Upton Country Park, thoughts on what it would be like to be a bird
Last weekend, I visited Upton Country Park, with Anne and Penny - we were well wrapped up - the air was bitter, yet very clear -
There's a stuccoed villa in the park, dating from the early 19th century - it was built for the MP for Bridport - Pesvner says, a little unkindly I think, that it is a "routine affair, except for the pretty friezes of swags and bucrania everywhere" -
I've been to one or two courses held in the villa, when I was a headteacher - we sat on hard chairs on bare rooms with very high ceilings - in one room, a beautiful chandelier hung from the ceiling like a fragile, intricate, planet -
But we were not intending to visit the villa - we were here to walk in the park - this contains woods, pathways by the northern shore of Holes Bay, as well as formal lawns with stone urns -
Looking up into the icy blue sky, I saw a contrail - an almost vertical line of vapour, marking the passage of a jet - I imagined being in a jet, seeing the curve of the earth -
The ground was still saturated with water from the recent rains - I was soon splattered with mud - we stood under bare trees, looking out at still lagoons, half hidden amongst beds of reeds - the tide was half way out, revealing a shining watery world of low islands - tangles of creeks and reeds -
Penny peered through her binoculars - there were many birds, swimming, feeding, in the shallows - we saw some Canada geese - swans - egrets - I looked through the binoculars - how self contained, insouciant, perfect, those creatures looked -
Anne wondered what it would be like, to be a bird - I thought of the moment of transformation - your arms becoming wings, your bones as light as air - what thoughts would you have in your sleek head?
Last weekend, I visited Upton Country Park, with Anne and Penny - we were well wrapped up - the air was bitter, yet very clear -
There's a stuccoed villa in the park, dating from the early 19th century - it was built for the MP for Bridport - Pesvner says, a little unkindly I think, that it is a "routine affair, except for the pretty friezes of swags and bucrania everywhere" -
I've been to one or two courses held in the villa, when I was a headteacher - we sat on hard chairs on bare rooms with very high ceilings - in one room, a beautiful chandelier hung from the ceiling like a fragile, intricate, planet -
But we were not intending to visit the villa - we were here to walk in the park - this contains woods, pathways by the northern shore of Holes Bay, as well as formal lawns with stone urns -
Looking up into the icy blue sky, I saw a contrail - an almost vertical line of vapour, marking the passage of a jet - I imagined being in a jet, seeing the curve of the earth -
The ground was still saturated with water from the recent rains - I was soon splattered with mud - we stood under bare trees, looking out at still lagoons, half hidden amongst beds of reeds - the tide was half way out, revealing a shining watery world of low islands - tangles of creeks and reeds -
Penny peered through her binoculars - there were many birds, swimming, feeding, in the shallows - we saw some Canada geese - swans - egrets - I looked through the binoculars - how self contained, insouciant, perfect, those creatures looked -
Anne wondered what it would be like, to be a bird - I thought of the moment of transformation - your arms becoming wings, your bones as light as air - what thoughts would you have in your sleek head?
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