Reflections
Reflections was the winning entry for the Corfe Castle Writing Competition, and originally published in the Corfe Valley News
“I walk home Corfe-wards, with a new spring in my step…”
The sun hangs low over the common, making me squint as I squelch away from the village on the Purbeck Way. Ribbons of purple moor grass lay curled and tangled in the puddles. The water ripples as my boots stomp down, stirring up the mud beneath. Where dry path emerges, mole hills have forced their way up through the surface, pushing aside the plant life. Sticking to high ground, I weave through the obstacle course, trying to avoid inevitably soggy boots and getting gorse spines lodged in my jacket.
It’s a quiet Saturday afternoon. The summer visitors are long gone. A few dog walkers smile and say hello in the village but, walking across the fields and through the woods towards the coast, I see nobody else. I pause beneath a curtain of Clematis that decorates the way. The fluffy Old Man’s Beard dangles above remains of moss-covered dry-stone walls, creating a real-life fairy forest.
The cold bites at the only part of me that it can reach, a narrow strip between the bottom of my woolly hat and the top of my scarf. Snuggled in warm clothes, jeans splattered with mud, and with nowhere else I need to be, I stand still and think back to pre-lockdown life. There were so many more demands on my time. Many of them, of course, I am missing. Not least, time with my family and friends. I miss the smaller pleasures too: a worry-free pint in a sunny beer garden, a dip in Purbeck swimming pool, live music. I know it won’t last forever though, and when the chaos of normal life returns, I might just miss having this time to myself.
We are a village that is blessed with countryside in every direction. Waking up on a day-off in lockdown, we are spoilt for choice for things to enjoy on our walks. During our springtime hibernation, the peregrines put on a show for anyone lucky enough to spot them soaring down from the castle walls. I remember one morning; I had stopped to watch the swifts dance. They rose and fell, diving fast before careering upwards, curling round and around their blue playground. They were so entrancing that I didn’t register the call of the peregrine until its pale underside passed overhead, disappearing into the glassless window of the keep. The swifts didn’t miss a trick. They headed high as the larger bird came into land, only returning when the danger was safely back on its nest. I left them cutting patterns across the sky. They left me floating my happy way home.
As lockdown fizzled out, and freedoms increased, summer arrived. I started to have socially distanced meetings with my parents. A take-away in their garden, chips on Swanage seafront, a dog walk with a school friend. These precious moments took priority over wandering on my own. The village felt busy compared with our time in lockdown, and to find the peace we enjoyed earlier in the year, we needed to walk further away. There were fewer opportunities to wave to our neighbours now that they were no longer confined to their gardens, and it struck me that we had got to know each other better over our fences. Perhaps I had been too busy to make the effort before.
Even the greatest optimist knew, deep down, that it wouldn’t last forever. By November, we were back to some degree of lockdown, and restricted to exercise walks again. Woodsmoke drifted down West Street as I headed to the common. The shrivelled skeletons of chamomile flowers marked the passage of time. They were a stark reminder that there are many small things to savour, despite the difficulties and strangeness we have all faced this year.
I return my thoughts to the present. The afternoon light warms the trees, even though the frost still endures in the shadows. It has taken nine months, but I am slowly adapting to appreciate these seemingly small things amidst life’s uncertainties. Obsessively checking the online news doesn’t change anything, and it certainly doesn’t do anything positive for my mental health. Instead, switching off and being outside is doing the world of good.
Filling my lungs with cold air, I wiggle my gloved fingers and carry on to the coast. Climbing down to Chapman’s Pool, the low sun is already trying to warn me that darkness is on its way. I won’t have long on the beach. Two kestrels spar above St Aldhem’s Head on the skyline, dwarfed by two circling ravens, silhouetted against the sky.
A couple sits on the rocks. They are prepared, with a picnic blanket and a backpack full of gadgets. I take out a flask of tea and perch on a blanket-less rock above the lapping water. There is a funny smell that I can’t place. It’s probably algae. More land has slipped since the summer. On the other side of the cove, fallen shale piles up on the beach. The glare of the sun on the water ripples away from the shore, creating a blinding mirror broken only by black rocks. Reflections of grey clouds peer up at their more tangible counterparts, lined with silver, above the great hulk of Houns Tout.
Pink tinges start to creep into the cold blue sky, and the pebbles take on a tepid shade of yellow. It is time to stand up, stretch my legs and head back to the village. It wouldn’t be much fun trying to stagger back in the dark.
As I turn to head inland, I spot the source of the strange smell, and realise I had wrongly accused the algae of creating the stench. Looking slightly rusty, in that unfortunate phase between occupying flesh and becoming a tidy skeleton, a deceased porpoise lays uncomfortably over the rocks. A crushed can of Thatcher’s Haze crouches beside it, as if its final moments were spent glugging supermarket cider. A piece of orange rope lies knotted, frayed and faded in the sea sun.
Having never met a porpoise before, it seems a shame that my first isn’t more alive. Standing purposely upwind, and keeping a respectful distance, I can make out its toothy beak, and trace the backbones backwards to its tail.
I walk home Corfe-wards, with a new spring in my step. Back in the warm, I add ‘look for a live porpoise’ to the long list of things to look forward to when all of this is over, and time to ourselves is a luxury once again.