Hello beautiful people, I’m delighted to see you back again to join me for a quick wander through the last short month of days. You warm and brighten them all. Thank you for being here.
February felt like one big puddle! So much so I’ve actually begun to really enjoy walking in the rain, I’ve had to! It was that or sit indoors watching as day after day a heavy slate black sky spewed torrential rain feeling more and more claustrophobic. Since I’m not—and never have been—a sit and watch type of gal, I donned wet weather coat and wellies (a hugely appreciated and unexpected gift from the sister of strawberry blond and freckles) and carried on as normal, or nearly!
In common with Vanessa—who writes beautifully about her life at The Post House Chronicles—I felt so sorry for my chickens last weekend with their copper feathers plastered to chicken skin, chicken claws and beaks sinking in swampy mud, I opened their rickety gate and let them loose in the field. They’re just as wet but happily scraping holes in every soggy pile of rotting leaves, filling their beaks with delicacies, no doubt of the wriggling kind!
The memory of my poor savaged sheep from last month is slowly fading. Though I miss their yelling for food, their adorable faces waiting for me at the fence every morning, for the time being my field will remain sheepless. Undoubtedly this will change when spring arrives and I realise there will be no lambs frolicking in spring-flower filled sunny days, for the immediate I am decided; I neither want the reminder nor the worry.
I was hoping to send you these words on that rather special day of February we are blessed with once in every fifty three moon rises, it was not to be though, once again time refused my open handed plea and the day slipped through frustrated fingers. And two others, filled with obligations unavoidable, after it….
But I’m here, now, warmed by the comforts of family and roaring fire—stove on best behaviour—on a blustery night, I am well fed and safe. As I was yesterday and hopefully will be again tomorrow, I am fortunate to be so.
How can I even begin to complain? A lost afternoon here and a little rain there… these are not hardships when so many thousands of people are being slaughtered before our helpless eyes?
I cannot.
I’ve passed much time walking on—at last—truly rain soaked earth, watching the advancing and retreating of two seasons undecided in their to-ings and fro-ings. I’m absent for many hours I can find no real justification for, only that it was necessary.
“Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.”
― William Wordsworth
Endlessly walking in ephemera…
Fog has dominated a good part of this past month on the hill and elsewhere. Sometimes in ethereal swirls of hypnotic plumes, mostly though, dense, impenetrable fog. A feeling of detachment exists. Separated from all that is worldly by muffled silence it is possible to believe that head, arms, body, legs and feet, their movement at times almost weightless, are no longer. Hovering where wild trickery and spirit of adventure are so strong a force that two, even three hours and too-many-photos-to-count later pass without even a glance in direction home.
Boundaries, both the visible and audible meander, fading then reappearing in liminal space, echoes absorbed and scattered by gazillions of water particles distorted into eerie silence; a ghostly unknown dimension, a haunted call…
Fog changes all; Shape to shapeless, ragged to sublime. I, too, fade into the mysterious landscape as I venture into the layered wild unfolds, softening into a macabre distortion of all that is usually so familiar. Each step, a different story to the one I knew before, vastly beckoning.
A flock of pigeons alight somewhere close, see me before I see them and immediately fly off again, normally they would startle 100 meters distant but somewhere in the murk, I hear the muffled but distinct 1clapotant of their wings, I search for the sound but they, so much more attuned to self preservation than I will ever be, catch sight of me, deftly spin off, invisible still, to the edge of elsewhere.
Further into fog I roam, paths etched like maps to the souls of my feet—without doubt, without fear—startled occasionally, and, just once halted by the haunting cry of an elusive 2black woodpecker. Behind or in front of me I know not but turning just as his cry disappears into the gloom. Somewhere…
And, was that a fox brush blending slyly with aging copper bracken? Or just a wisp of brazen winter chill caught in a sunbeam escaped from foggy embrace?
Again, I know not…
I climb to the edge of hill and fog, dither over moss and stone, delaying descent, delaying an end if truth must be told. Then, as if my thoughts are heard, intricacies of forest and field, fauna and flora regain prominence, outlined by a solitary wintry, shaft of light. Foggy blanket grey dissolves into gentle dove feather wisps, then, without waiting a second longer, pearly—like the inside of an oyster shell pearly—luminescence fills every crack.
Shimmering, higher than I imagined—time disappearing in oblivious layers—a silvery disc gains force. And, every airborne droplet de-fuses, deliquescent seconds linger, momentarily, then, they’re gone and as I reach the lane in the valley a light show begins, like a disco ball of iridescent colour and psychedelic flashes, of reflections dancing and prancing shadows. It is brief but oh my goodness, it’s beautiful!
I return. Vivified by light, the damp air still clinging to tendrils of ever disobedient hair, face flushed and smiling. Fluff on my woollen scarf glitters with a hundred thousand tiny glassy droplets, captured within, the secrets of wild foggy wanderings.
I hold them tightly.
A parting thought…
I wonder, as the month rolls gently into another, blossom—blossoming as only blossom can—naissant, entwining with ancient, what season would we be now, were it never to be a leap year?
Love and fabulous blossom filled light always
I have absolutely loved Nathan Slake’s The Sernox. The entire six part story a dreamy tale of whisperings of love filled mystery and breathtaking prose. You can read all 6 parts by tapping below.
And, Encourage Meant are asking you for help on their beautiful website;
“Would anyone be up for writing some words to fill a well of encouragement for others to draw on?” They would love yours too.
Clapoter v,i, (FR) - a dry clapping sound, (Clapotant adj.)
The Black Woodpecker (Dryocopus martius)is not an uncommon bird to many regions of Europe, preferring sparse woodland however, here it is rare sight. I have many recordings of its unearthly call on my Merlin bird ID app but have spotted it only twice, fleetingly, black and crow like in size, darting between the trees too quickly for any speedy camera reaction even if I did have ‘Swarovski green birder regalia,’
Incredibly beautiful writing, my friend. I wish I could bottle up your words and soak in a warm bath with them. You are truly gifted.
Stunning shots of the fog, and stunning words about the fog. There is something truly magical about it.
Thank you so much for your praise of The Sernox. That means a lot. It's a strange story, and I'm not sure it's for everyone, so I thank you for giving it a shout out 🤗