Today I was supposed to go to Cambridge with the club to talk to potential new members about joining. Everyone was gathering at King's Cross to make the trek up there at 3 PM, but unfortunately I got stuck in calls at work, and wasn't able to catch a train until an hour later on my own. Kind of a bummer to have to travel by myself, but at least I wasn't too far behind and still arrived in plenty of time for the event.
When I got to Cambridge, I took a bus from the train station into town, and then got out by Christ's College to make the walk over to Senate House. I found myself thinking about my ex, who was at that college, who rumour has it is now back in Cambridge. (I don't know, I haven't spoken to him in years). I rather wondered if I would run into him during the short walk over there, but as fate would have it, I did not.
When I got to Senate House, everyone was still setting up, and I ran through my speech with one of the older members of the General Committee. As I talked to him about crew dates and life in the MCR or JCR, it suddenly struck me how little the committee knows about recent life at Oxford or Cambridge, as all of these things didn't exist in his all-male days. Life has changed dramatically at colleges from what they knew of it, so they have no real relevance to it anymore.
The reception started, I spoke to a few people, and pretty quickly it was time for me to give my little speech. I got up there, tried to be humorous and spoke off-the-cuff, and when I realised that I was losing the attention of the folks in the back, cut it short. Perhaps I didn't speak as long as I should have, but I figured it was probably better to be too short than too long-winded. I didn't think it was that impressive, but everyone later kept complimenting me on what a good speech it was. That surprised me a bit, but perhaps it is quite simply that I'm a confident public speaker, which not many people are. It's definitely a good trait to have, and I suppose I'm lucky that I don't get nervous, even when speaking to rooms packed with 250-300 people.
I was immediately mobbed after my speech, and really did try my best to give attention to everyone and answer their questions, but I did find the attentions of the crowd somewhat overwhelming. And then to my surprise, when I looked up from the crowd, I saw coming towards me The Norwegian, who I hadn't seen since the Young Dutchman's birthday dinner. Again it took me a half-a-second to recognise who on earth he was (I always seem to blank for a second when I see him), but he came over and said hello and told me what a pleasure it was to see me.
So we chatted, and he actually seemed interested in joining the O&C, and so I set him up with the necessary forms and things, and then as we were just catching up and chatting, out of nowhere he asked, "Why doesn't the Young Dutchman have a girlfriend?" I mean seriously, most out-of-left-field kind of question.
Which means, of course, I was therefore keen to give it my best attempt at an answer.
And so I tried going with the "Californication" explanation, which I had discussed with the Young Dutchman before as his theory of his attitude towards women. As I told the Norwegian, "It's not that the Young Dutchman doesn't like girls (obviously!), but rather that he likes them too much. He's got this amazing capacity to see so many good things in so many people, he just finds lots and lots and lots of girls he likes. So while on some level he might want to be the 'boyfriend' kind of guy who sticks to just one girl, because hey, isn't that what society and everybody wants, it kind of goes against his natural inclination to just like everybody."
To which the Norwegian listened, paused, and then said.... "I think I may have that problem."
Okay, now perhaps he meant it totally seriously, as though he'd just come to a great realisation about his own life. Yet I had to restrain a snort. Seriously? His problem is that he can't settle on just one woman? Given that I was talking to the ultimate computer science-dork who is so excited to kiss girls that he brags about it and then never calls them back (not exactly the best strategy for getting dates), the idea that his problem was that he dated too many women was just preposterous to me. (Although he had arrived with a sweet Asian girl who I was never clear on what his relationship to her was. I assumed just a friend from college who he was going to a party with later, but who ever really knows?)
I did have fun teasing him a bit about how he had never called me, at which point he said to me, "You've got to give me another chance!" So I got out my phone and he plugged his number into it, and I entered his name into my phone with his details. Although he gave me such a confused look when I entered his name into my phone that I did pause for a moment to think, "That IS his name, right? I haven't gotten this wrong again?" Yet he didn't correct me, so I shrugged and went with it. Follow-up note: He never did call, but at least added me as a friend on Facebook. So that's progress, I guess...
Too soon however, it was time for us all to go to dinner at Gonville and Caius college, and everyone there seemed to be progressing on to their next event anyway. So I departed with the crowd from the club, and we made our way into Gonville and Caius for dinner.
It was neat as we walked into college, I was reminded once again how stepping into college is always like stepping into silent cloisters, how as soon as you pass through college gates, the world outside ceases to exist. We made our way through the college and up a creaky old wooden staircase, and into a private SCR dining room.
I found myself seated at the end of the table (unfortunate, but somebody has to take that seat I suppose), with an older gentleman, Julian, on my left and across from one of the older female staff members of the club.
The conversation was at times interesting and dull, although two stories stand out as being particularly funny...
At one point one of the men at the table started talking about how he was from Iran, but had left in 1980, and the conversation around the table turned to how Iran in the 1970's was completely unrecognizable from what it is today. After all, women wore bikinis to the beach in the 1970's, and everyone walked down the streets in shorts and tank tops, Iran in the 70's looked much the same as the US in the 70's. A far cry now from the women who all cover themselves from head-to-toe and live such lives of repression. And ask we were talking, we seemed to come to agreement that "being able to dress how you want is one of the most basic freedoms in life. One should really be able to wear what you want."
At which point, the older female staff member jumped in to say, "Except at the club, of course!"
We then all cracked up at that, the idea that the club, with its required "jacket and tie" dress code is an oppressive Iranian regime. Best line of the night.
I also did find myself explaining to the older men at the club why real tied bow-ties are so much better than pre-tied ones, explaining how you can seduce a guy by untying them. Whereas with a pre-tied bow-tie...there isn't that way that you can sidle up to a guy and pull on the end of the tie to pull him close. The older men seemed to get a good laugh at this, and one of the older guys gave a chuckle about how he wouldn't wear tied bow-ties then because he was married, and his wife was "perfectly adequate". I laughed at that one, saying how I hoped one day there might be a man to describe me as "perfectly adequate."
Too soon however, we had to jump into cabs to make the train back to London. I actually went with the group that was catching the second-to-last train (as opposed to the last train) back to London, that we might actually be able to make it onto the Tube as well.
I found myself on the train with a young guy, Ollie, who has recently joined the club and become involved. I took a picture out the window when we passed Stevenage to send to the Tall South African, and we had a good laugh at that one.
The photo I took of Stevenage and texted to the Tall South African. He replied the next morning "Ha ha! I work near the shiny red lights!"
Finally we arrived back in London, and departed to our various Tube lines at differing points as we parted company throughout King's Cross Station. I parted company with the head of the Membership Committee (an older man who I like very much) at Oxford Circus, and skipped on down to make my transfer to the Central Line.
You can imagine then my surprise, catching one of the last Central Line trains of the evening on a Friday night, when I ran into a member of my running club and his girlfriend! In a massive city like London, with 8 million people, you don't generally just run into people like that. So it was an unexpected surprise, and good company for the wait on the platform and a few stations. Finally at last however, I was off back home, on the last train on a Friday night!
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