Piccadilly is what I think of as a busy place, a cosmopolitan place, a much visited, envied, bragged about place. As a foreigner, that is: very braggable indeed! Clapham Junction is the place every train goes to - or so it seems, and busy also, but more business-like, more serious. Grungy, a little worn, uninspiring some would say. So, that's settled.
But why am I talking about the south? Because in the north there is no such thing as those two places. Up north, it is even no longer grim, but rather pleasant, rather restful and very beautiful. And yet we can bring the world to our door without any problem. Well, I have heard friends being self-righteous about not going anywhere near facebook, or webpages, or blogs, or anything that might endanger their privacy, or indeed lead them to giving anything away. I feel otherwise. I feel smug about my blog, my webpage, my facebook, my twitter...I think it is interesting knowing what others are up to, what they are passionate about, whether their children smear marmite on their faces...well, perhaps not that. I differentiate between the intimate secret things, like how badly I cooked that fish last night and the really quite irrelevantly funny and quirky, stuff you can tell everyone, such as that someone has been intimidating, humiliating or otherwise terrorising me... So, yes, this is about the confusion in my head and it comes from my usual joke, that my blog is the most private place on earth because no one visits it - surely?! It is laughable that it was only yesterday evening, in a moment of quiet mindlessness that I started to navigate my website's buttons and discovered one, enticingly named site stats. Right: how many hours have I spent on this? How many months and years have I had a blog? How many more bites have I got left before I have to fork out some money? Not at all: I was stunned to realise that it shows how many people visit and even more stunned to realise that quite a few do, actually! And there I was, thinking I was standing in a busy place - Piccadilly, say - and no one knew I was even there, only to discover that I have been visited quietly and softly by so many complete strangers. Because remember? My friends don't do this, or so they say! Standing in Trafalgar Square some months ago with a friend, I realised that all the people there were intent on their own purposes. We were talking to each other and planning the next move; They were getting to the museums or restaurants, or looking around for friends. Some were resting. Very few were looking at the facades, the fountains, the statues or even the 4th plinth. So a blog is not at all like that, not a passing through or resting place. It is a destination. What a thing to learn! Which makes me nervous because it seems I may have to change my ways and actually write something that has meaning and point, as well as being correctly spelt. I am scaring myself now. But I needn't be, because at heart I believe in a benign world and so I will probably continue to pour out my musings in the knowledge that all are invited but none forced to come. Come sit here a while and enjoy the quiet, scented morning; We are not expecting crowds, but we like the company. And yes, it is turning a little chillier... and soon we can go ice-fishing.
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