One day

A long read … I wouldn’t bother if I were you .. it’s just a stream of consciousness, the unfolding day, unfolding lives …

I went over to my friend’s and was met by Duncan and Olly but no sign of Ash. I put their food out and then went to the neighbour’s cat who was keen to see me too … well …the food, probably.
I meandered by the river, through the village, to the bus shelter to pick up the newspaper and back again. I saw a fish.
The sheep and lambs were basking and a cockerel crowed.
I decided to sit in the garden and read the paper to see if Ash appeared. 
I watched a buzzard being mobbed overhead. The hens next door were anxious.
No sign of Ash so I decided to hang around and walk from there seeing as it was such a lovely morning.
I walked along the river and then made my way up to Reagill. 
A vast profusion of Celandines made a cosmos on the ancient ridge and furrow fields.
I passed the Picnic Tree which seemed to me to be wisely aware that the little chap who used to scoff his sandwiches there many years ago was married yesterday. 
I wondered if the Picnic Tree remembered Maud de Morville or her brother, Hugh, who was one of Thomas à Beckett’s assassin’s and for which he forfeited his lands here. Probably a very long shot.
I got lost on the unfrequented footpath that would have probably been walked daily when it was part of the network that linked farms and hamlets to the village.
An angry goose raised the alarm as I approached the farm.
I saw a woman who looked as alarmed as me. She had come down from Edinburgh to visit her cousin. I commented on her lovely accent. A mix of Scottish, English and  American, she said. Her mother had died last Fall and so she had moved back from the States to be with her father. 
Her cousin knew of my friend and her family and reassured me that I was on the path.
I walked on.
At the next farm an old blind farm dog befriended me and we continued on the track together as he sniffed his way along occasionally bumping into my legs.
As we passed farm sheds a farmer was tending young lambs and their mothers in pens. His saluki came across to greet us.
I was delighted. G and I had Salukis all those years ago. The farmer was delighted I’d recognised her and agreed she probably had some Knightellington in her. She was called Belle.
The farmer knew my friend and her family and his children were similar in age and had grown up together. 
I walked on. 
I’d climbed quite high by now and the view across to the Pennines opened out ahead of me. I thought this area had the feel of sub-alpine meadows and pastures, full of flowers and blossom filled hedgerows.
I leapt out of my skin when the National Emergency test ring sounded out of my phone.
The woods were full of cowslips just coming into flower and I saw my first orange tip butterfly.
A hare ran through …
Back at the house there was still no sign of Ash.
My friend sent photos of their celebrations yesterday and said not to worry, Ash does her own thing.
I sat in the garden for a bit longer. So peaceful, no A66, the children’s playhouse repurposed as a wood store.
I thought about how we always used to get a paper at the weekends.
I headed home and thought of our whimsical random lives, sense of place, belonging, of lack and loss.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHxi-HSgNPc

https://onbeing.org/poetry/everything-is-waiting-for-you/