Thursday, December 6, 2012
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
A lovely cold day in Sussex.
Brrr ! A Turner
sunrise, looking from the high part of Ashdown Forest as I drive from East
Grinstead to Crowborough, seen through distant veils of falling snow. Hills beyond hills, and their crowning woods,
are silhouetted as if on fire and shrouded in smoke.
A spotted fawn and his mother nibble the icy grass on the
snowy first tee of the golf course as I slowly descend the drive to the hotel at
Ashdown Park.
A gaudy woodpecker swoops right past my windscreen, a flash
of emerald green and yellow green, and settles less than five yards from the
kerb on a sunlit bank of grass as my truck rolls slowly through a roundabout
in, of all places, the busy North Terminal of Gatwick Airport. For a moment I look down on his tightly
folded wings and the great scarlet flash on his head and neck, and he looks
back at me.
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
Monday, December 3, 2012
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Saturday, December 1, 2012
3BT
Slowly turning at a dangerous corner in Ashdown Forest, I look
down from the cab of my truck on a jay that forages on the sunlit floor amongst dull copper coloured beech
leaves, and for just a second or two I am able to enjoy the underlying pink tints
in his iridescent plumage.
Three people
are talking loudly to their mobile phones during the journey home on a red
double-decker at dusk. Two are speaking
in languages that might be from tropical Africa, and one from somewhere in Asia,
like China, and being seated close to one another, each feels they must raise
their voice.
A visual
anomaly appears on a busy corner at Clapham Junction. A young woman is leaving a fancy dress shop
wearing a lightweight reindeer costume made from a thin soft stretchy tactile sort of fabric with a
little wagging tail sewn on the butt, and somehow that wiggly tail communicates more about body form
and body language than any little black dress might do.
gentlemen prefer ...
mick, from sligo, probably the best irishman that ever lived, bids me farewell at the end of the week
we speak about painkillers ... in his opinion the best is and always will be beer
which reminds me, i tell him, that i have a bottle waiting in the fridge
i am too ashamed to admit it has lain there almost a month
he says' " i expect you can hear it talking to you ?"
the fridge is five miles away from our workplace
i cup a hand behind my ear for a moment
"no, mick ! she's singing to me !""
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Monday, November 26, 2012
Sunday, November 25, 2012
3BT, 25th November 2012
A little flock of starlings are “grazing” on the west end of Clapham Common, a minute or two on the grass alternating with a minute or two in one then another of the big trees. Their gentle conversations are carried on in soft sweet whistlings. The morning sun is very low, barely grazing the rooftops and as they fly away before wheeling back towards me, so their glossy backs catch the light and turn from steely grey to shining bronze.
I download a novella from Project Gutenberg, first published in 1888 by
Henry James, called the Aspern Papers. By
“editing” every line whilst I transfer it from one page format to another, I am
able to read it closely. In the first paragraph,
I learn that the setting is Venice, a favourite location. How easily he evokes the charm of an old palace by the naming of parts. And then he makes me
smile at his protagonist’s gentle folly … on every page.
The soggy leaves are breaking down in to a brown porridge along the
verges and hedgerows. I had hoped for an
opportunity to gather and preserve some dry leaves for a little memorial bonfire
at the solstice. I remember sitting in
the cab of the truck during a morning break last week before the storms, and watching a fat wood
pigeon who was pottering amongst such dry leaves at the kerbside until a
curious squirrel had approached. The wary
bird took off vertically and the downdraught from his beating wings left a
clear circle, about four feet in diameter, as the leaves were blown aside.
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Friday, November 23, 2012
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