Not playing out

We haven’t been going up the lane much recently so it was a nice surprise when the top field was free of sheep. The wind hadn’t died down yet and the long grass was swaying about all over. I dispatched Rab off into it, gallivanting down the hill after her ball. It’s warm, so she curtails her joy-loops and settles down about fifty yards away, I smile over at her stupid head, poked up above the long grass, tongue flopped out in the wind all daft. I decide to sit down too, on the path where the grass is a bit shorter, and I watch the wildflowers tip this way then that in the breeze. Occasionally she feels ready for another chase and drops her ball, just out of reach so I have to get up. I tell her firmly she’s getting trained one of these days. After a few of these ups and downs I hear a guttural scream which sounds so odd I wonder if it’s some kind of machine, or maybe even a cow in distress, but then the shock subsides and the sound takes form:

“OOOIIIII, it’s not a bloody playground”

I’m stood looking at where it’s coming from - the big detached farm house across the next field - and then finally decipher a guy stood on his wall. Blimey what to do? I shout back as loud as I can:

“I can’t hear you” cupping my ears in case he’s not sure.

This is mainly to buy time, find a reaction that respects both my pride and my safety but also it’s quite funny, asking him to shout louder given how enormous his first attempt was. But he tries, and hell, he succeeds.

“I said it’s not a bloody playground, clear off”

This time I respond immediately “I never said it was”

He doesn’t seem to hear, or I’m not giving him chance, but I shout again “What is it, is it not a footpath?”

“YES! It is. Not a playground. Now CLEAR.OFF.” He’s motioning now back the way I’d come

I’m a bit done-in by this sudden confrontation, I was just starting to loosen-off from a day of malfunctioning spreadsheets and really didn’t need any of this. So it’s in this state, on a beautiful evening amongst the wildflowers that I shout back over the wall, almost pleading:

 “I’M NOT PLAYING”

Well fuck me. Look at us, bellowing back-and-forth across a field as the world spins on all around us, spring in full flow and a million birds singing their evening songs. Its two angry men filling the air tonight though, crying inside about territory and rules, masculinity raining down and clogging everything like frogspawn. But for it to finish on that broken holla of every little boy that ever got upset, that final act of defiance. “I’m not playing”. Well that’s unwritable.

Rab and I take our ball home and turn on Springwatch instead. I hope we’re not on there tomorrow, “Look at these two male pipits disputing territory, very common this time of year when headspace is in such short supply”.

Leighton Moss

The colours all gone out the world again. I know, I know. We’re watching marsh harriers dancing over the reeds and Christ, an otter just slithered past all casual but I’m full up. The memories are fresh and warm in each hide, in the swaying reeds, in the smell of the shiny books and t-towels you loved so much in the shop. Memories of fear, of hope, the miracle around the corner, a hand on a knee, a shared cup of tea, the finches and tits on the winter feeders. Your face alive with the power of everything that ever lived as a robin lands on your hand to feed. You came good here, each and every single time, you came good. 

On the skytower staring at some dust out west by the sea, willing it to come closer and settle over the reed bed in front. A starling murmuration we’d travelled fifty miles to see but which wouldn’t shift the half-mile up the reserve to meet us. Cruel nature. But there's not time to be missing things like this, so its down the tower and into the car, we’ll catch them near the Eric Morecambe hide. 

“Are you sure?” I say 

“Well they’re not here are they? lets go” 

“Pullover!”. A thousand, a million of them in the shape of a whale over the field. And now look, look at you. Head tipped back on the car, eyes packed full with life, lips motionless and slightly apart, begging the sky to beam you up. Throw you into that seething pack, sway this way then that back to the roost where its just you and your birds crouched under the winter sky till dawn. But your hands. Your hands are too cold, let me get you in the car and home for a bath. Maybe this was the last time we came to Leighton? I don’t know who to ask.

“What’s that, there?” Dan’s question so succinct that it must be urgent, I see a long bar flying up the lake and think black-backed gull because I’m not used to seeing ospreys. At some point we realise, there’s maybe some words exchanged but I don’t recall them because the colour’s all back in the world and this bird just tilted into a curve showing me its big brown back. Three failed attempts at catching a fish, each time banking round and flapping like a kestrel as it waits for its next moment, a call from the tower to land. We’re close enough to hear the splash and see it shaking the water from those thick feathered legs, maybe in frustration. We don’t drop our binoculars for what feels like ten minutes, swifts keep crossing in front but they’re midges now against his ungainly frame. A woman asks me if they eat mammals too and I wonder if she’s scared. I feel like we all should be, nobody move until he’s gone.

When he does leave I remember why we’re here, that the memories I’d been indulging all day were the bad ones, the in-between ones, the half-thoughts in a day otherwise perfect, they weren’t the story of this place. We came here to be lost, caught in the talons of an osprey and dragged off to a place where all that ever shines is the feathers of a bird, no strip lights or bleached floors, no glasses hanging from the neck of that no-hope consultant as he pauses over your blood results. No, not lost. We came here to be found, picked up from the debris of your illness and laid out in a winter sun, tenderly brought round from the dizziness of loss.

Dan and I wander on through some woodland that’s thick and sticky with spring growth. We don’t say much and it reminds me of the silences with you, respectful of that bird and the time we both needed to recover from it.

The evening is chirping-in at the car-park, blackbirds singing above the slamming doors as we throw our things in the boot. We’re not done, away to Foulshaw Moss to chase this osprey back to its nest. There’s a tower above the raised bog and some volunteers with a scope who show us what’s what before leaving. We set our scope up and watch the male perched in a tree, just a white smudge from all the way back here. Soon Dan sees him fly back over towards Leighton, sent back to do a proper job this time. We watch a marsh harrier for a while as the wind gets colder, we’re hungry but when the colours are back in the world there’s nothing to do but look and so that’s what we do, stood up there like a couple of kids with BMXs, watching the redpolls chase back and forth and letting dusk settle over us. When we finally pack up and wander back we see two greater spotted woodpeckers at their nest. After a full day peering and peeping through hides and scopes Dan is still brimming with of all the enthusiasm you’ll ever see in a person, staring at the mess of black, white and red on the tree, so much like you.

Helvellyn & the Dodds fell race 2018

“I live like my dogs now, got three cocker spaniels and I live in the moment like them. I’ve got work left in me like, but I want to be out here so I’ve been winding things down a bit”. His voice was thick and warm, a bit Cumbrian, a bit dales, and his skin was browner than late May would suggest. He was talking to a stranger in the car next to me, and I was sat in mine looking busy, pinning my race number on so he’d not see me listening in.

But fell races are fascinating for listening, stood on the start line the conversations were bustling like a swarm of midges, all positive and inclusive, conducted with a keen eye for pretence, that rather than shackling people, seems to free them up to say anything. Like what they’ve learnt from their dogs or how they’re skint this month so couldn’t afford to replace their old knackered Walsh’s. There is no judgement or jealousy here and as the marshall gets up to give us a few pre-race instructions she’s afforded silence after everyone helps her quiet the crowd down by shushing.

And we’re off, funnelled along the tarmac road at the foot of Clough head, bound for the long ridge that will take us away over Great Dodd, Raise and Helvellyn. Chatter continues along the lane but as we hit the fell, with the gradient bending us double into a slow climb all there is to hear are the bleating lambs. I keep checking behind me at Blencathra to get a fix on how much we’ve climbed and it looks great in this heat, stood shoulder to shoulder with Skiddaw against a hazy blue sky.

The real story of the race hits us as we crest onto the summit of Clough Head. The incessant wind that will turn us into tacking ships all the way to Helvellyn presents itself immediately and violently. It takes a while to adjust but people seem to and I’m just grateful it isn’t blowing my glasses off. Someone asks me to hold his bottle whilst he sorts his bag out on the final climb to Helvellyn and he offers me some food as we walk together a while.The view west from here is fantastic with the whole park on show, I could sit for hours watching. Maybe its the thought of sitting or just the lack of training in my legs, but after Helvellyn I find it hard and start to wilt, people go past me in a steady stream but always say hello.

Its bloody awful descending Clough head on knackered legs, almost three hours after climbing it, and when I stop to say bastard, a woman in pursuit stops too and says “I know”. We run back to the tarmac swapping places a few times and exchanging some words of encouragement. At the finish a guy sits down in the verge next to me and says he was done with the wind after an hour, I agree but can’t summon the energy to add anything else. I need some food and hobble back to the car thinking about the man living as a dog, on the way I see the woman who’d descended alongside me and she puffs her cheeks out. Everyone is spent, but we’re all here together in the endless summer making a go of things whilst we can.

Kestrel

I wrote this in January at a time that Ali was particularly ill, she'd just been discharged from hospital after complications with her lung disease. Whilst in the hospital I read Reality is not what it seems by Carlos Ravelli, a book about a potential theory to unify quantum and classical physics. I feel that  understanding nature in your heart and mind are the same thing, and that the separations we impose are arbitrary. I'd like to explore this more, but here is my first go...

Kestrel

As the wind lashed handfuls of rain along the valley and yesterday’s storm debris lay awkwardly in the mud something made us turn right into the rotten ferns and up along the side of a wall. We’ve never gone this way before, it all seems a bit private, but cloaked in the dusk of a stormy January afternoon we snook on. 

Rabbit had a lot of work to do, frantically joining the dots on a new field of scents, I upped my pace in keeping with her and then caught a hint of something fighting the wind. A kestrel fell and then rose, and by the time it began to hover I had it in the binoculars, focusing past the bare winter sapling that separated us. My heart began to beat faster, and now it was me joining the dots, guided by the fine brushstrokes that the kestrel sketched across the gloaming.

Its thin shape changed continuously and was as sharp as a crack in the sky, the occasional flash of colour from the top of its wing marked a dive, always to rise again effortlessly against a wind that swayed the trees like huge reeds. I felt safe here, in the reed bed, taking cover from the fretful grey sky. I kept my eyes on him and imagined what he saw in the field, the countless ultra-violet urine trails, a hint of some movement before a tilt into dive.

My mind drifts. What if we could see all of the electromagnetic spectrum? Radio waves lolloping by unhindered by the furious wind, the infra-red glow of a sheltering fox ten feet away, and always the distant hum of the big bang in the background. I looked again and saw the kestrel hanging in the great known, framed now by the science that had flooded my thoughts. More beautiful, I whispered.

Rabbit remained seated, her bulky back legs splayed awkwardly to allow her long spine to touch the floor, pink belly radiant against the fermented browns of  last year's ferns. She wanted to know what all the fuss was about. Not interested in birds. Taught frame, wide eyes, patient for a mammal to appear from the lichen-moss folds of the wood below. The kestrel took its final dive and disappeared below the horizon. I watched the empty stage for a while and saw the mills of Connonley crouched below the rushing gales, the Aire valley was going about its relentless business and I felt tired. Lights twinkled on and our fire needed stoking, I no longer felt fractured or confused.

Rabbit kept seeing ghosts in the trees as we walked home and etched on my retina was the perfect curve of a kestrel wing.

A run from Swinside to Buttermere

Approaching Hopegill head from the Whiteside, fresh snow kicks up and sails north off the ridge. The wind is smooth and is pouring over Grassmoor like champagne foam. My legs begin to tire but I resolve not to break stride until the summit but then instantly do. Marching now, looking around more readily and the triangle of Grisedale Pike feels for a moment implausible.

Before I finish that thought I’m descending, choosing light snow on scree over tussocks and drifts. The col was lower than I recall and colder than the tops. Quickly onwards, easing through the flattened v that separates Crag Hill from Grassmoor. It’s a wind tunnel this morning and my eyes water as I bend forward into a slow jog across compacted snow.

Wandhope can be avoided so I do, staying low and close to the craggy southern face of Grassmoor. Thoughts drift back to warmer days here, to the Buttermere Horseshoe race and an afternoon amongst migrating butterflies. I stop dreaming once I hit the short climb to the summit of Whiteless Pike. Suddenly the Alps appear and startle me in a way that only mountains can, surely we need a word for this? Buttermere and Crummock water glint below, the Scafells, Gable and Pillar tower over a black Haystacks. High stile cowers in their presence, cloud glues to Gable like moss and, as always, Mellbreak sits still, untouched by drama, squat and silent like a camel at rest.  

The descent to Buttermere is fast and grassy, thoughts bounce like road chippings behind.   

Great Whernside

Great Whernside stands tall in the endless mid-winter sky. Not far from the orange glow of Kettlewell at its base, a concentration of white head torches flicker and bounce off neon running tops and throw light into great clouds of rising breath.

Its 7pm and there are twenty-three names on a sheet of paper, in a few minutes they’ll set off into frosted fields towards the perma-bog of Upper-Wharfedale. The day has been peppered with a thousand exchanges about the startling blue January morning. The low sun catching on a frozen canal brought the world to the towpath at lunchtime, disturbed gulls circled above, their cries baying for the return of their deserted, muted-grey home.

Any heat that had built during the afternoon has since been lost to the dark and puddles are rings of frozen white along the lane towards registration. A small beck hurries by and kitchens glow out from converted barns, one man is changing behind his car, another two are shuffling into a jog ahead. In the field where the race begins people are gathered and conversations follow the upbeat tempo of jiggling legs and rubbed hands.

The race begins with a few words “Know where you’re going? OK go”.

The talking turns to heavy breathing as field gives way to fell. Frost crunches and the grass glistens under white beams, we all find our pace and stick to it with few change in position. I’m pleased not to wilt tonight and the summit soon appears as we advance well across frozen bogs. The top is tended by a lady clasping a flask and she congratulates us individually as we turn back for the descent.

I’m in a group of four now, and one of them follows me as I confidently veer off in the wrong direction into tussocks and panicked grouse. He catches up when I stop to admit I’m lost, he regrets following me but between us we find our way back to the path and resume racing each other down the fast grassy paths to the finish. My name is written on a clipboard and an email will arrive over the following days with a result, the winner being the person who most accurately predicted their race time.  

Kettlewell was quiet as I jogged back towards the car, a runner threw a holdall into his van and gestured good night. We were all turned towards home now, pleased to be keeping pace against the long winter. 

A case for leaving the camera at home

I had 30 minutes spare and my trainers in the boot so I pulled in to a layby near Hardknott fort. Jogging out over the freshly wet ground I tried to pick out rocks to run on as they had already dried in the late summer air. Ten minutes ago I’d driven over Wrynose pass through torrential rain which only eased as I approached the bulk of Harknott.

 

I climbed quickly above the fort and tried to follow a line that would take me around some immediate crags to what I hoped might be the summit of Hardnkott. A small amount of scrambling and some careful route choices got me to a grassy path above the crags, and I could open up my stride once more. I jogged along glancing over towards the dark Scafell massif, which was engulfed in trouble-brown cloud.

 

I reached a natural prominence in the ground and stopped. The absence of wind screamed silence. I became aware of my heart pounding as I took in the panorama. My eyes rested on the Scafells again, then out into the Irish sea where a golden light was hinting of a sunset far too early in the day. Rain was visible in bands across the water, shaped into curves by wind. I looked the other way towards Harter and the Coniston fells who were also engaged in battle, the scene was still but suggestive of movement in the way an artist might draw drama. Everywhere I looked I could see storms. Every view fizzed with theatre, yet it was so silent and peaceful here in this moment. I stood for a good ten minutes, rotating, and looking deeply into each scene. I didn’t have a camera, or phone and I cant ever remember connecting so deeply with a mountains scene.

 

Perhaps we are not alone if we have a camera, sharing the experience with a lens, and all the future interactions we might have with that image. It roots the memory in a snapshot, focussed in on only one of the senses. The act of taking the picture also removes you from the experience, engaging with something else, frustrated by the limitations. Not being in the moment.

 

I am writing this on Christmas eve, four months since I had the experience. I can remember the view perfectly. What is more, I can recall the clothes I was wearing, the colour of the rock I was standing on, the sensation of my heart pounding in my chest and the build up of emotion in my throat. I can remember the silence and the scratching of my shoe on rock as I slowly turned around. I remember disturbing a falcon on the descent and watching it fly away, back towards the safety of the crags. I remember the smell of wet tarmac in summer heat as I reached the road again.

 

I’m not sure I’d even think about this experience again if I had taken a photo, after all, I’d have no need to, it’d be stored in the memory on my phone. In years I might look at it and try to recall the fell it was taken from. When I did remember I’d be pleased and maybe think we should go a walk there sometime. I doubt I’d recall the emotions I’m recalling today though, and perhaps I wouldn’t have even experienced them in the first place.

 

Sorry for the lack of photos on this post ;-)