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THE SHORT WALK to the post office is the only taste of the great outdoors I get today. I give in to the temptation to lean on the bridge for a minute or two, just to watch the river. The temporary island, which has now become a peninsula of silt, is almost entirely colonised by lush grasses and weeds. A Moorhen swims across the backwater towards the willows, its tail flicking petulantly.It's a scene that's constantly changing but which, in another way, is timeless. Swirls of pollution foam eddy below a riffled stretch where the river tumbles over the remains of an old wier.
Richard Bell, |
I take a short detour along the towpath. I've been drawing in the studio most of the day and it's good just to stop for a moment and look at greenness and water, even the dull water of the canal. In a collapse of the banking a thorn tree has ended up in the water. It's not quite the Everglades but its crooked silhouette does add a touch of wilderness.
It's a dull day but a couple of Wall Browns are still active on this sheltered, south-facing, section of the towpath. A Large White 
flies by. It is a male; it has no spots on its forewings.
My ten minute walk also crosses the beck, in this case running deep below the level of the road, in its own secret, shady, world in the old millrace, hemmed in by the tall Himalayan Balsam.