It’s not a T-junction or a crossroads. It’s more like that gentle uphill curve in the road that winds around a hill. You can’t see very far ahead. You can’t see where it’s going, what the landscape is other than your immediate surroundings. I was born in Malvern and spent my life with analogies such as these. From my bedroom window I could see the weather roll in over the hills. My mother came to know exactly how much time she had got before she needed to get the washing in… Because she could see it coming. But once you got up there, up close, you had no idea. At certain times of year you could go round a bend and swoop between the trees and suddenly find an isolated patch of fog so thick you couldn’t see the front of your own car. Or a nasty patch of ice the sun couldn’t get to. Or a gap in the trees through which the sun could temporarily blind you.
Analogies that pop back into my head. I can map this period of my life to a journey up, around, through those hills. At the moment I am on that long upward curve. I can’t see very far ahead… But I know the conditions will change. You have to be prepared for anything. Wellies and Sunhat. Kendal mint cake?
I can feel it coming.
I don’t know what to pack.
