I visit this place once a day. Arriving around 9.20am. A hectic drop off at School and nursery, pick up the dog, then on to the field.
Down a muddy footpath with fantastic amounts of dog poo to have a good self righteous tut at, past the barred and gated allotments and then out into (this morning) blinding sunshine.
This place is suburban, available, convenient in it’s location. One can’t really imagine adventuring here, no need for special hiking boots or supplies, no need for any forward planning.
It can be a bit windy.
And it does have a nice view over Baldock and St Mary’s Church (a church is always a nice focal point in a view, right) but the church spire is out done by the towering grey pylon, right in the middle of the field.
This pylon was my focus this morning. Yesterday I came, as everyday, suitably unprepared, with a wad of escaping poo bags exploding from my pockets, a crappy camera phone in hand, one glove off, one clutching a recently filled bag complete with smelly deposit.
All of a sudden I got a stab of excitement to see a large brown blob, perched on the lower half of the pylon. Red kites are frequently sighted here now. So my completely untrained eye, suspected as much. Damn, nothing to see it with and a growing frustration at myself for the binoculars, lying at home in the garage somewhere.
So today, I did some forward planning and dug out those bins. But surely, he won’t be there today.
9.30am – trying to get a picture of a passing train to London on my crappy camera phone and there perched up on the same beam. He sits.
I am so pleased with myself and having binoculars that I feel quite elated. Like this moment is just for me. It’s spiritual almost.
I watch him for a bit and he doesn’t do anything in particular. In fact his still, air of quiet contemplation, gives me a weird sense of my own impatience. I fiddle around with my phone in a ridiculous way, trying to get a picture through the lens of the binoculars, with limited success and then carry on up the hill. Seeing him (no idea of the gender of this bird) feels like an experience, or an encounter at least.
