Dunlin

From Reflections of a Curlew

An atmospheric walk along the sea wall at Clevedon was rewarded with oyster catchers, redshank and dunlin in flight - a true winter spectacle.


From Reflections of a Curlew

It was a grey day, the earth breathing again after the freeze.

From Reflections of a Curlew

I think it was G K Chesterton who said something like - to be English is to appreciate the colour grey - how true.

Happy Christmas

Happy Christmas to everyone, I hope 2010 was all it was hoped to be. We end the year with snow, ice, political goings on and a sense we are all more vulnerable than we thought. It has been ash clouds and ice that have halted the UK, not the Conservatives or Labour.



The snow and ice have been misery I know for many but they have provided many pretty photo opportunities too.

From Reflections of a Curlew

From Reflections of a Curlew

We have one more year of primary school nativity plays to go to, I love this picture - harsh message but young and hopeful face.

From Reflections of a Curlew

Happy Christmas and New Year
Mary

The Picture Straightener

Art Gallery Assistant - Banksy

Another short story. They keep on coming at the moment, but I fear Christmas will now put an end to all fancy. I have had the image of a "picture straightener" for ages but only just got down to writing a story about him.

The Picture Straightener

Harold was a good soul with a warm centre to his world and oak solid posts that supported his life, compassion, integrity and good manners. He was one of those people you just know is decent and kind; a perfect neighbour and a perfect stranger.

Harold worked at the town’s art gallery, one of those people who sit in the corner by the fire extinguisher and just keep an eye on things. It was a good job for him because people liked him and for as long as he could remember he had a real eye for the horizontal. Even if most people thought a picture was hanging straight he knew it was slightly off, and every time he was right if it was checked with a spirit level. He wasn’t paid to do it but each day he walked around the gallery just to check all was hanging as it should be. A slight adjustment here, a tiny tilt there, then the doors could open with pride.

The week of his retirement Harold felt a little sad. He would miss his colleagues for sure but he would also miss the connection he had made with the paintings; some had been there for years. Battle scenes, lovers, vast landscapes, heroes, magnificent red deer - none of them was particularly famous; they were all by lesser-known artists but in his opinion none the worse for that. There was no pressure to admire or analyse them or to stand looking at them with an air of great appreciation. These were just somebody’s attempt at a glimpse of the truth. Harold had never really liked photographs, in his opinion they were snapshots of an instant in time that was fleeting and didn’t represent anything real. Photographs don’t tell the back-story or give us a hint of the lives behind the smiling faces. He much preferred art; it was full of detail that led you to ponder rather than remember. For that reason he had never owned a camera.

On Monday morning of the last week Harold was pleased to see a new painting arrive and placed in one of the smaller rooms set aside for visiting works of art. The small information sign said it was called The Seamstress. What a lovely picture! A young and beautiful woman, with dark hair swept back in a bun, sat in the woods embroidering a piece of white cloth. She was wearing the most beautiful grey dress that flowed down to the ground and the artist had captured the filtered sun softly glistening on the silken folds. Her seat was a log in a glade and she was glancing up from her work as though she had just been disturbed. There was no alarm on her face, just an inquiring look that went past the observer to an unknown figure behind. Harold turned round to see if someone was really there! What a captivating scene, human and natural beauty in gentle light. He called the young woman Florence for no other reason than it seemed to suit. What was she looking at? A lover? A friend? And why sit in a woodland clearing to sew? He stepped back to get a wider view; yes the picture was hung just right. Welcome Florence, I hope you will be very happy here Harold thought to himself. You silly old duffer! She is a painting! But he still felt a sense of pride and joy that she was gracing this B-rated gallery. What a treasure awaited those who wandered in now and then.

Tuesday was rainy, probably not much traffic through the gallery today, why was it that bright sunshine and dreary rain put people off galleries? But Harold still began with his daily straightening round, every visitor mattered and every painting mattered; numbers didn’t concern him. The Muses needed a tiny adjustment, as did The Death of Socrates but otherwise all was well. He found himself hurrying uncharacteristically to Florence, how about that he thought, his last week and still something to look forward to. There she was, still glancing at the unknown, still beautiful – but tilted! “Now how did that happen Flo?” He chuckled to himself, “only known you one day my dear and I’m being familiar already.” The picture had offset to the right, not by much, but obvious to him. He moved it back to the horizontal, gave Florence a smile and carried on with his day.

On Wednesday Harold was well aware that there was not much time left at the gallery. He had plans for his retirement, including going on a safari which had been a long held ambition, but what with family expenses and a wife who had been ill for many years the time was never right. He closed his eyes as he remembered June who had been taken from him 5 years ago. Even now the pain of grief sometimes swept him onto a foreign shore. He had learned to keep still and let the force of the flow roll him over the razor sharp stones, but then slowly the pain ebbed away, back to the darkness of the ocean. God rest you June.

The morning round was uneventful; everything seemed to be behaving on the horizontal front, although Virgin on the Shore was maybe a little out. But in the far room for visiting works of art there was one exception; The Seamstress had once again slipped to the right. He frowned as he looked at the frame. It was definitely offset and, it might just be his imagination, but he thought Florence had moved very slightly too, along the log to the right. It would be indiscernible to most people but Harold’s eye for detail hadn’t let him down yet. Her gaze was steadfast as ever but as Harold moved the painting back to the horizontal he fancied, for a fleeting second, a look of irritation flashed across her face. Now Harold he thought, it is about time you hung up the peaked cap, you are definitely going soft in the head. As he turned to go he turned to look at her – she was straight in her frame and still beautiful but maybe not quite so content?

On Thursday Harold had many things to do. A new recruit was visiting him to learn the ropes, his locker needed clearing out and he had to collect his mug and plate from the staff room. He would take them home tonight and bring a flask tomorrow. His straightening round was a little later than usual but when he did get around to it, yet again Florence was wonky. He was sure now that she had shifted her weight ever so slightly to the right on the log, making the picture tilt to one side. No doubt the public would walk past and not give it a moment’s thought – but Harold couldn’t let it be. Once again he moved the frame back and once again he fancied he saw wave of annoyance sweep across her smooth face. “What is it love? Why do you keep moving? What can I do to make you happy here? My last week and I’ve failed to make it just right.” Tears pricked his eyes, but all he saw in Florence was a questioning look in to the distance.

Friday was his goodbye party. He felt an air of apprehension and for the first time a feeling of emptiness. His house seemed cavernous and he had put away the pictures of June, he couldn’t stand seeing them for hours each day; happy smiles, deep sadness. The months ahead looked worryingly lonely, despite all his plans, family and friends. “So this is it” he thought. “This has been your working life and now it is coming to an end. He hadn’t saved anyone’s life or made the world a better place for the poor, but too late now to have those thoughts old chap.”

He took time over his straightening round; each picture got a slight touch, more for old time’s sake than necessity. But once again Florence had defiantly shifted to the right. He stared at her implacable face, the softness of her hair and her delicate hands. Who are you? As he went to put the frame back he stopped. Her face had changed from questioning to pleading. He moved away to look at her for a long while. Memories of picnics in woods with June and the children flooded back. Logs were great fun to run along and sit on to chat, but he did remember they were never as comfortable as they looked. Annoying bumps and lumps made sitting in one place for too long a chore. “I think I understand Flo” he thought at last. “Well that is ok, I won’t bother you anymore.” As he walked away from her he turned to look for the last time and yes, he wasn’t imagining it, a slight curve at the side of her mouth said thank you.

The White Tissue

A while ago I was walking along a coast path in Cornwall and saw a woman in the distance on an isolated beach - she looked out of place and I couldn't work out where she was heading. Next time I looked for her she had gone. That memory has stayed with me and has turned into another short story -


The White Tissue

This was normally a favourite walk, a couple of hours through varied scenery which took in woodland, coast path, a beach and some fields, but today it was somehow tedious. The walk starts with a long stroll through beech woodland, which is where he was now. Even on overcast days these beautiful and airy woods evoked a sense of well being which is hard to experience anywhere else. He remembered reading somewhere in a magazine that the Japanese have a phrase for the sense of peace and harmony found in woodlands, shinrin-yoku or “wood-air bathing,” strange the things you remember. The article described the sensation of wallowing in the chemicals given out by ancient trees, allowing them to wash over and through your body bringing forth peaceful thoughts and a calm disposition. This was exactly how he felt about this place, but today those chemicals, if they were exuding at all, hardly dampened the growing feelings of irritation and disquiet.

A dull, heavy sky and a clammy heat combined to make him feel uncomfortable. Sweat pricked through his skin and his clothes cloyed. He thought about turning back but decided to press on, no doubt it would get better.

No dancing, dappled light lit the path, no shadows teased his eyes; not even a bird trilled in delight somewhere far away; this was not a day for play. A sudden scurrying in the undergrowth momentarily distracted him, but whatever it was fled into the shadows and was gone, leaving him alone. He knew the path ended at a fence where a wooden stile led onto a stretch of coast. He yearned to get there and to a vista across the sea; to feel the fresh breeze on his face.

The trees had become menacingly oppressive with each step. He could barely bring himself to admit it but a growing sense of panic was beginning to take hold as he imagined the branches reaching down, their hard twigs scratching his face and the saw-toothed leaves covering his mouth. Stupid, childish thoughts! He hurried on, occasionally glancing rapidly behind him, and anger at his inability to lift himself from this deepening mood grew stronger.

The woodland ended abruptly at the fence and for a few seconds he rested at the wooden stile before climbing over, his hands held onto the upright posts as though their man made nature was vital to restoring his balance. The rounded ends were polished through years of use. He gently stroked the smooth surface, reassured by their message of solidity and the continuity of human endeavour. Calmer, he climbed over and the menace of the woodland began to fade, even so he was left with a slight feeling of nausea and his heart was beating a little too strongly. But as he looked up to the path ahead he realised he would not see the sea for another half a mile. How could he have forgotten the high, dense hedges that hemmed in the narrow path, blocking the view of the sea? On other days he loved this short stretch of the track. The tangled vegetation would have been an endless source of treasures waiting to be found. A darting butterfly here, a focussed bumblebee there and a tantalising song of an unidentified bird that was difficult to glimpse. Often this section could take two hours of watching, searching, listening, sketching. But today it was a resolute and impenetrable wall. No life stirred in its depths, or at least nothing that he was capable of finding. He pressed on.

The coast path gradually led down to the beach and, mercifully, the hedge lowered and petered out. At last he could see the sea. It was calm and because of the heaviness of the weather the sea bled into the sky on the horizon. The lack of refreshing breeze was frustrating, but at least he could see into the distance and for a long while he stared at the vastness of the dark grey-green water that swayed gently to and fro, but lacking its normal energy. Occasionally, white gulls soared silently in the distance on their way to unknown places; otherwise it was an empty scene. He turned back to the path to look at the short stretch of beach ahead, only 200 metres in length at most and dissected by a small stream that trickled onto the sand and stones from the fields behind. The stream marked the point where the path left the beach again and headed inland towards the meadows and farm buildings perhaps a mile away. It was then he saw her for the first time.

A woman was carefully walking parallel to the sea, picking her way across the flattened pebbles. Two things struck him immediately as odd, the way she was dressed and the direction in which she was heading. Her clothes seemed to him to be more suited to the deck of a classy yacht, not a rather lonely beach far from any moorings, and certainly a long way from what he thought would be the right kind of setting. She was dressed in tight white jeans with a gold belt and a tight white t-shirt that clung to her slim but ageing body. Her gold pumps were not designed for serious walking, they were meant to be seen on clean wooden decks or polished stone floors. What was she doing here? To be honest this beach wasn’t attractive, it was smelly because of the rotting seaweed that fringed the shoreline; a wonderful habitat for sand hoppers, but a surprising choice for an expensively dressed, middle-aged woman. Her dyed blonde hair fell around her shoulders, but it was brittle and thin. He felt over-critical but couldn’t help thinking she had the look of someone who couldn’t accept that the glossiness of youth had passed. All this was summarised in a few seconds and without seeing her face because she was walking away from him beyond the stream and the coast path towards the far end of the beach where no one ever seemed to go.

The sight of another person on this surprisingly gloomy walk immediately cheered his spirits. He wanted to walk up to her, chat about the oppressive weather and the lack of activity all around, which was highly unusual. Where was she from? Did she know this area well? If she didn’t mind him asking, was she lost? Perhaps he could help show her the way? His pace quickened and his mood began to lift. He watched her walking slowly away from him, in a short time she would reach the cliffs at the far end of the beach and then she would realise she had missed the footpath onto the fields. He knew the cliffs were sandy and unstable, certainly too dangerous to climb, and so she would have to walk back this way to the stream and perhaps they could share the journey for while?

The track he was on led to a stile to climb over and onto the beach. He often stood on the raised platform to look around. Many times he had seen cormorants fishing just off shore and loved their primeval snake like necks and dagger beaks and always marvelled at their dark bodies held low in the water and how they dived from view in an instant; mini monsters fishing the deep. For a few seconds he glanced out to sea, perhaps he could point them out to the woman in white and tell her how throwing stones into the water could draw them closer, but today they were hunting elsewhere.

He climbed over the stile and headed out across the beach, but suddenly he stopped in total confusion. The woman had disappeared. How ridiculous! He couldn’t have imagined her, she was right there in front of him only a short while ago. She couldn’t have run back to the path, he would certainly have noticed, and he knew the distant cliffs were un-scalable. So where was she? There was absolutely no sign. He walked quickly along the waters edge to where she had been only moments before. Wet impressions of the soles of her shoes were still on some of the flatter stones, but they stopped after a while and were rapidly evaporating. He looked around for any sign but she had gone, simply disappeared into thin air. In the distance something small and white stood out against the grey stones, a fragment of hope. He ran to the spot where the snowy paper handkerchief grew heavy and formless on the wet, dark slabs of rock. It was quickly losing its structure and submitting to the destructive power of water. The clawing hands of the waves repeatedly tried to grasp it and take it out to sea, in a few moments they would succeed and all traces of her would be gone.

Despair swept over him and he felt unbearably tired. As the sea claimed the tissue and dragged it away he sank to the ground. All he could do was wait for her to return, as she must. Nothing so real could go forever, that wasn’t the way of things. Yes, she would certainly come back, he knew she would, it was just a matter of time.

As the grasping waves came closer he sank lower onto the beach. Time is all it would take, and just like the sea and sky, time and anticipation merged, heavy and damp as the air.