Some days you wake up in flow…others you wake up all stutter, unsure, itchety-scratchety, feeling like you should be (or want to be) doing something, but not really sure what it is. Yesterday was one of those. I've just finished dealing with an awful lot of stuff, and to be fair a lot of awful stuff, and I had come to the conclusion that I'm owed some down time. That was the plan.
Not a great plan, because I'm not great at down time. I'm not (yet) used to it. And it is November, and it has been November-ish weather, all grey and damp and…
…and as I sat over my journal and then my breakfast I could feel the sun fighting its way through the clouds. It wasn't going to be a stay-at-home kind of a day.
My well needs replenishing and here's a sunny day asking me to come out and play, but – and for me it's a fairly big but – I hadn't planned anything. Whatever I am saying about my mantra for this year being 'wild and free' the fact is: if I don't have half-a-plan and bag-&-boots in the hall, going walking isn't gonna happen. I need to work on that.
As the pen scratches through my morning pages it keeps telling me: just go, pick up a map or don't, just wander. It feels like it's been a long time since I did that.
So I did.
Nothing exciting. I took a look at the street map, aligned it to half a memory from about a decade ago and thought: ok, let's just go see.
So, this was an unplanned walk from my own front door, but it's a new front door, in the sense of a new address. My old out-the-door and go routes are on the other side of the city. They don't work from here, not in that free-form way. I need new ones.
I only got ever so slightly lost – and I'm grateful for the cycle network signers who gave me the big hint I was heading in absolutely the wrong direction – and my distance reckoning is low considering how long I was out. Then again, it was a beautiful day and it was a new route and there was a camera to play with. There were ponies to talk to. And geese to watch.
One of my old routes ends near the bridge where the Earlham Road heads out of the City. I've had a few meanders taking that route in reverse, back towards where I used to live, but today was a day for striking in the other direction, cross over the road and follow the river that way.
Even as I write, I keep going back to the map to find out where I went wrong. I think I've figured it out…but that doesn't matter. What matters is where I went right.
I went right every time I strayed off the path. I found a pond: reed-strewn, and staithe-flooded, the fishing platform looking like a giant leaf-collecting sieve. I found another local marsh that I knew nothing about. Bowthorpe Marsh doesn't compare with Marston – even the council calls it "species poor" and "unimproved" – but it's close to hand and if we look who knows what we will find. And if we look and if we then care, maybe it can be 'improved', maybe we can make it species rich, I wonder what that would take. Maybe I should figure out who to ask.
For today however I was just out for a walk.
I learned a number of things.
Firstly I learned that the year has suddenly turned cold and I should dig out hats and gloves, and that it is also wet, time to dig out the boots or get some proper winter walking shoes.
More interestingly I learn that I don't know my geese. My best guess is Canada, which means they could be locals or visitors. Somehow they didn't look too much 'at home'. I watch them for a while, doing what gees do in the middle of the day, which is basically paddle about, nibble a bit, rest. I'm curious about the fact that they were acting like a herd, all facing the same way, like they were grid-squaring the marsh making sure every inch was checked before setting off again.
Less interestingly, I learn that following Dan taking a nip at my arm several years ago, I haven't got over my fear of horses, even small ones, beautiful curious creatures that they are, have me taking a step back and apologising for having nothing to feed them with. No carrots, apples or polo mints. But then, we're injuncted against feeding them anyway…but I should at least have been willing to stay and talk a bit more up-close & personal .
I learn that I still cannot resist a glistening blackberry…but that those ripening this late in the season haven't had enough sunlight; they are not sweet. I leave most of them of them for the birds. I recall an old-wives' tale that a bountiful berry yield harbingers a hard winter to come. If so, it's not only the blackberries giving warning. The rowan are heavy, and there's a single stand of some unrecognised plant ablaze with golden fruit. Standing proud among the dull fading scrub, it reminded me of the flowering cacti you sometimes get on the high plains, rebels of the plant world, shouting their glory against received wisdom.
Bright berries and sunlight-on-water, the pond, the river and the pools in between, I know I haven't got this route figured out yet, but I've found a new local patch to get to know. It is one more stitch in the homemaking tapestry.
Maybe I also learned that "down-time" doesn't necessarily mean sitting still.
