Commuter's Tales - A Breakfast Odyssey

I have been commuting to my new job now for a month.  People keep telling me that I am mad, but I actually like commuting!  Except when there is a traffic jam; or if someone has the temerity to sit next to me - the nerve!

To minimise the chance of both, I have been experimenting with which bus to take.  The earlier I go the smaller the chance of traffic jams, so I like to take a bus before 06:00.  If I skip breakfast at home I can be ready in half an hour and take an early bus, and once in London indulge in one of my favourite past times - a nice long cooked breakfast with the newspapers!  Jam is so much better on hot buttered toast than on the motorway .....

You would have thought that early buses would attract fewer passengers than later buses, but that isn't necessarily the case - if I take the one that leaves 20 minutes before my regular bus, it is actually fuller than my regular one.  Once I seriously pushed the boat out and took the 04:30 one - superfast journey and half-empty bus, but what was I supposed to be doing in London at 05:45?

The trouble is that I can't start working before 08:00, and most breakfast joints don't open until 07:00 - the day I took the 04:30 I walked across London for an hour, to fill in the time between the arrival of my bus and the opening times of breakfast places, but it was a cold morning and I was tired and it wasn't as good an experience as I had imagined.  So I decided to stick to my regular bus, which regurgitates me at Marble Arch shortly before 7, give or take a few minutes.

The first breakfast place I patronised was Bill's, ten minutes away from my work.  Great breakfast food, free newspapers, and good service - but freezing cold!  I went four days in a row, and every time I was told by the staff firstly that 'it wasn't that cold!' and secondly that 'it was just that day - usually it is much warmer!'  I gave them up as a bad bet - having breakfast huddled under my shawl for warmth isn't a good start to the day.

Next I moved on to the Holborn Dining Room.  It is attached to a hotel, and has very innovative breakfast dishes, which are sometimes better and sometimes different than expected.  They also have free newspapers, and extremely friendly staff.  But they are expensive, especially considering the portion sizes, and ambitious - they plan to fill their restaurant with customers to the brim asap.  These are serious drawbacks.  If they have too many customers there won't be enough newspapers to go around and service will deteriorate, and since breakfast is the main meal of my day small portions are a big No No.  Update 18/05/15  I have started to frequent the place again, having ascertained that there is a cheap option available: toast and jam, which, together with coffee, can be had for £6.75!  Very nice bread, and jam which looks and tastes home made.  Also, I noticed that they increased the number of newspapers in proportion to their number of customers.  So, all in all, a winner!

Paul's Boulangerie, just down the road, is very nice, of course, but their breakfast dishes are extremely limited.  Also they have no free newspapers, and the staff consider early sit-down customers as nuisances and treat them rather badly - not what I need to start my day.  I tried them twice, and then left to explore other options.

After intensive Googling I chanced upon Beppe's at 23 West Smithfields.  It is an old-fashioned  Italian family run place, with huge portions and low prices, and a varied and friendly clientele.  Officially they open at 07:00, but if one shows early it is not a problem.  I went there several times, but had to abandon it, too.  Firstly, no newspapers and it is rather cold at that time in the morning.  Secondly, it takes me ten minutes to walk there, and fifteen to walk from there to work, so getting there and back takes half an hour out of my morning.  Which is fine if I take the earlier bus - but that bus is overcrowded and people try to sit next to me!  Also I have to get up 20 minutes earlier.

http://www.localdatasearch.com/london/the_city/cafe_tearoom/beppes_cafe-10022419

Being thus betwixt and between and at a loss for what to do for breakfast, I noticed, well concealed behind scaffolding, a breakfast venue I had not hitherto considered, just a few meters from my arrival bus stop - Lanes at the Marriott Hotel.

Now I have rather fond memories of the Portland Marriott hotel, but this particular one was in my bad books.  About a decade ago I once went there in the morning before meeting friends for a Christmas dinner.  To transport the presents, which were fragile, I had put them into a wicker basket.  And I wore tweeds.  And when I went to the restaurant in search of food, the serving staff asked me pointedly whether I had ever eaten in a hotel before?  Did I realise they cost more than McDonalds?  They must have thought I was a country bumpkin on a day out in London, blinded by the big lights and foolish enough to venture into a real hotel.  Darn cheek!

Well, this time I wasn't going to take any funny stuff from them!  I looked around the place imperiously and demanded a table and newspaper in my best genteel commando voice!  I needn't have bothered.  The place was empty, except for a very solicitous Polish waitress who pampered me to within an inch of my life and more than made up for my earlier bad experience.  So, I think I may have at last found the perfect breakfast venue - on the way to the Underground station, so no time loss; free newspapers - they even have the International New York Times! very nice food - I had the English breakfast and could barely finish it; and OK prices - not cheap, but given the portion sizes acceptable.

Update 18/05/15  I had to drop this breakfast venue, sadly, after having been treated with less respect than I expect.  Six times I was forbidden to sit at my accustomed table, because someone staying in the hotel had reserved it.  Which would have been OK if they had showed up!  But having to sit on a sub-standard table, huddled in the draft, trying to both read the paper and have breakfast on a small table, while one's favourite seat remains empty a few meters away, is not a good way to start the day.  I know when I am not loved!  For three months I had breakfast there every day, but they would not reserve the table for me, just for others.  And I had planned to go there every day until I retire in ten years time ....

True love is not for cowards!

For a long time I have wanted to review the book ‘Can Love last?  The fate of romance over time’ by Stephen A Mitchell, an American psychoanalytic theorist.  It is the best book on the subject I have ever read, and one that made immediate sense to me.

The basic premise of the book is, that romance doesn’t die of its own accord when faced with the realities of life as a couple, but rather that it is willfully destroyed, because one or both of the lovers can’t cope with the disturbing intensity of true romance over an extended period of time.

I think this disturbing quality of romantic passion is also the reason why parents have always been so keen to get their children married to a safe partner, preferably of their own choosing; as most romances depicted in literature and film show, love is extremely disruptive and inconvenient to society.

People in love are notoriously irresponsible, selfish, and unreliable, which is why they are bad employees, undutiful children, and irritating parents.  But people in love are also, equally notoriously, gloriously alive and deliriously happy, which is why we all envy people in love and like to be around them. 

People commonly try to reconcile their desire for romance with their need for a stable lifestyle by watching romantic movies and reading sentimental novels, and then go back to their prosaic lives, not entirely satisfied but content for the time being.  Every now and then they rebel against their passionless existence with a fling or by finding a new partner, but as soon as the dust has settled they will again try to choke all passion out of their new relationship, and repeat the cycle of passion/settling down/boredom/separation.

This attitude is of course not confined to love, but often applied to all aspects of life.  We do what we can to make life as safe as possible, and when we have achieved this goal we rebel and do something dangerous and exciting and, usually, incredibly stupid. 

I have always felt this rather unfortunate.  My approach to life is, by all means make it as safe as possible, but realise that much of the joy of life lies in the thrill and excitement of entering new and frightening territory.  I love to go out there and have adventures, but always make sure I am well prepared, figuratively speaking, with a knapsack full of food, warm clothes, a good map, a rope just in case, and a mobile telephone for emergencies.  To live life to the full, sometimes you have to throw it into the air and see where it lands - but make sure you don't throw it anywhere near a really dangerous place, like a desert or ocean!

This goes for romantic love, too.  There are no certainties, no guarantees of a happy ending.  But if one is well prepared, and judiciously plans ahead, one needn’t settle for the safe predictability of the devoted boy next door, but can venture out and search for the true love of one’s life. 

But be warned – true love isn’t for cowards, nor for starry eyed optimists.  If you want it to last, you need to have the sharp eyes of a sniper, the cunning of a politician, the patience of Jacob, and the fortitude of Job – paradoxically, that is the only way you can experience and safeguard the innocent joyous delight of true love, the joy that was yours when you were a child, before the cruel reality of the world intruded and crushed your happy optimism and belief in the goodness of life.

Illustrations, are, as usual, via an Hermes scarf.  This one is called Amour and is by Annie Faivre.  It is a jacquard – notice the bees that are woven into the fabric?  In case you notice the difference in colours, these are actually photos of two scarves – same design, different colour-ways.

Happy post St Valentine’s Day!  (sorry I am a bit late)

I cannot recommend the book ‘Can Love last?  The fate of romance over time’ by Stephen A Mitchell enough, and paste below, after the photos, a selection of quotes, as a taster.

Authentic romance is hard to find and even harder to maintain.  It easily degrades into something else, much less captivating, much less enlivening, such as sober respect or purely sexual diversion, predictable companionship, or hatred, guilt, and self-pity. (p 27)

We will find again and again that it is not that romance itself has a tendency to become degraded, but that we expend considerable effort degrading it.  And we are interested in degrading it for very good reasons. (p 28)

The need for a wholly secure attachment is powerful for both children and adults.      When patients complain of dead and lifeless marriages, it is often possible to show them how precious the deadness is to them, how carefully maintained and insisted upon, how the very mechanical, predictable quality of lovemaking serves as a bulwark against the dread of surprise and unpredictability.  Love, by its very nature, is not secure; we keep wanting to make it so.  (p49)

The unconscious contract that parallels many legal marriage contracts is the agreement to pretend to be permanently, unalterably, impossibly bound – an agreement that creates the necessity for a carefully guarded, perpetually measured distance.  Jacques Lacan captured vividly the mirage of degraded romance in the service of illusory security:  ‘Love is giving something you don’t have to someone you don’t know.’  (p50)

It is common for couples with a vibrant sex life to fear marriage.  Before marriage couples often experience themselves as free, childlike, adventurous, and spontaneous.  In marriage, they seek stability and permanence.  They identify themselves as ‘adults’ now, in a static institution.  And they attribute the deadening that comes with stasis to the institution of marriage, rather than their own conflictual longings for certainty and permanence.  Total safety, predictability, and oneness, permanently established, quickly becomes stultifying.  (p50/1)

Nietzsche suggested that our lives are transitory and illusory.  We can attribute to ourselves and out productions an illusory permanence, like a deluded builder of sandcastles who believes his creation is eternal.  Or we can be defeated by our transience, unable to build, paralysed as we wait for the tide to come in.  Nietzsche envisions the tragic man or woman, living life to the fullest, as one who builds sandcastles passionately, all the time aware of the coming tide.  (p55)

The lover builds the castles of romance as if they would last forever, knowing full well they are fragile, transitory structures.  Those boring, sturdy stone castles over there will last forever. (p55)

Romantic passion requires a surrender a surrender to a depth of feeling that should come with guarantees.  Unfortunately there are no guarantees.  Life and love are inevitably difficult and risky, and to control the risk we all struggle to locate and protect sources for both safety and adventure.  (p55)

What is alluring in the other may be the opportunity of making contact, at a safe distance, with the parts of ourselves we have suppressed.  (p82)

The great irony of many relationships is that the quality for which we chose a person is often just a psychic defence against its opposite quality.  Eg, the partner selected for his seemingly impressive stability may have adopted this behaviour trait as a defence against a terrible internal chaos.  Or a woman selected for her liveliness may be covering up an underlying depression.  (p83)

[I note, in my experience, people who genuinely possess a certain characteristic often seem to have it to a lesser extent than others who only pretends to have it.  This is because when you genuinely are something, you don’t need to constantly project this, but if you are only pretending to be something you must project this permanently, and to a high level.  For example, a transvestite who pretends to be a woman will usually exhibit more of the ‘markers of femininity’ – make-up, skirt, large bosom (fake), long hair, etc., than a real woman who feels no need to prove her womanhood.

Similarly, many a woman looking for a ‘strong man’ to protect her will fall for a guy who only pretends to be strong because of an insecurity he is secretly ashamed of, rather than for a genuinely strong man who doesn’t feel the need to prove his masculinity all the time.]

Erotic passion destabilises one’s sense of self.  When we find someone intensely arousing who makes possible unfamiliar experiences of ourselves and an otherness we find captivating, we are drawn into the disorientating loopiness of self/other.  We tend to want to control these experiences and the ones who inspire them.  Thus emotional connection tends to degrade into strategies for false security that suffocate desire.  And sexual excitement tends to degrade into those elements common to all perversions – collapsed expectations and omnipotence, which obliterate possibilities for love. Sustaining the unstable tension of romance and regaining romantic states over time in the same relationship require a struggle to resist those inevitable efforts to control unsettling experiences.  (p92)

Romance in relationships is not cultivated through a resolution of tensions.  Instead it requires two people who are fascinated by the ways in which, individually and together, they generate forms of life they hope they can count on.  It entails a tolerance of the fragility of those hopes, woven together of realities and fantasies, and an appreciation of the ways in which, in the rich density of contemporary life, realities often become fantasy and fantasies often become realities.  (p201)