A water canal with trees and small bridges crosses east London, and yesterday I fell into it. This would have been less embarrassing had I been able to blame my fall on the immediate suspects nearby – the impatient cyclers, the proud mothers galloping with their strollers or the flock of antisocial swans.
Follow Israel Hayom on Facebook and Twitter
But the truth of the matter is that I walked into the ditch all by myself, right into the light-green water that reflects the sun due to its thickness.
In fact, it was this thickness that led me to believe that the water was just a continuation of the pavement. The event, it turned out, was particularly amusing for Ravid, the coronavirus-immune Tzvi, and the absent-minded Yoram, who had just gone up the bridge at that moment when they heard my splash, despite being far away from me.
Upon hearing this noise, they turned their heads and all they saw was a takeaway coffee cup floating in the water, all by itself, without any signs of life of the man who had just held it a moment earlier. The same man who had ridiculed them for taking an unnecessary detour….
After emerging from the water, we sat on the dam in the center of the canal. I was a great sport in accepting the banter on my expense and looked with envy at those near me with dry clothes and hot coffee.
"This is the craziest period I have ever experienced," Tzvi tried to console me. "You can't concentrate, you don't know what will happen next week. You were probably looking at your phone," he continued. I immediately clarified that my phone was in my pocket and then blurted out a swearword. I then immediately realized: Forget about the coffee, what about my iPhone that had been killed in action?
"You are not focused because you are flying to Israel on Friday," Yoram said, and I immediately concurred. Even in normal times, in the runup to a flight to Israel, I feel bifurcated between the two countries, not really present in either.
This is all the more true during these days when there is no way of knowing what the airports will look like and what we should expect in terms of isolation and flights. Ravid and I walk in the parks in London as criminals who had been sentenced to death and are unwilling to separate from the sweet freedom that we had taken for granted.
"Maybe this fall is symbolic," I muttered.
"The distorted return to normalcy, walking forward in anticipation of finding a solid footing only to discover that we have been sinking in the filthy water in the ditch. This is like that week we went to SOHO to see how the stores reopen but rather than find the lost routine, we discovered that Oxford Street is empty, that the stores won't let you try clothes on and that the coffee shops won't let you use the bathroom, so I eventually took a leak behind some bush in a park," I said.
To which Ravid replied: "This is an interesting take, but as someone who keeps forgetting where he has left his keys and has lost two Kindles and a passport over the past two years, perhaps you have now set a new record in absent-mindedness."
I looked at Ravid with a frown, and he kicked me, smiling. The sun began to rise in the sky and the clothes began to dry in the warm breeze. Tzvi and Yoram said they had to go to work, and Ravid extended me his hand and we went to buy face masks. Their texture feels good, so there is a good chance that we won't suffocate from them on our flight.
Subscribe to Israel Hayom's daily newsletter and never miss our top stories!
