“I heard a bird sing in the dark of December. A magical thing. And sweet to remember. We are nearer to Spring than we were in September. I heard a bird sing in the dark of December.”
– Oliver Herford
Above my head, the tips of the oak branches gleam as if gilded by the sinking sun.
Power walking past me, her trainers squelching through the sticky mud, a lady holds the lead of her small, curly-haired dog high, as if competing in the ring at Crufts.
A single silver star punctuates the deep blue of the dawn skies.
Even my footsteps are muffled this morning; school is adrift in a sea of thick, grey fog.
The circle of ducks on my desk are migrating, following meandering paths across the wooden land.
Streaks of red reflect in the wet road surface behind the string of cars.
Small, silky buds have appeared on next door’s magnolia tree; the ghosts of flowers yet to come.
A hierarchy of teachers has appeared on my whiteboard; cause for great hilarity amongst staff.
“Mr M: stole the wheels from the computer room chairs.” (He was fed up of them wheeling around the room on them!)
“Mr J: Late notice for EVERYTHING! Flaky as anything!” (I tend to agree)
“Mr C: Room for discussion” (He’s new)
Two geese march across the skies; their plumage dark against the misty morning.
Wisps of cloud hang, ghostly amongst the trees; hauntingly lit by the shafts of sunlight shining through the branches.
Like a disruptive child, a pigeon calls, its call taken up and repeated again and again by its friends.
White birches dance gracefully at the front of the stage, the darker chorus line of pines behind them providing an atmospheric setting.
Framed by contrails, three buzzards circle lazily in the pale blue expanse of sky.
Where sunlight touches, condensation boils off like smoke from an unseen fire.
The girls have brought dolls in as props for their drama performance today; watching them revert to childhood as they play with them before school is a delight.
My Year 11s look at their recent mock exams and compare them with the work they’ve done in lesson today, tentative smiles spreading across their faces.
They might be realising they can do this …
Two seagulls standing on the roof of the Science block are taking it in turns to scream stridently, and have been doing so for ten minutes. The Year 8s valiantly try to suppress their giggles, with varying degrees of success. I can’t really blame them.
Robins sing as I hustle up the road; joyful heralds of the last day of term.
Tree trunks are adorned with an intricate Celtic knotwork of ivy.
A pigeon sits judgementally on top of a streetlight.
Scapegoat Hill is huddled grumpily under a thick, grey duvet of fog.
Streaks of twilight are scribbled messily across the sky.
“The finest workers in stone are not copper or steel tools but the gentle touches of air and water working at their leisure with their liberal allowance of time.”
– David Henry Thoreau
It’s Christmas Eve and we need to stretch our legs. The weather in the Scottish Borders has been oddly temperate for the time of year, despite (or perhaps because of) the constant gloom and dreary, damp grey skies. It’s not ‘warm’ per se, but it’s also not the level of bone deep, marrow freezing cold that it normally reaches. Having said all that, today seems slightly different; there are a couple of breaks in the unrelenting grey through which, dare I say it, there might be glimpses of blue. We decide to risk it.
Having bounded around in the heather for hours looking for a stone circle earlier in the year (see below), we decide to head for a slightly easier target this morning.
I’ve seen lots of photos online of a stone circle at Duddo, which is just down the road. We haul out a trusty Ordnance Survey map, and sure enough, just north of Duddo, there it is: Duddo Four Stones. It’s even got a convenient pathway that goes straight to it. Perfect.
We set off along the never-ending bumps of the road down to Coldstream, ignoring the SatNav lady and giggling at the random route she’d chosen and the notion that perhaps she’s trying to help us avoid a traffic jam. I’m not sure which is funnier, the idea that SatNav lady is trying to be helpful or the idea that there might be a traffic jam on this empty stretch of road.
The clouds overhead are uniform grey, but there’s a beautiful cloud formation over the Cheviots and some very bright crepuscular rays shining down on to the distant hillsides. Ali reckons there are alien spaceships hiding in the clouds and the lights are really tractor beams for picking up cows. Which suggests that aliens are Scottish; there’s always clouds to hide their spaceships in here! It may also suggest that my sister has an over active imagination, but it’s not like that’s news to any of us. After a slight miscalculation, we arrive just outside Duddo at the correct piece of woodland (the miscalculation involved the wrong woodland!) and stop behind a particularly badly parked camper van and car duo. Their owners appear to have looked at the slightly muddy verge and decided to just park in the road instead. We refrain from doing the same and park more sensibly on the verge. If you can’t deal with mud, Scotland in December is not really a place for you to spend time. A quick wrestle with wellies, coats and scarves and we’re ready to go.
The pathway is broad and formed mainly from mud with occasional sharp rocks placed in a way that seems calculated to trip people up. The mud is amazingly fine textured and sticky and we squelch audibly along through it. It’s not long before my boots are three times as heavy as they were when we started out. There are fieldfares in the pasture alongside the track and a robin in the hedge that flies in short bursts along the path ahead of us, looking as if he would rather we weren’t going that way. Crows are dancing in the clouds above our heads.
The path transects a field of winter wheat and becomes more militantly marked. The farmer is obviously very fed up with people wandering through his crops and has helpfully placed bamboo sticks to impale the unwarranted traveller who slides in the mud. We slip and slide up a slight incline and are greeted by the stone circle at the top.
Which very clearly has five stones. And a little one. And space for a couple more that seem to have faded away over the millenia. Not four like the designation on the map. Apparently, one of the stones was re-erected at the start of the twentieth century to make five, but the previous name stuck. The Scots (or I suppose, more accurately, the Northumbrians … although in this area, the difference is somewhat fluid) really don’t like to change things if no one makes them!
The stones themselves are beautiful; top heavy and bulbous, their faces runnelled and cratered, crusted and patched with lichen. We can’t work out why this is so or whether they have been carved, but read later that it’s because of water running down them, carrying away layers of the softer sandstone. People have clearly visited for the winter solstice; there’s a small bouquet of holly atop one stone (irritatingly wrapped with a bright red plastic ribbon), a satsuma on another and a Cuddy’s bead tucked away in a hollow on a third. I wonder what they were hoping for, what their dreams of the year to come might be.
Being a Bronze Age circle, it’s been here for nigh on five thousand years. How much have people changed in that time? How different are the dreams of today’s visitors to those of its original creators? It’s a place that makes you consider these questions … a place that somehow gives you a chance to take a deep breath and slow down.
I wander the circle, taking photos and considering the tiny details, the grooves in a stone that have been filled with tufty lichen, the dimpled surface of another that reminds me of baking foccacia, the interplay between light and shade, the line of harder stone that bisects two small holes, the parallel lines of the ‘carvings’ on the largest stone. It’s a place full of minute discoveries, each asking for careful examination and appreciation.
We squelch back down the hill to the car ready to re-enter the fray of Christmas preparations, leaving behind this ancient space and its calm, still air.
Five thousand years of history … with an incorrect name, on a quiet hilltop outside of a tiny village in Northumberland. Well worth a visit.
“As happens sometimes, a moment settled and hovered and remained for much more than a moment. And sound stopped and movement stopped for much, much more than a moment.”
– John Steinbeck, ‘Of Mice and Men’
Silence is a strange thing.
It’s something I’ve been thinking about on and off for the last week or so. As a teacher, I seem to spend an inordinate amount of my time asking for silence. I also definitely spend a lot of time not getting any! This is especially true in the final week before the Christmas holidays, when every day has been interrupted by Christmas dinner, rehearsals for the pantomime, the pantomime itself, reward trips, food technology exams, and reading tests*. I am desperate for silence in a way that only a teacher at the end of the autumn term could ever truly appreciate.
*Let’s just say that my ‘teacher face’ has been in full effect all week.
There’s a dream of a silent classroom, all my little cherubs with their heads down, writing confidently and eloquently about literature, that floats around in my head during those moments when they’ve kust arrived and all hell is breaking loose, I can’t even make myself heard to ask them to be quiet, and I know I’m perilously close to losing my shit and bellowing at full volume! It’s a lovely dream, in which I’m floating serenely round the room, offering quick ‘golden nuggets’ of advice that are immediately acted upon and happily ticking things.
It’s also completely, ridiculously, unrealistic. Firstly, students just can’t take advice on board that quickly. Secondly, there’s no point just ticking work in secondary school; I’m much more focused on how to improve, rather than just accepting an answer. Thirdly, I’ve never floated anywhere serenely in my life! And finally, in the unlikely event that my room was ever completely silent, I’m pretty sure I’d feel distinctly uncomfortable. I mean, I can’t say this for certain as it has absolutely never happened, but I’m fairly confident in this opinion.
Even when I get home after a day of mayhem, craving quiet and time to process things without a million children repeating ‘Miss!’ like the seagulls in ‘Finding Nemo’, I find I don’t actually want silence. It makes me slightly uncomfortable; a bit itchy and fidgety. I’ve come to the conclusion that what I actually want is emotional silence; a period of time when nobody wants anything from me, nobody needs me to talk, and there’s no need to put on a ‘face’.
It might occasionally need to be quiet, but sometimes the right noise can be just as emotionally silent. The right playlist that switches off my brain. The sound of skates on ice and pucks hitting plexi. The rustle and twitter of the great outdoors as I walk through. Even the reassuringly normal sound of the washing machine can count.
So that’s my plan (dream?) for the next couple of weeks; enough emotional silence that I can reset and recharge my stocks of patience and understanding. Given that I’m heading north tomorrow to see my family, none of whom ever stop talking, the chances of this involving actual silence are slim to none!
Now all I’ve got to do is pack … and wrap presents … and …. 🎄
“I’m not superstitious. I’m a witch. Witches aren’t superstitious. We are what people are superstitious of.”
– Terry Pratchett, ‘Wintersmith’
I don’t know what it is about hockey, but it can turn the most rational, logical human being into a superstitious fool without even seeming to try.
Case in point.
It’s Sunday night; I’m on the couch, snuggled under a cozy blanket, wearing (don’t judge me) fuzzy elephant pyjamas, woolly socks … and a snazzy pair of silver hoop earrings featuring chemical diagrams for serotonin and dopamine. And if one of those things seems a little incongruous compared to the others, it’s because it really is!
But if I don’t wear the earrings, the Ducs lose. Every. Single. Time. If I do wear them, they win. And on one occasion, when I realised I’d forgotten and put the earrings in half way through a match, we went from two goals down to one goal up in about two minutes flat. Proof positive that my earrings have some sort of magical powers and can make all the difference (?!).
It has to be these earrings. Specifically. In the correct ears and everything.
They’re starting to get a bit worn round the edges; I have a habit of running my fingers over the chemical diagrams when I’m stressed … and as any hockey fan will tell you, stress is an integral part of the whole experience. But it’s not like I can replace them. Obviously. Due to the fact that only these earrings will do.
Just in case anyone is wondering, my Panthers lucky earrings are not the same. They have to be my Schrödinger’s cats. Because the game is both won and lost until the very moment the final buzzer sounds. Obviously.
I know … it’s ridiculous 🤦♀️ … but it seems to work, and if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
“There may be a great fire in our soul, yet no one ever comes to warm himself at it, and the passers-by see only a wisp of smoke.”
– Vincent Van Gogh
Another quick one … life is busy at this point in the year (and the term) what with Christmas and its inevitable celebrations, birthdays, parents evenings, garage appointments (My car has decided that it’s not satisfied with any of its tyres or the oil it currently has!!) and baking.
I did manage to carve out a couple of hours for a wander at Wretham yesterday though. It had been cold overnight with a light frost, but the morning was fresh, clear and very sunny (I’m pretty sure I still have small purple dazzles in front of my eyes as I’m writing this!).
As I walked down through the first section of forest, sun rays shining through the trees were illuminating the wisps of mist that remained and punctuating them with thousands of tiny starbursts emanating from the dew drops that hung from every twig. It was like walking through a magical land … or at least it would have been, if not for the many, many, dirt bikers that had chosen to make it their playground for the morning.
As I walked, I was convinced my eyes were playing tricks on me; I kept catching flashes of movement in my peripheral vision but when I turned, there was nothing there. Was I seeing the movement of birds in the undergrowth? Faeries dancing in the mist? Animals scurrying for cover?
It was only when I reached a more open area that I realised that it was the condensation from the melting frost boiling off in the sunlight. Curls of smoke lifted from the bright embers of the bracken, twisting and dancing in the air before dissipating into sunbeams. I watched, entranced by the sight and lulled into immobility by the movement.
Shaking myself from my trance, I continued on down the path to see what other treasures I could find.
“A cat has absolute emotional honesty: human beings, for one reason or another, may hide their feelings, but a cat does not.”
– Ernest Hemingway
Just a quick share today as I didn’t manage to organise myself very well and the more detailed posts that I started planning are still very much in the planning stage. Let’s (very charitably) call them ‘works in progress’.
I get many pictures drawn on my board, and they range from the artistic to the absolutely ridiculous, through something that can only be referred to using the acronym WTF?. Charlie tends towards the former, with stylised cartoons that make me smile.
This delightful little creature was what greeted me at the end of lunchtime yesterday. I don’t know whether it was because she was feeling a little anxious, or whether anxiety in general was just on her mind (or maybe she has a very anxious cat), but either way, he was a great companion for the afternoon lessons.
He has been replaced today by a Christmas dinosaur. Very festive, but somehow not quite as endearing.
“Where does the rainbow end, in your soul or on the horizon?”
– Pablo Neruda
Regardless of the fact that the weather people say winter doesn’t arrive the first of December, in my little world it seems to have been here for weeks. After a very dry summer, the rain is making up for its absence.
Norfolk is brown in winter; soggily, squelchily brown. With accents of grey. And occasional outbreaks of pheasants. It is in direst need of some colour. So when I saw an Instagram reel from someone (@emilydubious) who was searching for rainbows, it struck a chord.
This is my Saturday rainbow. It was raining and, as I often do, I had repaired to the kitchen. Looking out of the window as I washed up after my latest bread experiment (Gluten-free walnut and cranberry 😋), I realised that I had the beginning of a rainbow right in front of me.
The red berries of the shrub I thought was a Robinia, but that turns out to be a Cotoneaster jump out at me first. This tree drives me insane throughout spring and summer when it grows ridiculously quickly, no matter how often (or how far) I hack it back. Having said that, its flowers buzz constantly with a whole collection of insects and I do appreciate the pop of colour from the berries at this time of year.
The orange is a shrub that I actually knew was a Cotoneaster, although its a completely different Cotoneaster from the first one. In autumn, its glossy green leaves turn a vibrant orange, their circular shapes always reminding me of those Australian aboriginal ‘dot paintings’ that depict stories and journeys.
I brave the rain to grab some pictures at the far end of the garden, and notice that behind the summerhouse, a single yellow rose is still in bloom. Goodness knows what on earth it’s thinking; there are definitely no pollinators around at this time of year, but it’s a welcome spot of sunshine right now.
The lime green leaves of a maple seedling are poking out through the overgrown mass of my lemon balm drift. It’s a self seeded plant that I’ll have to remove at some point; there’s no space for a maple in my herb beds. But for now it can stay where it is. It has at least had the courtesy to plant itself in a trough rather than between the paviours.
The darker green is a parsley plant that I’m ridiculously proud of. Mostly because it upsets mum no end that I can keep mine going. She may be much, much better at plants than I am, but she can’t keep parsley alive to save her life!! The fact that I like the taste is just an added bonus.
I think I’ll struggle with the rest of the rainbow, but the dumpy bags that the gardener has filled with leaf litter tick off blue and purple nicely. I love the frayed threads round the edges and the movement of the blue strands.
Pink is my watering can, currently redundant as it lies, slick with water, in the rain. It’s got some nice shadows though, delineated by the harsh daylight.
The rain is starting to fall harder now, so I retreat hurriedly back to my kitchen and the warm scents of baking. Outside will just have to wait until tomorrow, but I have my rainbow.
absolutelynotnormal 