Les Miserable
Quite recently I was walking through the streets of China Town in London, lost as usual - looking for something familiar to help find the right way. As I turned the corner I saw something ahead that for a moment quite literally took my breath away. A lot of people go to a musical assuming they're merely an audience, but let me warn you right here and now, those musicals have a life of their own and by the end you can find they're a distinct and real part of your life. I'm not just talking about a real part of our day-to-day life like "yesterday I went to the theatre". That's a very mundane form of reality that doesn't really have much meaning at all. I'm talking about the plot the songs, the atmosphere - all of which seap right through to the soul. I'm talking about a hand I was holding which I still didn't let go even though I can't see the hand anymore. And yes, "I dreamed a dream of time gone by, when hope was high and life worth living, I dreamed that love would never die, I dreamed that God would be forgiving, but the tigers come at night with their voices soft as thunder, as they tear your hope apart, as they turn your dream to shame, and still I dream she'll come to me, that we will live the years together, but there are dreams that cannot be and there are storms we cannot weather".
But how apt this photograph. China Town. The Chinese lantern and the Queen's Theatre. How deeply symbolic...