In the guest bathroom at my parents’ house hangs a frame with three prints of English castles. I don’t think I have been to any of those particular castles, but it made me remember a visit to a castle with Eric that I had forgotten.
Eric had a summer internship in London and I went to visit him there. I had just started dating my husband and I spent the entire flight over there listening to love songs and re-reading a letter he had written me. I still have that letter. I had no idea how serious we would eventually become, but I was in the throes of new love.
Eric and I had many adventures all over London and the near English countryside, but one of the funniest was a visit we took to a ruin of a castle. I don’t remember which one it was, it was ruined enough to not have a roof, or furniture or real walls separating most of the rooms; but not so ruined that it wasn’t part of the tourist scene. Eric and I splurged on the hand-held tour devices so we would have some idea of what we were looking at. The best way I can put it is; they didn’t help.
Eric and I are reasonably intelligent and educated people. He was a student at Harvard at the time, I had just graduated from Northwestern, and we couldn’t figure this out. I’m not sure I can truly convey the sense of hilarity we felt as the recorded voice told us to turn left and walk straight and we were facing a wall. Or another time when the very stiff upper lip British male voice told us to go right and up the stairs and the only thing there was a hole in the wall with quite a steep drop. I don’t think Eric and I learned anything about that castle, or castles in general, but we laughed until we dropped making fun of the recorded tour and creating our own.
Eric could help you find the fun in anything. I could easily see getting frustrated at a tour that I had paid extra for that was completely useless; but with Eric it was all part of the experience. And it actually made it a better experience.
I really miss that.
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