I was running today in the morning in the heat on Plumstaed Common. There were some boys playing football with their parents. And people with dogs seeking some shadow for their slowness. We were all trying to avoid the ground, but it is not easy to fly in this kind of weather. So we chose to melt in the scent of freshly cut grass which atrracted us to the place at eight o'clock in the morning.
I imagined family picnics somehwere else in the park, not here in Plumstead Common though, people waking up early to spend the whole day out, packing flasks of coffee, strawberries and cream, foot balls and blankets and joyful screams in plastic bags. Somewhere else. Maybe in Greenwhich. I was invited to a picnic to the Greenwich Park a month ago by a lovely family. Parents, children and so friendly aunts who were offering us bubbles and their love, sacrifying this quality time to the landscape. I felt so happy and attached, filling the cut-out shape of my belonging with a great precision: I had quiche and crisps and a run across the field. We were waving to the tourists passing by on the tiny rattling train, mounting with effort towards the invisible zero longtitude - the peak of the Western genius. Everything was perfect, And my daughetr was in smiles. We were doing all normal things on the heath, enjoying ourselves, grasping the warmth of connection. The grass smelt like home, and the crisps did go with the cream in the unexpected way. I have never had crisps with cream. I have never been to the English picnic. The grass in Plumstead smells the same, but people do not have picnics here. I had to run across the heath, since stopping would seem so inappropriate. Why a single person would like to stop on the Plumstead heath? Maybe to admire a view of the other side of the river? Or to wave to the boys playing football with their parents? Or to sit on the piles of empty cans and grunge a puzzle of life? Or to talk to another running person who doesn't know who to stop? Next week I will take a blanket and a whole basket of straberries to the Plumstead common, I will also take a book to read and and will lie on the grass which smelss the same. Maybe I will even paint a picture of the view on the other side of the river. And everything will be perfec