How is it that life can come at you full frontal in one concentrated 1/2 hour?...
....slipping into the cool calm waters of Kenwood Ladies Pond was transformational yesterday.
Copper oak leaves and sulphorous willow carpeted the surface, parting as I passed and reforming behind me.
The setting sun cut through the trees to illuminate the water in shafts; my skin shining golden as I sculled around with the moorhens, customary silly grin on my face.
But where were my waterblogged sisters with their much needed good sense to tell me to get out of the water? I slipped into my usual lone swimming trance and just couldn't be sensible enough to get out...but hey! I'd come all the way from Lincolnshire, sneaked out of an accounts review meeting in town, trekked across London by tube, Hampstead Heath the wrong way in the wrong shoes....I was DETERMINED to get this sublime swim into my day!
I still have the silly grin on my face, scaring the regular East Coast commuters. Hey ho, back to the fens country girl, your city adventure is over for another day, your life a little enriched.
Postcript thanks to all the lovely Londoners who helped me on my odyssey across the Heath - Man in Newspaper Kiosk, Woman with Dog, Spanish Man on Bench, Young Mothers with Babies in Buggies, Builders on Viaduct Bridge, Dogwalking Scottish Man, Mum & Daughter on way to Kenwood House, Local Couple Disagreeing over Direction, AND Lovely Staff at The Pond.
So, how many people does it take to navigate a country girl across a mile of London .... FOURTEEN! Now I see why I usually travel with my waterblogged sisters!!!
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