GLAZING

We're still putting windows into the new building; yesterday I found myself unable to watch as the glazing for the north lantern was being craned into place. The sheet of glass hung there from those huge suction caps in a way that seemed barely feasible, and it was all too much for my imagination. We walked around last Friday, with some senior officers from the City Council, and I was rather taken by surprise by how far from finished it all appeared, but apparently we are still due to finish in a couple  of weeks. I was a bit disconcerted by one of the council officers asking me whether the exterior was going to be brick, but of course what they were looking at was a large section waiting for its glazing to be installed. When I pointed out that the main facade material is our glazed faience, which is already complete, they understood and were duly impressed. At that point the faience was still concealed by scaffolding, so we took them to a different elevation where it is more visible, and they loved it; whenever we take people to see the faience at close quarters they get excited by it. I'm just keen now to be able to reveal the extension in all its glory.

I am preparing a couple of children for First Communion, and the only practical way is to see them individually in their own (or their granny's) home. Not especially efficient use of my time, but actually the only way to get it done. The weekend before last I was perturbed to hear mention of one of those two venues on the television news, and when I looked into it I discovered that it was not only the same street, but actually the same block, that had been the site of a stabbing. The victim died. At the time there was talk of a dispute over a woman, but now drugs and gangs are mentioned. When I asked my candidate's granny (who is my age, I should point out) about it, she remarked that it was a reminder that "although we live in St John's Wood" awful things could still happen here, as anywhere in London.

This conversation brought home to me how much perceptions matter in these things, because I wouldn't have supposed her neighbourhood to be immune, but nor would I have called it St John's Wood. Yes, her flat is just off St John's Wood Road, but it's also not far from Maida Vale, and is part of a sprawl of social housing that runs through to Lisson Grove. I dare say estate agents would call it St John's Wood, but why would we believe them? The whole point of St John's Wood Road is that it leads TO St John's Wood (unlike St John's Wood High Street, for instance) so it actually isn't in St John's Wood itself. It is, in any case, a sort of boundary, with much more prosperous territory to the north, but more diversity to the south, at least going east until you reach Lisson Grove. I once had a parishioner who insisted on telling people that he lived in St John's Wood, despite the fact that his flat was just off Edgware Road, near Church Street Market. I'm not even sure that he was in the right postcode, but nothing would shake him from the belief that he must be in a smart area. London neighbourhoods are amorphous things, but what you call your area can be bound up with your own perception of it (let alone other people's perceptions). For instance, I always say that I am in Paddington, whereas I could perfectly justifiably say Little Venice, but the latter just doesn't reflect the reality of the Warwick Estate, or the whole diversity of the area.

Organising a wedding is quite a faff, isn't it? I had thought we would make this a simple and informal affair, but all sorts of stuff seems to have crept in that requires choosing and organising (and paying for). Meanwhile, I keep wondering whether there isn't something which we have simply both forgotten as we are pretty much doing this by ourselves, unlike young people who always seem to have a gaggle of family and friends advising and suggesting. Still, if we haven't thought of it, it can't be important to us, can it?

We've had a couple of "test events" in the refurbished church. They were meant to be test events for the new facilities in the extension, but since that isn't finished yet, it was all a bit provisional. Anyway, we managed to host an immersive theatre production involving local teenagers (which was attended by the Lord Mayor and the MP as well as all sorts of local worthies), and a training day for the Waterways Chaplaincy (who had brilliant cake). Nobody died. Nobody fused the lights. The portaloos coped. That, in my view, was success. And, of course, loads more people came into the church and went "Wow!"