Stonechats

Yesterday's walk was a revisit to Woodbury Common - two whole months have passed since 23rd March when, clad in a fleece and jacket and full of pre-lockdown anxiety I marched around a pretty soggy common in equally bright but decidedly chilly sunshine. This time I went walking early again - but to avoid the sun which was hot even at 8.30am in shorts and T shirt.  The drugs I am taking to keep my back recovering are absolute "zombie juice" making me feel rubbish and sleepy so although I did have my camera and (like Dominic Cummings) was safe to drive I didn't think to take binos with me.  Maddeningly the sound of stonechats reverberated all around the walk.  I just couldn't see them for trees and bushes. 

Stalking them, with the camera at full zoom, prepped and ready was frustrating - my walking boots squeak! But this little guy perched and sang, happily at a non camera shake distance and he is particularly handsome I think.  The next bird I would like to see on the common is a wheatear - it's been a while since I saw one.  I have loved the spring and now early summer-ish chorus of birdsong and it is a joy to be driving and walking even if it isn't as far as I would like - maybe I will need to learn to work/walk and drive "under my pain level" for a while longer.  Sunday's sermon reminded me that there is no immunity from pain in this world, and that whatever we do with God we can make a difference - so encouraging to such an ordinary person who oftens doubts there is anything spectacular within them!

Perfect Day?

"Just a perfect day
Drink Sangria in the park
And then later
When it gets dark, we go home

Just a perfect day
Feed animals in the zoo
Then later
A movie, too, and then home

Oh, it's such a perfect day
I'm glad I spent it with you
Oh, such a perfect day
You just keep me hanging on
You just keep me hanging on

Just a perfect day
Problems all left alone
Weekenders on our own
It's such fun

Just a perfect day
You made me forget myself
I thought I was
Someone else, someone good

Oh, it's such a perfect day
I'm glad I spent it with you"

 

with thanks to the chill CD that's in the car, another Lou Reed song.  Wish I didn't hate his voice so much because this is a such reflection on what a simple happy day should be...except for me it was delivering food to parents and sitting sweltering in their garden while they huddled in sweaters - coffee and a rather odd squashed looking cake (I'm the maker of wonky flapjack & liquid lemon drizzle cake, who am I to complain) and lots of cheering of lovely worried little people.

 

Then down to the town for a blustery, salt laden turn around the seafront and across to Jacob's ladder - with a pasty and icecream & flake to make it feel like a holiday.  The waves creamed in, sunlight bounced off the water and there were surfers.  And social distancing transfers all along the front promenade.  Think the gulls have been on a diet as I jealously guarded the rather over peppered pasty and amazingly decadent Mr Whippy icecream from them.  I may have ripped up my costa card in favour of small shops but it was a non classy icecream proper seaside sort of day.  

 

There's a sting in the tail of the tale - I'm sore.  If that's the way it will be from now on I will carry painkillers and pace life until my back heals up but there's no way I won't celebrate and live my fun in style.

Another lovely day

Another lovely day.  I could be enclosed in my hothouse office, walking around the sweltering project management office, and the sticky hot paintshop where the lads have to wear full masked and suited protection - stinks of sweat in there in the summer.  Instead, I had a 645am walk along the canal.

The light was beautiful, intensely green on the trees, dappled on the water reflections, ripples of light enhanced sparkle where fish or insects disturbed the surface.  Cool with the sun not fully blasting.  It wasn't a long walk - I have social distanced coffee later and revel in the luxury of another permitted stroll. And friendship that is so much better than frustrating awkward Zoom which I personally hate - seeing yourself on screen during a conversation is not good.

Yesterday was frustrating: work has only one contract - with the DWP - not surprisingly given the bad news on employment!  Thank God for furlough - I'm grateful but it was an anxious day.  At least I had radio 4 inside science to keep me sane.  And I finished the dreadful "Lockdown" thriller.  I can quite see why it was originally rejected - it's sensationalist, has poor plotting and a ridiculous ending.  But there are seeds of the excellent thriller writer Peter May becomes - I have loved his Lewis series whose beautiful landscape descriptions are worth the library rental 75p!!  I miss library books - amazon has been my book source during lockdown.  My only necessary expense other than food...

Mercifully the bird book " A patch made in heaven" is much better.  In fact it's a joy to read. It covers a year of birding and wildlife watching in a scrubby patch of woods/gravel pit/lake.  Some days the chief pleasure is counting gulls, somedays it's rescuing an injured swan.  It is a treat to read.

Lockdown Lite

Ok, I want life to go back to normal now.  So here are a few photos that made me smile and also because I am too lazy to write.  Reading Peter May "Lockdown" which is a super trashy thriller written apparently in 2005 and rejected but just reissued.  It's uncanny if he hasn't doctored the text to take account of the current situation; this was written with a background of a potential bird flu pandemic. That's about my head space today!

Oh and I saw a works van with a "no biscuits left in van overnight" sticker - that alone was worth a walk in the sun. The signpost is perfectly reasonable unless you are me and have an inordinate ability to lose yourself - Bridlepaths in all directions.  Luckily it's on Mutters Moor, I grew up in Sidmouth and can navigate back from landmarks and most detours. 

Harbour

 Yesterday was a very exciting day!  Two twenty three virtual LGBTQ+ church.  I'd gone with friends to the real live event in London earlier in the year and to be honest this livestream event with "breakout group" coffee after was terrific.  It was reflective, gentle, thoughtful and encouraging.  I'd spent the week mulling over the story of Elijah taking a 6 week walking trip to have a quiet voice encounter with God on a mountain.  And that's what I remember from the 2:23 event - that same story - have a sleep, have some "cake", get going. So much creativity: photos, art, poetry, birdsong, worship songs and the lovely faces of my brothers and sisters in Christ from across the nation.  My Takeaway from this is definitely to keep trying to listen to the sound of sheer silence, the gentle whisper of a voice - the real honest voice and try not to listen to the "big voices" of my own inadequacy - and maybe have cake!  It wasn't the totally immersive expericne of being in London, being with rediscovered friends, making new friends but it had that same tranquil quality of being able to be honest.  

A while ago - back in 2016 I wrote the following small reflection.  I'd obviously been busy! Now, 8 weeks into lockdown, I guess I am longing to go back to work - as soon as my sore twinging back allows.  Before I get too used to this weird new world.

Psalm 43

For you are God, my only safe haven"

Father I feel so glad that you are the safe haven for me.  I can tie up to the wall of your protection for a while.

I can climb out, refuel, replenish, refresh - take on provision and stores, and wander around without fear.

For within the shelter of your haven, my ship is not storm-battered, and I have no need to fear tide and waves will sink me - you provide peace for me.

But help me remember - haven is not where a ship should be!  That's a guarantor of rust, barnacles and rot.  A ship is for sailing and butting into waves headlong and to enjoy the thrill of a trip or the usefulness of service.

So help me remember that as I long for a week of haven.  I am tired and in need of overhaul and maintenance!  Reset the compass, replenish the supplies and let's go find new places!  I get tired of routine and long for a bit of adventure after too long safe passage!

Hotel Transylvania

Hotel Transylvania is one of those kids films that makes me smile.  Along with "how to train your dragon" they are wasted on children.  But when you live next door to Count Dracula? Seriously, I met my South African very loud, very entertaining sun-loving neighbour yesterday.  His name is Bram - I ask him "like Bram Stoker" and it makes me laugh inside when he says yes, though he must be so very used to this. Small things entertain me in lockdown - like the day he was sunbathing on the flat roof next door and inattentive - a passing seagull drank his soup for him! (yes, I know it's not a seagull)

Today I met my neighbour up the road smoking quietly in front of the charity shop; I joked he'd been kicked out to smoke - he and his partner live across the road and we go to work at the same time and "clap for the NHS" at the same time.  But we've never spoken beyond a good morning.  He says he woke up craving a smoke and there's none in the house - I say I feel like that about coffee - and chocolate and we end up singing "everyone's a fruit and nutcase" together while bonding over migraine (him) and asthma (me) - how did we get there - chocolate of course - he can't eat it and like me has rescue meds at home.  I'm amazed at the conversations I'm having with neighbours now we all have way too much time.

 Later Adrian Goldsworthy's epic and fairly tedious Vindolanda will be finished.  How do you explain to your mum what a "sword and sandals" novel is?  No wonder I am an alien being.  I feel like I am from Neptune not Venus (I read "Men are from Mars and women are from Venus" once upon a time before endless banter/football/SAS who dares wins conversations became part of my working life) King Neptune and I share a passion for all things watery - my fond nickname from one friend is "Pondlife"

And so the next book will be a Ta Da moment.  It's taken me 5 years to find a 2nd hand copy of this one - the library never had it, and it was far too pricey new on Amazon.  "A patch made in heaven" by Dominic Couzens.  A year of wildlife watching in one place.  Very exciting.  It was recommended by the lovely and knowledgeable man who led the bird watching course I'd attended and who washed up in our bookgroup for a while as a token man, until he took up painting instead!  Will update on progress.

Down to the River

Bruce Springsteen "Down to the River" has echoed around this week - not the original song but an acoustic version by Welsh folk singer Martyn Joseph.  Lovely voice, good album, slightly depressing but haunting.  So today's walk was a cover version too - my friend Phyl saw a kingfisher yesterday down on the river, near the walk alongside the back of Millbrook Lane.  I thought I'd go see if I was as fortunate.  Not a chance - there were a lot of gnats hovering over the surface, a gentle chirping, warbling chorus of bird song,  the first fox gloves of the year, and a pheasant on a fence at full camera lens stretch and later, a lot of bunting and charming chalk drawings!

There's a beautiful prayer/poem in the book "Watching for the Kingfisher" by Ann Lewin.  For me it perfectly describes what Simon Barnes calls the "bloody hell Kingfisher" moment when you are lucky enough to see that flash arrow of brilliant blue - my last one was on a river in the Wye Valley. But also definitely prayer - "nothing much happens" but you put yourself in a place where something might. So here's the full version: From Watching the Kingfisher - Poems and Prayers

Disclosure

Prayer is like watching for the
Kingfisher. All you can do is
Be where he is likely to appear, and
Wait.
Often, nothing much happens;
There is space, silence and
Expectancy.
No visible sign, only the
Knowledge that he's been there,
And may come again.
Seeing or not seeing cease to matter,
You have been prepared.
But sometimes, when you've almost
Stopped expecting it,
A flash of brightness
Gives encouragement.

Reasons to be cheerful

Another song lyric.  "Reasons to be cheerful?" Ian Drury and the Blockheads of course.  And a very early start I know! 5.30am and an hour of listening to the "curious cases of Rutherford and Fry" on Radio 4 where bad song lyrics mingle with science and investigation and more giggle producing radio fun than should be allowed.

Reason for listening?  I've run out of "open country" and "ramblings" as my fall asleep/early wake up cures and can't get "History of the world in 100 objects" to autoplay so I keep having to find the phone and reset it!  All three of these are definite favourites and have replaced anything that whiffs of Covid 19.  I find the figures of the deaths pretty dismally depressing.  As they rightly should be.

I like popular science. As long as there's not too much maths - Hannah Fry seems to be a maths enthusiast though.  In the last hour I've learned that gold wasn't formed in the earth but either - from a star or two supernovae crashing together - I think - it was a bit early to remember.  And that oxytocin and dopamine are produced when you are in love and this can be measured in a MRI scanner - or some other scanner - that was 5am's episode from valentines day.  Which also contained 4 80s power ballads entitled the power of love: Jennifer Rush/huey Lewis & the News, Frankie goes to hollywood and simply can't remember the other one!  And oxytocin is the pair bonding chemical that encourages couples to stay together.  Apparently long term couples brains have chemicals associated with comfort rather than the addiction chemicals of "being in love" well then cue for the marriage course!

Have I totally lost the plot?  Possibly, but hip nerve pain is a new one on me and I have to wake up to take pain killers and stretch - it's definitely getting better or at least the pain meds are kicking in.  Such a bad patient! But a well informed one.