JULY 6 8:02 PM. Edinburgh.

This is more like it. This is a proper city.

“It’s an Englishman’s idea of a Scottish capital,” said the bus driver when he was slagging it off. This says more about either group than he may realize.

Edinburgh ticks all the boxes. The architecture is more somewhat more restrained and sedate, with the occasional insanely filigreed monument.

First stop: Calton Hill, aka the hill with all the old stuff on it.

The object on the banner above is a monument to an Enlightenment Guy, and hence is suitably classical and intellectual. There was an observatory up here, and while the dome is still there - its gears and teeth and rotating mechanism intact, like something out of Myst - it has been filled with precious little bits of modern art, which of course asks us to interrogate the relationship between - are you ready? TIME AND SPACE. Even better, time and space “according to the theories of (some dude, can’t recall.)

There is a strange half-finished structure, and you think its incompleteness is intentional, standing for some job yet undone.

But what is it for? It is the National Monument of Scotland, the memorial for the soldiers and sailors who died in the Napoleonic Wars, which was somehow surprising. That was so very long ago. But here it is. Stark and unmodified as the day it was erected. You think: two thousand years from now, will it have fallen? Will its ruins be a tourist attraction? Will they rebuild it according to the wishes of the Lost Ancients? Who was this Napoleon, anyway?

They’ll probably know. After all, we know of Caesar.

Anyway, its incompleteness gives it the quality of an abstraction, which would be quite a modern idea for the time. Why, I could write an entire paper on the Enlightment ideas as manifested by an unfinished building, how it symbolizes man's search for refinement and completion, and . . .

It was designed during 1823–6 by Charles Robert Cockerell and William Henry Playfair and is modeled upon the Parthenon in Athens. Construction started in 1826 and, due to the lack of funds, was left unfinished in 1829. This circumstance gave rise to various nicknames such as "Scotland's Folly", "Edinburgh's Disgrace", "the Pride and Poverty of Scotland" and "Edinburgh's Folly”.

NEVERMIND

There was a Nelson’s monument, designed by a fellow named Robert Burn. No doubt he tired of the jokes. No I don't have a twin by the same name which would mean we are a poet when get together ha ha good one tho.

From there we wandered westward, looking for a place to sit and eat a panini. Marveled at the Walter Scott memorial, claimed as the world's largest memorial for a writer. Seems about right.

We headed up into the New Town, which was built along the enlightened lines - a rational grid with long “palace facades” that tied blocks of apartments together. One of them was restored to its original state, and why yes we would like to tour.

The former home of Mr. Lamont, a landed gentleman who apparently sold off his various properties to fund his indolent society lifestyle. Another visitor either had permission or decided the risk was worth it:

In one room an elderly docent asked where we were from, her first question in pointing us to something specific in the room. “Minnesota” presented a challenge. She settled on telling us that if we were French, we would enjoy this newspaper account of the fall of the Bastille. They had original papers, and since I know a bit about the newspapers of the period we had a nice chat about that, exchanging observations about the layout, the precision (justified right, hand set, 1789!)

At some point in the main salon I saw a picture of a temple by a stream, read the notes about how it was a nearby structure by the river, and thought “wife’s going to hear about this SOMEHOW and we’re destined to go find it.” Which is what happened. SOMEHOW. We headed up in the wrong direction, ended up in Stockbridge, had a coffee, then set out to find it.

This is late 1880s. Sherlock time. It strums such a broad deep chord. Why? English confidence and solidity and good intentions, a solid Anglo future built on these noble works.

Like I said, everything here just feels like I am a human tuning fork struck once and resonating all day.

Where's the modern world? Elsewhere.

Then the rain came as we were trying to find supper. We made the mistake of going down Rose, which was mostly pubs for the people watching soccer, piled inside in humid human masses. Eventually ended up at a place I’d seen at the start of our peregrinations, and it was snug and civilized. It's on the left, the white portion of the building.

This was our street. Waterloo. Swing around and you'll see the 19th century without a tall glass structure in sight.

We found a pub that said there’d be live music. Not packed. Not mad. The singer came in with his dog, Poppy, who was worried every time he left to get his gear.

I had a bit of a genial disputation with the barkeep, who disparaged all my whisky and whiskey choices, especially the latter, and I gathered I was in the presence of a whisky snob. He recommended something I finally tried, which had a middle note of soap.

Day one concluded. My new favorite city.

SUNDAY, July 7 10:51 PM Back from the Whiski, where the band was loud and the scotch abundant and the accent in the man at the next table absolutely impenetrable, but, after much shouting and pantomiming, I discerned that he wanted to know how late the pub was open. He asked where I was from and what brought me here, and I said the train from Glasgow but before that, America, and he told me that if you want to experience true Scotland you go to Glasgow so it was good that I had been there. We somehow got talking about guitarists and he had a recommendation and then a fist bump and I said “shake hands, like a man,” and he grinned and gave me a bone crusher and I returned it in kind.

Then we said good night to the couple with whom we’d shared the table, Steve and his wife, midlanders, on vacation as well, although Steve was born here in a tenement. In between songs we shared child and dog photos. The band played “Stuck in the Middle with You” and I had to shout that I loved Gerry Rafferty, the poor drunk, and his second album Snakes and Ladders kicked off with a song called “The Royal Mile,” and here we all were having a wee dram on the Royal Mile, so a toast: to Gerry Rafferty.

That kind of night. We had begun the evening at the World’s End, where Sara was fascinated by the way the staff closed off a corner that had three tables. Why? What was the point? Since they closed at ten we decided that they had closed it off to make it easier to clean. You have no idea how much this mystery occupied our minds.

What of the rest of the day? Well.

It began with another grand breakfast, then moved into Old Town to see the wares at the Tron Kirk, a disused church that now sells crafty items from locals. Eh. From there to the National Gallery, and I could tell that Sara was not in a painting museum room, so I was content to whip through faster than I would’ve liked. One room was astonishing, though - a DaVinci, three Raphaels, a Botticelli, and I knew now of them. Which makes you think “could be School Of,” and that might be the case with the DaVinci, although he probably did the faces.

Next: Gladstone Place, where another restored house shows you the life of the people who’d gone before.

Old drawing, which I've enhanced a bit. The top floor, where the menfolk laborers lived:

Computer, enhance

A collection of the things a working man might put up on the wall for his amusement. Ads, theater pictures, an actress chewing on cherry stems.

		Can we find her?

Yes, we can.

Ray was considered one of the most beautiful actresses on the London stage and became one of the most photographed women in the world. In the first decade of the 20th century, she had a good career in musical theatre. After an unsuccessful marriage, she returned to the stage, but she never recovered the fame that she had enjoyed. She later struggled with depression and spent her last 37 years in a mental hospital.

I also noted some news stories.

All these years later, the name is still infamous.

Downstairs a fellow who looked as if he was a punk in 1977 explained all the details of the draper’s shop. He made us wear bonnets for a picture.

The level below had a living room, and then a nice cafe where I had a sausage roll for lunch. Around the corner to . . .