The Birmingham Sojournal - Day Two

On the plane, after I had settled into my seat with my feet on the bag of pillow and blanket and covered myself up under my jacket, I was awoken I-don’t-know-how-much later by the woman in the seat next to mine when she needed to get up to use the bathroom. When she returned I thought I might have to use the facilities soon myself, but I sat back down and covered up under my jacket again.

The next time I awoke, sunlight streamed into the cabin, and the flight attendants were wheeling out the breakfast service. There was less than one hour left until landing at London/Heathrow. I had slept almost the entire flight!!

The cabin crew handed out the landing cards for UK immigration, and as I filled out mine I realized that I didn’t know Mark’s address. I entertained the thought of fudging it, but I figured I could just call him when I landed...until I remembered that my phone would be useless in the UK. If I pled my case to the immigration official, I would probably be allowed to call him...and then I realized that, despite all the times I wrote down his number for others, I had never written them down for myself. Okay, so I could call directory assistance and hope to reach Sue, who could then tell me their address. But then I thought that I would probably remember the address by the time it got to that point.

When it got to that point, I still had not recalled their address. And I fudged it for the immigration agent. While standing in the immigration line, I wrote “86 Sheldon Way, Sheldon, Birmingham” as Mark’s address on the immigration form; I was WAY off! The agent asked me what sort of place the address was where I was to stay, and I told him it was my friend’s house. He asked me who my friend was, and I told him. He asked me how I knew this friend, and I told him, realizing how absurd it actually sounded. He asked how long I had known this friend, and I told him, adding that I had visited him in 2005, hoping that would make our original acquaintance sound less absurd.

The immigration agent allowed me in, though I was technically entering the country illegally!

I was early, at least according to Mark’s calculations. He estimated that immigration and bag claim would have me out the doors between 11:00 and 11:30 a.m. The flight had landed maybe only ten minutes early, but the immigration line for non-E.U. passport holders was short and quick-moving, and my bag came out quickly as well. I was standing on the curb by 10:30! I waited, wearing my agreed-upon, easily-spotted Cubs cap, until about 11:10, when I saw a black Land Rover Defender 110 enter the short-stay car park; it was the only Defender I saw in the entire time I stood out there, so I just knew it was Mark.
Or was it? I thought I recalled that he would come to the curb to look for me, so now I wasn’t sure it was him after all. There could be someone else with a Defender 110 coming to the airport, right? I didn’t want to head inside to try to find him and wind up actually missing him at the curb. What to do?

I caved to the fear and I headed inside. And I realized very quickly that I would never find him in that throng!

Meanwhile, as I found out later, Mark was himself embroiled in an ordeal. To keep it brief, he was misled by signage to a parking area for “high-sided” vehicles, only when he got to the barrier it wouldn’t let him in. He thought his Defender was over seven feet tall, but it isn’t, and the sensor that senses the height of vehicles didn’t sense his, so no entry was allowed. After dealing with a couple of parking attendants who couldn’t be bothered to actually help him, he went in search of the car park supervisor.

I left the madding crowd in the arrivals area and headed back outside. When I had earlier entered, I had noticed a door leading into a coffee shop in the arrivals area, though I walked past it. I saw it again from inside, and this time I decided to take it, as it would save me quite a few steps to get back to the curb. As I stepped outside from that doorway, I saw across the way from me, as well as across the way from where I had earlier been standing at the curb, a man who looked from a distance of about 100 yards a lot like Mark! He stepped briefly inside the valet booth there and came out again.

When I had decided to head inside to look for Mark, I had very dutifully walked to the crosswalks and made my meandering way in. Now, as this person who looked like Mark stood across from me, I made my way toward him across two lanes of traffic where there was no crosswalk. I was already criminally present in England; why fear crossing a roadway illegally?

As I crossed, the man who looked like Mark looked in my direction and set off determinedly toward me. It was Mark! We approached each other quickly, and as we closed the last few feet between us, I was without doubt he was Mark, but he glared past me as he trudged along.

“Mark?” I said as he went by.

The man turned to look at me. “OH! Christ! TONY! I’m sorry! I didn’t even see you!” He threw his arms out and hugged me. Then, as we walked back to his car, he told me about his ordeal, and why he didn’t see me from only feet away, and that, while he ventured off to find the car park supervisor, he had parked illegally. I felt right at home with a fellow criminal!

Very soon we were on the road north toward Birmingham, engaged in what would become the main activity during my visit — talking. About halfway to Birmingham we stopped for lunch at The Orange Tree, a nice pub in apparently a very posh area. The women there were very attractive and very attractively dressed. The Orange Tree became the frequent off-hand joke of where I wanted to go “tomorrow.”

When we arrived at Mark’s home, Sue came outside to greet me and welcome me inside. After a cup of tea and a brief chat, they suggested I take my things upstairs and have a quick nap, and I took them up on it.

Later, Mark knocked on the door to get me moving again, and when I got downstairs there was already-cold Domino’s pizza in the kitchen. Ordering pizza had been mentioned, and we had discussed a one-hour nap, but it would appear that Mark and Sue opted to let me sleep a little longer to catch up, and they went ahead and ate when they were ready. When I came down Sue heated up a couple slices for me, and I ate while watching some telly with them.

After dark, Mark and I headed over to his parents’ home where his brother, Colin, was visiting for the day. We went in, I was introduced to the parents, and we gathered up Colin to head over to The Griffin Inn for a couple of pints.

After only a brief stay — we were there maybe an hour — we brought Colin back to the folks’, headed to an “Off Licence” to pick up a couple bottles of wine, and then back to Mark’s where we sat to watch some telly and sip wine with Sue.