Swimming through the sunlight

[dolorosa_12]

Yesterday was the second public holiday in May. Unlike some of the other public holidays in the UK calendar (the Easter long weekend, etc), the two Mondays in May are not mandatory days off at my workplace, and instead our practice is that each employee gets one as leave, and has to work the other. For various reasons, I had elected to work the earlier May public holiday, and take yesterday off, and I definitely made the right decision: the first holiday was grey, raining and freezing, and yesterday was cloudless, warm, and sunny.

For the first time since December 2019, Matthias and I got on the train for reasons other than trundling between Cambridge and Ely for work or appointments, travelling to one of the villages that dots the river, and then walking for an hour or so along the towpath to another village, where we ate a great meal outdoors in a restaurant. Such a little thing — a totally normal way to spend a long weekend in the before times — but it seemed like such a wild adventure! Here's a photoset.

I'll leave you with this beautiful photo essay of swimming pools, photographed from above. Many of them are in Sydney, and were regular haunts during my childhood and early adulthood. It's in the New York Times, so if you've read several articles there this month and don't have a subscription you may be faced with a paywall. The whole aesthetic very much captures my current mood!

Comments

[corvidology]

That's only really possible here if you live in a small town or in a downtown area if your work is also there. Most cities here don't have very good public transportation.

I have a 20 minute drive to work and most of my colleagues envy me. There's no train and the bus system, such as it is, would involve a 2 mile walk to the nearest bus stop followed by changing buses three times. It would take me 2 1/2 hours to get to work.

[dolorosa_12]

Oh, absolutely — it's a totally different situation in the US.