"Wherever I sat, there I might live." Thoreau

First, this guy:



I saw him one morning while heading to the tube. Slow and steady. Patience. I bet he's very observant.

Today, I went out exploring after work today. For some great reason London wasn't pouring all of its moisture onto its streets when I got off of the tube, so with my pocket atlas and camera in hand, I embarked on a mini adventure.

First off, I don't know how New Cross cosmetologists stay in business, but SOME HOW every other business owner in this area is a barber or a hairstylist. I’m REALLY NOT EXAGGERATING when I say that EVERY two shops is a hair salon. Sometimes there are even two right next to one another and then one right across the street. I'm really not kidding. You think I'm kidding, but I'm really not kidding. SO MANY.

So I walked down Lewisham Way for about a mile and a half. It was just a bunch of shops, a college, buses, and a nice roadside garden at one point. I decided to head back down a different road. I wasn't too impressed by my journey at this time; I was hungry, and it was starting to drizzle. Plus, the area I was in started to look a little sketchy. BUT THEN, then, OUT OF NO WHERE, I see a river and green grass and trees! I found a little oasis in the middle of the cement village of advertisements! It was perfect.


LOOK AT THAT!


IN THE MIDDLE OF THE CITY.


Also,I think I've fallen in love with London's trees. They are so warty and bulbousy and colorful.





character. so much character.

I remember talking about pleasure gardens in my nineteenth century art history class. All these gardens and parks and green spaces were meant to make the person immersed in them feel as though they are in some divine paradise. That's also what William Morris was getting at with all his wallpapers and fabrics. What a great idea.

So, I emerged a much happier camper. Right back into the colorful advertisement clad streets. No but really, I think I like the city life. Especially when I know a tiny paradise get away is only a few blocks away…no matter where I am in the city.

It's also nice not to have any reason to drive. The tubes and buses go everywhere, and if I lived here I'd have bike.

Another great thing that happened to me this week was that I got to go to the printers. So I got to see how large scale textile printing works. Hand printing tables, machine aided hand printing tables, rotary printing machines, and flat beds! OH MY!



Machine-aided hand printing.


Rotary printer


Flatbed.





I met this great great great man named Pudge who told me about some funk and soul music that I haven't had the chance to look up yet, and who told me all about the machine-aided hand printing machines. He also let me run it and do some printing. PLUS I hand screenprinted with him. The screen was huge so it was a two person job where you had to hand the squeegee off to the other person in the middle of the fabric. La;kdsjfwoerivmaerwoijweoijf;alsdkjfsldfj It was lovely. I reallllly want to do more team printing.

Oooohhhhhh what a great great life this is. Thoreau has been telling me some great things as well. Read this sentence and tell me if you don't start drooooling. "I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms…"

Assertive.

Yummm yum yum yummm