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Every country has its national pastime, and for British people, it is following rules, being obedient and then complaining about it. I began to miss my family more than usual during the early months of last year’s lockdown, so I decided to sublet my apartment in Los Angeles and move back to England for six months, which was a lucky move since ten months later, UK citizens are mostly banned from travelling (the British government website states, “it is illegal to travel abroad for holidays”). The hidden blessing within this draconian imprisonment is that we get to complain.
An exception to this ban on international travel is if “you have a reasonable excuse to leave the UK.” I think it is perfectly reasonable to say that I have shpilkes and want to get on an airplane, travel to California and get high at a music festival. The last part is untrue because I don’t do recreational drugs, but at least I’ll sound like a credible Californian.
Another travel loophole is if you have to go on an essential trip, so my plan is to go to the British Foreign Office dressed up as a medieval knight and explain that it is essential that I travel to a US Renaissance fair as research for a newspaper column. I tried that strategy last week = but couldn’t get through the metal detector because of my chainmail bodysuit; the pedantic security guard muttered some weak excuse about not being allowed to bring a sword, axe and vat of boiling tar into a government building.
Another legitimate reason to travel is attending your own wedding, as long as one of the participants lives in the United States. I call this the “Las Vegas Chapel of Love loophole,” and it is now easier than ever to find a willing American bride using a site like www.DateBritishGuys.com. It’s also perfect for cash-strapped Englishmen since “Verified British Men Get 100% Free Membership.” I am still looking for a complimentary website called www.DateAnAmericanHeiress.com.
Although Americans have been vacationing across the United States, until recently it was forbidden for British people to travel outside of their immediate area. Some friends and family wouldn’t even drive five miles to meet me for a walk. Fortunately we didn’t have the extremes of Israel, where people were fined if they tried to leave their immediate home vicinity. We are allowed to drive north and visit Scotland, even though half of the Scottish people still hate us and would still love to leave the United Kingdom. Sadly for them, their animosity towards the English is unlikely to be cured by a vaccine.
There are some upsides to being stuck in the United Kingdom. England is a beautiful country, the homeland of Shakespeare and the location of the Warner Brothers film studios where Tom Cruise had his well-publicized (and well-justified) meltdown since not everyone was wearing masks on the set of Mission Impossible 7. Spring has now sprung, the trees have blossomed, some lockdown restrictions have eased, and the sun is shining. I keep my mouth shut on a 60-degree day when people say, “isn’t the weather beautiful?” and avoid responding, “beautiful? In Los Angeles this is the bleak midwinter.” Instead I join the local custom, strip off my clothes, jump in the river, catch a little hypothermia and sample the local waterborne disease.
There are some upsides to being stuck in the United Kingdom.
Last week I visited London, which is as beautiful as ever. Missing my weekly trips to Santa Monica and Malibu, the first beach I had seen in months was a three-foot wide strip of sand by the side of the River Thames. There were no surfers or yachts, but there also weren’t any bodies washing up, so that was a good thing.
The River Thames was vibrant, and I was intrigued to see a riverboat shuttle service that has been branded Uber Boats. Coincidentally, the word uber is the same as the Hebrew ubar, meaning pregnant. Ubar is a kabbalistic concept of reincarnation when a body is “pregnant” with a temporarily-visiting soul.
In 1777, Samuel Johnson famously said that “when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.” One day we will be allowed to travel again, but in the meantime, there is much to enjoy in the nation that brought you Jane Austen, William Shakespeare and Love Island. Life is pregnant with possibility.
On social @marcusjfreed
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