online: 25 july 2013
modified: 24, 25 july 2013

24 july 2013 the west wind returns


evening at the 39 steps and later

...as i arrive to see further growth of ferns and the surrounding chestnut sycamore birch and other trees... i notice a slow rise and fall of about 30 cm of the chestnut branches beside me as the tree adjusts to the intermittent breeze... and i contemplate action without forethought or planning...

...an insect 2 or 3 mm long (and about 1mm wide) is moving across this touch keyboard until (in two breaths) i blow it into the ferns before me...

...a tiny bird (could it be a wren?) emerges from the undergrowth and stands on a chestnut branch before flying away in a straight line near to the ground as i've seen wrens do on other occasions... so wren it probably is... (a bird of myths and fairy tales but also natural)...

...looking straight up i see a wasp still visiting a pine tree and beyond that some cirrus cloud of a kind not seen for months as we endured loss of the west wind which has partly returned this week but still looks as if it's temporary... no longer 'prevailing'...

20:40
soon it will begin to get dark so i set off for the 2nd random point...

21:03
...now at the 2nd point (after walking closer than usual to a straight line)... a still sunset shining through the trees... and a westerly cloudscape above them... dark blue clouds with edges of yellow sunlight... in long streaks and barely moving... i hear a creature behind me but when i look round i see only vegetation (not moving)...

...on my way here i spoke with a man who was locking a garden gate (which is at the edge of the forest)... i asked how he and his neighbours had agreed on a unified colour scheme their three joined-together houses... but i didn't understand his reply...

(at point 2)...a tall man with white hair walks quickly by... as upright as if he were a head master...

...on the way to this point i was one of three beings walking separately across a field marked for football... one was a crow (who paused now and then to move its whole neck and shoulders while cawing)... another was me (following an imaginary line to point 2 and also the lines of the football pitch)... and the third was a woman (holding a phone to her ear) who changed direction (perhaps to avoid crossing my path)...

...the next field is marked in parallel lines for sprinting (with large numbers indicating the distance at each 10 yards or metres)...

...and now before leaving i shake away several mosquitos and look again at the cloudscape (now resembling an exploding fish) and at the darkening trees surrounding the field before me... as i watch the clouds moving slowly (relative to the overhanging tree) i realise that, yes, the wind at a height is from the west though the air at ground level is not moving...






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