I did not post many photos today. Well, I did post a couple from London but then I got sad as we wandered around Stratford-upon-Avon and saw so many things that were not as they should be, in my mind, and now I am going to vent so that I can sleep and try again tomorrow.
We walked down what was one of my favourite streets in this quaint town and I learned that the curmudgeonly used bookseller is gone, the Windmill has been bought out by a crummy franchise and is serving a canned menu that I can find anywhere in England and so I can no longer get that garbanzo bean/beetroot salad that was to die for, and there is a wall up around New Place with all sorts of written promises on said wall that in the Spring of 2016 we will have a new exhibit that will allow us to see Shakespeare the man at home more clearly. Erin is correct in that I should wait and see what they put there, I know she is right in my mind. But my heart is really pissed off. I cannot even put into words what happened to me when I saw that wall around New Place. It is one thing to be filled with rage at that idiot who, back in the day, tore down New Place in hopes of keeping the Shakespeare nuts away (what a twit, fat lot of good that did). It is quite another thing to consider something else aside from a grassy expanse and gardens being in this place. I desperately don't want some glossy building with pieces of what may have been Shakespeare's cannabis pipe in a glass case. So, what do I want? I want New Place to be exactly what it was one my last visit. I want to go to the exact same bench that I sat in before when I had such a powerful meditation. I don't want any change. I am not gonna get what I want and so I am sad and feeling rather quarrelsome.
I am also wondering how Shakespeare would feel if he were in my shoes. He had a rebel side, he took old stories and changed them, radically in some cases. He would probably laugh at me and my angst. But I am not Shakespeare, I am more of a Christopher Wren or a William Blake. I tend towards mysticism and I want or even need to be able to touch and be in and absorb old places. The day began with Eucharist under the dome at St. Paul's and that was glorious. As was visiting the tombs of some of my patron saints, Wren, Blake, and Donne. I suppose I need to end with the some of the words from the man associated with the oldest piece I saw today. After St. Paul's burned down in the Great Fire of 1666 and Christopher Wren began work to replace it with something equally if not more splendid, he sifted through the ashes and the one monument to survive the fire was that of my old friend, poet and Dean of St. Paul's, John Donne. This monument now stands in the south aisle. I suppose that to close and put my quarrelsome self to bed, some of John Donne's words are applicable here I suppose…
"Contemplative and bookish men (and women) must of necessity be more quarrelsome than others, because they contend not about matter of fact, nor can determine their controversies by any certain witnesses, nor judges. But as long as they go towards peace, that is Truth, it is no matter which way."
I am not contending with matters of fact here, I am contending with matters of the heart and soul and so I will say my prayers and work, as dear Mr. Donne suggest, towards peace and truth and try and to keep my eye on the big picture. But for tonight I am sad and I will ask for dreams of New Place just as I remember it.
No comments:
Post a Comment