BAKING DAY

BAKING DAY

That sight of the sun streaked sea and the dark shaded clouds. I love it each time I see it. It is crystal but better than crystal, it is music but better then music. Just sitting here; I can feel the wind on my face the smattering of a wake up of rain on my cheeks. I can hear the waves, the birds.

There is a brown headed duck in the mud red lined rivulet. There is a goose silhouetted against the clumps of tufty grass and a busy whistle of small waders flying low across the bay. I am happy ambling; thinking of Wendy, while Dash the dog tugs on the lead and sniffs at every bush and wees on every fence post.

The aspen trees with their straight grey trunks no longer rattle their leaves in the breeze, instead I walk over them and those of oak, sycamore, rowan. There is a cluster of bright holly berries, a scattering of yew berries brightening the hedges. There are hawthorns and there are blackened rosehips. The oyster catchers gather on the old heap of ballast rocks and the herons stalk tiredly in their intensity through the seaweed. Wendy is back at home making cakes.

And as usual there is the lovely sight of the seal on his usual rock curling his body into the air in the great ‘c’ shaped release of what must be its equivalent of a wonderful stretching yawn. I do not have boots on so I have to be careful where I walk; not get completely lost in my thoughts but it is hard to forget the memory of lying cuddled up on the couch last night; watching films on telly; that blissful end to a draining week.

When I look at the low moss covered, rocks from old walls, and the frayed ropes round the roots of the tree by the shore. I wonder at what life once was and who went to the effort of building them, binding them and have slight horrified glimpses of the years to come when all this is under water. Wendy will have the telly on while she bakes. I wonder what the children are doing with their Dad just now? I wonder if the rabbits have been fed and have stopped making their; We want breakfast! racket.

On the point, where the rocks are covered in yellow lichen, the sea cascades into the rockpools, swirls out of them to fill new hollows as it must do each day. Here we are exposed to the wind. I can see rain further up the Firth between Dunoon and Gourock and wonder if my sister is at work in the hospital there today or has a weekend off. I love the intersection of hill after hill as I look down the Clyde and wish I had the energy, time and inclination to walk amongst them. I promise myself yet again that I must get fit again one day.

Dash is sniffing at the shore bound piles of driven seaweed; the bladderwrack and the kelp. There is a hint of spray in the air. I am remembering the laughter we had just an hour ago when taking photo’s with Kath and Katrina at Jean’s Bothy. The tangles of beads and baubles for me and the sleek simplicity of Katrina’s design on it’s Christmas mat.

At the car I skirt the mud and the puddles and wonder if Dash will do too. I look out at the sea where the sea still shimmers silver and the sun still peeks out from the scudding clouds. There is my favourite tree. I wonder how Wendy will react if I put up yet another photo of it on Instagram tonight? I wonder when she will get home from her friends later tonight. As Dash, for once, leaps into the boot of the car unaided. I think of the vegetables I will cut for tea and look briefly at the mackerel sky to the north with its heart shaped hole between the clouds and the green fields and white houses and yes, of course, my heart thinks of Wendy before I head back home to the smell of sugar, vanilla, flour and fruit.

(Photo- Ardmore November 2021)