A return

It felt like old times when I got off the bus in north London to go see San. I used to always take the underground in London, it was faster and simpler than the buses -- but it's also very temperamental, and so one day when the engineering works made it difficult to go straight to San's I started taking the bus. Since then I have become a bus-convert -- I like to sit on the top deck and stare out fo the window at the city. Sure, it takes longer but you don't get the feeling you could be trapped in a tunnel and it's more interesting.

I got to San's and although it had been less than a week since we last saw each other, things were different. There was a renewed passion between us, a rediscovered desire to just sit on the couch and make out that I can't remember us doing in Leicester.

Our plans for the day were simple. The Tate gallery of Modern Art were hosting an Edward Hopper exhibition, and being a big fan of his work it went without saying that we would go. When I called the gallery, however, I discovered that booking in advance was "strongly recommended". We went anyway, and although it couldn't have been very late in the afternoon we were told (after standing in line forever) that the earliest we could be admitted was 17.30. We booked tickets for 19.00 instead -- so we could take our time with the rest of the day.

It was one of those days where you can forget everything else. I could forget about exams in Law and Public Affairs, and my search for a job. I could even forget the uncertainty of what might happen between us.

The exhibition was more or less all I could have hoped for. Hopper's canvases were often bigger and more dramatic than I had expected, and I was only slightly disappointed that the exhibition hadn't included New York Movie.

It was late when we got out of the gallery -- having been side-tracked on our way out because I wanted to see something by Damien Hirst -- and we decided to walk a different way to the way we'd come in. Instead, we crossed the Thames on the Millennium Bridge, taking our time to look at the lights of the city and to stop and stare down-river and the lights of Tower Bridge. There was some confusion over where to catch a bus from -- San has no sense of direction -- but we were in no real hurry to get home.

The first time I ever met San we went to the Tate Modern gallery, and she tells me now she thought I hated her because I was so quiet. I tell that I loved her even then, and had always tried to be sure I knew where she was the whole day -- but didn't think it necessary for us to be at each other's side the whole time. I uphold that Saturday wasn't meant to have any significance, I would have wanted to see the exhibition wherever it was being held. It was just coincidence we'd spent the day together there once before.

The questions still remaining are: Is San right, and were we complacent seeing each other all the time? Will it be better to have a chance to miss one another now? Will our relationship stand up to this change of pace? And of course, what the sam hell am I doing with my life?

Tune in next time for all this and more...