Disgressed

Is it just me, or do people assume you must be able to tell them what they want to know – that it’s somehow your duty? I suspect that I do have a certain chameleon quality of looking as if I belonged to whatever institution I happen to be in at the time, as a matter of fact. More than once in the past people in department stores have attempted to buy things from me. But I don’t really think it’s that. I’ve found that merely answering the phone puts you in a similar position sometimes.

“No,” I said, “I think you’ve got the wrong number. This isn’t the Trumpton Prudential. Sorry.”
“But that’s the number on your leaflet!”
“Their leaflet. I’m afraid it’s wrong – or perhaps you misdialled?”
“I really must speak to someone about this. I’ve been charged an adminstration fee when I never even had an overdraft!”
“That sounds pretty bad.”
“But you’re not prepared to actually do anything about it, are you?”

There used to be a distinct group of people travelling from Waterloo who never looked at the information boards: instead, they would jump on to the first carriage of a likely-looking train, and then ask “Is this train going to X?”. It always seemed to be me they asked. Now as it happens, I always had to change at Clapham Junction – and all the trains from platforms 1 – 3 go there before they go anywhere else. So I never had the faintest idea where any of the trains was going after that. My ignorance was always a source of some annoyance to these people. Once, a nice young lady with golden curls actually sneered at me.

“So let me get this right,” she said contemptuously, “You’r standing here on this train, and you don’t even know where it’s going?”

Anyway, yesterday we had a complicated day. I normally take Sarah to school, but yesterday I left her with Katharine and was in the office before 8.00. At about 8.30, Katharine had a call from the school to say they had an electrical problem, and would be closed for the day (Schools can’t operate without electricity these days? In the summer?). Katharine took Sarah to work with her, but I agreed to take a half day and pick her up from Surbiton. I should easily be there by 1.00, I said.

Trying to walk past the front of County Hall, I found that the area in front of the London Eye had been evacuated and closed off. A man dressed as a town crier was proclaiming the fact, but not the reason. (Tourists must get a very strange impression at times. A few weeks ago anyone coming through Waterloo would have been convinced that the top hat was still normal wear in London (because of Ascot); now, people back in Ontario or Osaka would be told that English security staff actually wore red coats and tricorn hats.)

There appeared to be someone doing something up there on the wheel.
“Is it a bomb?” the short man next to me demanded.
” I don’t know.” I replied.
“Well, can I get a refund on my tickets?”

I turned and retraced my steps.

At Waterloo, some catastrophe had occurred: only about four trains were shown on the boards and some of those were cancelled.

“What’s going on here?” asked a man in a linen suit as we stood gazing forlornly at the boards.
“I don’t know.” I replied.
“Well I’ve got to be in Thames Ditton in half an hour!”

A smart lady standing nearby turned her head.

” I believe” she said, “there’s been a track-side fire in the Clapham Junction area. This is affecting trains from most platforms, though one or two lines are still running.”
“How long is it going to take to sort it out?” demanded the man in the linen suit.

Usually the best policy in these circmstances is to get as far as you can by whatever means is available: there was a train about to go to Clapham Junction, so I took it. That was a good decision – not only did it give me chance to sit down and deal with the Cajun Chicken wrap with salsa and sparkling mineral water from the Wisbech hills plus a hint of synthetic Castillian lime juice which I had grabbed on my way over – it was air-conditioned.

At Clapham Junction, I faced the minor challenge of finding out which of the twenty-odd platforms might have a train to Surbiton (could be either of two, it turned out). This is nothing like as difficult as it once was: signs have been put up which tell you what goes from where. In the old days, if you hadn’t got a friend or family member who could tell you in advance which platform you needed for, say, Thames Ditton, you tended to be a bit lost.

“Where does the train to Dorking go from?” someone asked, but I ignored them. Contrary to all expectation, a train to Surbiton was just arriving.

Lewis Gordon Pugh is planning to swim the full length of the Thames: he starts on Monday and plans to take fifteen days. This feat is intended to help save the walrus and the polar bear by drawing attention to a WWF campaign on climate change. I dare say Lewis won’t mind too much if it gives a boost to his career as a professional public speaker, either.

This is only the latest in a series of long-distance swimming achievements he has to his name, including swimming in both the arctic and antarctic. But if he really does intend to swim from the source of the Thames, he’s going to face a new challenge – no water. The official source of the Thames, shown in the picture, is completely dry these days except in the very wettest of weather. The excellent Thames Pilot site provides lots of information about the Thames, including two west-to-east accounts (one seductively describing all the pubs along the banks of the river): it says that for some considerable distance from the source it requires an act of faith to believe you are actually following a river at all.

I suppose swimming along a dry river might well dramatise the issue of climate change, though I don’t think the dryness of the Thames is mainly attributable to that. It’s partly just a matter of definition, a result of pushing the official source so far west (far nearer to the west coast of England than the east) and partly the steady increase in the population of the south of England, with its ever-growing water usage. The humble Wandle, near me, used to drive a dozen different water-mills, grinding gunpowder, snuff, and virtually anything else grindable except wheat: nowadays I understand it is only kept extant by water pumped into it.

This idea of doing things all along the Thames seems to be growing in popularity. Last year there was a campaign for prayers to be said all along it. I suppose Divine intervention in the shape of a quick flash flood for Lewis’ benefit is asking a bit too much…?

Update: Told you so…!

Further Update: He made it.

My bag involved me in a small imbroglio yesterday. Well, that’s not fair really – it wasn’t the bag’s fault.

On my way in, I visited WH Smith’s on Waterloo station to buy a couple of AA batteries for my mini fan. (I know those things look a bit wimpish – not exactly an enhancement to the stern and manly image – but you know, when am I going to use it if not now, when I can feel hot steam escaping from my shirt collar and giving my face an unwanted sauna?) Anyway, there was no queue to speak of for once, and I was on my way in no time. It was only as I was about to cross the river that I noticed the gap under my arm where the bag should have been.

Back at Smith’s, I barged in front of the queus which had now gathered.

“Oh, yeah,” said the assistant, “Yeah, you left it here. It’s gone down to Lost Property”

What? But it was only about five minutes ago I left it! Couldn’t you have kept it for, say, half an hour, just to see if I came back? Still, in all fairness, you can’t blame them really.

Off I trudged. Lost Property at Waterloo is in a fair way to being lost itself: stuck in a sort of tunnel under the bowels of the station, with no signs that I could see until I was only a few yards away from it. I rang a bell and a man appeared behind what seemed to be bullet-proof glass – perhaps they get a particularly valuable class of lost property at Waterloo. We tried to communicate via the intercom, but it was no good: after a couple of minutes he switched it off and we resorted to crouching down and shouting through the small hole between the glass and the counter.

“No bags brought in today,” he said, “Wait a minute.”

He disappeared and came back with an A4 document in his hand.

“Was this in it?” he asked, mysteriously.
“Er, no.” I said.
“No,” he agreed, “That one came in yesterday. And it was yellow.”

We seemed to have reached an impasse, so I retraced my steps. Back in Smith’s, the assistant looked puzzled.

“Actually,” he said, ” I didn’t take it to Lost Property myself. I gave it to my manager.”
“And is your manager here?”

He rang a bell and she popped out of a door in the back of the shop.

“No,” she said “The police have got it.”

The police? You gave it to the police? Immediately? So that it could be destroyed in a controlled explosion? And all in the five minutes while I was away? I couldn’t really blame her, though – it could have been some sort of bomb (though in that case they should have cordoned it off and evacuated the building, shouldn’t they, not started passing it from hand to hand?). It’s a bit sad really: there were all those years when the IRA were liable to leave bombs around, and then as soon as they stop, some other group of murderous nutcases steps in to take up the slack.

Anyway, she very helpfully took me off to speak to a group of policemen on the main concourse. It looks as if the police are getting somewhere with diversity these days: they all used to look the same, but these three were about as different as they could be: one quite small, one tall and thin, and the other, who listened to our problem, reassuringly Plod-shaped. He communed with his radio for a few minutes, and told us the bag was in the office.

It took a few minutes for the bell at the office door to produce any result, but at last a stern looking chap appeared. The bag contained my pass with photo and name (as well as my train ticket, Oyster, keys, and battered old Nokia – the Ford Escort of mobile phones) so there was no doubt about ownership. Thanking everyone, I went on my way at last. I have to admit that I felt more annoyed than thankful, but really whose fault was it? Everyone I’d dealt with had behaved properly and courteously – the fact was, there was only one person I could really blame.

God damn you, Osama Bin Laden!

I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot.
So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.
KJV, Book of Revelation 3 15-16

Is it safe to talk about football fever now? You see it’s not really fever in my case – more of a sniffle and perhaps just a hint of a headache. The World Cup is infallibly one of those occasions when I feel isolated in a sort of bubble of incomprehension. It’s not that I don’t like football. That wouldn’t be so bad. Eight, or perhaps twelve years ago I remember my boss looking at me pointedly and saying:

“You really hate football, don’t you?”
“No, no” I replied “I like it, really. It’s not quite as interesting to watch as rugby – a bit too random, you know? But it’s OK. More entertaining than cricket, anyway, and I can watch cricket fairly happily for an hour or so. If there’s nothing else.”

A look of puzzlement crossed his face and he abruptly terminated the conversation.

Lukewarm is just not an option. Football is like breasts on page 3: either you can’t get enough, or you find the whole thing vulgar and an incitement to bad behaviour. If you’re not much bothered either way, but think the standard of photography leaves a lot to be desired, you find yourself alone.

Nick Hornby himself, in his seminal work Fever Pitch, condemned me over this. With some justice, he basically said I should leave football to the people who really like it. Well, alright, he didn’t actually name me as such, but he said something along those lines about people who turned up to watch Ipswich defeat Arsenal in the final of the 1978 FA Cup without having any particular connection with either team, just on the basis that it might be a nice day out. That was one of the two football matches I have ever attended in my life, and that was, to be honest, pretty much the spirit in which I went.

This year, though, enthusiasm is rife. We would not normally have acquired a flag of St George (Katharine, an Aberdonian, would have had some difficulty with attaching one to the car) but in the end we were given one more or less whether we liked it or not. Even Elizabeth, my elder daughter, began to show an interest. She professes unconcern, but has always been in place on the sofa when a match is due to start. The other day she asked me if I could explain the offside rule to her, which I did – it’s a father’s duty really, don’t you think, like buying a train set and then playing with it yourself.

“Okay?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said, “not bad. You got most of it right – but you forgot the bit about having to be actively involved in play in order to be penalised.”

The thing is, we all know that defeat is overwhelmingly likely. Only one team can win. Anything less than winning the tournament is defined, and experienced, as failure, which virtually guarantees eventual misery. We’re quite unrealistic about these things. Look at poor old Tim Henman – a very good tennis player, just not a top tennis player (never looked like a top tennis player, if you ask me): but nothing short of winning Wimbledon will do for us: anything else, no matter how creditable, amounts to ignominy and national disgrace. My advice, if you can’t stomach lukewarmness, is to try to pretend soccer is not a game invented by England, but one we only took up about five years ago: that way, anything we achieve is great.

And as a matter of fact, you know, I do have an uncle who lives in Ipswich.

Out for a walk recently, we found a mention of a wall painting in Chaldon church. The reality turned out to be this astonishing 13th century Doom picture. You can find a nice big image where you can click to zoom in on the details here.

The church, St Peter and St Paul, is a fairly small one, and the painting takes up virtually all of the back wall. It was discovered in 1869 when the walls were being stripped for repainting: luckily the Rector noticed that something was emerging underneath (I prefer not to think about how many similar paintings may have been carelessly destroyed at one time or another.

In the bottom left-hand section of the painting, two devils (all shown as giant figures) are throwing murderers into a boiling cauldron. To their right, another devil is pulling people off the ladder of salvation (surely that’s not allowed, is it?). The people in the bottom right section of the picture are apparently dishonest tradesmen being forced by two devils to walk across a bridge of spikes. The usurer has already fallen down and is being roasted underneath (not the first time I’ve had occasion to note the commendably robust attitude to usury displayed in medieval wall paintings).

In the top left-hand section, good and bad deeds are being weighed in the balance. A devil has crept up from the left and has his hand on the scale (that can’t be fair, either, surely!). At the top right, a devil (or possibly the devil?) is being pinned down with a cross and thrust into a fire (that’s more like it) or possibly the wide open jaws of some vast beast.

The full name of the whole thing is “The Ladder of the Salvation of the Human Soul and the Road to Heaven”. It is believed to have been painted by a monk some time before 1200 – though obviously no-one can be sure about it. I’m no expert, but to me the style seems to have more in common with Nordic carvings and art than other medieval wall paintings – compare the similarly early paintings here, which to my eye show a more Continental, even Byzantine influence, but haven’t got the same vigorous, imaginative qualities.