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Cloud Based Activism

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Round bales carapaced in black, in the fields, in formations. Clouds that blew in from an oil painting, circa 1700. Love how the trees lean from a predominant onshore. Our white car, new, we even keep it clean, drives by the crossroads where the sheep thief was buried. Circa? Imagine the dirt under his fingernails; why this detail? They hanged him on Gallows Hill. Up in the town they beheaded a priest, circa 1600. Not the same ‘they’ as in people, the same ‘they’ as in upholders of the law. Home is mildly clean, swept, the garden tangled, verdant. So what’s the right thing to do? This history that leads to here, this present time stuck with bits of beautiful, bits of raw inequality? From global to local, the thread that leads to my own door? Where does this go? Simple advice to myself: it is up to me, just what I do. Avoid apathy. Buy local, there’s a start, make your own bread. Hand over the earth with minimal apology. Broken necks are vivid stories: keep the

Adventure-Trousers

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It is possible that we did. Track through the maize jungle, doused in rain. We were monkeys, giggling. Slunk big cats, louche, fantastic. Bright birds. Or maybe it was something we thought of: today’s adventure could be… Trespass through the living crop. Maize grows with toes, it can, at any time, rise up. Run on its toes like raptors. Leaves wide as machetes. Take nothing for granted in here. Rain forest magic in here. We have our best adventure-trousers on, and Wellington boots. It is possible. Anything is.

Backlight

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It must be a year since the damsons were planted, and the meadow grass grew its gold splay, and now we have it just right to backlight this spiderweb. A garden takes time but returns it in increments of moments that somehow contain timelessness; like the sun can be caught in one raindrop, perhaps, reflective magic.  This morning Mr is finishing a sleep that began on the sofa last night. Dog was curled on her bed, Fat Beagle had taken the vacant man-space, before we went out for our garden wander. The mist was thickest over the river. We walked in dots and all the while the sun was clearing it up. I have my coffee mug, and my camera, a slouchy t-shirt, old shorts. Two dogs snuffling, for scent-gossip and their favourite grass snacks. ‘Look at this web.’ I say, but they just stare down to the river.

Holiday Pieces

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Of beach and field and chips and ice cream, of campfire stories with smoke and marshmallows, of flickery lights and buttered vegetables, of a whale skull and wide skies and unexpected swimming, one holiday is assembled. Never dressed in day clothes much before midday. Breakfast served in waves of impulse; eggs and toasts, and bits of fruit peel piling on a picnic table. Dogs underfoot, wanting to help with anything we might drop. Children cook at the mud kitchen, making delicious cups of mud, but sometimes they are not children, they are snow leopards and puppies, or ponies, or cows called Betsy. Grandad gets tethered to a tree; again. Wet clothes lump on warm stones; dry ones rescued from a tide stranded rock. Laughing: we spend some time on that. At night we follow the lines of flames, up, up; all of us struck, over and over, with every sliver, every glint, that there are the stars of our origin. What else could we need?

Water And Skin

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Widdershins, barefoot, slowly walk around the block, around the lanes that lay around the fields, warm road sometimes flat, sometimes not.  Kick small stones from a bold instep. Pods of storm cross overhead. The maize crop has grown, enough to whisper secrets. Leaves shiver, clustered like spears. Sun on puddles makes them shining pieces of dropped sky.  In the river tethered clouds skim and bump.  Here, flip-flops in hand, just walking, listening, absorbing. Later, hear the wind shake; shake the light from the sky. Rayburn lit. Water hot. Light a candle, take a bath. Water on skin. Rain on glass. See steam droplets on tiles, sparkled by a naked flame.

Two Rescues

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Next-door have a cat, a great advantage in the discouragement of rats. But here on the ground is a fledgling; feathered, with wobbly flight skills, a wagtail chick. This should not be cat food. Dog pays it scant attention, until I pick it up. Then she gives a look that announces both her acceptance of the situation and her opinion that I am a traitor. The fledgling sits in my hand. It too looks at me. Tiny mites climb all over it. They dot my hands. I get some dust and a box to bath my new friend. It remains unstartled. There’s no further sight of Next-door Cat so the fledgling is allowed back to play around the flowerpots. Parent birds are watching. I am watching. It hops out to watch me. The urge to name it is strong. Next I find a bee afloat in a tub, and pick that up. It revives, and walks up and down my arm and will not leave until it has rubbed its legs and buzzed its wings back to health. I sit in the polytunnel, Dog lies out in the shade. The bee walks, it

Cooking For Camp

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First pans on: no time for photographing after this! The first thing the grown ups say is ‘Remind me again why I’m doing this?’ The team leaders are thinking of the 5am wake ups, the number of times one child can lose a shoe, or need the toilet, or answer your question about where did you put your shoe with an anecdote about a hamster. (The shoe will be in the first place they looked for it, but not until you look for it too. Shoes are magic like that.) This year I am not team leading: I am on the kitchen crew. I don’t know what it is that I should be wondering why I’m doing it, it’s never been done by me before. Everyone should have a try at kitchen crew in order to fully appreciate the work that goes on to get the masses fed and the dishes washed. It starts and ends with heavy lifting. I’ve seen the bespoke field oven and the fry table and the gas bottles in place every year and never thought they were easy to shift about. Closing gap between knowledge and experi

Niece, First Viewing

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Here she is. Petal pink, goosey fatted She had been dreaming of light A sky light A sky opened up for her Into air she swam; part aquatic part rosebud grown from the warm bed of her mother - humidity nothing for her but reminiscence - Her father breathes deep, for joy barely, for amazement She breathes: is moving - one thing to dream of light another to meet it - The singular miracle closes her eyes Sleep, sleep will make sense of it They will wake up, of course The new parents. To look at her. They have been dreaming of this light too. Here she is.

The Best Smirk We Have Ever Seen

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This well earned smirk, caught on film. The car slides to a halt. All systems fail. A few hours later I am happy because I can move my head. But I was all ready very happy. These events are not directly connected. Or they are. Shall I begin with a beginning? The Chap, known then as Boy; although his sister being seven years his senior often led to the absentminded title of Maid, and I would pretend I had said Mate; since the age of four, had wanted to be a carpenter. Had his own tools, collected from birthdays, from approving relatives. Had graduated to power tools. Eight years an intended carpenter, this Boy, until the age of 12 brings him to a bigger school and a reconsideration. Carpentry will be a hobby, now, he says, he might be bored with it otherwise. He will become a Naval Officer instead. Okay. Mum is fine with supporting her children. Some things like committing atrocities she would not support, but this urge seems humanitarian. He mentions (in this order)

Comfort Baulks

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We say, if he doesn't put his toys away, does that mean he no longer cares for them? They could be gathered up easily in a bin bag, bundled to a charity shop? I’ll get new ones at Christmas, says Grandchild 1. Okay then. (But maybe he remembers that time at the Eden Project when Granma took his ice cream away?) He tidies some stuff, it makes his arms slow and heavy. Somewhere on tv are his parents, dots in a damp field, best-friend dots drinking cider up and watching bands, holding hands, eating good food, good simple important stuff. We look for the blue tent. There are a lot of blue tents. Humph. Grandchild 4 has a bump, holds his hands up for Grandad. Gets cuddles. Comfort. We go to run in the park, the one that is just grass. It will be boring, Grandchild 1 huffs. They have races. He is the fastest. Look at this tree he says, it’s tiny, but it’s a tree! He finds a dock leaf for his nettle sting. The nettles are taller than him. He looks up, sees the sk

The Rather Nice Show

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Homewards, driving, the film of existence is over exposed. Gold-glare where the road should have been. It has a thickness, this light, a liquidity. We are swallowed in it, guessing the route. We guess close enough, close enough to get home unscathed. Half a moon hangs in the sky there, a lace clad performer waiting for applause. All the blue deepens. The sun dips to a spotlight, gives the moon centre stage. A bottle of champagne crouches in the fridge. A note from Houseguest Ben, out at his Leavers’ Day celebrations, is propped over the oven: I had seen him earlier, suited and booted, off to have fun. We are to have a glass of champagne, he says, a thank you, he says: if there’s any left could he have another glass, it is rather nice. A toast we drink, to all of our children and all of their guests. Whatever else is achieved, is a script to be interpreted, is our encore.

Whale Visuals

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Here are photographs of the revisited former Fin Whale, with apologies to anyone who finds this gruesome. It would be more fabulous to see it live and swimming wild. Grandchild 2, although impressed by the size of bones, mostly found it stinky. 

Whale Scent

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There was a time I was smaller than this. Barefoot, summer-frocked, home-cut hair. If were lucky, smelling like cheap ice pops. It was one of those times I followed my father along the seawall. The storm had passed, it was warm, the tide halfway. My father, who photographed everything; I don’t recall him holding a camera. Everything I remember smelt like clean salt and beach heated seaweed; perhaps because it was fresh. The whale was fresh. We were empty handed. This memory opens like a box of that fresh sea air, streams out, tidal, blue-green. We are tiny, perched over a rock. Below us the whale carcass looks, mournful, out to the ocean. It cannot go home. It is oblivious to my awe, to being an  object of awakening. The oceans are That Big. Nature is immense. Above us, sky, space. We are tiny, perched in time, perched in space. Wow. I was four, maybe five years old. Forty years ago. And here, on Wansonmouth Beach, I am walking, barefoot. My daughter cuts my hair and I fo

Pea Blossoms

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Tractors rumble, back and forth to the field where a wind turbine will be installed. The dirt they carry has an orange cast, looks iron rich, but today they dig the earth to harvest the weather. Some loathe the turbine blades whirring in the landscape: not me. A blend of sleek futuristic styling and eco friendliness, to a girl who would live in a cave but keep the wifi? A cool wind swoops, the sun plays blaze and hide, clouds take interplanetary sizes. Our seedlings cling in the ground, dazzled. The taller plants only know that they have made it this far, no one is an expert. The peas have an exuberant way of growing: throw as they grow and curl and climb, experimental, without regrets. Like a tumble of pea blossoms, our grandchildren at play; Grandchild 3 has her second birthday: the diary is checked because it seems she has been here longer: but do we remember not having any of them? How the present can alter one’s perception of the past! Grandchild 3 has a fine sense of purpo

Coffee After Work

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A working wheel on your wheelbarrow makes a difference. Three loads I had brought with the flat tyre, and satisfaction had balanced difficulty. But with a pumped new tyre, nine loads flew up from the horse field today. The newest raised bed is nearly filled, is covered with pots where we decide what will take root where. A working wheel is better, though the lack of it enhanced the joy of having. I am learning to love ease. To sit back after the work and admire. In the polytunnel the squashes and the melons have their handmade frames, and I have a mug of coffee.

Summer Is Uncertain, As Expected

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Summer’s first month arrives with its two weather predictions: a drought will come - or relentless rain. The first thirteen hours hold dry, though the air is heavy-humid and the wind skitters in the manner of an overtired child.  Down comes the windbreak, blown flat. Grandchild 2 breaks from learning to skip. It’s cold. We go indoors to eat peanut butter. (She is tired from her weekend party. She loves all her presents. She loved the candle on her cake, it was a number four. She loved the cake but she didn’t eat any except the horn of the pink icing unicorn and a sugar daisy.) A small storm visits our cottage gardens. Next door’s gazebo is brought down, bunting flapping on the grass like bright triangular fish. Our tallest broad bean is bent over the side of the raised bed, it looks seasick. Later today I will tie it back up.  We never know the weather, I will say, until our faces are in it, and however set it seems, it always changes. The plants all know this, of c