Adder

One spring morning the girls, who had been playing outside, rushed into the house in some agitation to announce the presence of an unusual visitor on our drive: a snake. I went to check their claim, and found it to be true. 

The creature had a v-shaped marking on its head and an elegant diamond pattern down its back. It lay so still you might think it was dead, but the occasional slow stir indicated otherwise. 

Back in Bolivia, that kind of patterning and colour would indicate that the snake was venomous. I did not think such a thing was possible in Britain, but K confirmed that it was, and that it was called an adder. I knew, in theory, what an adder was, but had not expected to meet one at close range, let alone right outside my house.

As no doubt every reader of this blog knows - even though I didn’t - adders are common on this island. They come out of hibernation in early spring, which is when most sightings are reported. Our adder visited on 19 April, which counts as early spring if one remembers that the previous winter had been one of the harshest in memory.  The Forestry Commission tells us that adders are common in “rough, open countryside” and are to be found in “woodland edge habitats”, which is, I suppose, a valid description of where I live. 

If there is a snake you are reliably informed is poisonous in the vicinity of where your children are playing, what would you do? Had I been better informed, I may meekly have brought the girls indoors, hoping that this meeting was a one-off. But I was not better informed, and it was a glorious spring morning, and the girls had been having a good time outside until the adder arrived. I had not read the Forestry Commission’s clear description of adders, which mentions in passing that they are a protected species. I did what I thought I had to do. I did it with regret, and have since had much occasion to feel guilty about it.  

Drought, rain, colours, smell

There has been the longest spell without rain I can remember. Last week, for the first time the canine walks ended with the dog's paws and my wellies as dry as they had been at the start. Dry! Having trodden on grassy soil! Inconceivable, but true.

The last three days saw the end of the good weather. This would normally bring a blanket of gloom over the landscape and over many people's mood, including mine, but this time the fields and the eyes seemed to welcome a bit of rain. There even was that smell, which doesn't grace British nostrils very often, of thirsty soil getting wet at last. I don't remember experiencing this away from Bolivia.

Early in the morning today, the sun was out in force again, and the colours had an unusual intensity. Bright, clean green on the trees and fields, glassy transparency on the river. And that smell again. They, too, reminded me of youthful days in the thin air of the Andes. I had to stand outside, experiencing the weather as an artistic happening.

Less kind readers may say that my middle-aged senses are tricking me with mirages of childhood. I contend that the weather is changing so much that some phenomena that used to occur only in southern latitudes are now taking place right here. And, alas, not in Bolivia anymore.

Take, for example, the adder.

Fuel

Today Northumberland basks in the unwonted luxury of a two-digit temperature: ten, to be exact. The thaw was slow but in the last week or so it was hastened by a another type of precipitation: rain. Wet in the morning, wet in the afternoon, wet through the night. Oh and windy too. Right now I look out of the window and it is lashing down, the trees swinging like upside-down pendulums. One wonders if this land is meant for human habitation. 

At least we now have central heating. When we placed the order for oil, in the early part of December, we were warned that the freeze and the snow would delay delivery. What the warning failed to spell out is that the delay would be over a month long. We began to stint ourselves before New Year. In January our reserves hit rock bottom, forcing us to rely on labour-intensive wood, expensive coal and extortionate electricity. The size of the next electricity bill is something best not thought about. 

It is, of course, purely coincidental that the time announced for resumption of oil deliveries  was just a little later than an expected hike in fuel prices. Back in Bolivia, people would be out on the streets over this. In urbane Britain, activism is confined to conversational demonstration and the writings of George Monbiot. It would be tempting to start a civil rights movement from this rural backwater, if I didn’t have the near-certainty that it would be a one-man battle.

Snow

Yes, as everybody knows, we are snowed in in Northumberland. It happened last winter, and at the time the local council explained away its not coping, assuring us that next time they would be better prepared for extreme weather. Well, this winter came early and is much worse than the last, but relief is less in evidence. 

The road to Bellingham has been treacherous - I skidded off it last week, and didn’t stop until a hawthorn stopped my descent, leaving my car badly scratched. It took two kindly locals to pull me out, one with with her four-by-four and the other barking out instructions with mildly suppressed impatience at my poor understanding of the  emergency motoring lexicon. That was last week.  For the last three days this road has remained innocent of grit or snowplough, leaving its users to our own devices. My own device has been to leave the scratched vehicle parked past the bridge to avoid last year’s doomed struggles on the battlefield of my drive and the communal private road. From this vantage point I was able to dig it out for a slog to Bellingham to get supplies - such as they were - three days ago. Since then my raked vehicle has stood at the bridge gathering snow, resembling more and more an overiced birthday cake. Fresh attempts to break a path out for it have been greeted with the mockery of Nature, who would proceed to cover the grooves of my shovel with plentiful new waves of snow, even as I shovelled. 

Which is why last night, when I followed the Bouvier on his final outing, I was struck by an eerie stillness where all commotion had ceased. The snow had settled, the wind had stopped, the air had a cruel clarity to it, and the sky was the starriest I remember. Each star was making a textbook display of itself, lacking only the name tags for the astral ignoramuses like me. The constellations outlined themselves with such incandescence that you could read in them any form, not just the requisite Orion with his belt, but the features of your own imagining, your own unbridled dream. You had to admit that Nature knew how to inspire as much as how to punish. At least when it chose to. And, for a moment, you had to forget all the harm, all the hassle, and be thankful for the beauty. 

Rain

In an unwelcome contrast to sunny Cochabamba, the Northumbrian heavens have been open almost all the time since my return, and without a moment’s pause in the last four days. 

The unsightly stables on the side of the house have now been dismantled, allowing an unobstructed view of the river. This in most circumstances would be a highly aesthetic experience, but in the present weather conditions it is a stark reminder of nature’s ferocity. Over twice its usual height and width, the river flows with vertiginous speed towards its confluence only a few hundred yards away. Its usual murmur is a prominent part of our quotidian soundscape, but what we now hear is something different: a roar of intimidating fierceness.   

If I hadn’t come to trust the wisdom of the ancient builders of Northumberland, and if this trust were not often reinforced by the savvy locals - “they knew how to build houses then, and where” - I would be living in fear of being swept away in my sleep, family and dog and cats included. But I have come to trust this place. The weather has changed around here thousands of times before, whipping this land without mercy, but the house has stood its ground. 

I live within yards of a river, surrounded by tall trees, flanked by a hill at touching distance, and with no neighbours to shield me from the forces of heaven. When nature chooses to unleash its power, these are its tools to wield it. They are the executors of its might. Sometimes their actions make me feel nature’s destructive breath on my face, and hear the swoosh of its claws just missing my head. But history suggests that I, my family and our surroundings will survive this test too.

Maverick alone

Bob Johnson, Delilah and Miranda before the last-named was left on her own

Miranda’s life in our midst had a difficult start. She was mistrustful of people, to the point that she would baulk at approaching humans even at feeding time. You had to drop the grain on the ground hoping that the other hens would have their fill before the last morsel had gone. Moreover, she was the victim of bullying among her three peers. María’s days were over when Miranda arrived, but the remaining two - Bob Johnson and Delilah - showed Miranda no kindness at the onset. Pecking was merciless, particularly when the unfortunate newcomer ventured near the feeder. We were worried about her prospects of survival. 

What an irony, therefore, that Miranda should now be our only surviving hen. I cannot remember the exact circumstances of the last two birds’ demise, except for the lack of evidence that the fox had played any part in it. I can vouch for the peaceful death of Bob Johnson and María since I personally gave them humane burial in our north field. More recently, Delilah was seen puffed up and not herself for weeks before her eventual disappearance. Had the fox been involved we would most likely have found a trail of feathers in the place of Delilah’s apprehension, but no feathers were seen. Only the surprising fact that, before our eyes, the hen community had been reduced to the lone presence of Miranda. 

She cuts a dignified figure going about her daily business of scraping for food around the hen court. She doesn’t venture into the fields anymore, as she once did as part of a trio. She doesn’t trespass into our garden either. But conversely she is more confident with humans now, and she doesn’t hesitate to run towards one of us when food is being proffered. And, of course, she stubbornly adheres to her unhenly habit of sleeping in her nest, rather than on the perch, a most annoying practice she introduced when she joined the group. Every night when I shut the henhouse the ritual must include opening the back door and ordering Miranda on the perch and, if she doesn’t obey, which is most times, nudging her in the right direction. 

Does she feel any sense of bereavement? Is loneliness an issue for a hen? I haven’t read enough to know if her species counts among the social animals who need companionship in order to survive. But this one is certainly surviving and, if it’s not too cruel towards the deceased to say so, she is thriving. 

Bales of hay

Bales of hay, not on my field. Below, right, The Farmer taking them away.

The inclement weather forced The Farmer to return a second time to turn the grass he had previously cut and turned once. I did not observe the work, but the result struck me as artistic. The grass, quite dry by now, lay in a dishevelled rumple and you could almost see its joy for all the air that was now able to go through it. The field was a blow-dried landscape of lovingly tousled cuttings; to stride on it was to experience a tufted softness that even Fluffy seemed aware of, as the caution of his first steps showed.

Only two days later the baler came around. Childcare duties prevented me from leaving the house to watch the process. But when I came out that night the field was transformed. Underfoot was the hard ground again, something not experienced for many months, and, at irregular intervals, there stood these monuments of compressed grass. They have the shape of squat cylinders, more or less as wide as they are high, so it is debatable whether it is right to say that they are standing when part of their curvature – rather than one of their flat ends – is touching the ground. Or should one say that they are lying on their side? Whatever the correct terminology, the hay bales were imposing. They only came to the height of my chest, but, as you knew if you tried to push one to roll it over, they were very heavy. None yielded an inch to my push.

The night was dark and, ever fond of natural light, I was not switching the torch on unless it was necessary. You could feel that you were about to hit a bale from an intensification of the darkness at a couple of feet’s distance. It may possibly have been an aural phenomenon too, the sound of your steps reflecting…no, the bales’ surface was much too rough for sound reflection. Sound absorption was more likely; a deadening of the sound of your steps forewarning you of impending contact with a bale of hay.

The following nights were not quite so dark, and you could make out the bales’ silhouettes against the background of the cloudy sky. Their random placement around the field seemed less random each night, till their positions became fixed in the mind as a purposeful configuration. Without a doubt they had presence. They looked innocent enough in daytime, but in the dark their latent power unfurled. They were the sentinels of the night.

It was sad when, a few days later, The Farmer came to take them away. It had been during their sojourn on my field that a photo camera had seemed a pressing need, but by the time I did something about it the bales were gone.

Falstone Show

Following his fall from grace at last year’s show – when I had to fumble frantically for the poo bag in front of the dog judges and circled by a mortifyingly sympathetic audience – Fluffy was not allowed back to Falstone Show this time.

Instead I took the family. There was no shortage of things for the children to eat (sausage sandwiches from Dunterley Farm), to watch (dogs, sheep, tractors, people) and to play on (bouncy castle!). And they even happened on youngsters they knew from their infuriatingly extensive social circle. The bar was not unduly undersupplied either, and it was my pleasure to see W there chatting to old farmer friends, and I hope a wordless wave from a distance was enough to signal this approval. The day did not smile on W for much longer, but that is not for me to expand on; suffice it to say his plight broke my heart.

Once more I delighted in the seriousness with which the participants take their dogs – a relatively easy thing to do now that I did not have my Bouvier nemesis with me – and the splendid coiffure displayed by the sheep, betraying long nights spent by their owners washing, combing and possibly, dare I say it, dyeing.

A surprising number of acquaintances turned out to take their photography seriously. AB, for example, had bought an impressive-looking Canon SLR which she was taking on its first outing. Some others I vaguely recognised were also sporting equipment of sufficiently professional aspect to make me envious. But I must not underestimate the humble compact Samsung I have just acquired. The dramatic beauty of where I live and the momentousness of my children’s lives at this time made me think enough is enough: to borrow a camera at every portrayable opportunity hampers spontaneity; I must have a camera again. And who knows, even this Northumbrian Diary might benefit from a little more graphic content.

Falstone Show’s Committee has a new chairman. Although the old one in his time did a splendid job too, I have to salute the impeccable choreography last Saturday. Friendly, well-trained stewards guided you with a strong hand to your parking space, even telling you what motoring manoeuvres to perform to get into it. The food and the drink stayed plentiful all the time, and the whole configuration worked like a well-oiled machine. Well done N.

Bellingham, watch yourself this Saturday.

More on the cascade of lights

Thanks to Bella for the suggestion that the cascade of lights may have been a meteor shower. She rightly points out that there has been activity around this time and, sure enough, even a superficial search reveals that around 12 August was the expected peak time for Perseids.

What I saw on 10 August was rather less dramatic, gentler and more sparse than any of the spectacular pictures to be seen, for example, on Google Images under either Perseids of Meteor Shower. On the other hand, none of those images shows the tunnel shape and the relative stillness I found so intriguing on the Northumbrian sky. But these are probably minor divergences compared with the very satisfying fact that a plausible explanation has been found.

Horse or pony

The new resident across the road displays all the characteristics of a horse, including the size, but I am told he is a pony. Somebody will have to explain to me the finer points of equine differentiation; for the time being I call him indistinctly horse or pony when I greet him.

Unlike the long-standing local dwellers of his species, he keeps his own counsel, avoiding contact with man or dog when we pass by and staying so still in his hut that you have to look carefully to believe he has not been taken away. We haven’t yet brought him one of our apples, but his behaviour to date is such that I am not sure he will trust us enough to accept it.

For a horse, or pony, he also boasts an uncommonly varied wardrobe. The mesh mask he wears most days would look sinister on him if he were not such a reclusive character. I take it to be a protection against biting insects. In this fluctuating weather, he reacts swiftly to temperature changes and on wetter days more often than not he is seen with a coat on first thing in the morning. His handlers must be early risers and quiet workers.

No answers

No answers means either nobody reads this blog or nobody knows about the cascade of lights. I would believe that I imagined it if K had not seen it too. Never mind.

The Farmer came around a few days ago, knight in shining tractor, to perform the annual shearing of our field. I meant to be courteous when I shut the gates after him, forgetting that he always returns a day or two later to turn the grass. He did that too, but last night the rain started again, putting an unwelcome spanner in the works of hay-making.

Fluffy and the girls have enjoyed being able to circle the field again, as we had been prevented from doing by uncontrolled growth.

A cascade of lights

Last night I reported on the impossibility of feeling fear before the beauty of the Northumbrian night. Well, tonight I did experience something akin to fear, albeit mixed with fascination.

The glow was brighter than last night, casting a supernatural heat over everything. The new pony across the road, a misanthrope during the day, was out in the quiet night, munching grass. Fluffy and I walked up the hill, and on the way back something caught my attention on the left, from what I take to be a northwesterly direction. At first sight it looked like a tunnel made up of lights in the sky, very much like stars but a little brighter and redder, moving diagonally down and left towards the horizon. Immediately the trees obscured my vision on that side and I felt impelled to walk faster past the trees so I could make sure I had really seen what I thought I had seen.

Past the trees, the tunnel had dispersed into a line, a casually curving procession of stars still progressing down in the same general direction. By the time I reached home most of the component lights had gone, presumably behind the horizon; there were only a few visible, perhaps ten of them, but enough for K to come out and see them and to agree that it was a most extraordinary phenomenon. A few minutes later all the lights had gone, leaving only the usual stars in their places, only a lot more visible in what is perhaps the most luminous night sky I have ever seen.

Does anybody know what those lights were?

That moon again

Tonight the moon is so bright that you can feel your pupils contracting when you look at it. Its reflection on the field magnifies the glow, making you almost screw your face at the brightness. If you stand with your back to it, you can see your shadow cutting a distinct contour on the silver-coated grass. You could read in this light, if the type were large enough.

The Farmer's dogs are barking with unease and midnight is not far off. Perfect setting to conjure up the stories of werewolves used to scare the children into staying still in bed when I was small back in Montero. Except that this is the North Tyne, and Fluffy is sauntering ahead of me, stopping to sniff into every molehill and pouncing heroically on the source of every ruffle in the grass, real or imaginary.

And the house, at other times a forbidding shadow, tonight stands ignited with the glow of this impossibly fiery moon, like cosmic water sent to bathe the two youngsters sleeping inside.

To feel scared would demand more imagination than I can muster right now.

Douglas in the rain

I came back in the evening after a day spent at the office, dealing with the frustrations of a computer malfunction rather than productive work.

Fluffy leapt out the moment he was allowed, darting off in pursuit of something unseen. I then took him up the road, avoiding the field which is now impassable. The day's copious rain had left a heavy pall hanging over the evening, and a coating of little sad diamonds on the leaves. The slightest shake would cause a little replica of the earlier downpours.

On the way back down the road a dark marauder intercepted me, staring with his ominous green eyes. It was Douglas the cat, wanting nothing more than a friendly stroke to mark this chance encounter. After two or three such expressions of friendship, he went on his way to meet the night's adventures. I came home.

Cleg

W was here today. As an erstwhile forester and farmer around these parts, when asked he knew exactly the identity of the bloodthirsty assassin that had marred my grass cutting yesterday: horsefly, known around here as cleg.

Field traffic

Contrary to the forecasts, today was sunny and sultry, easily the warmest day I remember in these parts. Even the rooms downstairs welcomed you in short sleeves, which, believe me, for a Bolivian in Northumberland is a novel experience. But not right now any longer, for as midnight approaches I have had to switch back to reality and the central heating.

One conspicuous absence today was the cuckoo, so audible on previous days with its unbelievably perfect-pitched ostinato. His performances had marked our summer evenings with the most poetic punctuality. I never caught sight of him, but he sounded as if he was always perched on the same tree by the river. But not today. Too hot for him, presumably?

The field, luxuriant with vegetation, has been pretty to look at, but impassable for all but the most committed, namely Fluffy and I. I had been wanting to cut a path around the field for months, but other priorities had always prevailed, until recently the grass became so long that no walking child could join me and The Fluff. The unwonted weather made me think I could venture out with the strimmer and the kids, so the older one could see me toiling to restore her transit for daily walks. Toil I certainly did, and was almost eaten alive by the flying hordes of whatever it is that eats humans this time of the year - it looked too large and it hurt too much to be midges. But I had underestimated the overgrowth; my efforts over several hours made little more than a dent, not even opening a path as far as the river. My older offspring will have to wait. It will take not hours, but days to make the field accessible again. And perhaps not my strimmer, but The Farmer’s tractor.

First of the summer

Today has been a miracle of a day. The sun shone with a brightness that defied belief; indeed, it still does at half past seven in the evening. After a family lunch at Wark's Battlesteads Hotel - a very well cooked carvery - we came home and sat by the river. When it was time to feed the baby, I left the rest of the family on its riverside idyl and came to the house. The impulse seized me to hear my own music, something I very rarely do. I found the recording of shapeshift from Mystical Dances and subjected the poor infant to it twice over its dinner. Whatever the baby thought, I was surprised at the effect it caused on me. It was invigorating.

I badly need this piece performed more widely. I also need to realise more projects. Family is all very well, university is all very well, but I need to compose and to hear my music performed to feel alive. This has always been the absolute priority, and yet somehow it is proving elusive.

Mourning

It has been windy and wet for days. The air had been heavy with the departure of a dear friend, spouse, parent and sibling. But it lifted today for the farewell. Bellingham mourned together and quietly. 

Belated sun

Long time no write. It appears that some of the stories I have been telling have caused one or two of their protagonists  a degree of bother. My use of first initials was intended to protect their identities, but in England's most thinly populated county there are not many of us and recognition is easy. Sorry! I never meant to compromise anybody. I will try to be more discreet, either by using better disguises or, in the last resort, by telling fewer stories involving people; this, I have to say, would be a pity.  

Today's sunny morning is a balm for the eye, but it is hard to accept it with unmixed gratitude. Where was the sun in the summer, when we could have done so much with it? All summer K's barbecue languished in a shed unlit, and the lunches cooked on a fire by the river remained a fading memory of the past. 

Moreover, while I was away in Bolivia this part of Northumberland experienced its worst rain for over 60 years. The river grew to unimagined proportions, flooding the field almost to its middle. K worried that Fluffy might run down his usual route and find himself carried off by the powerful current. She took a couple of pictures to show me. It looks threatening, but even at three times its normal level the river came nowhere near the house. We are safe! The proximity of the river had been a major worry when we were considering this house, but at the time we consulted every local we knew, and their answers were unequivocal: people knew how to build a house in those days, and where. That house has not flooded in living memory, and it is not going to flood now. The worst rainfall in 60 years has proved them right.  

Bovine visits

As I write the view from my window is of cows and calves grazing outside. We have no cattle, but one day The Farmer announced that, if he opened a gap in his fencing and reinforced ours, his cattle could have access to our field. He did all the work with invisible efficiency. All we knew was that one day there were cows in our field. We saluted their formidable presence; large, serene faces ruminating with slow persistence, looking at us with a quiet confidence that belied their condition as newcomers in our land.

But we were delighted. K loved the calves, their grace and their agility. I celebrated the fancy that the place looked like a working field. Besides, although we prize the solitude of where we live, the proximity of these large beauties felt exactly right, as if in some way the family had grown. The first night the cows spent near us there was a different feel to the place, one of solid confraternity among creatures. It was with disappointment that we saw them disappear.

We never quite understood what made the cows – or their Farmer – decide when to come across to our field and when to leave. The fact is that their visits proved as erratic as they were welcome. Sometimes days would elapse, perhaps a whole week, without any cattle being seen. And then one day K would phone me at work to tell me that the cows have arrived; she likes to call them coos, with a warm intonation in her voice. I would then look forward to coming home and driving past them down the drive. K was less pleased when occasionally a cow would lean across the fence to eat the holly tree or even the much lower-lying daffodils, but these were forgivable offences. Things changed somewhat when, at the corner where the eaten holly and daffodils, the fence gave in.

Since the beginning of the bovine visits K had expressed the hope that they would be restricted to cows and calves; bulls, she thought, were intimidating and could be aggressive. Fate dictated that on this particular day, the first time cattle spilled onto the drive and the garden, a large bull was among them. I was working in Newcastle; K was alone. She phoned The Farmer for help, but he was out, so she left a message. Then, realising that there was nothing to stop the cattle venturing out on the road, the bridge and the outside world, K walked among the cows, past the large bull, up the drive, and she closed the gate; then she walked back among the cattle. Apart from that, all she could do was wait to see what happened. The next development was that H, one of The Farmer’s helpers, knocked on the door and apologised for the inconvenience. By this time the cattle had been herded back to their farm.

That evening The Farmer dropped in, as is his habit when you have left him a phone message. He explained that there had been a breach in the fence which had now been repaired. In any case, he added, lambing was due to start soon and he did not think allowing the cattle out of their field would be a good idea. I didn’t understand the connection but who am I to question The Farmer’s wisdom?

This morning the cattle came out through the same gap again. Being at home, I did as K had done before me: phoned The Farmer and closed the gate at the top of the drive. The bull’s countenance was such that it made me take a deep breath when walking past him towards the gate and back. And I knew I was not going to try to herd him anywhere. The Farmer was not long to come. He adroitly coaxed and menaced the animals back into the field, except for one black cow who somehow ignored all entreaties and stubbornly failed to join the herd. Thus she attracted her owner’s personal attention. It was a joy to behold The Farmer mounted on his quad, border collie next to him, giving chase to the black cow as it cantered up the hill towards the farm.

Our neighbour returned later to repair the fence again. When he finished the job he apologised.

Far from me to cast aspersions on my neighbour’s fence-fixing, but the evidence of my senses was that in the evening there was a fresh cattle invasion. In what was now a familiar routine, I rang The Farmer and shut the gate. Once again he turned up without delay, but there was pleading in his voice when he asked “Shall I let the cattle spend the night here? Tomorrow there’s a lad coming to fix all the fences up the hill”. I knew my good friend had planned an evening out in town, and time was short. Of course I didn’t mind. So I am sitting in the study, recurrently looking out of the window as a small army of cows and calves under the large bull’s command tread on our admittedly long-neglected garden, patio and drive and help themselves to as much greenery as they can find. Some of them come within touching distance, and although I like the brutes I am glad there is a window pane between us. One needs some privacy to work.

A night at the Riverdale

Bellingham’s Riverdale Hall Hotel is a survivor of a bygone era. Not because it is in any way dilapidated; on the contrary, the building, dating back to the mid-nineteenth century, and its appurtenances, of a distinctly pre-World War Two character, are rather well kept. It’s the concept. The owner, John Cocker, oversees everything with a personal eye that gives the place the stamp of his warm, slightly bohemian persona. In spite of the constant flow of guests, betokened by the quantity of vehicles usually sitting in the car park, John seems to know every customer by name, both the locals and the visitors. The place must, indeed, be of considerable attraction to the latter, magnificently perched on the north bank of the North Tyne, with the promise of abundant fishing and an excellent restaurant. But it is not the fishing or the restaurant I mean to write of; it’s the bar.

A small space with a red floral carpet and floral curtains, the bar has no more than five or six tables, but most of the action takes place around the bar itself and in the clearing at the centre, which is warmed by a log fire of incendiary strength.

On this particular occasion K and I went to the Riverdale at the suggestion of The Farmer. It was a Friday night and, as is often the case on Friday nights, there was musical entertainment, in this case provided by the singer Leevi, whom I knew in her incarnation as a music student at Newcastle University.

We arrived around ten and there was already plenty of what can be called an atmosphere: animated conversations in tones that had lost their reserve. The Farmer knew everybody and at once disappeared among his acquaintances. K and I stood by the fire. Soon a local singer, KD, from Falstone, came to say hello. Some other people recognised K and greeted her in passing. From his stool beside the bar, The Farmer glanced over every now and then. After a prudential time, he came over to our spot by the fire and introduced us to his friend B, who was to be the discovery of the night. Tall, brimming over with vitality, a tanned face betraying outdoor work, eyes sparkling with mischief, B engaged K in a whirl of talk, banter and drink. His twitchy body language made it clear he would have liked to dance too, but he confided that his health prevented him for the moment – a reminder that, despite many signs to the contrary, he was in his sixties.

Leevi began her show. She sang pop classics to the accompaniment of pre-programmed backing tracks and of her own guitar. She surprised me with her confidence in front of her audience, and the ease with which she charmed them into listening and participating. She may be learning at university under her student guise, but as Leevi running her own show she certainly knows what she is doing. The songs, varying in pace and character, were unknown to me but not to the audience, who sang along to many of them. There was also dancing at times, of the sedate kind you would expect to see in a cross-generational crowd such as this. Except that at one point out of nowhere came The Farmer with a young blonde grabbed by both hands. Usually measured in action and speech, he was now as if possessed by a demon. He twirled the girl at high speeds, he pulled her towards him and pushed her away without letting go of her hands, he lunged forward making her arch backwards and stepped back to allow her to stand vertical again, and he performed many other moves, too fast for me to register. Our good Farmer had turned into a berserker, and the blonde looked too surprised to resist. When the song came to an end The Farmer gently led his abductee back to her table in a corner of the room, where her male companion waited with a bemused face. Then The Farmer went back to his drinking as if nothing had happened, never looking again in the direction of the blonde who, it seemed to me, had become rather intrigued by the thunderbolt that had hit her. Puzzlingly, several times since that evening I have heard The Farmer tell exactly this story but attributing the actions to his friend B. This must be The Farmer’s personal brand of bashfulness.

All this time glasses of wine – white for K, red for me – had been coming our way from various quarters and I don’t think we had the opportunity to buy more than one in the whole night.

I lost K for some considerable time, so I went to investigate in the direction in which I had seen her go. I found her in an adjacent room, still part of the bar, talking animatedly to a woman I had not met before and, apparently, neither had K. She appeared to be the companion of J, a tree expert who had just devised for us a strategy to deal with the trees around our house. K wanted me to hear it from J, but, once introduced, J was only interested in talking to me about music. He was evidently proud of the presence of several musicians in his family. Pressed by K, he summed up the tree strategy thus: ask R for the smaller tree jobs, but for the bigger ones get somebody with the right insurance. This advice was to capture K’s imagination, making trees one of her principal enthusiasms for some time to come. R, it was clear, was not present at this time; he was to take a while to materialise, but I will expand on him some other time.

Among the younger contingent, in the same group as KD the singer, was Young R, who had served us at the now-extinct Oscar’s and at the till in the local Co-Op. She could not be much more than school age, but clearly she was working hard. In conversation I found out that Young R was studying for her A-levels, one of them in music, and she now had a new job, at the restaurant in a nearby town.

And of course I talked to Leevi, in a more relaxed fashion than it was possible to do at university, and she was introduced to the Farmer, who did not fail to exercise his charm on her. Meanwhile KD had bought K one more glass of wine, which was more than K could drink, so I offered it to Leevi, no thanks, driving, and to Young R, no thanks, underage. K and I together made a brave final effort as we got ready to go home. By this time a new group of drinkers were asking me where I was from, and at this billionth repetition of the same question I said I was from Albania, but this was received so earnestly that I didn’t have the heart to keep it up. I said where I was from on the way out, prompting some to try out a few Spanish words, along the lines of adiós or hasta la vista.

We left with the conviction that the Riverdale would play a part in our lives.

A Christmas offering

Yes, K did get the Maran she had wanted. I, too, had been keen to have a home-based producer of the lovely brown eggs of which The Farmer had given us two examples. In late September I answered an ad in the Hexham Courant, in time for a Haydon Bridge-based, personable-sounding lady to agree to reserve me her last two specimens until after my return from Bolivia, two weeks later. After my trip, it took several phone calls to arrange a viable collection time, partly because I was busy and partly due to the need to give the lady good notice so she could catch the hens. When the day came, the lady’s farm was not easy to find in the dark, particularly not after the first right turn off the road to Haydon Bridge led me, without any warning sign, up a dirt track and right up to the edge of a steep bank from which, had I not slammed the brakes in time, I would have plummeted to the bottom without any prospect of coming back up unassisted. But after that I got the right farm, found the personable lady waiting with the two Marans in a box, and I drove back listening to the subdued accompaniment of their sulky twitter coming from the back of the car. The lady had told me not to expect any eggs before Christmas. One of the new hens was for the Farmer, and he came to pick it up without delay. Fearing a hostile reception from the three older hens, I gave the Farmer the smaller one and kept the larger one, thinking her physical size would equip her better to face the bullying. We called her María.

It soon became clear that María was a different kind of animal. Her mistrust of humans knew no bounds; it was impossible to approach her without sending her into a wild run with loud squawking. This made it difficult to help her when she was being pecked at or forcibly excluded from meals. More critically for us, it made it impossible to herd her into the henhouse, or anywhere else. While Bob Johnson, Rocky and Delilah had always been happy to follow wherever you allured them with a handful of corn, María would not come anywhere near you, and would only bring herself near the other hens with the greatest caution and for short periods at a time. Had she had a traumatic childhood at Haydon Bridge? Or are all marans afflicted from birth by the same pathological shyness? The fact is that it was a very long time before María began to interact with other hens with a semblance of normality. About two months to be precise. By mid-December she was joining her seniors for meals and foraging. She had grown, she had become able to stand her ground, and she even managed to approach within four feet of you if you had some corn to offer, even if the movement of you throwing more corn on the ground would still cause her to run away, sometimes half-flying with her surprisingly nimble wings. The balance of power between the henly generations may also have shifted because Bob Johnson has be moulding for sometime, and at the moment she appears reduced to a pathetic wraith of a hen.

In the morning of 24 December something happened that was to change the hen dynamic in the household. When I went to check the nesting box I found the usual speckledy egg, but also a very small one, of a deeper shade of brown and with speckles similar to Delilah’s or Rocky’s. Only some of the hens are laying these wintry days, so it is hard to tell from numbers alone who was laying what.

On Christmas Day, alongside a normal egg was again an unusually tiny one, this time light-coloured and perfectly smooth, such as might have been produced by Bob Johnson. Was she emerging from her winter moulding and doing it with caution first? Or, more excitingly, was it possible that María the Maran had produced her first two? The thought was too attractive to rule out, and the unprecedentedly small size could be taken as evidence, albeit inconclusive. Later on, we noticed something strange about María: something was hanging out of her backside. On closer inspection, it was a pink, fleshy matter that clearly had come out of her inside, hanging heavily down almost to the ground. We tried not to think too much about it on this special day, and certainly not to look, but I was worried enough to phone the Farmer for advice. In reply to my message, he turned up on our doorstep. He looked at María and declared that nothing could be done for her. She would last another two days, he predicted. There was no fatalist air in these pronouncements; they were matter-of-fact. K reminded us of her uncle’s advice that we should avoid getting attached to hens.

On Boxing Day, the surprise egg was as small as the first two, but this one had no shell and was on the henhouse floor, not in a nest. María herself looked much better: the fleshy matter was not there anymore. We could not find a tasteful explanation for it, and a Boxing Day miracle would have seemed far fetched. We went to see the panto in Newcastle and forgot about María.

On 27 December María stayed in her nest. On 28 December I found her dead. I wrapped the hay she had nested in around her, dug a deep hole in the field and buried her.

María had a brief time in our midst and, unlike all the other animals, was not happy there. Her relationship with the world was uneasy at the best of times. She was more troublesome to keep than any of her peers and at times she caused some irritation. But she made an effort at Christmas time to show that she appreciated our care. The timing of her first two eggs could not have been better chosen. But the exertion proved too much for her. She was either too young or too weak inside to be productive. Gratitude killed her.

16 December 2007

This incomparable corner of Northumberland is proving unique in more than one respect. As the rigours of winter bite, temperatures seem to reach lower nadirs than the official forecast, even those the BBC or Mozilla predict specifically for this particular postcode. After a diluvial November, the first fortnight of December brought welcome dry weather, but at a price: every day the frost gets sharper, the roads more slippery and the house more damn bitter cold.

Ensconced on the side of a hill and framed by the confluence of two rivers, the house is built into the hillside, some of its walls acting as a kind of rampart against it. Mysteriously, one of the downstairs walls has an arrow slit, even though there is nothing on the other side but the bowels of the hill. Was there no hill outside when the house was built? Hardly, since some of the upstairs is sculpted in, with concrete flooring laid directly onto the seemingly natural elevation. Only parts of the house have a downstairs as such at ground level.

This situation provides good shelter from the wind, but also puts us in the shade for much of the time, causing the ice to stay longer with us, sometimes not thawing at all. As to the squadron of builders, plumbers and electricians who once were part of the house’s ecosystem, they have taken their vibrant presences, colourful temperaments, musical propensities and sonorous voices elsewhere, presumably to a more pressing project, leaving us with drafty cracks unsealed, central heating unbalanced, and electricity very provisionally connected through a tangle of cables plugged into a socket at my feet in the study – not to mention the next stage of remedial houseworks we cannot afford to proceed to, such as tanking the said study, a room ‘unfit for human habitation’ according to the survey. And, believe me, the house is cold.

Even before any snow has fallen, the field is iced with a white coating that glistens under the moon and crackles underfoot with a satisfying sound, as if you were walking on corn flakes. Initially this experience would be available only on canine walks, first thing in the morning and last thing at night, but this week the cold has been such that the frost stays over the field all day. On the dirt drive, patio and paved areas the ice provides a treacherous rink where the postman’s van and any inadvertent visitors skate with unpredictable results.

I come out in the morning to find the henhouse all frosted over, and sometimes it is a struggle to open the door. The hens’ water freezes within half an hour, so we have begun to bring the dispenser into our house at night so the poor creatures will have fresh liquid water to drink in the morning. They now choose to lie in their nesting boxes, all huddled together. This unfortunate habit is not a result of the cold as you might expect, but an practice introduced by María, the Maran, who joined us in October. It was not cold then; the problem was that on her arrival the other three hens accorded her a fiercely hostile welcome, so vicious that at night the newcomer had to take refuge in the nesting boxes, away from the perching bars where the bullies lorded it over. Apart from sympathy for the underhen, this drama affected us in that the unusual amounts of hen droppings in the nesting hay forced us to replace the hay more frequently.

Sunday 9 September 2007

Life on Tynedale and the endless works needed on the house have brought a procession of interesting characters I never tire of observing. There is the Chimney Sweeper, with a colourful, resonant voice and a use of the dialect that epitomises the vocal music of this region. There is the Calor Gas man, who doubles up as welder and mechanic, and whose son has a small farm nearby and a small child that takes his hen-keeping duties very seriously. There is the Skip Man, whose aristocratic face and dignified bearing, unhampered by the overall he wears to work, exude an air of lordliness. Some other time I will write about the motley team that has been working on this house on a daily basis, giving our space the stamp of their idiosyncrasies and dictating to a large extent the rhythm of our lives.

Last week came the Scrap Man, bearing a luminous face and a sense of enjoyment of his trade that seemed at odds with the evident physical effort of lifting heavy pieces of metal, dismantling obsolete contraptions and loading the rusty components on the back of his van. He was quite methodical about it, and seemed to know where each piece of metal should go in the van with such exactitude that my offers of assistance were cheerfully declined, as if it were obvious that I wouldn’t know where to put the items I was proffering.

Like most of the local tradesmen, he knew this house well and had done work for its previous occupants. He wanted to know what alterations we were planning, he enthusiastically agreed on the need for all the changes I mentioned, he praised the beauty of the surroundings and he told me about his own house near Wark, which over many years he had improved with his own bare hands. His pride in it was unmistakable. Well after he had finished loading the remains of our ancient Rayburn on his van I could still hear the clunking of metal outside. At length he knocked on the door to tell me that he had finished. He informed me that he had removed some metal from the skip at the front of the house so we would have more room for our rubble. I looked at the skip, previously full, and it had come down to about one-half of its capacity, betraying a considerable burst of activity on his part. He left, wishing us good luck with the remaining work to be done, and he left behind the warmth of his beaming face and his name card: P Pratt, Wark Metals Scrap Dealer.

Friday 31 August 2007

Geordie’s demise has transformed the dynamic between the surviving hens. Bob Johnson is now in a minority of one, so she can ill afford to peck at her younger and increasingly stronger colleagues. There is no vindictive bullying from the black majority either, so the three go about their business in amicable normality. What’s more, the Black Rocks have begun to lay! Smooth, light brown, white-specked eggs. After a period of unsettledness Bob Johnson has resumed daily laying too, so we are now blessed with three eggs most days – one brown, slightly rough and jagged, the other two smaller, a lighter shade of brown, very smooth and with delicately placed white specks here and there.

Monday 27 August 2007

The two new Black Rocks are feisty characters, especially the younger one, Rocky. Her friend Delilah is more corpulent and has more of a comb and her behaviour, although quite bubbly too, is less exuberant. Rocky spots you from a distance and follows you around running at high speed, and when she catches up with you she overtakes you, she stands in front of you and goes flat on the ground spreading her wings. You have either to walk around her or bend over and stroke her head, which appears to please her, even if her real hope was that you would have some corn for her.

When Rocky and Delilah first arrived they were bullied by the older residents, Geordie and Bob Johnson. Jealous of their space and food, the senior hens would peck the junior ones so mercilessly that we often felt we had to intervene. It took several days for the four of them to learn to coexist in some kind of entente cordiale, although the balance of power was far from even, and the everyday activities were segregated along colour lines: two brown hens on one side, two black hens on the other. Until Geordie got broody.

One day Geordie was seen all puffed up, sitting sulky and motionless in quiet corners instead of being out in the field foraging for food with her comrades as usual. Alarmed, I phoned W to seek advice. When I described the symptoms, the diagnosis came unhesitant: “she’s clocking”.

At least that is what I now understand W to have said, even though at the time I thought he was saying “she’s clucking”. After all, I had heard it over the phone, I’m new to this area, not a native English speaker, and certainly no expert in the jargon of hens. But K was prompt to correct me. Clocking it was, even if I could not find independent corroboration in the dictionary. The fact is, I knew what W meant, and K knew what I meant, and Geordie seemed to know what she was doing as she did it with assurance. What took me aback was the intensity of the broodiness, and its duration. Day after day she refused to join the other three, preferring instead to sit alone and sulk. Gradually she even lost the interest in food, her one remaining pleasure being sitting in the sun. Although there was no visible reduction in her bulk, it was clear that she was getting weak, and one evening she did not have the strength or the will to go back to the hen house. She sat in a corner by the hens’ gate, with her face against the wall. There was something resolute and final about her posture, and by this time I was wondering if there wasn’t more to Geordie’s sufferings than mere broodiness. I let her be, partly from fear that, whatever her ailment was, it may be contagious, and I closed the door to the hen house with the other three in it. I fully expected to find Geordie on the same spot the next day.

First thing in the morning I went to the hen house, and on the spot by the gate where I had left Geordie there was nothing. The other three came out of their house and down to their breakfast, seemingly cheery and in good health. When I told W, he said he had seen brown feathers on the way to the field – sure sign that the fox had got Geordie.

Saturday 25 August 2007

Bellingham Show day. The road workmen have had the good grace to remove their barriers, cones and ‘no access’ signs for the occasion. I had to miss the show because of family business in Edinburgh. K went with her cousin J taking the Bouvier with her, but there was no category for him. An attempt was made to smuggle him in with the Child Pet Dogs, and one of J’s small daughters was game for it, but when it came to answering the judge’s question “how old is your dog?” her answer was “he’s not my dog”. That put paid to Fluffy’s competitive season this year.

K met the Farmer on the Show ground, and commented on the absence of sheep this year. "I feel undressed without them here" was his comment.

Saturday 21 August 2007

Roadworks have been on for a few weeks on the road that connects us to the A68. In order to go to Newcastle we have had to take a detour through Bellingham and West Woodburn. This week we found that the road to Bellingham was closed too. W was the first to break the news to us yesterday morning, flushed with the excitement of his argument with the workmen who had tried to stop him coming to his workplace. By the time we attempted the crossing the workmen looked weary, as if W and others like him had dissuaded them from preventing the likes of us leaving their village in any direction. After a few days they and us found an equilibrium where they would let us through if we waited patiently for them to move their big machines. There was even a semblance of friendliness in the way they returned our handwave.

18 August 2007

Saturday 18 August 2007

Falstone Show day. K decided we should enter Fluffy in the dog class, Any Other Dog category. Following the discontinuance of the Terrier Race on grounds of Health and Safety, it seemed that the dog presence in the show was set to have a lower profile than hitherto. She thought it would be good for the show if we unleashed our Bouvier on it. Who knows, he might elicit a smile or two. In the morning I gave the Bouvier a good grooming, or as good a one as a dog as shaggy as this can undergo. He submitted to it with good grace, as if he knew it was a special occasion.

Once there, Fluffy became predictably excited, especially at the density of the dog population on the show ground. Every time he saw a dog he would make an impetuous dash for it, often causing its owner such consternation that we had to shorten the lead and hold on to it quite firmly. In frustration Fluffy would pull at his lead with such force that once the collar came off over his head. I went to the dog accessories stall and bought a smaller one.

Falstone turned out to be a smaller affair than the only other display of its kind I had been to before, the Alwinton Show. Its scope was further diminished by the ban on transport of animals decreed in the wake of the latest foot and mouth scare. There were no sheep and no cattle. Only some stalls selling produce, a tractor display, a few tents where prior to our arrival prizes had been awarded to the best cake, the best painted egg, the best jam and so forth.

The dog display attracted interesting characters, not only the four-legged ones being entered but also the handlers and spectators. The judges carried themselves with an air of impressive authority, their faces strained by the responsibility they bore in the knowledge that their verdict was going to be incontestable. They choreographed the handlers around the ring, they motioned us one by one onto the platform in the middle, then after a hands-on examination of the dog they would direct the handler away towards the side of the ring and back onto the platform, and then away again. Next the judge would call the three finalists onto the central platform, give them an appraising look and choose the final winner. All this was conducted with a cheerful solemnity.

When it came to the Any Other Dog Category and Fluffy walked onto the central platform, the adjudicator admitted to some puzzlement as to the kind of beast he was judging. He gave Fluffy third prize. No comment.

5 August 2007

After the best part of another day toiling fruitlessly, finally towards the evening I found a way out of the deadlock in ‘Music and Land’. It doesn’t yet feel like a breakthrough, but the relief to see the music flowing again is no bad feeling.

Fluffy the Bouvier showed a rare semblance of vigilance when he barked from his watching post. The reason became apparent soon. The farmer, who had done some more work on our field yesterday, was back in his tractor, and behind him another machine, bigger still, followed into the field. They lost no time and began to work, one on each side of the field. The commotion was considerable and I was curious, so I went to have a look, leaving Fluffy in the house lest he run under the tractor’s spikes. It was an impressive sight to see two agricultural vehicles working in our land. Their weight set the ground vibrating underfoot and their roar sounded incongruous in this idyllic retreat, but at the same time it felt right to see the idle long grass gone and coming out of the rear of a round baler as neatly compressed bales. The thought that that hay is going to be used is good for the soul.

Seeing me standing there, the farmer came down from his tractor and explained that he wanted to make the most of the dry weather to press on with the job. I expressed concern that he was having to do this on a Sunday evening, but he didn’t seem to mind. Tiger the cat was sitting beside me, transfixed by the big machines. Her estranged colleague, Douglas, watched from a respectful distance, looking deeply concerned at the turn of events. I left the farmer and his assistant to their work and I came back to mine, which was now also making headway. Night has now fallen, but soon I’ll be going out with Fluffy to survey the transformation.

4 August 2007

I’ve hit a dead end at bar 135 of ‘Music and Land’, the second movement of the string quartet. I’ve been trying one solution after another since K went on tour three days ago, but nothing I come up with seems to provide a suitable continuation from this point, which also has to be a preparation for the movement to come to an end. Only my surroundings are keeping me sane.

On the way to the bins I bumped into M, a professional gardener and a friend of the last owners of our house. He was mowing the lawn on the other side of the road, the piece of land that has been retained by our predecessors. After some small talk about his gardening and our building works, I found myself telling him, without meaning to, about the full moon on the field. Rather personal perhaps, but I did give him an edited version that he might understand. He understood, and responded in kind with some or other of his own admiring experience of the beauty of these parts. This appreciation of the landscape did not surprise me. A couple of days ago I had also intimated something about the lunar experience with W, who, in turn, had told me about his days as a farmer, when in the summer he would rise at three in the morning and let the dogs run around in the moonlight. “You felt grateful to be alive” is the exact phrase W used. Notwithstanding his claims of inadequacy at self-expression, W not only uses language vividly, but he is a true aesthete. And today M the gardener didn’t fail to empathise either. I’ve come to the right sort of place.

3 August 2007

In the morning the Bouvier had dried up a bit, but an unholy whiff still wafted up whenever he got near. His self-esteem seemed still shaken. He would approach me with awkard movements and a needy expression in his face. And every now and then he would still bend to reach the affected area, even though he could not think of an effective action to improve his situation. I could: I gave him a shower.

He was very reluctant to come into the bathroom – no fool, he. He had to be dragged with some force, but once there he resigned himself to the warm water and the shampoo. His frame decreased to about half its habitual dimensions with the wet hair stuck to his skin. You had to make an effort not laugh at him. Douglas the cat broke into inconsolable wailing outside the bathroom, possibly in sympathy for what he considered a cold-blooded torture on someone who was, after all, a family member. The Bouv came out in a fit of hyperactivity, no doubt part of it designed to shake the water off his fluffy body. The smell was gone, and nothing untoward stuck to his rear anymore. His dignity was saved.

True to his word, the farmer has been cutting the grass in our field. He must have arrived when I was out in the village buying food. As I came up the drive I could see his tractor’s rotor blades scything the wild growth into some kind of agrarian submission. He was working quite intently, but he responded when I waved from the car. He will use the cuttings for hay, even though, he had said, this is no longer the best time for it and it will be all seeded. But I think this is the time he is making his own hay, as are other local farmers. If the best time is past, our grass doesn’t seem to have been alone in outstaying its prime.

An interesting man this farmer. The other day he turned up with a present: one deep brown, speckled egg for K. It was perfectly shaped and tastefully coloured as if by the hand of an artist. I held it with admiration and respected the farmer for his attention to detail. K had been talking about liking brown eggs, such as a Maran might lay. This jewel was the farmer’s demonstration of one his Maran’s output. Now K very much wants a Maran.

One of the hens is limping. K thinks there is some kind of infection in her foot, the one she (the hen) can’t put down. When I asked W, who knows more about these things, he thought the hen had hurt her foot on the construction debris she had been exploring. He recommended soaking the injured foot in warm water with TCP. But the next time I saw the hen she was walking normally.

All day I thought with anticipation of the nightfall and the lunar conflagration it would bring. When the day’s work was done and tiredness set in, I took the Bouvier to the field but was disappointed to see that no moon had risen yet. No party, no late night, no moon. Never mind. The dog was entitled to is walk. He was off the lead, since in the night he is less likely to run amok. As I made towards the river he stayed behind near our bonfire spot. I reached the bank and waited, listening for the owl. No owl either. On tonight’s evidence, it seems that the owl remains silent if the moon is not out. The young Bouvier was not answering my calls and he had not joined me by the river, which was unlike him. I walked back to the spot where I had left him, and there he was, sitting in a cowering sort of way. He would take a step or two towards me, bend his body in a sideways arch and then sit again. The unpleasant smell was the telltale sign. So that is what was keeping him.

He had done his dogly duty in the field, but this time he had something of a loose stomach and he had either misjudged the angle or just been unlucky. The fact is that not all of it had fallen down, and there was a large mess sticking to the fluff of his rear. The Bouvier seemed mortified, and it was clear that he was unwilling or unable to walk anywhere in his present state. This had happened before, and I knew what to do. I went to the house, got a roll of kitchen tissue and came back to the field, where the Bouvier, as he hadn’t ever done before, had stayed put on the same spot. I laid the lit torch on the ground, stood in front of him and, holding the fluffy body between my legs, I bent forward towards his backside and wiped his bum.

It was hard to believe how much there was, as sheet after sheet of kitchen tissue came off soiled until there was a goodly pile of them on the ground. I realised this wasn’t going to solve the problem this time. After puzzling awhile over the humbled dog’s predicament, I coaxed him towards the house, left him sitting on the yard and went in to prepare a solution of warm water with washing up liquid. I probably don’t need to describe what ensued. Suffice it to say that, after repeated ablutions to which he submitted with surprising docility, the Bouvier began to wag his tail again. As I disposed of the rubber gloves, the water and the plastic container, I remembered the kitchen tissues in the field. I went to fetch them without a torch and found them easily, not only because I know my field and I remembered the exact spot, but also because, only then did I realise it, the moon was now shining in all its glory, and the field, apart from the temporary defilement of a few soiled sheets of paper, had once more become a silver temple. The unscheduled developments of the night meant that I was, after all, able to partake of tonight's lunar worship. If the owl screeched, I did not notice.

1 August 2007

I was late home after the performance and the party, which the worrying about dog and hens had compelled me to leave earlier than I would have liked to. The roads were blissfully empty most of the way back, and on arrival I headed straight for the Bouvier, who had spent a record number of hours by himself. My visions of psychological harm to his canine mind and physical harm to the furniture proved groundless as the good fluffy thing came up to me in his unfailing affectionate fashion, the only signs of any trauma being, if anything, a greater intensity of joy in welcoming me. He came out with me to check on the hens, who unforgivably had been left out at the mercy of every wild beast of the night until a late hour. They had come to no harm either, and as I shut their pophole I heard a screeching in the field indicative of some interesting creature. I brought the dog into the house for his dinner and once he had eaten I took him out to the field. A treat was in store.

In the chilly midnight the moon was burning the field with its silver light, giving it the look of one vast pagan temple dedicated to lunar worship. It was impossible not to remember Casta Diva che inargenti queste palle piante antiche…I didn’t need the torch; it would have been sacrilegious to intrude with a man-made light. I plodded over the uneven ground in the direction of the screech, by the river. When I reckoned I was in front of the sound’s source I put the torch on and shone it on the trees: it was an owl, perched on a horizontal branch. I hadn’t come this close to an owl before, but I had always thought owls made an ocarina-like hoot. And yet this was a strident, alarmed kind of screech, with a two-beat, iambic sort of rhythm. And the bird was definitely an owl. This owl was not amused to be glared by my torch and it showed his displeasure by releasing a dropping, audible and wet. And he held his ground, not budging from his branch, and the light did not inhibit him performing his screech with determination, not averting his round eyes from the glare of my torchlight. I observed it for a moment and then switched the torch off and went on my way round the silver temple the field had become. The murmur of the Rede sounded confidential, like an intimate talk or perhaps a prayer in propitiation of the moon. After a full circuit round the field it still seemed too soon to go back in, so the Bouvier and I went up the drive. Walking back, the moonlit was a blessed thing. If I hadn’t written mooncast I would do it all over again, but the result would be different up here from what I wrote in Coquetdale.