be you upstanding

That is one of my favorite phras­es in the Eng­lish (as opposed to Amer­i­can) lan­guage.  “Be you upstand­ing,” intones the music mas­ter at Avery’s school, at the end of the Sum­mer Con­cert (I shall leave it to you to find Avery in this pho­to!), for all of us to clear our throats and sing “I Vow To Thee My Coun­try.”  Now, at times like this, I put aside the small feel­ing that “my coun­try” is not this one, because at moments when I am at my child’s school, cel­e­brat­ing the beau­ty of her Eng­lish edu­ca­tion, it IS my coun­try.  I’m more than hap­py to vow to it.

This coun­try has giv­en us so much: Avery’s place at her two blessed schools, our friends who find our Amer­i­can­ness a beloved trait, the pageantry of Avery rid­ing in Hyde Park, the gor­geous Eng­lish pro­duce in our gro­cery stores, the peo­ple who have made our lives here a com­plete joy.  Roc­co, my dar­ling ten­nis instruc­tor, who loves noth­ing more than for me to bring him an apple and banana cake, and then spend an hour teach­ing me to heal my ten­nis elbow.  Tony, my fish­mon­ger, who was hap­py to wave me off to Amer­i­ca, but said he’d miss my “cus­tom.”  Brooks, the snack place of choice, with its piles of delec­table brown­ies, lemon tarts and cook­ies for Avery’s after-school treats, glad that I came to tell them we were leav­ing for 52 days… “We’d have thought you stopped lov­ing us!” they said, laugh­ing.  “See you in September.”

The suit­cas­es are packed: lacrosse sticks for a cer­tain some­one who we are sure will LOVE them, red chi­na tea sets for a cou­ple of oth­er small peo­ple who will clap their hands in glee, birth­day presents for my moth­er, my cher­ished apron fold­ed care­ful­ly in antic­i­pa­tion of many, MANY cel­e­bra­to­ry meals to be cooked for Amer­i­can fam­i­ly and friends, favorite nov­els we can’t live with­out for two months, bathing suits for the POOL, recipes I’ve put aside all spring and sum­mer, plan­ning to cook them “when I have time for some­thing new that might bomb.”

The last gifts have been giv­en to teach­ers, the last hugs to friends leav­ing for board­ing school, the last trip to Lost Prop­er­ty to sort through some unex­pect­ed junk, includ­ing a first for me: a pack­et of cig­a­rettes?  Come on, girls, you are too bright for this!  The last sweaty game of ten­nis, the last filled dish of cat food… all those fun­ny mile­stones that mean the end of our Lon­don life, the nev­er-nev­er­land of trav­el tomor­row, and then… HOME.

So… Be you upstand­ing.  Give your vows to those who love you, whether it’s Amer­i­ca or Eng­land, or BOTH.  That’s the glo­ry of our lives!  We get both.  See you in the States.