Cuckmere Haven shows water drawing through the landscape. Elegant curves and meandering lines take the shortest possible route. It helps me reconsider my own meanderings and wanderings, wonderings and shifts in thought. Water takes the path of least resistance. At Cuckmere Haven the river illustrates this to be a much longer path than you’d expect. It is not a straight line, not even close. It feels like the water is taking up as much space as it possibly can, that it’s taking the longest route imaginable. Geological structure gets in the way. The land is not uniformly created beneath our feet, making for a much more interesting environment – more varieties of flora and fauna are nurtured and sustained.
My walk alongside it feels like a useful pause. A day out in the drizzle of the summer holidays I am surrounded by water. I am filled with water. The immensity of the sea is often evident, it shouts at me and shows me, hurling itself at the shore and beating at the land. Running water has a slower pace, but in time it carves through stone.
