Getting About


Tim Hinton was not a very close friend of mine when we were fellow-sufferers at LWC, aka the London Water Closet, but I did my best to show him some of Oxford. He wanted to take lots of photos around a central theme and "Oxford" seemed to fit the bill.
 

I think Tim's pictures are brilliant, as he has the splendid images of the magnificent old university buildings and he also has some rather ordinary, everyday life pictures of people getting on with their normal lives.
 

One of the first places I took Tim was up the spire of the university church, St Mary the Virgin. I wanted to give him an aerial view, so that he would get some idea of where everything was.


 
Unfortunately, Tim also took quite a few photos of me! Did I really look so innocent, so fresh and naive? What would this young man say about the 67-year-old writing these words? What would pearls of wisdom would I have given to him? And would he - would I - have listened?
 

For my first two years in Oxford I was in college, with shared rooms on staircase 9 in my first year and then my own rooms in the Margary quad tower in my second year.
 

My third year was in a rather squalid bedsit in Norham Gardens and my fourth and final year was in the House of Saint Gregory and Saint Macrina, up the Woodstock Road. St. Greg's was just past Little Clarendon Street, otherwise known as Little Trendy Street because of all the bijou boutiques and overpriced, fashionable shops. 


Looking at these old photos of Oxford is rather bittersweet for me. There were many happy and hilarious moments, mind-expanding experiences and enjoyable times, but there were also periods of doubt, drifting with a lack of direction. Yes, there was always the beauty and the charm of my surroundings. 


Did I work hard? Was I a very studious student when I was at Oxford? No, I was not. Perhaps I just wanted to enjoy my time, making up for more than seven dreary years at LWC. Or maybe, having got into Oxford and achieved my goal, I had no focus, no real purpose for being there.






 
    

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