So my computer has crashed. Again. Happily, they are going to repair it under warranty so there is no real reason to complain. But for the next few weeks, internet communication will be spotty and all contents on my hard drive hard to get to. My computer decided to bail while I was editing my PhD proposal, and I’m not sure whether or not to take that has some sort of weird omen or just sod’s law.

Yesterday, like perhaps many of you, I was glued to my television watching the events unfold in London. Amazingly, I had access to a friend’s computer (as I do again for a bit today) and was able to send emails to check on loved ones in London to make sure they were okay…physically as well as emotionally. While everyone seemed to see yesterday’s events as somewhat inevitable, people were still shaken and confused.

As I sat watching the television, I was hit with image after image of streets I had walked down, transport I had taken and the same sound of sirens I used to hear barrel down Commercial Road. Ever since the mid-90s, I have been intertwined in a love affair. Not with a person, but with a city.

Somehow it happened quite without me knowing it, wandering alone throughout crooked streets on rainy days, walking along the river at dusk, watching the sun rise over Canary Wharf from atop a hill in a nearby playground. Even though sometimes I wanted to be anywhere but inside the M25 and would escape to the seaside, London would always call me back.

The thing about having such a relationship with a place combined with an errant sense of wanderlust is that you leave behind many chances for new relationships to start because you’ve always got a backpack at the ready. And when one city in particular continues to call, you go, unsure and a bit bemused. Thankfully, I have been blessed with dear friends all over the world who have opened their hearts and their doors to me whenever I felt like traveling, but there was one city that had unshakingly held my attention.

Yesterday, watching London hurting (but still resilient as ever), I was reminded of why I fell in love with its charm, the sounds of footsteps on cobblestones, the smell of curry along Brick Lane, the sight of boats on the Thames. And was also reminded of why I came back to the home where I grew up, because all affairs have their limits, even if one day you might not be above returning.

While I will always love London, I am just not sure if it is where I need to be right now. So I put that dream to bed, tucking it in and giving it a kiss, to see what else is in store. And right now, it seems like I need to get back to paper and pen (while still writing here -hopefully- on my M/W/F ‘schedule.’ for lack of a better word).

I bought Baudelaire’s Les Fleurs du Mal as well as another Barthes book (one of the few I haven’t read) after I got the news about my computer, and made a list of all the library research I could do in the absence of email correspondence and site reading. And I’m excited to have a few weeks without it, hoping that no more technological insanity ensues and I end up reading Baudelaire by candlelight or something else equally ridiculous, reminding of the Dickensian mornings in London, listening to the sounds of the foundry across the street and the church bells ringing next door.

It will also give me a chance to step away from the few technologically-based projects I’m working on and get back to spinning and working with my hands. Taking a step back and delving into the world pre-internet, slowing down and yet hopefully, taking more time to listen, write and connect.