Letters to Viv: The Underwear Aisle Where My London Life Began

Air Canada took my wardrobe on its own little holiday, and I'm still waiting for the postcard.

Letters to Viv
Open, soul-packed letters to the kind of human I write for: the curious, creative, exhausted by the hustle, and craving something more. I’m writing to you (and me).

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Dear Viv,

I didn’t expect my new life in London to begin in the underwear aisle at Marks & Spencer.

The funny thing about fresh starts, Viv, is nobody tells you they’re incredibly inconvenient. They arrive looking all cinematic in your imagination. You picture yourself stepping off the plane, breathing in London air, wheeling your suitcase across cobbled streets like you’re the lead character in a Richard Curtis film. You do not picture standing under fluorescent lights buying emergency trousers because Air Canada has apparently decided your wardrobe needed a holiday in Toronto.

Of the three suitcases I checked, they managed to lose exactly the one containing every piece of clothing I own. Every shoe. Every jacket. Every “I’ll wear that when I get to London” outfit.

The only reason I’m not writing this wrapped in a hotel towel is because, in one rare moment of travel competence, I packed extra underwear and socks in my carry-on. Past Tanya deserves a medal. Or at least a nap.

Yesterday I learned the suitcase never even made it onto the plane. It simply… stayed behind. Imagine moving across an ocean, Viv, only for your clothes to decide they’d rather spend a few more days in Toronto. Honestly, the betrayal.

So my London wardrobe currently consists of one Marks & Spencer T-shirt, one pair of trousers, one pair of shoes, and the optimism of someone checking a baggage tracker every forty-five minutes like it’ll suddenly say, Surprise! We’ve been hiding your suitcase behind Big Ben.

Windsor | Photo: Tanya Fraser

Then there’s the flat. The studio. The one I’d imagined overlooking the canal — tea in hand, watching Mister and Missus Swan hold court on the water while the boats drifted lazily by. What I’ve got instead is rooftops and traffic.

There are a few other issues I’m trying to sort out, and I’m hoping they’ll move me into the room we originally discussed. At the moment I’m living in that strange space where nothing feels settled enough to unpack. Which is ironic, because I literally can’t unpack.

Everything I’d imagined for my first weekend in London has been replaced with customer service emails, phone calls, waiting, and trying not to buy an entirely new wardrobe out of mild panic. This weekend was supposed to be about beginning. It turned into admin. Life really does have a wicked sense of humour. I knew London would have hard days waiting for me somewhere down the line. I didn’t expect one to show up on day one. The frustration’s real, Viv, I’ll say that plainly.

I’m sitting here thinking about the last two years, Viv. Nothing has gone exactly to plan. Not the marriage, the house, the nomad years, the rebuilt career, none of it arrived looking the way I imagined. Somehow, every detour led somewhere I couldn’t have planned.

Maybe London is introducing herself properly. Through patience, adaptability and reminding me that a city isn’t built in a weekend, and neither is a life.

Besides, one day this will become one of those stories, the one I’ll tell you over dinner. “Remember when I moved to London and owned exactly one outfit?” It’s already funny. Well… Almost. Ask me again when my suitcase arrives.

XO,

Tanya

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