These Boots

If I flirted with happiness in America, it's certainly been given the boot today. And it took a severe kicking when I found myself violently thrust into life – or something like it – in Cruel Britannia.

I’m staying with my parents in Telford, Shropshire this weekend, my sisters in tow, and suddenly my post-vacation blues have been given a harmonica and a bottle of Southern Comfort. My family, though usually served on the rocks, have been pretty neat and, at least, have appeared interested in my travels.

There was a moment however, shopping with my sister and my mum, when I thought I might become irrational. We went to a fabric shop, a garden centre and a car accessory store, none of which stocked anything that I could use: I don’t have a car; I don’t have a garden; and I have little or no interest in buying fabric.

Worse still, immersed as I was in Telford's Saturday shopper crowd, I thought what a generally unattractive people the British public are. Sure, there are the occasional gems – Kiera Knightly, Catherine Zeta Jones, Princess Diana – but it’s always the same old story: they move to America, or they marry a Douglas...or they die.

Still, I shouldn't judge England by Telford's standards. It’s not like its streets are flooded with talent scouts, looking for England’s next top model. The attractive people, they’ve realised, have fled to the cities, or at least, a little north, to Shropshire's county town, Shrewsbury.

With this thought, and some (northern) comfort, I wandered the garden centre and resisted the temptation of irrationality. I did not smash the terracotta pots that I held for my sister, but instead subjected her and the rest of my family to a rather thorough (though not wholly comprehensive) slideshow of my travels.

Swigging on our memories, happiness and I flirted again, and I thought to myself, with all the rationality of a drunk, about taking another trip. This time however, I'll be heading north and back home, to Shrewsbury. And though these boots were made for walking, and maybe one of these days that's what they'll do, tonight I'm looking forward to taking them off, putting my feet up and having a drink, perhaps a Corona, to the future.

Postcard from grey skies

What was I thinking? After a seven hour flight with the shutters down and only English people to see I'm eating my words and paltry English food. In my last post I waxed lyrical about England and its people and about seeing them differently and can only deduce that between catching all those trains, planes and Greyhound buses, I caught the great American love bug - the Oprahtics, the bloody heart sleeves, and now, back in England, I'm filled with grey skies, faces and frowns. I've seen the English people, from the airport to the train station, paraded before me like a grotesque theatre of the macabre and will have to look much harder to the find the beauty between the beasts. Hello dire customer service, hello England.

Postcard from the Last Day: Atlanta, GA

It's an image some might associate with "real America": Two cops are sitting in a road side diner, sipping coffee and actually eating donuts.

But they're not overweight, as you might imagine, nor are they male; hell, they're not even White! What's going on? you might ask.

Before they rush off to fight crime (they've actually just ordered more coffee), I think to myself, on the final day of my trip, of the lessons that I've learned. Have I learned about myself? Sure. I've learned that I have very sensitive teeth; that I'm a chocoholic (but for Corona); and that I'm not so bad with women (and that having a British accent, though only incidental back home, is pretty valuable here).

I've also learned that the pursuit of "real America", which I suggested was the point of this trip, is pointless in nature. "Real America" is not what I imagined. It's the people that have constantly altered my perception. It's the slim, Black policewomen; the Cubans in Miami; the girl from Dayton, Ohio (who I know for sure does not have a tattoo on the small of her back); the gamblers and the drunks in Las Vegas; the hopeful of Hollywood; Michael Jackson; the ex-girlfriends; the trendy and spendy of San Francisco; the Jazz; the Bostonians.

On the train to the airport at the very outset of this trip I peered into the gardens of suburbia and deduced, like a shitty Dr Watson, that people's lives were roughly the same. I saw paddling pools, rock gardens and patios. But I didn't see the people.

And though I don't expect to see slim, Black policwomen, or Michael Jackson, for that matter (not until he gets his passport returned, at least), I might look at England and its people through different eyes and, at least until those two weeks in July we Brits call summer, a different light. Goodbye sunshine, goodbye America.

Postcard from South Beach, Miami

In his 1997 hit, 'Miami', West Philidephia (born and raised) Will Smith offered an insightful and comprehensive introduction to the Sunshine State's very own Sin City. And as I near the end of my stay here on South Beach I find truth in the former Fresh Prince of Bel Air's lyrics. True dat, you might say.

Miami is an intoxicatingly beautiful place, awash with sunlight intensified natural colours and, at night, aglow under a neon lit skyline. Looking out at palm trees swaying in the breeze and, with some guilt, a topless beach, it is hard to imagine a better looking city.

Half of its two million population is Hispanic, the vast majority Cuban; all, it seems, beautiful.

Postcard from the small of a back

Is it just me, or is anybody else beginning to find girls who don't have tatoos on the small of their backs exotic?

Postcard from Ohio. That's right. Ohio.

Cincinnati, Ohio is probably the best place to write about Las Vegas, and as I await my connecting flight to Miami, a sobering respite from the two notorious party towns on my itinerary.

And although I made a deal with myself that what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, I can tell you this: Never before have the relative creative powers of man and nature inspired and appalled me with such veracity than yesterday. It is a story of love and hate. Two houses, both alike in magnitude, the first the Vegas Strip, painted in broad, neon brush strokes; the second, the Grand Canyon, in a much gentler orange hue, are built on and into the neighbouring states of Nevada and Arizona.

It took but a short, and albeit expensive, helicopter trip to realise that Vegas, the glowing and glamourous lady of the night was a gaudy and vulgar thing by day. And, as is so often the case the "morning after", I was hungover, a few bob short and filled with regret.

But flying into the Canyon last night I fell in love. Perhaps because, sitting as I was, awkwardly between two Honeymooning couples, there was a lot of love in the air. Nevertheless, this gaping 18 mile wide hole in the lunar-like landscape is a thing of magnificent beauty. And although I spent a lot money getting there it was certainly well spent. And a much safer bet than Vegas.

Postcard from Hollywood

They say that LA can be described as 19 suburbs in search of a city. And tonight, sitting in one just two blocks from Hollywood boulevard, I imagine that the 19 or so people at the bar are in search of something no less imaginary.

Whereas other bars have looked upon my spectacle wearing, coffee sipping, notebook scribbling self with some suspicion, in Hollywood I'm just another writer, and looking around I wonder if I'll ever see these people in the movies or on television.

Tonight, I highly doubt it. Statistically speaking the odds are very slim. Perhaps only one of the 19 at the bar will find what they're looking for - fame, fortune, a fan-base. But for the 18 others, like suburbs in search of a city, those dreams will remain undiscovered. Here, like nowhere else, the stars light the pavements and not the sky. "Are you a writer?" the barman asks. And since everybody else here is acting, I nod. "Welcome to Hollywood."

Postcard from Neverland

Fumbling in my blazer pocket, which hangs noticeably on non-Michael Jackson t-shirt clad shoulders, I feel my way through Granola bars and candy for a non-perishable to give to the King of Pop. Everybody else here has fluffy toys, books and banners. All I find is a 30c postcard from Santa Cruz, actually intended for another aficionado of small boys, my mate Steve from Essex. It shows a freshly caught shark, blood dripping from its mouth. Not the most appropriate gift for a self-professed lover of animals (and indeed proponent of violence towards), but nevertheless I scrawl on the back:

Dear Michael Jackson,
Look what I caught fishing! If you get a chance visit my website, sansharma.com
Love,
San (from England)

I added the "from England" in case he knew another San in the area. Almost as soon as I do a black SUV drives up to the gates. Michael Jackson is back, after a day in court, to what he calls home and what we, this side of the gate, call Neverland.

Like shabbily dressed G8 delegates the crowd here have come from major industrialised nations: the US, France, Germany, Spain, Japan, Australia and, as represented by yours truly (and regrettably one other guy from Blackpool) the UK. And what with all the Jesus Juice we've been sipping I desperately need to pee. And while the others here are wriggling with excitement, I am only to keep it in.

But when his window winds down and an enormous white hand with alabaster fingers extends to net the gifts thrust before him I nearly let it out. Instead, and after 15 years of fan worship and adulation, face to gaunt, ghostlike face with my idol, I ask him if I can use his bathroom, laugh nervously and hand him a postcard of a bloody fish.

Postcard from Court

"Welcome to Santa Maria," he says. And then with the blatant disregard for accuracy that we have come to expect from Fox News reporters, "It´s a million miles from England!"

And that´s where I am. Well, more precisely, I´m sitting in the media camp just outside the small courthouse where Michael Jackson is currently fighting multiple charges of abduction, false imprisonment and child molestation.

Here, from a shanty town of satellite dishes and news vans, the media provide daily updates on the court proceeding. But news reports that Santa Maria is a quant and charming place does little to endorse its credibility.

Tomorrow morning however it will become an altogether more glamorous place, albeit under dismal circumstances, when Michael Jackson walks from his blacked-out SUV to the white washed walls of the Santa Maria courthouse.

In the words of two infamous Californians, one the leader of the state, originally from Europe, the other former frontman of the Jackson Five, seemingly from outer space, I'm going to "Beat It" but "I´ll be back."

Postcard from the Camel's Mouth

"Oh, I'll never stroke a camel again."
"Did he bite you?"
"He had my whole hand in his mouth."
"Gosh." The old woman is shaking her head.
"And do you know what his name was?" The woman clearly has no idea. "Saddam."

And so the conversation goes. The man is seated opposite me on a train from Davis to San Jose and wearing a t-shirt with an American flag and the word "Freedom" emblazoned across it. And although I think his shirt is a bit of a joke, I respect the man's logic. Had I heard his camel stories (there were actually two) I might not have visited my ex-girlfriend Amanda, nearly had a hand bitten and a foot in my mouth.

Why I did see her exactly I don't know. But I have just read the novel, High Fidelity (there was also a film). In it, Rob Fleming, avid music fan, lists his all-time top five worst breakups and visits those ex-girlfriends in an effort to understand why his relationships have since followed a template for failure.

I lost interest in the book when the shallow, immature and self-obsessed Rob, with whom I found great kinship, began to grow up. But my travels unwittingly followed a similar course when I visited the two ex-girlfriends of my relationships past.

The first, Beth, lives in Berkeley with her boyfriend; the second, Amanda, with hers in Sacramento. Beth and I remain close friends – best friends, in fact – and meeting with her was nothing but pleasant.

Seeing Mandy however was an altogether different story, and not one penned by Nick Hornby, with a happy ending, or a forthcoming film adaptation starring John Cusack, or anybody anywhere near as suave.

Should I have more than five break-ups from which to choose, mine with Mandy would definitely make the chart. Since I don't, it enters by default. It was nevertheless the sort of breakup that lovelorn Emo songs are made of.

I broke up with her (let's make that clear) in January 2004. (You have to strike between the holidays and certainly before Valentine's Day.) And in the year that has passed, I imagine as most men would, that she never quite got over me. There were actually e-mails to that effect and then a silence that I took to mean that a severe bout of depression had ensued.

My meeting with her last night however proved that not to be the case. On the contrary, she's not turned to the bottle, or a nunnery; nor has she recorded a heartbreak album in the vein of Leonard Cohen. She is in fact doing fine. And after a brief moment of disappointment at this I was too. We enjoyed a mostly pleasant evening: dinner, a moonlit stroll, great conversation. And then suddenly the realization that we were barely strangers. Having shared showers, now sharing a bottle of water seemed somehow inappropriate. It dawned on me that I would probably never see this stranger that I used to know so well ever again. And so I postponed the farewell and arranged to meet before my train out of town the following day.

The train was soon approaching and there was no sign of Amanda. While I waited, the annual Picnic Day parade passed through downtown – a marching band, jugglers, clowns – and I realized that I didn't recognize a single face, painted or otherwise. There is nothing for me here, I thought. Everybody has moved on. And I suddenly looked forward to being back in England, to immersing myself in a world I had thought only temporary, and to grasping with both hands the opportunities and relationships that make a life less ordinary.

I wanted to tell Amanda all this but time was closing in. With just minutes to go before my train showed up she did. With her boyfriend. And, saving my grasping hand for England, I gave her a hug, let go and said goodbye. And suddenly, not seeing this stranger ever again didn't seem so bad after all.

Postcard from the Past

It didn't take a fluxcapacitor and a souped up Delorean to go back in time last night. It took just a train from the Bay Area and some fading memories to give the impression that time has stood still in the Californian college town I left in 2003.

Nothing here has changed very much. Perhaps there are more iPods per head than before, but save for the dangling white cables those heads are the same pretty young things, more often than not, shrouded in blonde hair or baseball caps and not much mystery.

The University of California-Davis is tucked in the Central Valley, just an hour from both snow and sand and about 50 miles north of San Francisco. The campus is a tad more conservative than its big sister in the Bay and has never quite shaken its agricultural roots. Students here still call themselves "Aggies" and a quick glance at the course catalogue tells you that Tractor Driving 101 still runs in fall quarter.

The college does however now offer a broader curriculum, with strong bio-science and engineering departments. It's nightlife department however is rather weak. And without classes to go to (or even classes that I should be going to), I've little to do besides write, remember and move on.

Postcard from 111 Minna Street, San Francisco

Positioning myself equidistant between the bar and the gallery I lean over to the woman admiring the art on display and, in my best impression of a pretentious modern artist, say, "If you have any questions..."
"Oh," she smiles. "What's your name?"
And so we shake hands, I tell her about texture and tone, she tells me about the desert and the flowers and we both pretend to know what we're talking about. But it doesn't matter. I get the impression that everybody on 111 Minna Street is pretending.

It's only 6:30pm but the DJ is already on and playing the kind of house music at the kind of volume that makes any kind of conversation, not least that about modern art, very difficult to conduct. And so for the hour or so that I wait for my late date I sit, look and listen, while Mickey Mouse drills for oil and the 'common man' hangs his head in shame. I overhear a white guy with dreadlocks deciphering the painting's latent symbolism as if he's breaking the Da Vinci Code.

It's no wonder the trendy and spendy of San Francisco hang ideological dilemmas on their walls and trouble themselves with meaning. They are some of the luckiest people in the world - and the most content.

"I have absolutely no reason to leave," Bay Area resident AJ said Tuesday. "And when I do I am ultimately unhappy. There is really no place better."

AJ wakes up, for much of the year, to cloudless blue skies; there are always palm trees; and the Bay and Golden Gate bridges form a right angle at the north east corner of the city.

And when the DJ finishes tonight, quite bizarrely at 10pm (early is the new late apparently), folks will most likely spill into some of the finest restaurants in the country for a decidedly Mediterranean late dinner. Saint Francis would certainly approve. (Though he was homeless and would appreciate any meal, I imagine.)

Postcard from New York City

It is with a touch of jazz that I write this morning's postcard. I'm sitting in the Jazz on the Park hostel on Duke Ellington Boulevard where I spent the night (in the hostel, not on the street).

I was drinking in Chelsea when I met some Danish guys who were on their way to a jazz gig in Greenwich Village. Where abouts exactly, they were not sure, but using the New York City street layout as our rhythm foundation we meandered - improvised, no less - our way to the bar in question.

The jazz was amazing. And in my pursuit of "real America", which I've sort of decided is the purpose of this trip, it dawned on me that this is America's classical music, and as the instruments each played their turn before coming together, democracy in action.

Postcard from Newbury Street, Boston

Bugger. Bugger. Bugger.

My laid back attitude, though endearing to some, has just cost me a date, at least a weekend's worth of sex, and potentially, marriage, babies and a home in Cape Cod.

By the time I got to the restaurant she had gone and without her phone number, surname or any specific address details I'm stuffed.

I know three things. Her name is Cheryl; she works in mortgage; she lives in Cape Cod. And, if I can't find her on Newbury Street where we arranged to meet, or in the narrow Boston bar where we met last night, then that's where I'm heading. Cape Cod, with the little information I have and a blatant disregard for sense and sensibility.

Postcard from Nine Zero, Boston

After having lured Mike from his teaching post in New Hampshire to my hotel room at Nine Zero and a seafood dinner I stood arguing with him in a remarkably narrow Boston bar.

"She's totally checking me out man."
"Sure."
"I'm telling you. It's everytime you look away," I said. "That was a sustained, three second glare."

This went on for some time until the five or so men surrounding her began staring too. At one point they all laughed (inbetween buying her drinks and shoving their cards under her nose). She was frankly the most popular woman in the bar: a cross between Andie Macdowell (and roughly the same age) and Elaine from Seinfeld (you're getting big hair, right?).

With my ears burning (and my loins - I need to see a doctor about that), and not feeling quite brave enough to break the business man barrier surrounding her, I made my exit, touching her arm on my way, and wished her a good night. Soon after she followed me outside, revealed her height (pretty tall) and put her arm in mine.

"Are you coming?" she asked.
A little bit, I thought, and followed her to the next bar.

More alcohol flowed and slowly so too did the unsettling admissions. She wants babies, soon, and - so it transpired - with me. The former swimwear model, it turns out, had spent the evening defending me from the discouragement of the men surrounding her who said that I was a geek. And, in the most backhanded compliment I've ever received, she told them that while I was a geek I was "adorable".

She then asked me to lunch for the following day, which is now. So better run. Those babies won't make themselves.

Postcard from the University of New Hampshire

As we sit under a perfect blue sky, eating ice-cream, drinking beer, smoking cigars and watching the beautiful and scantily clad people of New Hampshire walk by, my university mate Mike assures me that I have an atypical impression of his life as a teaching assistant at UNH. It is a Friday afternoon and the first day of Spring, and whilst it is lovely and warm there are still traces of snow on the hillside, a reminder of a time less hedonsitic.

Postcard from the Days Inn Motel, Atlanta

I can't recommend the Days Inn Motel enough. I can't recommend it at all, in fact. My night was trecherous and while you might blame jet lag I'm pretty sure that it was because every crossing plane (and there were many - Atlanta is the largest airport in the country) sounded as though it were targeting my bed in a pointless act of terror.

And now that I'm sitting in its modest dining room for breakfast I'm trying to work out which of its guests overcame the roar of jet engines last night to express their love for one another. I really hope it's not the couple that have just sat down beside me. They're holding hands across the table. Oh God. It is them.

Postcard from a bar, Atlanta

Leaning over from his personal space to mine the American business man asks, "are you here for the windows and blinds convention?"

When that is a plausible question, I think, it's about time I reconsidered my image.

Postcard from a buffet, Atlanta

Americans can eat. More specifically, Americans can buffet. And they know exactly what they're doing. I'm sitting here at the Mariott Hotel in Atlanta (not because I'm staying here but because I've walked the half-mile, sidewalk-less strip from my Days Inn Motel) with a plate of what looks like canteen food: a lumpy pile of carbs.

The American on the table opposite has very calmly made himself a salad (with just the one dressing) and is now helping himself to a chicken marsala with a side of vegetables while I watch, with a slight pained expression, having ignored the advice of my parents, friends and indeed a nation, and filled up on bread.

Postcard from 27D

I'm sitting in seat 27D, probably the worst seat on the plane, in the middle of the middle isle where neither arm wrest is yours. (You don't realise how much you need them until they take them away.) Writing this is therefore uncomfortable, not least because I suspect the guy to my left is reading this over my shoulder.

I know that I am already in the company of Americans. Obesity is suddenly more common, some have already applauded the pilot and there is a young man in the adjacent isle with a slightly overgrown moustache that's not unlike a ferret. I imagine his name is Dwayne.

The guy sitting to my right is a professor of computer animation who has worked on Ren & Stimpy and The Simpsons and lived for a time in Hollywood. Of course, he could be completely lying - I'll never see him again. He has nevertheless spent considerable time (we're talking hours) proving that he really is that intelligent. And cultured.

"I only watch Art House or foreign language films," he says. And then (honestly) browses the in-flight magazine and says, with some excitement, "ooh, Spanglish is on."

Postcard from the departures lounge

Whenever I get to an airport I have a sudden sinking feeling that I've had a moment of madness and got the day completely wrong. Or the time. Or the whole darn thing. And just before the check-in clerk prints the boarding pass I imagine she'll say, "excuse me sir, you're in the wrong airport," or the MI5 will swoop down from the ceiling (a la Mission Impossible Tom Cruise), declare me a terrorist and subject me to unspeakable acts of torture. Since 9/11 (or what is technically 11/9 here) I imagine that every brown man suspects even himself of being a terrorist - like he just didn't realise he was, or he forgot. And though I've packed nothing more sinister than an excessive number of hair styling products I am convinced that I'll by flying to Atlanta via Guantanamo Bay.

Postcard from the train

There's a strange feeling of Godliness (is that a word?) riding a train over suburbia, looking down at the tiny houses, and the tiny people, cleaning their tiny cars. And it doesn't seem real somehow. More like Legoland, or those miniture model villages (which are incidentally popular amongst megalomaniacs).

It also allows a rare viewing into the lives that people close away. Fences that keep neighbours from peering in are, from this height, redundant and look more like a grid, or a repeat pattern, that suggests that people's lives are roughly the same. Some have inflatible paddling pools, some rock gardens, some, for the idle green fingered, fence to fence concrete patio. But they all share the same postcode and look up at the same patch of sky.

My excitement, the reason I am shaking my leg, is because I am about to embark on a tour of North America and, periodically, look up at different skies, roam 'zip code' zones (oh yeah) and, if only for three weeks, live a life less ordinary.