cheer up and dry your damp eyes, and tell me when it rains, and i'll blend up that rainbow above you, and shoot it through your veins

On Saturday morning, I packed up all my things, and Jane and I walked to Christchurch, which is Steven’s college. I was to leave on the 5:31 train to Peterborough, and Christchurch is quite near the train station, and Steven was kind enough to tell Jane the code so that we could leave my things in his room and not have to either cart them all over Oxford, or have to walk all the way back up to St. Anne’s before leaving.

As I was sorting out which things I wanted with me for the day, Steven arrived in the room. He asked what our plans were today, and when we said that we were going to Magdalene, he asked if we had talked to Joses, their friend who goes there, so that he could let us in and show us around. We hadn’t, because we weren’t sure if we were going until the night before.

“I’ll call him,” said Steven.

“Oh yeah, there is that method of communication,” said Jane, amused. We forget that other people have phones, not having them ourselves.

“Hi. Jane wants to come see Magdalene. Are you there? Can you show her around? Okay. When can you be ready – 15 minutes? Okay, good. Bye.” Jane and I blinked at the suddenness and brevity of the conversation.

“That is how we do business in Singapore,” declared Steven, throwing down his phone onto the bed. Which amused me, because I had been thinking about how Steven was like an elite businessman with high connections who could just get things done like that. (insert finger-snap here.)

“Joses is from Singapore, too,” Jane explained.

So I quickly finished grabbing the few things I wanted to take, and Jane and I left for Magdalene.

Joses met us outside the gate, and we went in. There was sign saying “£4 for admittance for visitors.” Bother.

Joses walked up to the porter, Jane and I behind them. He held up his card.

“They’re with me,” he said, gesturing to us.

“Okay,” nodded the porter. And we walked in.

Nothing like having connections.

Oh, Magdalene College, how beautiful you are! We peeked into the dining hall, and walked around the cloister.

This is Joses:

This is a little girl, full of wonder (and yes, i got her mom's permission for the picture):

And we came into a little garden, and then around the corner was the building C. S. Lewis lived in!

And there were the windows with the red flowers in them, the windows of the rooms where he lived!

And then we started down a path – oh, a beautiful path, with daffodils and little purple flowers…

“Where is Addison’s Walk?” I asked, though I thought I knew.

“This is it,” said Joses.

He walked with us to the first turn, but upon hearing that we wished to make the whole loop, said that he had better head back and get things done. And we thanked him very very much and said goodbye, and Jane and I went on together.

It must be one of the prettiest places in the world. And it reminds me both of the Shire, and, at this time of year, of the Pevensies walking through Narnia when spring was suddenly coming.

Which, if you think about it for a split second, is really not to be wondered at.

So we walked, and I thought of two reluctant, intelligent men who have wrestled with the problem of pain, and prayed that the one might move the same way as the other once did in this same place.

And we exclaimed over the incredible flowers, and the sweet pussywillows, and the pheasants in the field.

Jane said all the time that I had brought the whimsy back to Oxford, that she had been depressed before I and her other friends had come, and that she was so happy...

At the end of the loop it comes out at a river, and there were people going punting, though it seemed an awfully wet cold day for it.

We met Steven at the entrance to Christchurch, because he was going to give us a quick tour and then take us to the meadows.

We went to the cathedral again, this time to wander around it.

St. George and the Dragon:

Jonah under his vine, and the city of Ninevah:

Window telling the story of the patron saint of Oxford, St. Frediswide, who devoted herself to be a nun and then had to run away from a king who demanded her hand in marriage:

Her memorial:

The meadows were big and green, and also a path through forest, along the river, and it was sort of melancholy and peaceful, in the rain.

We stopped by an art exhibition before going back to the common room at Christchurch. We got there just before the close, so Jane and I were joking about getting kicked out of a convent and an art gallery in the same week.

I was very hungry when we arrived at the common room, and was very happy to find there a cake, unfrosted, with strawberry jam between the layers, that was accompanied by a handwritten label reading “EAT ME”. I had two pieces and it was really, really good. And Steven made us tea. And I must have looked really tired because he insisted that I go sit down, and also washed the dishes for us. It was nice to feel taken care of. Taking care of people and being taken care of are two of my favorite things. I hope that I marry someone who feels the same way so we can take turns.

Then we went back to Steven’s rooms, and got my things, and had a very fast walk to the station.

We arrived just in time for me to make my train. I was rather sad to say goodbye to Jane and Steven. We had had such a lovely time.

The train ride back was very pleasant, however. I’ve become much better at managing my things without banging into people or taking a long time. And it was rather nice to just be alone and think and write. I like that sort of feeling of vanishing, when no one around you knows who you are, and no one who you know knows exactly where you are.

Jack picked me up at the Peterborough station, and we went home. I was ravenously hungry – this seems to be a theme in these posts; apparently I was hungry a lot at Oxford – and they had saved me a piece of pork pie, which I had never had before, but it was very good. And bread and butter. But I don’t like pickled beet root.

And then to bed.