Other Than the Usual

In Oxford

We were walking along a narrow street lined with brick row houses topped by chimneys, past an old pub and a bright red postal box, everything around us so other than the way it is at home. Even the grocery stores intrigued me, stocked as they are with different kinds of chocolate and cereal and yogurt, fruit weighed out in kilograms, heaps of pale root vegetables. The oatmeal was called porridge. There was piccalilli, and clotted cream, and small brown jars of Marmite

."I love coming here!" I exclaimed.

"Words never before uttered, ever, by anyone, upon entering Tesco," said my daughter.

Nothing seemed ordinary, especially not the cinematic clouds, and fields of white dandelions ready to be wished on, and the damp smell of mud and nettles by the river. Little children spoke in Peter Pan accents, a fellow cycled by carrying a drum, and the white light of evening lingered eerily late.

"We're strolling around in England! Can you even believe you live here?" I asked my daughter. "Don't you find yourself in a constant state of astonishment? Or are you just so over it?"

"Can't I be something midway between astonished and jaded?" she said. "Why are those two extremes my only options?"

And therein perhaps lies the crux of my own problem. I veer around continually from wonder to despair. It's exhausting. I'm gonna strive for quiet equanimity today.