A Rainy Night....

In Soho (and other stories)....

Anouk Aimee entices me. What can you say? Her call is her call. I sometimes wish it was so simple.....

But it is a rainy night. And I am in Soho. Not that that means much these days.....

I mean, far from the seedy side, these days you can be clean.....

And you don't need to be hungry....

I'm not singing for the future

I'm not dreaming of the past

I'm not talking of the first time

I never think about the last

Everywhere changes.  Nothing remains.  (The centre cannot hold....)  Cold, shiny alleys are the veins of an older city....

And where for sixty years or so i camisa & son provided the best of Italy on Old Compton Street, economical issues led to the demise of the family firm. It is sad to face the old shop front, without the bicycle, and to think of the passing of time..... But that is how it is....

And not far away there is another outpost of Europe, where pints are not the accepted measure....

Meanwhile there are those who like to sit:

And those who seek:

And the cool cats who rely on past vibes:

And those who, like me, will pay over the odds for something that reminds the soul of Italy:

Yay! 

Though one must not forget that there is inequality and some may sit on the cold steps of society rather than in the comfort of hallowed halls:

Night falls, and there are those who have no memories, no sense of the past, but who enjoy in their own perfectly secure way the delight of the now:

And the plastic angels still fly overhead, as they have flown for some years now.....

While, as dawn begins to wash the pavements, the big names reappear, their price tags only a mark of the way some people have, and others don't.....

It is Christmas time after all,

And everything is shiny and high gloss - good for glittering memories:

Nothing can be said about these delightful windows and their messages.  As long as I have more than you, or less than you, it matters not whether Jesus was born in a stable, nor whether he was conceived by miracle....

And all the tinsel and baubles and glitter of Christmas says is that in the depths of ugly winter we must rise up and cheer each other with love and kindness:

Whether we are Fortnum, or Mason.... Or immigrant, or visitor, or poor, or rich,

We should remember refugees and immigrants and those who have nowhere to lay their new born, even if the stage is clumsy and chronologically inaccurate:

And not forgetting that only a few yards away the scene is even less composed:

And that Nelson, our National Hero, is reduced to a fairy figure atop a foreign tree:

But then, with a new day, we take time to review the lives and works of:

Remarking that an early woodland work by Constable would have been the perfect image for Winnie the Pooh [Isn't that sacrilege?  Ed]

But then as the years passed and life took its toll, we find that both masters are watching the clouds form and the rain lash down.  Tell me who painted this?

And who this?

If you know your chocolates, this won't be difficult, but it was a surprise to me that John Constable (the painter of the second picture above) was just as able as his contemporary Turner to depict the falling of the skies, the concatenation of watery forms, and the lights of whirling shadows.

And so, I am led to the darkness again, and wander through the park night, marvelling at the variety of illusion around me, sometimes grand and robust:

Sometimes heartbreakingly alone and just soooo overthinking:

The Serpentine seems almost inviting in its pearly sheen:

But then the lights of the great Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park restore my faith in the Christmas Spirit, and I am reminded of how life is really about other people - I am reminded that it is worth attempting to understand the Buddhist concept of Dukkha, as the wheel of life turns.....

Though by a curious coincidence it is Claudia Cardinale who shakes me out of my melancholy and encourages me to consider the sinuous strands of sanity:

Don't ask me how, but Fellini's Otto e Mezzo still has the power to poke fun at my state of indecision.....

I'm not singing for the future

I'm not dreaming of the past

I'm not talking of the first time

I never think about the last

Now this song is nearly over

We may never find out what it means

Still there's a light I hold before me

And you're the measure of my dreams, the measure of my dreams

Shane Macgowan

A Rainy Night in Soho

London

 Underneath the arches.....

Flanagan and Allen.... The great couplings.  Wilson, Keppel and Betty (no that's three....). Wilbur and Orville Wright, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, Homer and Marge Simpson.....  Oh, and Gilbert and George....,

Whose new gallery just off Brick Lane is a joy to visit, whether the

Pavement is our pillow

or

Without a sheet we'll lay

Underneath the arches

We (will) dream our dreams away

And dreaming is what it comes down to.....

I'm in London for a day or two, paying respect to the great and the good, and offering disrespect where it is due:

I laze a little, with Italy in mind:

Then wander a while in Hyde Park:

Reminiscing a little of the days when I visited this Police Station for reasons I won't go into here:

Then relaxing a moment in the shade of FDR in Grosvenor Square:

While young things prepare themselves for the upcoming celebrations of the unctions of Konig Karl von Battenberg:

Ah, but I'm not here for the fun nor the unctions.... 

The Ritz we never signed for

Savoys they can keep

No. I'm trolling (Shome mishtake?  Ed) along the South Bank with Simon Ellingworth (Multi Award Winning Photographer & Educator), in an attempt to steal some images of life as it really is.....

Starting with the Tate Modern, where concrete brutalism decapitates the passer-by:

A screen in the old oil tanks continuously plays with the shadows:

The structure of the Turbine Hall puts all in their place, section by section:

While windows obscure stories that could be interesting - or which may be just so:

I like to think that Love exists: but as with all art, maybe it's just a passing fancy - a flash between two mobiles?

Upstairs the clouds are gathering.  A shy guardian marshals the strays, while the ceiling lowers:

Sleeping when it's raining

And sleeping when it's fine

It's nice to see people quietly reflecting:

Or letting time coil by:

In colour, or in black and white:

And it is good to know that, despite the brickwork, there is a world outside:

Then we are outside, again, and 

Underneath the arches

We dream our dreams away (bon-bon-bo-da-be-do)

Sleeping when it's raining

And sleeping when it's fine

Trains rattling by above (bon-bo-bo-da-bi-da-bo)

There are truths in lies. Perhaps:

Earth has not anything to show more fair

And

these are not drunk, as you suppose, since it is only the third hour of the day.

London and I have been friends, of sorts, for over sixty years. There have been, as in most friendships, moments of friction, but I am not (yet) tired of life, and our relationship continues to grow. I accept that everything changes, from black and white:

To colour:

From noughts, to crosses:

Some people walk down concrete stairways, as if they're under orders:

While others indulge their tastes with clear expressions of delight:

The young record their progress:

And life goes on, whatever we may prefer.....

Underneath the arches

Where:

We dream our dreams away (bon-bon-bo-da-be-do)

There's only one place that we know

And that is where we sleep......

Pavement is our pillow

Without a sheet we'll lay

Underneath the arches

We dream our dreams away

Bud Flanagan, Joseph Mccarthy Jr. and Reg Connelly

With many thanks to Simon Ellingworth, Gilbert and George and Flanagan and Allen

https://gilbertandgeorgecentre.org

https://simonellingworth.com

https://youtu.be/q7HoMWuXCY4