Reprieve

Tube strike from Tuesday evening through to Friday morning. Water causes natural disasters in areas away from London. The South Downs flooded. A rail line washed away in Dawlish on the south coast of Devon. On Wednesday it rained sideways. Yesterday in the park in the straight downpouring rain, empty of nannies and children, a gardener caught my eye. He said, “‘orrible weather we’re having. ‘orrible.” From under his rain-jacket hood he showed me his crooked teeth. I grinned back agreement, happy that 1) he spoke to me 2) in movie cockney English and 3) that he expressed sentiments I have pushed away all wet week long, for I am the Canadian and am not allowed to be affected by this mild [chill damp] weather. I sauntered on, smiling at pathways narrowed by borders of water.
And today, Friday, a reprieve. The strike is over, the sun comes out. Because I can, because the buses are not overcrowded with displaced tube passengers, I go to the library. Sunny days are so rare that I regret my research.
I have a favourite seat in the upstairs of the number 10 bus, the one with a foot rest. Favoured by others, too, as the window’s smudge of head-level grease shows. As does the food flotsam on the floor. I settle in for the hour-long ride, keeping zipped in the unheated pod rocketing through the city. From up here I can better see the buds on the trees, the Victorian flourishes on buildings, the two-tone brick designs around windows. The traffic chaos of Tottenham Court Road. The empty windows of a building under renovation stalked by a dried-blood red steel frame near Goodge Street Station.
There is a large terrace or court in front of the British library, which I have cursed as the rain swept across it. And the wind. Today it is calm, bright, a place of contemplation away from the traffic on Euston Road.