Emotional rollercoaster

I'm not sure this photograph is one of my better ones, but you'll have to trust me that it illustrates perfectly the idiocy that is displayed around this wonderful planet all too frequently. It was taken yesterday evening on the ground floor of Zara Homes, Regent St. It is the third or fourth time I've visited this establishment, and the third or fourth time I've been stopped in my tracks by the lettering on their stairwell. On each occasion, I browse the ground floor, and then meander towards the staircase to continue my shopping experience. To help me decide whether to go up or, indeed, down, I peer at the steel art deco letters on the wall - but instead of telling me what I might find, should I walk up or down the stairs, the sign merely has an arrow pointing in an 'up' direction, labelled 'First Floor', and an arrow pointing 'down', labelled 'Lower Ground Floor'. I mean. Has it come to this? That when we're on the ground floor, we need instruction labels to help us know that, by walking up a flight of stairs, we will find the First Floor? Or that by walking down, we may come across a basement? Growl. Like any good shopper, I went both up and down the stairs, possibly as a result of the mystery and intrigue provided by the lack of labelling (perhaps this was their intention), and my rage died down when I spotted the most incredible gold leather sausage dog. It has shot straight into my top five favourite purchases of 2008, along with my Bookworm shelf, my sugar bowl from Anthropologie in Seattle, my cherry blossom fairy lights and my carpet.

My life has been extremely weird since approx. last Thursday when overnight, any hint of the summer ended and it suddenly became Autumn. As soon as I started wearing my delicious pea-green coat and little blue hat, so beloved last winter, I started experiencing the most overpowering feelings of deja vu and nostalgia, so intense as to be almost unpleasant. The Faithful will know that I am up there in the World's Most Unspiritual, and weird sensations such as these are unheard of in my past. I think it's something about having an August break-up and then going on a couple of interesting dates, which is precisely what I was doing a year ago - I feel like a completely different person in so many ways, very much happier, older and wiser than I was in 2007, but history still repeats itself...

Last summer, I went on a weekend in Devon with a group of friends and remember feeling startlingly relieved to return to the varieties of London. And similarly, this weekend just past, I went to stay with a girlfriend in Wiltshire, who is now married with three gorgeous children and three dogs. I had a fantastic time helping out and going for long walks, interspersed with drinking Cava and watching The X Factor, but there was just no denying the breath-taking hit of relief when I boarded the Bakerloo line at Paddington and looked around me at all the different, unfamiliar faces - people from every walk of life, going through every permutation of experience. It is just impossible to feel alone in London. Whatever you're going through - someone else has got it worse, someone else has it better, someone else has been through it before. I never feel isolated here - but the anonymity also allows one to have time to oneself, soul-space to consider and grow. In the countryside, the geographical space is beautiful and wonderful and energising - but the lack of people mean that there is an intense claustrophobia, a blinkeredness that, while it may also exist here in London, is so much more easy to avoid in the Big Smoke. The dream of retiring to the country is popular for many - but I'm a City girl through and through and I'm proud of it.

So I was feeling very odd. But then last night was the start of the new choir term and it was so incredibly lovely to see everyone again that I felt almost emotional. And we sang Christmas music which just filled me with atheistic joy. And then today, I received an email from a prospective suitor, a 46 year old currently living '15 miles north-west of New York' who effectively sent me his CV, including his diet, his exercise regime, his background (where his parents were born and where his mother died) and the fact that he is looking for a permanent relationship. Terrifying. I won't be dating him but it made for interesting reading. I showed Laura his photo, which is admittedly not the most reassuring, and she said:
'Jane, he looks like a serial killer.'
'What does a serial killer look like?!'
'That.'
I had to concede that he had a guilty mouth. Sad really, but what can you do. Thankfully I have also received messages from other young men who sound lovely. And, just in case, I'm keeping schtum about that this time! And then I received a phonecall from Westminster council, admitting that they'd been idiots, and dropping the charges against me for when they towed my car from Soho Square back in May, and so I'm going to be refunded £260. All that and my unbelievable gold dachshund - ah me! All of a sudden, life is good again and I am appreciative.