under another sun

Off to London this afternoon. I'd been doing bits and pieces at home, but not very productively. I did some poetry and managed not to make things worse, which was nice. To Victoria, and I walked down to Tate Britain, which is becoming my new favourite gallery. There was an exhibition there by Rachel Whiteread , who I have liked for years. She makes invisible spaces concrete. I didn't have enough time to go into the exhibition, but I looked at the big piece outside, which was a hundred spaces under chairs she had cast in what may have been glass or some kind of plastic. They looked like big boiled sweets. The problem I am beginning to have with Whiteread is that everything she does is an expression of the same idea. I rashly snapped two of the Francis Bacon faces, and enjoyed it when I was looking at Jacob and the Angel by Epstien, which I absolutely love, a two women stopped and sniggered at it, and then one said, "ooh look he's got wings!" From there I walk...

Sartre in a swimming pool Not only was it a Friday, but it was a beautiful morning and I felt happy and relaxed going into agency. Quite a bit of work on my plate at the moment but that's fine. Managed to have my fourth swim of the week at lunchtime. At the end of my swim I just floated in the pool for a few minutes, feeling good and staring up at the light streaming through a couple of trees outside. Increasingly, I'm getting stolen moments of happiness like this. In the pool I decided I am getting the psychological reward from having taken my decision to leave the agency. For better or worse my life feels in my own hands again, and mentally that is a far healthier way of living. I'm with Sartre and his buddies on this one. When you take a decision, you prove to yourself that you are alive. After work I met Bob in the West End. Good to catch up with the old Mad Dog. We lurked happily in Soho in The Nellie Dean and forked down a curry afterwards, leaving no stone unturned ...