Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Tears in London (Part two)

If I told you right away where the next place was that I cried, you would think I was a nut case, so let me ease you into the story.

My mother was a wonderful woman who loved to jump in mudpuddles and play in the backyard with her kids.   She baked chocolate chip cookies for us for our afterschool snacks. She and my sister Cindy, ate ice cream for lunch on a regular basis. She was fun!  She had an unlikely hero in her life... Peter Pan. The idea of never growing up appealed to her a great deal.

It seems that there is genetic dispensation toward this attitude. I have been accused of living the same motto and it seems like my eldest daughter is also prone toward being child-like (notice, I didn't say childish. :) )


Years ago, we found out that there was a Peter Pan statue in London (through watching the movie, "Hook"!). Needless to say, with that history in our family, we were going to try to make the statue one of our stops, but first we had to find it.

We got really close on the second day. Late in the evening, we were walking through Hyde Park. We were tired and our feet hurt. We decided to head back to our hotel. As we were going, I glanced up at a sign and saw the words "Peter Pan" with the arrow pointing the opposite direction. We decided that the next day we would begin our day there at the park, rent bikes, and go find that statue.

So early (Okay, not too early.) the next morning we arrived back at Hyde Park and tried to rent a bike. This process, which should have taken about 5 minutes, took us about 45. After putting our credit card in and out of the machine about five times, getting two codes and attempting to take the bikes out of their racks, we finally were riding. We rode for about 10 minutes trying to follow signs to the Statue. We finally figured out that it was in the Kensington Gardens, the park right next to Hyde Park.

We headed that way on our bikes and then found out that you can't ride bikes in most of Kensington Gardens!  So we got Off our bikes and walk them through the park and finally (about 30 minutes later and after asking directions numerous times) found the statue. What I found out while I was there was that Barrie secretly erected the statue in the middle of the night so it appeared "as if by magic". I love that!

 A little girl was visitng the statue at the same time we were. She circled that statue, touching each little animal that was part of its base. As she did so, she told her dad who they were. I don't know if she was making it up on the spot or if she knew more of the Peter Pan story than I did, but it was so very sweet to hear.

So that's when I got teary. I thought about my mom, my sister, my daughter, and the creative genius of J M Barrie. I know that it seems like a little thing when you think about our entire trip to London, but I have to say that it was a major highlight to our trip.



L

2 comments:

Gregg said...

It sure was fun once we got there.

Sheila Siler said...

So sweet, and totally fitting for you! If I ever make it to London, I'm going to try and see that statue too!