Paul and I went to see Holland defeat France 4-1, including an amazing goal by Arjan Robben less than a minute after France’s only riposte. The Dutch pub we planned to go to was too crowded so we ended up in an Irish one. We stayed there for the first half before even that crowd got too much for us, especially as some seemed to be there exclusively to jeer the competition. Eventually we saw the second half in a quiet pub where the only other people invested in the match were a man dressed all in orange and his young daughter. I went over to congratulate him after another goal. War and sport make strangers into brothers. The tribal drumming from the supporters in the stands got my heart pounding. A call to battle, that somehow stirs everyone with a y chromosome. I’m the least patriotic guy you’re likely to meet yet here I was, in my Clockwork Orange shirt, cheering with the rest (and the best) of them.
Texted quite a bit with my dad as well. This may be as good an opportunity as any to say some words on the subject of my father, to honour the occassion of Father’s Day which is fast approaching and heavily advertised all around me. Until recently I did not feel I had a lot in common with my father, save for being tall, having big, flat feet and tending to stand or gesture the same way. But in my personality too I increasingly see him reflected. We both love films, I’ve taken up drinking beer and now, as said, football unites us too. And I’m increasingly okay with that as well.
This night out for the footie has been a rare break in what is quite possibly the most intense week we’ve had since this term began, perhaps even since the first term. There has been the redraft, the WRJ, many classes including a pitching workshop that had me sweating off kilos in anticipation, and a lot of extra-curricular work as well. That’s not even starting on issues of accommodation and finances. And there’s still a lot more to do. I’ve been sleeping an average of four hours a night for a week, often not crawling into bed until dawn, and keeping myself going in class the next day with a cup of Starbucks coffee and a muffin for on the Tube into town. I’m fairly sure that once we enter the real world and start working professionally, we won’t be quite as busy as this. Busy, but not this busy. Because few but a vampire could cope with this for long.
We went out briefly again last night (sort of undermining my statement that I haven’t had any time for anything), because Paul had heard through the grapevine about a party in Hyde Park thrown as a reunion of those people who got totalled on the Tube a while back to commemorate the Underground going booze-free. There were supposed to be upwards of 500 people there. As it turned out, it was closer to a hundred (although in all fairness we did show up three hours after they started), and was really an afterparty for a protest held by Anonymous, an internet entity that is currently doing battle with the cult of Scientology. It had something of a High School camp to it, and everyone else was considerably more drunk than I, so I didn’t stick around long. That a long night finishing my redraft still lay ahead of me was also pressing on my mind.
As the week draws to a close, however, I feel not just relieved but also glad for the experience. And even a little melancholy, as well as excited, because in just five weeks we’ll be done with this degree. And the world will be waiting.
1 Comment
July 9, 2008 at 8:27 am
Film, beer and football… what more could a father wish for?