The New Leaf #21 - The Little Year
Hi, and welcome to the twenty-first instalment of The New Leaf, an informal and infrequent email bulletin with the things I’ve been writing and reading lately.
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“Nothing happens until something moves.” [Albert Einstein]
On 4th March 2020 I got a tattoo (this one here) - it's a bunch of cherry blossom which are one of my favourite things. They come along just when the winter has been dragging on forever and everything is wet and cold and sad and you think it will never change. But then suddenly one day they’re there - a shock of pink and white flower on bare tree branches, showing you that it’s going to be ok. Life comes back. We weren't in lockdown yet when I got that tattoo done, but it seemed inevitable that we would be very soon. I'd been planning it for a long time so the cherry blossoms weren't about the pandemic, but even before it had really begun, I had a feeling that this might lead to the biggest "life comes back" moment of all.
Happy newyear everyone. I am usually a big fan of the newyear but I won't lie - I'm feeling kind of apprehensive about 2021. This time is usually a delightful blank slate - an opportunity - but right now nothing is happening, nothing is moving.
2020 was a strange little year. I remember a lot of walking around my neighbourhood, a lot of "let's go while we can" trips to the pub, and how odd it was to watch the city change so fast. Adding insult to injury was the feeling that the people who were supposed to be steering us through this aren't quite up to the task. It wasn't a particularly great year, not just for reasons related to the pandemic. But some very nice things happening in 2020 too:
The newyear in California, where it was sunny every day and I was temporarily a healthy person who ate vegan food and exercised daily, and most of all, that sweaty and thrilled moment at the top of Mount Tamalpais where you could see to the ends of the earth.
Soho opening up again just in time for my birthday, the streets full of people and tables and it felt like a big party, all of us stunned by our good fortune. Could you believe it, we would get a summer after all!
Going to Amsterdam for a week with Luke in July, on a good old-fashioned European summer holiday. I remember being apprehensive about these "travel corridors", wanting to wait and see, but Luke insisted we go RIGHT NOW before it went away and he was right. It was a brief candle, and it was glorious.
In the same spirit, I went to visit my mother and my father in August, during what turned out to be the last week of the year where it was possible to do so. I was very worried I would kill them all by bringing in corona, but I didn't. It was luck, and logistically, it was brute force.
And then in October, Tom and I went to Bristol, taking the weekend just at the edge of second wave when travelling even within England became impossible. If this summer of reprieve taught me anything it's to go for it while you can.
In 2020, life came back for a bit even in the middle of the pandemic. Looking at this list, it seems that for me, that meant moments of freedom - it's not necessarily indicative of what I value most in general, but it certainly was when it was taken away. No matter what happens in 2021, life will come back too, in whichever form matters most to you. We will probably still be in lockdown when the cherry blossom comes back in 2-3 months from now, so maybe remembering that will be helpful to you too. They will still be quite spectacular.
Here’s what I wrote in November and December.
At the pub in lockdown London - October
Going to the pub this year, at the various stages of semi-lockdown, has been an exercise in "Enjoy yourself, it's later than you think". The hospitality industry has been hung out to dry this year, and we're going to lose a lot of great places if we don't turn things around. I wrote a reported essay about London pubs during lockdown for October, Condé Nast's beer-specialist publication - it was published on the first day they started administering the vaccine and cheers to that. We need our pubs - it’s where we put the world to rights.
Future of the Wick: After gentrification, Hackney Wick finds hope in collaboration - The Wick
In 2018, I wrote a deep dive on what was happening with the artist community in Hackney Wick in East London - this is the 2020 update, published in the new local freesheet “The Wick”. Much of the old anarchist spirit of Hackney Wick and Fish Island won’t survive the post-Olympic gentrification of the area, but there’s a new focus on collaboration and organisation that means that a version of this incredible wellspring of creativity will survive into the future.
How to enjoy winter like a Scandinavian - Brent Cross Town
I really enjoyed working on this little story for Brent Cross Town on how to enjoy winter like a Scandinavian - TL;DR: There's not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing. I've been doing a lot copywriting work for the past few months, mostly promoting the regeneration of underdeveloped areas of London. After all those stories on "The Disappearing City" I'm very conscious of good versus bad regeneration - sometimes it's a curse for established communities (Hackney Wick!), but other times it can be an asset to underdeveloped areas that could really use a shot in the arm. That's arguably the case for Brent Cross Town in North London, as well as for another project I've been part of: the Royal Docks, East London's still-wild ex-industrial lands.
Here’s what I read in November and December.
Reading List, The Little Year double edition.
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