The two mes that meet briefly on the London Bridge train

Every other week I go back to London to my other life. In this other life I do different things and my friends call me Dom. Or Wooden Toys. I have different debit cards for my other life, I use different phone number, read different newspapers and have my own favorites for breakfast. In fact, it almost feels like there are two ‘me’s’ living this weird parallel life.

(I have one husband though - just to preempt all the helpful comments!)

I am really curious about this moment when the transformation from one 'me' to the other 'me' happens. Wish it was like Alice in Wonderland entering the other side ...

But yesterday, like in any other week, I woke up at 4AM which does not quite sound like a fairy - tale. It’s this time of night that makes me feel like my life is actually the most miserable of all lives I could imagine. I feel sick, like every week, and the smell of the taxi doesn't help. By 5AM I reach the airport, where I head directly to duty free to buy a carton of marlboro red for my friend Marine (I don't do lights, she would scream otherwise). The London-Luton sign on the departures screen always makes me uneasy and at that point of the day I start daydreaming about actually going somewhere nice and hot. Nevertheless  I bravely jump into the always random looking pink aircraft.  A bleak thought crosses my mind around ‘I know these set of stewardesses’, and next thing I know is touching down in London. Which I utterly hate.

Ever since I moved to London (and subsequently moved out) I really disliked landing there. There is something really cold and unpleasant about arriving to London no matter which airport it is (well, not entirely true, London City has pretty spectacular approach, but this fancy experience dates back to my past corporate life so does the outdated frequent flyer card that I still use to avoid the queues ). Arriving in London I feel stressed, in a rush and out of place. Always unfamiliar no matter how familiar this journey is. I want back home.

Usually my morning travel from the airport entails taking a train that goes down to the London Bridge Station and than, after changing, further to New Cross. At this time of the day, the train is full of sleepy commuters that are fully immersed into their own worlds, trying to read their kindles, playing with their smartphones or starring at the undefined point of the train. And I stare at them trying to figure out if I am one of them. Or if I would like to be one of them. Or how I miss not being one of them. By that time I have already drunk the skinny latte from coffee nero which I got at the airport and I might have glimpsed through headlines about new cuts announcements made by George Osborne.

When I reach Farringdon (heart of Clerkenwell where we used to live) life in Warsaw already feels like a deep past. When the train enters the Blackfriars bridge and the amazing view of the City emerges to my left and Southbank to the right I always feel ...‘woooh’ - I can’t resist wanting all this to be mine again. Finally, there there is this last bit, when the train goes along the Southwark, very close to offices and houses that have been set in the old docks and magazines. I love watching the life that goes on inside. People sipping their morning coffees, starring at their monitors, talking on the phone and laughing, smoking cigarettes at the emergency exits. Signs of the yet another morning at work. Signs that life has been happening there with or without me. Only by looking at the Shard building that rises in front of my eyes as the train approach the London Bridge Station, I feel the passage of time. It rises taller every time I come.

And this weird transformation between the two ‘mes' must have be happening on this very train. This mixture of nostalgia and smile to my life there. Because, by the time I reach London Bridge, I feel completely ‘in place’. Back in my London skin. And than the sound of my mobile (UK one) takes me away from my dream- like journey. It’s Aallaa ringing to ask me if I think that turkey for the postponed Thanksgiving dinner should be 12 or 14th kilos.  Nice to be back.

I will miss my London life. And this other ‘me’.

Travelling back in time ....and falling in love with the midnight in paris.

Falling in love with Midnight in Paris is certainly not difficult. It’s quite likely, that I am last one to see the film, but I‘ve fallen in the Allen’s dreaming trap completely and do not want to return from there.

I love the idea of doing a film not about living a dream, but l living in dreams, where the difference between the past and present is just an illusion. While we are getting more and more used to traveling in space, we forget (or, I forget) how amazing it is to travel back in time.

My weekend has been yet again about my travel back into the Jewish warsaw. Listening to the sounds of klezmer music at the Singer festival I was trying later to re - imagine the bustling life of the Jewish Warsaw... Hearing the sounds of the music and watching people dancing at the Pardon to tu vine, vinyl & vintage bar i kept imagining i was hearing the laughs of the people sitting in the coffee bars at Grzybowska in the summer of 38...

Thinking about THAT Warsaw from the 38 that is not only gone, but its life that had been so terribly interrupted, Allen’s film made me smile about the prospect of new possibilities. Because, obviously when you travel back in time ... the past is never really gone and can be easily re- imagined and lived again. His film is immensely seducing way of thinking about the history ... as something that you can cherish and experience all over again again instead of worrying that it’s gone, closed or broken. All you need to do is dream .

And I guess I could easily stay in those sweet dreams, but it’s well after midnight ... and Mondays are those few remaining things that I cannot dream away ... yet :-)

What I am doing if I am not doing what I should be doing. A short guide to the art of wasting time

I am back at school with all the pains and glories of going to school. It means that most of my life I spend in the library, in books, reading and writing and … doing all those other things that keep me wonderfully distracted, completely unfocused and successfully ineffective for the bloody 6 weeks.

Surely there must be really nice ways of spending time nicely, when you are supposed to work and you just do not feel like, like …

… staying all day in bed
… watching all Antonioni collection
… having long sex (with my husband, to be clear!:-)
… reading Three Musketeers all over again
... writing proper letters to old friends

But no. I am not having ANY of those. No of course not. Doh! I am working! My catholic guilt would not allow me to do anything pleasurable, when I have to work. Oh no no no, every distraction is strictly forbidden!

So I write. All day. All night. Almost.

A short guide to the art of wasting time:

1. Start your day with the obligatory walk through facebook, twitter, gmail and pudelek.pl Leave some comments, press some ‘likes’. You see? What a nice productive start of a day. Takes only 20 minutes (Don’t you dare to actually visit proper newspaper websites. You don’t have time for distractions! Already forgot??? )

2. If after first 30 minutes you feel like falling asleep. No! Go for a coffee. Now, that’s called a productive break.

3. Visiting a bathroom is a humanitarian affair. No guilt here. Even if you find yourself breaking a record in ‘brick breaker’ on your mobile every time you visit loo. I’m a new master in brick breaker after having lost my blackberry with the glorious game called ‘word mole’.

4. Time for lunch, right? It’s been a hard day so far. And it’s so cold and gloomy outside. Everyone needs some nice kick at some point! You still worry that it’s only 11.45 am and you only arrived at 11? No worries. Its food for though. Feeds your brain, can only be good!

5. Back from lunch. You deserve a little update. Facebook. Gmail. Twitter. Skype. Found yourself 50 minutes later watching friend of a friend of a friend photos from his brother’s daughter birthday? Well, let's not be obsessive… who counts little distractions?

6. Sleepy again? High time for a nap. Naps in the library are really healthy. They never take more than 45 minutes.

7. Time to call Michal. He’s also studying hard. So no, actually, no worries, it’s not a distraction. Again pretty humanitarian. It’s always useful to discuss what you haven’t done.

8. Cigarette? Ha, you see, I don’t smoke in the library. Earned an extra time for facebook update, right? Or maybe coffee?

9. Ah now you have an idea! There was this really clever guy the other day? Hmmm? Let’s google him …

10. Hmm, library closes in 20 minutes. You’ve been working bloody whole day and you even haven’t start writing! And you didn’t even call your mum! Call your mum. She’ll take pity on you for the whole day of hard work.


See? Now you see I was far too busy to write blog! ☺ Sweet dreams and lovely weekend!