![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The Bottom of Regent's Canal
Jul. 2nd, 2009 09:55 pmI walk up and down Regent's Canal every week day because it's the easiest way for me to get to work. I wonder if a day will come when the canal is as clean as a fresh river again and London's eastend residents can enjoy it like an open-ended lido. I once saw a large carp in it, and the swans and coots don't seem to mind the floating plastic bags, but it still looks damn dirty and uninviting to me.
Yesterday, on my way home from work, I saw a student from the Bridge Academy in the water, holding on to his instructor's canoe while his classmates splashed him with their paddle. This morning, a girl tangled her cloth bag with her bike's front wheel, spun in the air and landed at my feet, griddled by her bike's spokes. I helped her up and asked if she was OK, then tried to make a joke that at least she hadn't fallen into the canal. "That would have been terrible," she said. She was deeply embarassed and cycled past me all hunched up, as if I might not notice her anymore.
Up ahead, I came across a note tied to the canal's railings. It said something like this: "to the girl who crashed into me yesterday (01/07/09), I never got a chance to get your number. Drop me an e-mail. ______@gmail.com" I wondered if it might be the same girl who fell off the bike - each day a different boy at the receiving end of her disastrous biking skills.
In the afternoon, I heard laughter and cries from my office window. I looked into the canal and the canoeing students were at it again: this time, at least three of them were in the water, trying to get back on their canoes while the others splashed them and fought like gladiators.
I'd be in heaven if I could go for dips in the canal on my lunch break.
Yesterday, on my way home from work, I saw a student from the Bridge Academy in the water, holding on to his instructor's canoe while his classmates splashed him with their paddle. This morning, a girl tangled her cloth bag with her bike's front wheel, spun in the air and landed at my feet, griddled by her bike's spokes. I helped her up and asked if she was OK, then tried to make a joke that at least she hadn't fallen into the canal. "That would have been terrible," she said. She was deeply embarassed and cycled past me all hunched up, as if I might not notice her anymore.
Up ahead, I came across a note tied to the canal's railings. It said something like this: "to the girl who crashed into me yesterday (01/07/09), I never got a chance to get your number. Drop me an e-mail. ______@gmail.com" I wondered if it might be the same girl who fell off the bike - each day a different boy at the receiving end of her disastrous biking skills.
In the afternoon, I heard laughter and cries from my office window. I looked into the canal and the canoeing students were at it again: this time, at least three of them were in the water, trying to get back on their canoes while the others splashed them and fought like gladiators.
I'd be in heaven if I could go for dips in the canal on my lunch break.
