We all agree that chronology is pretty passée now, right? Well that's good because I'm planning on writing about a weekend at home that was about two weeks ago now & I'm playing catch up. After a busy week at work, rolling into Flitwick station was as welcome as ever on Saturday evening. As often happens when planning just about everything under British skies, you're always at the mercy of the weather but it doesn't matter so much when many comforts of home often include sitting in pyjamas in the kitchen eating bowls of cereal & reading back issues of newspaper supplements. This was exactly how I started my couple of days at home, Sunday morning eating slabs of honey & banana on sunflower seed toast while listening to the radio in our cosy kitchen. This aptly set the tone for listening to KCRW's 'Bookworm' podcasts (not far off the revelation of 'The New Yorker's fiction podcasts presented by the dulcet tones of Deborah Treisman) while soaking in the bath, wandering up to the town to buy fresh bread & having a poke around the charity shops up there. I struck lucky with an oversized, burgundy Topshop jumper than I am already imagining being layered over turtlenecks what with the changing of the seasons.
Having gotten back late the night before & lazily ordered takeaway curry to drink with red wine, me, my Mum, sister & Grandy went out for dinner the next night & were home by nine to watch the DVD of 'The Grand Budapest Hotel' that I had not-so-subtle-y bought Andrew for his birthday & swiftly borrowed myself. It was my Mum's first glimpse into Wes Anderson's fantastical world & I was so keen for her to love it, as she did, from the sumptuous styling of that sweetshop hotel between the wars to Ralph Fiennes' articulate expletives, I'm already all too ready to watch it all over again. Undeterred by cloudy skies on the Monday morning, we resolved to head to local town Olney to try the run of the charity shops there. Thrilled to have dug out a copy of Jean Rhys' 'Wide Sargasso Sea' early on (I have read almost everything else of hers since they're so slim & have studied 'Jane Eyre' on four separate occasions but have unforgiveably never read 'Wide Sargasso Sea') we holed ourselves up in our favourite tea room to miraculously avoid the temptations of a slab of cake & wrap our hands around hot chocolate, tea & an elderflower fizz between us.
Understandably crestfallen at the next two shops on our list being closed for the day, our determination was renewed as we chanced upon the last at the end of the high street with twenty minutes of browsing left to do. Several turns of the dressing room later, I emerged with an armful of astonishingly well preserved vintage ahead of starting a new term at university - a long length black cord skirt with a slit up the front for £5, a long button-up paisley-esque patterned dress with all its golden buttons intact & a fully lined skirt for £9.50 & my woollen, tomato red Jaeger jacket of dreams for just £7.50. Doubtless once part of a mean twin set, it fits just perfectly & hopefully the shoulder pads are just subtle enough to segue its way into my wardrobe with patterned midi skirts & loafers. Last to be balanced atop that pile was a new copy of Jeanette Winterson's memoir 'Why Be Happy When You You Could Be Normal?' that has been recommended to me endlessly & which I've been keeping an eye out for for a long while. It's obviously off-limits for the meantime but that didn't mean that I didn't sneak a few pages alongside Miranda July in my final bath of the weekend.
Alas it wasn't long until I was being waved off at the train station, precariously teetering on the platform with a plethora of tote bags stuffed to the brim with bargains & promises to return again soon. The time in which I've been back in the city has, however, proved that my spirit of discovery never leaves me & I sit typing this looking lovingly at the most beautiful blushed rose coloured silk blouse that I've just bought on Broadway Market for a fiver. Lucky, lucky me.
Have you had any secondhand success lately?
Speak soon - O.
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