Gritstone

It's been a very up and down day, mixed in terms of pleasure and frustration, mixed in terms of success and failure with my lads playing cricket, and very mixed indeed in terms of the weather. Indeed the weather seems to have mirrored my emotions from morning to night. At lunchtime, after difficulties with some work stuff, the weather had closed right in with wind and rain and it seemed unlikely that they'd be any cricket played today. But things improved from there and apart from a few sharp showers the rest of the day was mostly sunny.

By the time I arrived at the cricket the opposition had scored fifty without loss and looked set, but as the weather got brighter our fortunes got better and wickets fell in rapid succession. They reached one hundred for the loss of seven wickets but the tail wagged and got lucky and I'm afraid Roam was on the wrong end of some lusty and not very attractive hitting and edging. As some very heavy clouds loomed over the ground the game seemed to be going away from us. My youngest got very frustrated and his head went down. It's so hard to watch him when that happens.

I headed back home at the tea interval just as the rain finally arrived but within a few minutes the skies cleared as dramatically as they had become filled in. I thought I'd get out for a short run on the moor but the light was so fabulously intense that photography took over and I missed getting back to the cricket completely. In the end it proved to be an easy chase for us so I guess I didn't miss too much excitement. And Roam is now in a much better frame of mind.

It was hard to choose which shot to blip tonight but I seem to be drawn to simpler compositions these days. Lots of shots of the match and long views from the moor but this lump of gritstone just does it for me. Perhaps I feel the need for a bit of grounding and solidity when so much seems up in the air at the moment. This just feels right today.