’m pretty nervous about the pictures getting back safety,
but I can only hope, I suppose. (They’re actually stored safely between a
notebook and many a soft articles of clothing in my suitcase right now. I’m
more worried about their safety than I am about my own at this point.
Volunteering made me a tad paranoid. Not my best idea of all time.)
The
entire group headed over to a nice pub called “The Boathouse” so that we could
watch Joel’s band perform. We went upstairs to the “entertainment room” and
found it set for a small group to sit in chairs and listen to the concert.
Disappointed that it wasn’t more of a “show” setting, Phil, Ryan, Logan, and I
all headed out to the small dock patio behind the pub. We watched a swan that
was incredibly close to the edge of the dock and talked until it was time for
the show to start. And then we stayed outside and talked some more. Eventually
we roused ourselves from our seats and went upstairs. Some kind of long
dreadlocked English granola hipster acoustic playing guy was babbling on about
how he had “heard this next song in my head today and thought ‘I need to learn
this.’” First of all: WHAT. I understand that songs just come to songwriters
sometimes; the same thing happens to me with passages. But this dude was the physical
embodiment of “trying too hard” and saying things like that were not helping anything. But, as travel
always does, my first impression was thrown for a loop. He wasn’t the best
performer I’ve ever seen, but he had a fun little lyric in the chorus of one of
his songs. He sang, “I have to give up everything just so I can be free, but
how can I have my freedom if I have to give up me?” I thought to myself, “what
an excellent question.”
The next
act was a man and woman who played folk music from the U.K. I’ll let you know
everything you need to know about folk music from the U.K.: don’t listen to it.
The people gave very pretty renditions of some songs, but when the songs are
about sad sailors on the North Sea and “old Edward’s father” it can get pretty
dreary. After their act, Joel’s band came up. Joel plays bass guitar and is
more or less a master of the funk. Not that his band played funk, but you could
just tell he had a very intimate relationship with things that would be
modified by the adjective “funky.” Their
lead singer was a giant, bald, English teacher of a Scotsman. He obviously wrote the songs and his lyrics
were fun and casual. Their final song was a touching and personal little love
song that had a chorus that said, “You look fine, you look fine, even though
you don’t believe me.” It was just a pretty little ditty about a man telling
his love that she looked beautiful all the time and didn’t need to worry, even
though he knew that she was going to anyway. I really liked the song.
Most of
our group had been drinking during the show and many people were feeling pretty
good. We all walked back to the city center through Jesus Green and were all
laughing and loving, aware how little time we had left together. Most everyone
was hungry so we went to “The Trailer of Life” which is a food trailer the
parks itself in the market square in the night. Logan and I were first to
arrive and we each tried a bacon cheeseburger. We were busy raving about its
deliciousness to each other when the rest of the group arrived. So we raved
about the deliciousness to them. We didn’t convince anyone to try the bacon
cheeseburger like us, but as far as Logan and I were concerned, we were the
only people who had truly experienced
The Trailer of Life. Our experience at “The Trailer of Life” had bonded us as
“Bros for Life” and we happily shared an order of chips on the side. I walked
back to Magdalene with Mackenzie and Cam. I went to Mackenzie’s room, and after
a little while Cam joined us. We talked for almost two hours about OSU,
Stillwater, Greek Life, and our dating lives. It was a wonderful conversation
spent with friends and as Cam and I said goodnight and goodbye to Mackenzie
until this fall, I felt blessed to have gotten so close to such wonderful
people.
I
returned to my room and noticed I didn’t have my phone. I ran back to
Mackenzie’s room and she let me in so I could search through the couch. I couldn’t find it, so I just shrugged it off
until the morning, bidding a final farewell to Mackenzie as I left. It was bedtime,
and without my phone as a distraction (the damn wifi was down again anyway) I
went to sleep as soon as my head hit my pillow.
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