Hometime

I was briefly back in the UK last Sunday, meeting with the project organisers who are commissioning me to do some writing on psychosis. Nothing like a late night flight into Stanstead to make you feel psychotic, it really did the trick in terms of stoking my creative engines. My passport is almost out of date, so the photo is ten years old. I got a very searching look at border control, and had to produce additional proof of identity. It's true, beard growth corresponds to terrorist tendencies.

Being back in London is an increasingly odd experience. Stuff carries on changing after you leave, of course, so new buildings mushroom up from concrete sites and shops get replaced with new shops selling the same thing in different colours. This is usual and to be expected, if jarring all the same. What makes it even odder is when I find myself speaking instinctive Swedish to the people I bump into on the tube.

"Are you queueing for the ticket machine?" asked someone.

-Nej nej nej, I reassured her hurriedly. It sounds pretty medieval to the modern Brit (not that she was one, I think she was an Italian tourist). Coincidentally I'm trying to learn how to pronounce Anglo-Saxon at the moment for a voice over job. Anglo-Saxon isn't totally dissimilar to Modern Swedish, it turns out, same Germanic roots. My Swedish probably sounds a bit medieval at the moment too. If this was one and a half thousand years ago, I'd probably fit right in. Or be executed in both countries as a spy. Either works.

Even weirder is that V has recently started apologising in English to her collidees in the street. And in the proper London idiom, too, a startled 'Sorry' without eye contact before briskly moving away so they can't hear you muttering how it was their fault anyway. She's very annoyed about this, she doesn't want to have English mannerisms. They don't come across well in Swedish, apparently. Her employees asked her to stop being so polite when making stage calls the other week. It seems 'Can Mr. So-and-so come to the stage please, thank-you!' can make you sound patronising, i.e. English, and is to be avoided.

The worst thing about the visit was just how much of a wrench it was being away from F. I'm pathetic. Two hours and I was already in emotional turmoil. What if she walks when I'm gone? Or what if she misses me so much she's upset? Or what if there's, I don't know, a landmine! Sweden is very prone to landmines! I must go home at once. 

F did notice I was gone, long enough to look round and ask 'ba pa?' of V once. That was as missed as I got, which is A Good Thing (if somewhat wounding to my pride). She was asleep by the time I got home, so I had to stay awake until three o' clock in order to pick her up, smell her hair and reset my spiralling blood pressure. Keswick is going to be a sore test, I fear.

In Other News

- V took F to the baby group last week. She knew about the same number of children's songs as I did, which was immensely comforting. To me, at least. Not her.

- Spoon Progress: on being offered a filled spoon, F will take it in both hands and stick it firmly into her mouth, then turn it upside down so she can lick it clean. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. It already has porridge on it.