Diary of Lisa Taylor, reluctantly 42 (and a half)

Or.. 'f.ck me I'm forty.. two.. and a half', though can look 38 on a - not so deluded - good day. Or 'How to reconcile a well experienced mind trapped in a still - but for how long? – youthful body.' Don't have the 30somethings angst/problems, neither have the resigned (?) ageing baby-boomers in safe family territory outlook yet. Here's how I cope, one day all sexy women will get old... but never invisible. © Lisa Taylor 2005/6/7/8/9. Jeez.. so much for the 42 and-a-half delusion

Friday, December 03, 2010

2 December - Marmite & Memories

So, the other day I picked up a British Airways/Standard sponsored magazine which featured the 100 most influential people in London in arts/media/finance you know the type. As Toph says ‘You read every page, no wonder it takes you so long to read Sunday papers etc’. and my stock answer is always ‘That’s why I know so much more stuff than you do’. So am reading most of these peeps, and in the food section which is not that relevant to me as I don’t chase around the latest restaurant usually, it says that Ms Marmite Lover is ‘a guerrilla cook who pioneered the underground/pop up restaurant scene from her flat in Kilburn.. blah blah former rock photographer KR.’ Fell off my chair!

Back in the mid 80’s I was a good friend of Kerstin, she was a photographer covering music and her best friend was Clare Muller, another photographer and sister of the soon to be more famous Sophie Muller who did plenty of vids for Eurythmics and practically all of Sade’s up to the most recent output of the not so prolific singer. Try as I May, and I’ve exchanged emails with other friends of that period and nobody remembers introducing me to KR or knowing her though they remember me mentioning her. Maybe it was through my dead ex M. or maybe CM who did some work for Euryth when I knew them? and then Kerstin? My mind is simply not throwing up the info at all. Incidentally a friend now in Switzerland asked me in return if I remembered her gay friend N. who helped out at most/all her parties. Not, a, clue. I said was he tall? She said no, very short. Not, a, clue. She said he was at all her parties and so was I, and they were meals or Sunday lunches or bbqs in the garden, not a druggy crowd and pouf! No, this friend did not leave a trace in my memory.

Anyway I was in and out of her tiny flat in Kentish Town and have various pictures of KR including at a b’day dinner at Pollo in Old Compton St with her in a sari having recently returned from a trek in India/Nepal where she had met her husband to be, the lovely but not quite as frantic as she was, Alain. KB had a horrible relationship with her parents. Dad owned a famous agency and had cash and she was always feeling a) not as good as he was and b) that of course he would be the one to give her work when there was none and therefore resented him/mother. Think she also a had better (according to the parents) behaved sister. So her role was quite rightly the rebel daughter. She was fun and an aquarian but also very outspoken/direct/mouthy (clearly between her and HP and FS I must have been the quiet friend? Is that possible? I am direct but those 3 could kill you). Part of the reason may have been that KR was /is shorter than me by a bit and as they say small people sometime develop this bully behaviour to be heard /stand out. She also had the biggest tits ever for that height and I seem to remember she had a breast reduction. Anyway.. I have no idea exactly why we fell out, not the dimmest. All I remember is going to visit after she had her daughter and bringing a gift. She was then staying at her parents who had a gigantic open plan amazing flat in one of the wharves near the Times /Tower Bridge. Daughter had a suitably hippy name like Saffron but not Saffron, maybe Sienna and things were not looking well with A. who could never get a decent paying job (can’t remember what he did? Chef??). And that’s that. Back in the days one had so many friends that forgetting a few for decades didn’t seem to leave you missing them that much.

So have been reading bits and bobs from KRs blogs, and it would appear that she's doing very well indeed which is nice, she was/is involved with various anarchist/protest movements, (makes perfect sense) but that she is also a great cook and has a book coming out based on her blog and am always jealous of people who manage to monetise their blogs since mine is reasonably crap and not worth a book. She seems to be mentioned even in the Daily Beast etc. which just goes to show how media stories can now really travel round the globe. I bet as we speak there are north Koreans wondering if they can go find/eat at her flat. She appears to still have a confrontational outlook on life, which now, on paper, makes me laugh. Fight on sister.

However, despite being majorly interested in catching up in tons of years of someone I used to know, and there being a blog to help me, I found that I just couldn’t go through it all and dipped in and out. Which must mean that my long cherished thought that when I die, Toph can finally read all about me/us here or some other friend will want to do the same, well it just won’t happen. You’d have to be mad!!It seems all the restaurant/soirees etc are hosted in her flat in Kilburn (which has a yurt in the garden occasionally) so am toying with the idea of dropping into one (have to buy ticket first) and see reaction from there.

Am slightly puzzled as to the daughter (there’s plenty of mention of KR being a single mother so Alain er. .. went) but daughter is 16 or so and that cannot be right. The latest she could have had her was 1990 and so either she’s a few years out or I am memory wise. Got to be me. So if we did fall out in 1994… instead of 1990 it means I was already not going out with M. he was dead by then and I don’t remember KR being someone who was there to support me through the pain? And I vaguely remember where I was working but why didn’t we stay friends? Only thing I can imagine is that maybe she moved out of London for a few years? This being prior to email/ easy link? Or that she as a new mother and me still gallivanting to clubs and wine bars maybe I was no longer well placed to be a good mate? This is going to puzzle me for some time.

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