Au revoir Jubilee Gardens

Some cities have a sweet spot where I tend to return. It’s like a magnet and I don’t know why.

Over a decade ago I walked alone along the Thames riverfront in London. This was before the London Eye wheel was built. I came to the Jubilee Gardens and sat down on a bench.

A few years later I returned, sat down alone on the same bench and read a book in the sunset.

Reading Bruce Chatwin in Jubilee Gardens.

Some years ago I passed the garden once again, but this time I had the company of a beautiful girl so there was no time to park on silly benches.

Just me and the bench at sunset. Perfect.

Recently I revisited Jubilee Gardens, walked past that particular bench and was reminded of how much had changed during all these years. Friends, relationships, attitudes, locations. But here I was again, back in town. Added a few wrinkles and a few pounds, but it was still me.

That was a comfort in a way, yet still an annoyance. After all those things we go through during the years, some things change irrevocably but some tend to stay the same forever. But I noted that Jubilee seemed a lot more touristy these days, with street performers everywhere.

Jubilee Gardens, my bench guarded by the lizard king.

It reminded me of a chapter of Sandman by Neil Gaiman, where a man is made immortal and agree to meet with the godlike Morpheus in the same location every hundred years. The meetings occur every year while surroundings and fashion changed throughout the pages, but the man stayed the same.

Maybe it’s time for me to move on, past Jubilee Gardens and the Ghost of Christmas Past.