A letter to London

Dear London,

It's good to meet you. In fact...it's incredible to meet you. I already feel like you're a great friend. I hope you feel the same way too. I'm glad you're so full of wisdom and history. You may not be an old friend...but you are OLD friend. I don't know how you carry on. So many people have fallen in love with you. Thanks for making a space for me. I'm sure I will make our friendship worth while....I don't see how I couldn't. Every second I'm with you I realize there is a lot you know that I don't. I hope you'll share some secrets with me.

I really enjoy the quaint streets you possess. I know, most people don't notice, but the little streets lined with beautiful flats are my favorite part about you. I guess it's ironic that I love the most simple part of a city with such complexity.

I enjoyed running around in Hyde park today. I like that you have parks.. Some time the city is too much too handle. But you bring a beautiful combination of nature and city. I've fallen in love with you. You feel like home. You are so full of life that I wouldn't mind being just by myself. I look forward to being alone with you.

Love, Fran

Hoe Street :)

Okay so the first news of my ward was that it's located on Hoe Street...so that was promising.

But after taking the Queensway tube, tranferring to Victoria tube, taking that for 45 minutes, then getting a little lost and finally walking for a half an hour we found our way to the White Chapel ward. Never have I felt so welcomed and comfortable in a new ward. So many people came talked to us and wanted to know all about our experience so far. The ward is small and everyone seems more than happy to be there.Bishop Odoi is great looking black man who can't be more than 33 and his wife Vida..well... she is loud and wonderful. No calling has been given yet but I'm more than looking forward to getting one. I've always been intimidated to get a teaching calling because, the experience of BYU wards calls for knowledge and a wow factor. In student wards it seems like people want to be impressed. But this ward is nothing like that, everyone feels comfortable and everyone is accepting that we are all learning the gospel at our own pace in our own way. Seriously I couldn't feel more at home in this ward and it's only the first week.

But wait! The best part was when we sat down before sacrament meeting started and a little black boy who must have been 7 or 8 got up and practiced his musical number "praise to the man" The spirit became so strong and it was so precious that I got a little teary eyed. :) I'm so happy to be here. I love London

National Gallery

The National Gallery yesterday...wow

Just try to remember 5th or 6th grade humanities when your teacher so boldly tried to teach you who Monet, and Vincent Van Gogh were. And though it may not have been significant or meaningful to you for some reason you will ALWAYS remember the images of their paintings these artists so beautifully mastered...even though you had no respect or appreciation for them.

BUT THEN!! You're wandering around the HUGE National Gallery looking at the TONS AND TONS of paintings and you look over, and there it is. A painting of sunflowers done by Van Gogh himself, and even though you didn't care before, now it feels like you just saw a celebrity. 'Cause there it is!! I've seen so many pictures of this painting through my whole life that to actually see it, just sitting there mounted on a wall was like finishing a 19 year long game of Where's Waldo. I knew what it looked like but I had finally found it. And that's not the only one. There were Davinci's and Rembrandts too, and once again I'm reminded Frances you're in LONDON! and I get super excited like I just barely arrived.

Being someone who never really appreciated art before...I'm repenting. In our walks class we go to gallery's and spend hours, and one of the challenges is to sit and look and write about a painting for half an hour. the painting I stared so intently at was by Johannes Vermeer "Young woman standing at a virginal" I still don't know what a virginal is...and I need to find out so...research is on it's way! But for some reason this one painting kept coming back to me and I wanted to study it. OF COURSE it was the one painting that was in a room with no bench. So like a real art student I sat on the floor and let annoyed tourists snap pictures and walk around me. I stared at this picture for ever and wrote about what I saw and what I felt. Even when I didn't really understand it, it felt like that painting was made just for me. Just for this one day of sitting in a museum; Johannes Vermeer painted this picture so I would be completely amazed and dumbfounded by a girl painted in 1672 who seemed to be staring into my soul.....

I love London.

Home Away From Home

Well I've made it to London..Got here on Tuesday..it's Thursday and I've been to

3 museums

Globe Theater

6 tube trips

4 double decker bus trips

And I'm sure I've walked about 13 miles..I'm LOVING MY LIFE

This city is PACKED with stuff to do.. three and a half months is NOT enough time

Off to Never, Never Land

Well..It's Aug 29th...One AM

If anyone doesn't know what that means I will tell you....

I'm going to London today. Going through security, boarding a plane, studying in Europe, becoming educated and sophisticated......Pretending like I'm all grown up and I can do things by myself.

Bring it on.

The Spot That You Hold.

Through Boxes and pictures, digging for notes.

Something to cling to that gives me some hope.

I want a new memory to play in my head

A yearning so hopeless, you’re better off dead

It would leave me with absence that’s, so definite, so closed

That no gap in my heart would be kept for your home

But you are still out there, so I still leave a space.

You go on through your life and you still own a place.

Up for sale, and no takers, so it says “empty lot”

The sign that reminds me I’m still someplace you’re not

Is it selfish of me to want you to stay

To know you’d be with me if I had my way

But who you are now, is not what I want.

I want the old you to stay in this spot.

Now as quick a gun shot and as sharp as a knife.

I find who I wanted, no longer has life.

Walking dead to me, you’ve got life but no soul,

At least not the same soul for the spot that I hold.

Naive Orleans

Life goes on