Blooming marvellous

On waking this morning, and squinting myopically at my reflection in the mirror, I noticed that my picnic in the sun yesterday had caused little pale freckles to bloom enthusiastically all over my forehead. Like little daisies, springing up optimistically, believing in summer, in months of warm, glasses of Pimms, meals outside, the promise of holidays. The freckles had sprinkled themselves exuberantly, foolishly, over my cheeks and my nose. As though seeds had been scattered there with a loving but unsteady hand. As though painted by an indulgent (and none-too-practised) artist. They made me smile.

Today we went to Spitalfields Market. I meandered hopefully in amongst the stalls, inventing an alternative life for myself with every fresh treasure. A stall of second hand clothing. ("I’ll wear vintage jackets. And gloves – with little sparkly buttons at the wrists. And I’ll sit in cafes looking chic.") A stall of handmade jewellery. ("I’ll buy another work suit. Conventional, but with a twist. Cut on the bias, perhaps. With a brightly coloured lining. And I’ll wear it to important meetings, combined with impossibly beautiful handmade necklaces. And even while I’m making devastatingly good, complex points, everyone will be distracted by the way that even work clothes can’t hide my innate sense of style.") A stall of brightly coloured canvases. ("I’ll fill my house with off-beat, one-off pieces of art. I’ll buy them because I love them. But in a bizarre moment of synchronicity between my taste and the zeitgeist, every piece I buy will go on to be a classic. I’ll sell a few, for hilariously inflated sums of money, and will keep the rest, and will give interviews in Sunday supplements, with full colour spreads of me with my collection, with articles entitled ‘The accidental art collector’) A cafe selling organic brownies. ("I’ll eat them. Er, that’s it.")

Jack and I arrived at a stall selling cheap books, and I dived in without looking back. Somehow, spending money on anything else would have been wasting it, but spending money on books is so inherently not wasteful that it’s absolutely fine to just buy as much as you can carry. But the best thing was that because each book was only a few pounds, I felt able – no, almost duty-bound – to buy books that I would never normally have considered. Anything I picked up and considered, which I would normally reluctantly discard, I hung onto. I sifted through the ‘two for £5’ section, I piled books into my arms. I stacked them up against my chest, and held the top-one firm with my chin.

I bought:
The Return of the Naked Chef, because you can never ever have too many cook books. Even if you never cook from them, it’s a little known fact that just having them in your house makes you a much better person, by a process of osmosis.
The Virgin Suicides, by Jeffery Eugenides, because I have just finished Middlesex. And because a stranger on a train who struck up a conversation with me once despaired of being able to recommend to me any book that I hadn’t already read, and seized gladly upon the Virgin Suicides, and made me promise I would read it.
Iris, by John Bayley. Just because. I have never read any Iris Murdoch. And when I’ve read this, perhaps I will want to.
Fingersmith, by Sarah Waters, because I don’t often read historical novels. And perhaps I should broaden my mind a little.
The Story of V, by Catherine Blackledge… this was on a complete whim. It bills itself as ‘a persuasive and exhaustive study of the history, culture and reproductive power of female genitalia’. I bought it because I like to read feminist literature, and I thought this might provide a useful angle on some of it. And I also bought it because just occasionally, I like to shrug off my conventional demeanour, and shock people a little bit. (Did I succeed?) I certainly shocked myself when I had a flick through over a drink in a bar near the market later on. I have made a mental note that this might not be a book to read on the tube. No matter what Gwendoline says in The Importance of Being Earnest.*
Trading Up, by Candace Bushnell, because I have just finished romping through my friend’s entire boxed DVD set of Sex and the City. I rather foolishly missed it when it was on television, and hence could enjoy going through series 1 – 6 in entirely chronological order, at my leisure. I absolutely loved it (sobbed happily through the last episode, since you ask) and have also read ‘4 blondes’ in the past, which I found rather surprisingly cutting. Ascerbic. Acutely observed.
The age of revolution, by Eric Hobsbawm, because when I first started my A-levels, our first term was on European history from 1789 – 1848. We were continually exhorted to read this book, but never got round to it because we were too busy hanging around in the common room trying to look cool, learning to drive, snogging each other, and learning how (not) to drink. I would like to read it now as a belated homage to my history teachers, and to see how much of my History A level is still lying dormant in my memory.
Now and Then, by Joseph Heller, because I love everything he writes. Even though I am sure I’d hate him if I ever met him, I think his writing is magical. And also because when I saw a book by Joseph Heller that I hadn’t previously read in the ‘2 for a fiver’ section, I knew that my book shopping spree was meant to be. I don’t have to hunt out Joseph Heller books. They find me when they know I need them. Hence, I once found three books of his in a car boot sale over the road from my parents’ house. I then found a little known play of his in a bookshop in Prague. I’d never even heard of it before, and there it was on the shelf. If that hadn’t been a sign enough, I also flicked through it, and found a quotation in it from my favourite poem of all time. I was so shocked, I nearly fell over. I felt as though I’d looked up just by chance, and for a split second, the clouds had spelt my name out. It was a lovely moment, feeling as though that spot, in that bookshop, on that day, was the place that was intended for me. Meaningless, but beautiful, somehow.

As Jack and I left the market, we noticed a flower stall, and lingered for a moment wondering whether to buy flowers…
"Shall I buy you some?"
"We should save the money…"<br />"We could get some gladioli…"
"Or some roses…"
"They would be beautiful…"
"But maybe we should save the money. We have already got some flowers at home…"

Then we noticed that the man retrieving flowers for customers was getting not just one bunch, but another, and another, and added them together to make a huge bunch of truly gigantic proportions… we lingered a little closer, earwigging shamelessly:
"… for  a tenner…"
"We’re shutting up…"
"It’s so hot. We won’t sell them tomorrow."
"For ten pounds?"
"Whichever ones you like," an expansive gesture.

Hardly daring to believe our luck, I rather shyly approached the man whose arms had so generously waved at the bounty. "How much can I have?"
He grinned at me, "How about you keep picking bunches, and I’ll tell you when to stop?" By the time he wrapped up the flowers in paper, I had stiffly sculptural aubergine-coloured arum lilies, cream roses that blushed to hot pink at the edges of their petals, purple alliums like an artist’s rendering of fireworks using only petals, some pink flowers that looked like stocks ("Not stocks! Their cousins..") and flowers I’ve never seen before that look as though thistles have been cross-bred with pink-purple crushed velvet, with spectacular horticultural results.

We staggered back to the station, weighed down with treasures. Armfuls of flowers. Bagfuls of books. An embarrassment of riches.

Obviously, the way to make yourself feel better is not necessarily to spend twenty-five quid on books, and then spend ten pounds on more flowers than you need. But, as I reflected when I had finished filling almost every vase we own, and dotted them around the house… it is perhaps a start.

with love,
therumtumtugger
xxxx

*"One should always have something sensational to read on the train." She was talking about her diary. But I reflected on her words when I was reading one of the Hite reports on the Northern line one day.