Walking 'home' in the rain

Dear insightful and tolerantly patient (or patiently tolerant) reader,

There's something just so deliciously sad and lonely and yet epic and heart-warming about walking 'home' to a beautiful high-ceilinged flat on Gloucester Road in the rain, listening to this after an evening out alone, in a deserted bar in central west London. It's drizzly like only London can be, the strings in the song I'm listening to are swirling, I'm click-clacking away in my boots that have holes in so my feet are getting distinctly wet. It wasn't raining when I came out, so I took a chance, but just like on my birthday night, it drizzled and softly rained just enough to create small puddles that meant my boots, my lovely green and grey and white striped boots, let in the water and made half my foot soaking wet by the time I got home.

I know that it would be better to be holding the hand of someone brave enough to tell me he loves me. Someone who would be proud to be with me, which I know deep down I would be thrilled to have, but this is ok, almost delightful even. In its own way. I don't fear walking alone at night at all. It's rather uplifting and I even feel elated to raise my head to the sky and have rain fall on my eyelashes and surely spread the mascara I'm wearing across my cold, wine-rosed cheeks. The warmth of the lovely Malbec I had is still comforting me even in this sense of loneliness as I walk home without a warm hand to put mine into. On one glass, I am suitably softened, but not heavily blurred. I think that if I were to return to London, there would be hope of finding someone who might venture to roll the dice with me as a companion. Someone who might listen to the things I had to say and be inspired and intrigued by them. Someone who might want to hug me with all their strength for the love that I could exude from just a deep glance into his eyes. I'm sure I am capable of it, because I had the gift of having it, for many years, in the past. I know that I have things to offer, something to give that could be as warming as the wine and as soothing as the delicate feeling of the light rain falling on my face.

But not tonight. Sleep will be the only entity embracing my body tonight. And that's ok, because I am tired and a little damp from the drizzle.

So, for now, without any attempt to catch-up on other events, I must stop and pack and prepare for another journey. The platform at Paddington awaits.

Goodnight reader, wherever you are.

Ms. Platform Edge