Day 37

Sunday March 28, 2021


I made a full English breakfast for me and Maja yesterday while Sarah danced and sang in the main room. This will be the backdrop to the greatest disaster in the apartment yet.

First, Sarah’s been doing a lot of dancing and singing in the apartment lately. Brilliant. It’s added a greatly energetic vibe and we’re very happy to be living within it, even on a day like yesterday when she dominated the main room with it. Great. Go for it. We’ll stay out of your way and do our thing, inspired by your thing. And it really has worked so much the other way with Sarah saying we have inspired and lifted her mood so much just by being here and by being us.

So yeah. Yesterday. Full English breakfast. Me and Maja eating that in our room at our window overlooking our part of central London. Just brilliant. The kitchen, as you know by now, is tiny. So Maja walked back to our room and past Sarah while I carried on in there while Sarah danced away to her music while checking out her form in the full width mirror. On the way, Sarah caught Maja’s eye through that mirror. The wrong kind of eye apparently. I’m about to find out just how wrong.

It begins to unfold first thing in the morning with a disaster we already had in waiting that we had no idea of

I’m up and going to the toilet and Sarah, all warmness and blessings, calls me in. I ask her to hang on, pay my visit, then come back and pay my visit. Sarah’s temperature has dropped about 10 degrees. She is no longer all warmness and blessings. She’s all fine with me though, she assures me. Oh yes. All fine with me. It’s Maja that’s the problem, she says. What the hell is this? ‘I received some feedback from some friends this morning about your video,’ she says. What video? What friends? ‘The one I recorded in your room a few days ago.’ Oh. OK. Not a great start. Didn’t we agree that was to be immediately deleted? Didn’t Sarah herself say it was deleted? While she was standing there holding the phone in her hand? Well apparently not only had she not deleted it, but she sent it to people. By all accounts, very influential people. Her people. That she says she’s been hoping to work with with us. Maybe even get funding from. Yeah, this has been a thing that has been mentioned a lot and I have absolutely no idea what it means. ‘They’ve come right back and asked what the hell I’m doing letting that negative energy in my house. They’ve told me I should not have that energy in my house.’ You’re talking about what exactly? I don’t say anything. Sarah calls up what she now knows as the clearly offensive video on her phone and shows it to me.

‘Look at that,’ she says, zooming in on Maja’s face – Maja, who at the time was being suddenly filmed deep in concentration and in some mild distress while she was struggling to come up with something on the spot to jam. And yes, feeling intruded on while we were very much in the middle of something. ‘Look at that scowl. That negativity. In my house. People have seen this and said this is a bad vibe that I should not be having or allowing in my own home. And do you know about yesterday morning?’ I do not know about yesterday. Yesterday Sarah danced and we had breakfast. Please tell me about yesterday. ‘It was the same again. Maja walked past me as she came through the room and looked at me in the mirror like I was some piece of dirt or something. Just a look of aggression.’ I have no idea what Sarah’s talking about and I just know that if I mention this to Maja, she will have no idea either. I’m in a state of disbelief. To deny anything would just be to admit there’s a problem. To apologise would be to admit there’s a problem. To say I’ll talk to Maja about it would be to admit there’s a problem. To tell Sarah she’s imagining it all would cause a problem. If I say nothing, I’m kind of admitting it’s a problem. I say nothing. So Sarah continues to talk, confirming that yes, there might just be a problem here. ‘Maybe living here isn’t the best thing for you guys,’ she says matter of factly and suddenly with a hint of sympathy in her voice. Maybe you’d like to think about looking for somewhere else.’ She speaks that last sentence with something approaching compassion, like she’s doing us a favour. It’s not kicking us out. It isn’t even remotely asking us to leave, but it’s the first time anything like this has been remotely suggested. And once a conversation like that has popped up, it really doesn’t go back in the box very easily. Where exactly? Wasn’t getting this place the impossible? For the first time I have the realisation that Maja was totally right to keep the rent up on her room in the house to keep it open. But surely no. We won’t be needing that. This, whatever the hell this is, can be worked out. I gently tell Sarah I don’t really understand and that I’m sure things are all good. She smiles sweetly and says, ‘I’m sure they are darling. I’m sure they are. Yeah. You go and talk to Maja.’ I’m grateful for that hint that the conversation is over and I leave Sarah’s room and head back to ours. Which, until very recently was Sarah’s. Until she gave it to us and she came into this tiny room to sleep on a mattress on the floor.

Back in bed and Maja of course wants to know what I was speaking to Sarah about. Is there a problem? Hmm. I really don’t want to cause a panic here so I say that things are fine, but there may just be something of a misconception that could be cleared up. Maja’s listening now. I tell her about the mirror incident. Get me. Incident. Damn. She’s stunned. It wasn’t something she’d even thought about. I’ve already decided I’m not going to mention the video. I think that on top of everything else, that could really cause a blow up so I’m keeping that to myself and Sarah. For now. Maja says she’ll go and talk to Sarah now about whatever this misunderstanding is. Before long, I hear them both giggling away and talking affectionately. By the time Maja returns, it’s clear that all is sweetness and light again. But for how long?

We get ready without any real hurry, then decide to go out for the day. We have no particular destination in mind, just catch the first bus that comes along. We take that bus to Kings Cross and then just get the first bus we see from there. Which goes to Elephant And Castle, quite a long way south of the river. Us north Londoners don’t cross the river too often – the South Bank doesn’t count – so this is a rare excursion into unknown territory. It’s just cool to be out and to take in some different streets and scenery. That area also boast the Imperial War Museum. It’s closed, of course, but the out front display is still there – an enormous double field gun, which we take time to marvel at.

After a few aimless wandering hours, we see a bus heading to central London so hop on that. From Trafalgar Square we walk all the way back home, but when we arrive at our street we just don’t feel like going in. So we carry on walking and end up going all the way to Holloway, where we continue walking aimlessly until eventually we see a bus coming towards us and heading to our area. Yeah. It’s time to go back. We’ve walked over 11 miles today.