I walked over the Fairways this morning: I did that because I used to walk there when I wanted space, somewhere to reflect, have internal conversations with myself, listen to the birds, look at the autumn colours, and enjoy being in a natural landscape.
All those things have long gone, and I knew that. But I had resigned yesterday as one of the Directors of a local arts organisation and I was getting emails in the fall out from that. I remembered how I used to enjoy the tranquillity of the site when it was an unused old golf course and in situations like this would have just took the dog over there and enjoyed the fresh air.
I decided to carry on with my walk over there plan, knowing I would get a different experience as remembered from an earlier time! In the distance I could see two men cutting down an expansive area of reeds (I had nicknamed this area the swamp) they were using small yellow tractor type machines not unlike a lawn mower to scythe down 5-6 foot high reeds. As I walked past viewing them again much closer this time I realised these machines were operated remotely and the driver was walking along side or behind them!
They had noisy engines and it made me notice the drilling, the pile driving, the mixers, the motors, the alarms and beepers all working simultaneously together on the other side of the path, on the building site itself. As I walked along a could still hear black birds singing amongst all of that.
I noticed an out of context empty plastic bucket in a small copse! It made me remember I had split not one but two plastic buckets about a week ago installing my last mosaic project in the town centre. A replacement bucket for free. I wondered, is it more than a bucket, its a container. It looks empty, but then magic, good luck, and three wishes might not be visible on first inspection! What did it contain, or will it contain in the future? I put it down saying I will collect it on the way back.
As I walked on the well worn footpath it started fragmenting into small sections and eventually disappeared because massive earth works, road foundations and reservoir type water courses truncated it. I pressed on across the building site over half finished tarmac roads, muddy piles of earth, water pipes, hoses and flattened half buried Harris fencing panels. Eventually I found a short section of the path again but was forced to stop as a yellow barriers blocked the way with a sign saying footpath closed.
I walked back the way I came, picked up the bucket as I walked past it and brought it home.
