After yesterday’s observation about the recent paucity of evening shots, here’s another evening shot. It’s been a while since the skies have been interesting enough to warrant a reappearance of the ‘back of the house’ view: they’ve been blue and sunny, but bland. Perhaps tonight’s display is one sign of an imminent change in the weather.
Evening shots have virtually disappeared from the blog since lockdown: this is only the second post-7pm shot since February. But every evening now begins and ends in the same place, doesn’t it?
It’s Joe, and his peers, for whom I feel sorry the most. He’s 17, he shouldn’t be inside day after day, under house arrest in all but name. What will this do to the psychology of his generation, not to mention their prospects? It could be worse for us of course — he’s not a belligerent kid, there have been no tantrums nor lapses into week-long bouts of near-catatonia. Not yet anyway. But like the rest of the country, and the planet — how much longer can he go on like this?
Amongst the points of interest within walking distance of my house (honest, officer), there is this place, Top Withens, which sits way up on the moors overlooking Haworth, former home of the Brontë sisters. The plaque you can see on the wall here reads:
This farmhouse has been associated with ‘Wuthering Heights’, the Earnshaw home in Emily Brontë’s novel. The buildings, even when complete, bore no resemblance to the house she describes, but the setting may have been in her mind when she wrote of the moorland setting of the Heights. (This plaque has been placed here in response to many inquiries.)
In other words then, here we have a building that vaguely resembles a place in a novel. And that’s all.
But because popular opinion has it that Top Withens is Wuthering Heights, the structure, though abandoned for more than a hundred years, has been preserved as a ruin. Left alone it would surely have collapsed by now but the walls are carefully cut and mortared together, as gone or complete, it would not be worth what it is to the Haworth tourist trade as it is in this half-life state.
Except for the guys on the screen last Sunday, people have been absent from the blog for many days now, so let’s rectify that today to make us remember that humanity has not yet quite given up the ghost. Would this have been better, or worse, had the weather been poor? I suspect worse. At least this guy’s approach to boosting his vitamin D levels — the chair, the can of Carlsberg — is still available to us.
Peacock butterfly, that is. This specimen positively batted its eyes at me, clearly it wanted its close-ups doing; but then again, with a pair of eyes like that, who wouldn’t. It seems to be a good spring for butterflies, there are plenty of them about. Maybe it’s because we humans aren’t disturbing them so much this year, but more likely is just that it’s been warm and sunny.
I may have already said this — like in Groundhog Day, there is a sense of repetition — but there are a couple of things whose value has been emphatically demonstrated during the last few weeks. Firstly that the topography of my life still provides legitimate reasons to leave the house on a regular basis. Second that there is attractive woodland just over the road that I can reasonably walk through in order to get from one part of this topography to others, which at least provides regular photo opportunities. These gnarly roots (brushed here and there by strands of gossamer) caught my eye this morning: this is the earliest shot on a day since February.
The last time I was on campus was the 8th March (and it was deserted then, although that was because it was a Sunday). Since then, all work has been done at home, and the shirts I would wear to scrub up a bit in Manchester have gone unworn. Dry cleaning is another business that I assume has been deemed ‘non-essential’ at this time.
At the moment, some pictures just need saving up for a day when there’s nothing else to show. The bluebells have been out for a few days now. Is there a flower with a more appropriate name? Beyond the fact that they don’t make a sound, it’s hard to fault it.
As lockdown (British-style) extends into its second month we find our visual pleasures where we can, including in cute toys with retro 70s appeal — militaristic, yes, but look! press a button on his back and he crawls along the carpet. Great fun for about thirty seconds or so.
Action Man’s second appearance on the blog (after one was snapped on the top of a mountain in the Lake District on 1/3/12). Neither of them mine, I will add.
I said a few days ago that when one is imprisoned, the arrival of the mail assumes a new significance. I greet the arrival of this magazine with pleasure every month, but this one is particularly poignant: it’s 32 days since there was last any football played in Britain (my last game was at Blackpool on March 14th) and who knows what state the local game will be in when all this is finally over. When Saturday Comes has been going for over three decades now, so let’s hope it survives, at least.
Being 42 