Living In England

How do you know you've really moved?

Get a mammogram - I’m all signed up for the NHS . Don’t be fooled into imagining a free ride with the national health—as a spousal visa holder with a right to live and work in this country, it COST. And I have to renew in two years and pay again. I needed to show all manner of proof that my British husband and I have lived together a good long while, filed tax returns together. But it was worth it. I got a letter saying I was eligible for a mammogram. It gave me a time and place. No “will that work for you?” (though you can go into the system and request a different date and time if needed).

The mammogram was fine, easy even. There’s no preamble, no gown, no wipes in case you’re wearing deodorant. No dressing room. Just get your top off right next to the machine, hold on to the bars. “That’s lovely,” the woman doing the tests said. A letter arrived ten days later saying everything was fine.

Go in for a cervical exam - or not. I received another NHS letter, saying I was eligible for a cervical exam which I took to mean the same as what we call a pap smear in the US. Here is where moving is really hard. I loved my gynecologist in New York, her office was in a little cottage at the edge of Hudson and we could talk about anything. She’d give me all the time I needed, became like a friend. The idea of going to some random doctor or nurse for such an intimate exam wasn’t appealing but I steeled myself and…

Walked to our local surgery. All the doctors/nurses are housed in this one building. That’s something I love about being in England in a town of this size - you can walk to one of a few supermarkets, the post office, a train station, library, pharmacy and some other shops and pubs and cafes. It’s a little limited cafe wise—Eric and I have actually sat in the local Costa a few times, the coffee choices are that dire—we’re not right on the sea any more, that takes a twenty minute car or train ride or a forty-five minute bus ride. But that’s not bad. Anyway, it’s one of the nicest things about living here: walking.

Off to see the doctor. “If it’s a guy, I ‘m out of there,” I told Eric. Surely they wouldn’t do that to a lady. I sat in the light and spacious waiting room, the building resembling a budget ski lodge. When it was my turn to see the nurse, we sat and chatted for a minute and then she tapped my info into her computer and “Oh I’m sorry,” she said. “You’re CEASED.” She showed me the letters glaring in all caps from the computer screen, like a giant OUT OF BUSINESS sign on the front window of a shop. “Sorry,” she said again. Turns out when you’re 65 or over in the UK, they no longer test you for cervical cancer.

“Does that mean you don’t care whether we live or die at this point?” She chuckled, assured me that wasn’t the case. “I don’t know what you’ve heard about the NHS,” she said. Looked around, even though the two of us were alone in a room with the door closed. We said the next part together, sotto voce: “It’s shit.” Somehow her being so willing to tell me that made me think it’s not completely shit, because she’s a real person who clearly cares about her job. And the fact that had I been under sixty-five they would have given me the test without making me jump through a bunch of hoops. Same with the mammogram. But clearly it’s a struggling system.

Finding a dentist is another trial. Forget finding one on the NHS, around here anyway. They’re proposing building a new housing development on the outskirts of our town. On the website where townspeople were encouraged to voice their opinions about this very bad idea, one of the main points against was the lack of comprehensive health services, especially dentists, nearby. Eric and I have a car or can take a train and willing to go to Norwich twenty five minutes away. We found someone there and then a friend confirmed they were good. Eric had an appointment first, and when he came back said “Don’t be alarmed - it’s above a shop and the waiting room smells like a care home or old dinners.” He must’ve seen the stricken look on my face. “But they’re really nice and the equipment all looked state of the art.” We thought back to our first dentist when we moved to the Hudson Valley: the place looked like a Florentine villa, with gurgling fountain in the plush waiting room, leather sofas and water with slices of cucumber and lemon. With prices to match. When Obamacare came along to help us in 2014, regular visits were covered in a much more modest practice.

The Norwich dentist seemed like she knew what she was doing. I paid the bill and thought I’d walk over to Marks & Spencer department store to change some money. Donald Trump had just been inaugurated president of the US and I thought it was probably a good time to turn dollars into—something, anything else. The dollars kind of smelled when I took them out of the envelope I’d stuck them in back in October at the end of my tour.

The lady at the Bureau de Change nodded approvingly— a good day to divest of dollars, the exchange rate was favorable. With pounds burning a hole in my pocket, I headed down to the lingerie section, tucked away in the basement. M&S is full of older couples, Eric and I had noticed on a previous visit. “Are we them? Are they us?” we’d asked ourselves, looking at all the white-haired dears in sturdy tweed and fleece, fingering socks and sweaters on sale. “Please don’t let us be them!” Was us noticing the possible similarities a way of warding off becoming the thing we feared? “We’re just taking a break from OUR WORK!” we wanted to shout. “We’re not RETIRED!” Not that there’s anything wrong with retirement. But for an artist it’s kind of like that nurse’s computer screen saying CEASED. Closed up shop, out of business. Not gonna happen, though sometimes I wish I had time to finally learn to bake, grow my own vegetables, make stained glass or walk the Pennines.

Anyway, down in ladies underwear, I was trying to figure out the system. There were bins of styles with corresponding sizes below the graphics: thong, Brazilian, bikini, boycut and full and those then divided into fabric choices. There were two elderly couples blocking every row, whichever way I turned. They were lovely really, reminding me of Celia and Alan in Last Tango In Halifax except with Norfolk accents instead of Yorkshire: “Ooh, you won’t see me in these anymore!” one of the ladies said, holding up a hot pink thong. The other lady waggled a large beige granny pant: “These are more my speed these days, sadly.” They all chuckled. Who brings their husband to the lingerie department on a double date?” I wanted to shout, though mentally I was joining in, wanting to weigh the merits of the boy short. I wanted to hear everything, at the same time afraid I’d catch that lack of self-awareness from them, that ability to just not give a fuck or maybe I wanted to ask them for tips “How do you become so carefree while wearing sensible shoes and availing yourself of the hot drink and a slice of cake meal deal in the cafe upstairs?”

All will be revealed to me this week I’m sure, because I turn sixty-six, which in this country qualifies me for: my bus pass. Free to ride buses all over England, after 9:30 AM weekdays, all day on the weekends. I already make regular use of my Senior Railcard discount but this is FREE. I feel grateful to be able to join this exclusive club. We’ll both work forever (Eric recording and me trying to revise this second damn memoir and I’ve just booked some dates for the US in April and my first solo event in Norwich at the American Library March, Germany maybe even Sweden in May) but every now and then it’s cool to jump on a bus, and better for the environment. My favorite destination is the beach, it’s gorgeous in the winter with nobody around and the tide seems to go way out, leaving even more beach to walk on and stones to examine

The town of Cromer, with its beautiful pier and shops and cafes, is still my favorite to visit. They have a few decent cafes, a good old-fashioned stationery store and a lot of charity shops. I usually stop into the Cancer Research one. It’s my own personal groundhog day in there: without fail, when I walk in “Young Girl” by Gary Puckett & The Union Gap is playing.”You must go crazy in here, listening to this song over and over,” I said to the woman who works there as she hung up skirts. “Every time I come into the shop, it’s playing!” “Oh, a favorite of yours then? That’s lovely!” “God no,” I said. “The song is trolling me…” The woman had moved on to sleeveless tops. I never loved the song, even as a kid, though there was no denying the vocal prowess of the singer. I also remember responding to the chorus, verse, chorus structure, the way those verses build to the inevitability of the chorus so you can’t help but want to sing along when it comes around again and again even though you feel sort of like a pervert for doing so, even when you are that young girl yourself. Ah the magic and mystery of pop music. I saw Gary Puckett on the Turtles Happy Together tour stop in Poughkeepsie in 2019 and he strode out onstage in the Union Gap jacket—then made a point of telling the audience “it still fits.” I can’t remember if he apologized at all for the cringey lyrics of Young Girl. He was still in fine voice.

Yes, whenever I walk into Cancer Research in Cromer, Young Girl is playing as I shift some hangers on the racks. It’s hard in the UK cause size 10 is size 14 and I’ve drifted up to size 12=16 the last half decade and there’s rarely anything above 14 that isn’t way on the matronly side of things. But I’m not really there to buy anything, just hear Young Girl. It’s that familiarity I cherish. Young Girl, the cringe I can cling to. I’ll be 66 on Monday, bus pass age. Donald Trump is back in the White House, and I’m living in England.

Pattern explosion - ready for my bus pass tomorrow