Building a Mystery

It started as an idea for an unusual Christmas gift -- a playing-card caddy bought at the Princess Alice Hospice charity shop.

The decorations on the box looked like something John's mother would like, so I took it down from the shelf thinking it could be part of her Christmas gift, since she loves playing cards.

A few aspects of this purchase begged to be investigated:

1) I had hopes that the cards were vintage.The Missions to Seamen is is still around. Since 2000, it's been called The Missions to Seafarers. The name Britannia Airways was used from 1961 to 1995, so the cards date from then. No way of knowing yet if it's nearer to 1961 or 1995. But maybe, I thought, the next piece of the puzzle would give me a clue.

2) When I tipped the cards out of the box, I found this clipping:

Now I was on to something. Could this box have been owned by Laura Francatelli's nephew? Maybe he even received it from her estate. Was I holding an object that was within two degrees of separation from Titanic history?

The auction, which took place in 2007, also included a letter Laura wrote shortly after the disaster, and her affidavit from the subsequent legal inquiry. The life jacket was signed by people aboard that last lifeboat she shared with, among other people, Lady Duff-Gordon and Sir Cosmo Duff-Gordon.

None of this, of course, proves that the box belonged to Laura's nephew. None of the sources I found mentioned the nephew's name, much less where he lived and if and when he died. No clue then, if the box may have been from his estate.

3) The bottom of the box has this tag affixed to it:

Do the numbers indicate the year it was made, or is it just the number of the box? What about the company Persian Crafts? Were they importers, located in the UK, or did the owner pick this up on his or her travels? Is the company still around? Google remains silent on the topic.

If anyone reading this has any ideas about this -- or any other part of this mystery -- please share.

Leave the Light On

From the first time I heard it, the song "Leave the Light On" by Chris Smither was one of those that breaks your heart a little every time you listen to it. You know, in a good way.

For me, the lyrics are about being caught up in our lives, in the midst of events large and small that we know are happening but that we forget to notice until they've passed. It reminds me of risks ventured, life gained.

The other day I was listening to the song after a few months of not playing it, and it didn't break my heart, not even a little. I started thinking about why.

Maybe because I am caught up in events large and small that I can't help but notice. A new job and a new house, new roads in a new country. Choosing what I will try to understand and leaving behind those things that aren't, for now, important enough to figure out.

Or maybe it's to do with the risk finally ventured, gain unknown.

I don't actually have an answer, and I think it may be one of those things that, for now, I'll put off understanding.

Waiting for George

Since I moved to England, many people jokingly ask, "So have you seen the queen?" I can now answer "yes" to that question. It's important to note that "seen" can be defined in a few ways. It could mean that I was invited to a reception where the queen was in attendance. It could mean that I was part of a crowd lining the streets to view the royal wave.

It was neither of those.

We recently hosted our first visitors from the U.S., which gave us a chance to visit London together for the first time since we moved here. While walking from Buckingham Palace to the Houses of Parliament, John noticed the blue lights of a police escort and said, "someone's coming around this corner." Behind two police motorcycles, and in front of another police car was a nondescript black auto that was not a Bentley. We glimpsed the profile of a woman wearing a yellow hat and dress and we said, "hey, that's the queen!" Then she was gone.

We hoped for a brush with royalty of a different kind later as we walked through Leicester Square. Spying a red carpet, and having heard that morning on the radio that George Clooney would be in town for the BFI film festival, I assumed the best. Seeing George Clooney after glimpsing the queen would make for a pretty good day. I approached a couple that waited with the gathering crowd -- still only two deep -- and asked, "Who's everyone waiting for?" They both shrugged, said "I don't know," and laughed.The next person I asked also didn't know.

Still, they waited.

We were encouraged by the fact that the marquee over the cinema showed that "Real Steel" was playing so maybe, we thought, it was Hugh Jackman. Finally we found someone who knew the person he was waiting for. Roughly 2.5 hours from then, Michael Fassbender was expected. And well, he certainly looks nice, but not worth standing on the pavement in the cold for more than two hours. For that matter, is George Clooney?

Ghost Rider in the Traffic Jam

A busy few weeks: Moved into a rental house, started a job, got a new car, worked at a trade show in London, and caught a cold.

We bought a car just before I started working, so for my first week's commute to work, I had to drive a rental, specifically a Kia Picanto. With a robust 1.1-litre engine, she really set the motorway on fire with her 60 mph of pure putt-putt.

Not that I could go the 70 mph speed limit, what with the traffic. I should say here that the commute isn't nearly as bad as I feared, but my first night coming home, there was an accident that closed the motorway just after my exit. It took me an hour and 45 minutes to get home; it usually takes somewhere around an hour -- maybe 10 minutes either side. One guy at work who lives not far from me said that one time he left work at 5:00 and got home at 10:30. I'm thinking I need to put together an M25 survival kit: pull-tab cans of beans, cereal bars, a blanket, water, an emergency pee container. Other ideas are welcome.

My new car is a Toyta Yaris diesel automatic. Now that I have an automatic, I'm very happy that all I have to think about is where I am on the road. Driving on the left is the easy part. The hard part? The roads are narrower, there's no such thing as a straight line, and there's a roundabout, like, every 100 feet. (No, not really, but on any given trip you can pretty much count on hearing "drive .8 miles then enter roundabout" coming out of the GPS speaker several times.)

After much consideration, I've named the new car 'Ghost Rider'. While not a motorcycle, I still hold out hope that the Yaris will one day have the ability to "travel between interdimensional realms and along any surface".

Ghost Rider and The Tangerine Dream.

Time Enough

I always got a chuckle out of what seemed like the national 'aversion to convenience' of the English. Things like mixing your own windscreen washer fluid from concentrate, instead of picking it up in a big jug in which it's already mixed. Or being able to buy ibuprofen only in packets of 16 instead of 150-pill bottles, or finding ways to dry your laundry on a rainy day when the clothesline isn't an option.

Look at toilet paper. In the States, we would buy it in packs of 48 rolls -- sometimes two at a time -- and keep the extra on a shelf in our basement. This was very convenient; we never ran out of toilet paper. At our local Waitrose, the largest package contains nine rolls. This is probably a good thing, since we have no basement, and our garage and third bedroom are currently filled with all of the stuff we brought with us and have no room for in a house that's half the size of what we had in Massachusetts. We need to become better at planning for our toilet paper needs.

In another example, drying laundry on a line should be done whenever possible. In my world that means on sunny days, or perhaps overcast and breezy. But this is England, where winters are cold, dark, and wet -- perfect for using a clothes dryer. The problem: they require space, and in a house where under-counter kitchen appliances consist of separate refrigerator and freezer, and a washing machine, there's no room. We have a condenser dryer, which is keeping our boxes of books company in the third bedroom. But even where people have dryers, the cost of electricity can make them expensive to run.

Things take time: mixing the fluid, making another trip to the store, hanging laundry, setting up and using the drying rack. It's worth reminding ourselves that for many reasons time is not, in fact, money. Nor does it free up cupboard space to stock up on food, water, and medicines in case of blizzard, epidemic, or zombies outside your door.

London's Motorway

The Tangerine Dream

It's going to be mine now, the orange Skoda Fabia we call The Tangerine Dream. Starting in a few weeks, I'll be using it to commute to my new job.

I thought my first job here might have me commuting by public transport to Central London. Now, in place of commentary on the state of the National Rail and sketches of colorful characters who ride the train, my commuting stories will be about the traffic jams encountered between Junctions 10 and 16 on the M25 to Uxbridge. I'll try to make it seem interesting.

The M25 is the 117-mile London orbital road known around here as 'the world's biggest car park'. In length, it's sort of the Capital Beltway half as much again, or Route 128 times two. For traffic jams, it may be times ten. A couple of weeks ago, traffic was backed up for 28 miles and parts of the road were closed for 24 hours. I've read that sitting in traffic on the M25 inspired Chris Rea to write 'The Road to Hell':

On your journey 'cross the wilderness
From the desert to the well
You have strayed upon the motorway to Hell

I think it's probably a metaphor.

Some of London Is Burning

Thanks to all of our stateside friends who have inquired about our well-being in light of the riots in the UK. We are about 30 miles out of London, in the country, and so haven't seen any of it.

I was thinking it's probably a good thing I haven't found that perfect job in London yet. Then again, this morning I was speaking with a friend who works in London and she has gone into work every day this week without a problem. Yesterday they were told to leave early, and that's when she got angry. Not so much for herself as for all of the people whose lives have been disrupted and livelihoods ruined.

I haven't been here very long, and so I won't start delivering my opinion based on my five weeks of being a permanent resident temporarily living in a West Sussex hamlet. Maybe when we move closer to London at the end of the month, I'll start to be able to form an articulate sentence about the culture.

I will offer one piece of advice to my American friends and family: Don't read only the US press. Don't follow only Fox, or only Salon, or only anything. Here are some links to UK news sites:

www.bbc.co.uk/news
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/

The Ties That Bind

I've written before about discarding those things which no longer have any meaning to us, if they ever truly did. But before we left the States, we also let go of things that we used, things we loved, things we would have kept if we only felt we could. Things like: 

• Our cars, especially our Mazda MX-5 (Miata). Two-year-old 'Red Sonja' replaced the 1997 model John bought used just a month after we started dating. That's 13 years of top-down driving along winding country roads in New England. In theory, we could have shipped it, but fortunately there are plenty of MX-5s in the UK, and the roads are narrower and twistier (or 'naggery', as one pub denizen described them).
  

  

  With 'Red Sonja'

  
• Our living room set. Almost as young as Red Sonja, and just about as big. We feared our America-sized furniture wouldn't fit into England-sized doors or living rooms. This fear was confirmed when friends told us they had to remove a window to get their American couch into their English house.
• Several hundred books. Maybe we would have reread them all, if we won the lottery and quit our jobs and spent our days reading. As it was, our shelves had become sort of monuments to books we've read. There will be no room in our house for monuments.

Those of our belongings we did ship made it through UK customs this week and are now in temporary storage. Just a few short weeks and we'll all be reunited at the house we will be renting. As we unpack, maybe we'll think, "Why did we keep this?" Or, "We have no room for this".

And then we'll start letting go all over again.

Bells on Their Knees

Last night the morris dancers showed up.

Bad Habits

Nothing like a driving lesson to make you feel 16 again. The feeling that you know everything only to find out you don't, but if you act cool maybe no one will figure it out.

Roundabouts? Pfft. I've done those. Here, though, everyone mostly knows and follows the rules. According to my instructor, I should trust that the drivers waiting to enter the roundabout won't dash in front of me and the people in the "straight ahead only" lane won't turn right. Please. I spent the last 15 years driving in Massachusetts. I trust no one.

Mistrust isn't the only habit I have to break. I now have to: check my mirrors before I signal; never, ever steer hand over hand; and give way more than I stop.

To get my driving licence I also need to learn about zebra crossings, pelican crossings, toucan crossings, and puffin crossings. It's important to note that these are for pedestrians, not animals. There are also equestrian crossings which actually are for animals, albeit those being ridden by people.

I can drive for 12 months on my Mass.licence. In that time, I'll take a theory test and a road test. Then I'll probably forget everything I've learned and develop new bad habits.

It's nice to have goals.

The Long and Winding Road

This morning I received my National Insurance number, nine weeks from the day I electronically submitted my settlement application to the UK Border Agency's New York office.

This doesn't sound like a very long time.

It seemed interminable.

I'm the kind of person who has to act Immediately! and In Great Detail! when there's an inkling of a project where Anything Can Go Wrong at Any Time. In March -- before we even knew John had a job -- I visited the UK Border Agency website to start my detailed plan and outline a contingency plan or two. Three weeks later, I was more confused than when I started. What did I have to do when? What sort of visa could I apply for?

I did learn one thing: I could apply for UK settlement, instead of a spousal visa. This required taking -- and passing -- the Life in the UK test before submitting an application. The test can only be taken inside the UK. We had already planned a vacation for May, so while there we traveled from country idyll to city neighborhood so I could take -- and pass -- the test.

After we returned from vacation, we spent many hours over several nights preparing the application packet which would prove that we have been married and living together for at least four years; demonstrate that my sponsor (John) was willing and able support me without recourse to public funds; show that we had a place to stay in the UK; document my employment; list my previous trips to the UK. That's about 500 pages worth of proof. I also went to a professional photographer to have a picture taken that met the specifications, and had my biometric information taken at a US visa services center.

Much like the US, immigration in the UK is a complicated and controversial topic, full of sad stories like this one. It's an intimidating and expensive process to undertake. As difficult and stressful as this was for me, I can't imagine what it must be like for people with little education and little English, desperate for a better life.

Not Like the Other

In the U.S., we all know that U.K. electrics are 240 volt, instead of 120 volt. We also know that people in the U.K. drive on the left side of the road and the right side of the car. (I've driven about a mile and already had some close calls with curbs, car mirrors and trash bins.)

I expected that. But there are other, more subtle differences I didn't expect. I realize now there's much I never took note of, even after visting regularly over the last 12 years.

A few of the things I noticed this week:

• On light switches, down is on and up is off.
• Non-automatic doors on shops and office buildings open in, not out. When I go into a store I wonder: What if there's a fire and everyone needs to get out at the same time? Do we all hold it open for the person behind us as we file out and politely thank the person in front of us even as we feel the flames licking the backs of our necks?
• In any building, enter on the ground floor and walk up one flight to get to the first floor.
• Some people use their middle fingers to point, whether at something in the distance or a spot on a map. When this happens I try not to flash back to driving in Boston.
• I need to figure out how to collapse the ironing board and open and close the clothesline.

As tourists, I've always thought that most of us don't begin to really see the place we're in until we're leaving it. As a newly arrived expat, I'm beginning to understand the difference.

 

Hanging the laundry on a breezy day. This clothesline is collapsible.
I still haven't figured out how to do it.

 

Diary of a Reluctant Housewife

Yesterday morning we landed in London and immediately took part in the great British pastime of queuing up: first at passport control, where lines were long due to a border agents' strike; next at the car rental counter, where we waited 45 minutes for our car; and finally on the M25, in a six-mile backup caused by an accident. Four hours after we landed, we arrived at John's mother's house. The rest of the day is a jet-lagged blur, but there was a pub involved.

Today we went to the bank, where I learned I have no history. In fact, as far as Lloyd's bank knows or cares, I'm a housewife with no credit rating or past employment. I should have suspected something when the car insurance companies said that once I get my UK licence, I'll be a new driver.

So I'll tag along on John's new credit card, and he'll be the primary owner of our first and second cars. There was some question about whether or not we could open a joint account, since I might bring down the credit rating of my 53-year-old husband, who -- as far as Lloyd's bank knows or cares -- lives with his mom.

Today's lesson: I really need to get a job.

The Things We Keep

After John was laid off in February -- with a few months' severance and an employed wife -- he wasn't in a hurry to find a job. Instead he made some travel plans, with the first stop in the U.K. in March. Where he got a job.

About two months; one "Life in the UK" test; $1,500; and 1,000 sheets of paper later, I became a "settled person."

Since we first knew we would be moving, we've spent many hours going through our stuff -- selling it, giving it away, throwing it out. We've gotten rid of empty boxes, thingies, whatsits, dental impressions, aspirin that expired in 2002. Posters never hung on walls, ship models never put in bottles, vases never filled with roses.

Then there's the scrapbook I started when I was 13, before scrapbook was a verb. The Christmas cards from the friends I no longer know. The books read by the person I no longer am. The sea glass collected before a different 3,000-mile journey. One that was west, not east; when I was bereft of  options, not flush with anticipation.

In less than two weeks, I won't have a job, or the driving licence I need, or a clue about the correct way to spell or pronounce actual English words. And I'm looking forward to it.

Sweet Beginnings

This week I received permission to settle in the U.K. This means I can do work of any kind for any employer, start my own business, or not work at all (fat chance). It also means that I don't have to reapply for permanent status after two years on a spousal visa.

One of the first things I'd like to try to do after we sort of settle in will be to create a strawberry-rhubarb something-or-other. Probably squares, because pies are hard. And I am no baker.

I mentioned the combo to the in-laws on our last trip -- and they hadn't tried it. They do rhubarb, they do strawberry, but not the two together.

So if anyone is reading this: Do you have any simple strawberry-rhubarb recipes that I can try out?