Returning to London and playing the safety game

I'm back in London rather unexpectedly. I wasn't supposed to be here until Friday but then weather warnings sent the world (England) into a frenzied hysteria and I decided to travel up early to play it safe. This may have been a little bit over cautious (and that might have been a tiny understatement) but I blame Sian for this entirely because I hadn't even considered coming up that early, but once she'd suggested it, I couldn't not - because if I didn't and then I couldn't but I could have prevented it by coming up earlier then it'd be all my fault...or something like that.

(I know I sound like a lunatic but England does not handle snow well. It kinda goes into a blind panic. Of course I don't expect us to have battalions of snow ploughs and mountains of salt and grit to hand, like they do in Boston - since our weather's usual M.O. is drizzle, it's not really necessary. But, you would think that a couple of cms of snow wouldn't result in total apocalyptic chaos, wouldn't you? You would be wrong.)

I am the Queen of playing it safe. Except where my heart is concerned and there I let loose with reckless abandon. But in all other areas I take the safe option. I've often ended up waiting at the airport for 5+ hours after all the catastrophes I'd envisaged stopping me from getting there failed to occur. I sleep on couches rather than navigate my tipsy way home alone at night. I drink lattes (skinny ones) 'cause I can't handle espresso. I sit in the last carriage of the tube 'cause by my thinking it's the least likely one to be bombed (I once got off a tube and onto the next because the man opposite looked very nervous and had lots of wires in his bag). I hold tight onto handrails and don't go near edges. I'm not so good at road-crossing, but that's more me being oblivious than risk taking.

I figured coming back to London would feel exactly the same as it always did, that I would feel like the reluctant Londoner I always have. It didn't and I don't. Maybe it's the Dibley Quiet working its magic in my soul or maybe it's that with my 10 days of lie-ins and unemployment I've successfully shrugged off the obligatory London mentality of speed and hassle and suppressed rage. Either way I am free of the shackles of stress and now serenely stroll my sibilant way wherever I happen to be going. I'm the bane of Londoners lives and I care not.

So, here I am, back on Sian and Marc's couch. Everything the same except it's different. And it is snowing, but not enough to prevent them from trudging to work today (I felt so guilty and smug staying in bed while they had to go out to work). And as it has 4 whole days to sort itself out, I kinda think I may have taken the whole safe option thing a teensy bit too far. But if I can break out of the London shackles, maybe I can break free of 'what-iffing' my way through life. We'll see. For now, I have a whole series of Mad Men to watch so this 'better safe than sorry' scenario isn't the end of the world.