Walknotes

Monday

Some days I feel like I could walk through the wood forever. It would help if it was bigger of course, but still. Woods then, if not this wood.  

Today the birds are singing, there’s petals scattered across the paths from flowers blooming so high you need to crane your neck to see them, and there’s King Alfred’s Cakes fungus halfway up a tree. 

I’m back in wellies which means I can walk wherever I want: through the muddiest bits of the wood and down the path between the fields. The cows are back, glowering. I try not to make eye contact as my feet sink low into waterlogged ditches.

I’ve chosen the route for the cow parsley but it’s still too early here yet, just a few sprigs. The stitchwort is coming though, and the purple honesty flowers. White deadnettles, and purple ground ivy too.

Back in the wood the squirrels are skittering noisily. And the white wood anemones are everywhere now, taking their turn in the limelight before the bluebells take over. Won’t be long.

Before I leave I stop for the birds – they’re loud! Thrush, blackbird, robin, wren, chiffchaff, nuthatch, parakeet and what…? I look up and the app is right, two Canada geese are passing overhead.

In the evening I watch the solar eclipse on TV, glad it’s a spectacle. I wish I could’ve seen it, but at least we only need to wait until 2090 for the next one. 

Tuesday

Watch the rain move in sheets across the garden. It was so heavy last night I discovered the ‘too-fast’ setting on the windscreen wipers is occasionally just right. 

Last week I moved some plants back outside as it was just about warm enough. Today I pick up the broken pieces where the pots have smashed in the wind. There’s no time to repot them so I do the best I can before I head to the train. The train, of course, is cancelled.

Wednesday

It’s sunny, and I have no idea what to do with it. What coat? I go for a raincoat, it surely can’t last. (It doesn’t). Before I leave home I walk around the garden and look at the tulips. They’ll open today and I’ll miss them. It’s the blousy parrot tulips, and some new ones this year too, dark red at the base, orangey tips. Next door’s cat is sitting on the shed roof, angry as always, grumbling at the world. 

On the way to the station the theme from Raiders of the Lost Ark bursts out as a whistle. We’re playing it at band (of course). Tip an imaginary hat as I cross the threshold and head into town like a rebel/hero.

In the evening I catch the overground to Hackney Wick. Every woman speaking on the train finishes their sentences with an upward inflection.

Thursday

“If you see something that doesn’t look right”, says the voice on the tannoy, “See it. Say it. Sorted.” I was reading The Haunting of Hill House on the train.

I wonder how the station staff would react to reports of the supernatural.

Today the bus arrives at the same time as I do, so I take it. From the top deck I  notice they’ve replaced the dead trees at London Bridge with live ones, and this time they’ve added a watering system. 

The bus is barely a quarter full. 

I spend until 2pm trying to ignore all the other things I should be doing so I can focus on the one thing. Then for the first time in this job, I take myself out for a 45 minute lunch, alone in a cafe. I read more of Hill House: it’s good. I finish it later, on the train and then before lights out. 

Friday

Sunshine. I get to enjoy the majesty of the tulips before heading to the dentist.

I’m early, so I sit in a green space opposite the building and wait. There’s not much here: a small grassy triangle, self-seeded forget-me-nots and a bench jammed next to a massive bin. I almost complain about the bin in my head, but never forget:

“At Disneyland, there’s a trash can every 30 feet. Walt Disney was obsessed with the park’s cleanliness, and in the 1950s, he determined that Disneyland guests would carry trash about 30 feet before dropping it on the ground.” (Via but also elsewhere)

So if the bin is not next to the bench, then where?

 The dentist asks about my job. I wonder which story to tell, the one about design or content, the one about digital products or the one about death.

“I work on a computer for about 10 hours a day.”
“Where?”
“Home and east London”.
That covers it.

Later:

“He’s lived in Germany, Paris and Budapest. He was the Vice Consulate of-“
“How do you know this? You’ve known him for 10 minutes.”

We went on a walking tour of the old Crystal Palace High Level railway track. Saw both sides of the Paxton tunnel and more. It felt wrong to leave someone so far behind so I chatted with the man at the back. Two hip replacements, unnecessary apologies for slowness, an interesting chat.

Also:

• Sydenham Hill Wood is nice.
• We saw John Logie Baird‘s house
• We saw Six Pillars House, a modernist home designed by Valentine Harding (who, oddly doesn’t have a Wikipedia page. He does have one here, but Six Pillars House seems to gain a pillar between paragraphs, so YMMV.)
• Edited to add: The 2012 listing for Six Pillars House on The Modern House, a video showing aerial shots of Crystal Palace before and after the fire.