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Writing now, I must try to lay down the ambient background of slowness, heat and modest but constant pain. Too loud and you will tire of the moaning. Too soft and you miss a critical dimension. Plug away, plod away, drift away. Time does the rest, turning a walk into something richer, as cream changes to golden butter under duress. Though individual days blend together, the result becomes an experience more vibrant than the mere cumulative act of trudging towards the next sit-down and sandwich. Travel long and slow and you learn to pay attention. Time moves strangely on the road: at once fast and slow. There is real time, told by tolling church towers and the sun’s relentless sweep. But there is also walking time, marked by the body and mind – tortured soles and souls – that pays scant heed to the chronological order of the universe. Weeks fly, days pass, hours and minutes drag: just me, my violin and my shadow slowly crossing the landscape with Laurie. ‘The days,’ he wrote, ‘merged into a continuous movement of sun and shadow, hunger and thirst, fatigue and sleep, all fused and welded into one coloured mass by the violent heat of that Spanish summer.’ This is just one day of my life. But every day to come will depend fractionally on what I do today. I must live it as vividly as I can bear to do. (An extract from my new book, ‘My Midsummer Morning’. Available for sale now – link in my bio. Thank you / Gracias!) #MyMidsummerMorning
Writing now, I must try to lay down the ambient background of slowness, heat and modest but constant pain. Too loud and you will tire of the moaning. Too soft and you miss a critical dimension. Plug away, plod away, drift away. Time does the rest, turning a walk into something richer, as cream changes to golden butter under duress. Though individual days blend together, the result becomes an experience more vibrant than the mere cumulative act of trudging towards the next sit-down and sandwich. Travel long and slow and you learn to pay attention. Time moves strangely on the road: at once fast and slow. There is real time, told by tolling church towers and the sun’s relentless sweep. But there is also walking time, marked by the body and mind – tortured soles and souls – that pays scant heed to the chronological order of the universe. Weeks fly, days pass, hours and minutes drag: just me, my violin and my shadow slowly crossing the landscape with Laurie. ‘The days,’ he wrote, ‘merged into a continuous movement of sun and shadow, hunger and thirst, fatigue and sleep, all fused and welded into one coloured mass by the violent heat of that Spanish summer.’ This is just one day of my life. But every day to come will depend fractionally on what I do today. I must live it as vividly as I can bear to do. (An extract from my new book, 'My Midsummer Morning'. Available for sale now - link in my bio. Thank you / Gracias!) #MyMidsummerMorning
Readers who liked ... Writing now, I must try to lay down the ambient background of slowness, heat and modest but constant pain. Too loud and you will tire of the moaning. Too soft and you miss a critical dimension. Plug away, plod away, drift away. Time does the rest, turning a walk into something richer, as cream changes to golden butter under duress. Though individual days blend together, the result becomes an experience more vibrant than the mere cumulative act of trudging towards the next sit-down and sandwich. Travel long and slow and you learn to pay attention. Time moves strangely on the road: at once fast and slow. There is real time, told by tolling church towers and the sun’s relentless sweep. But there is also walking time, marked by the body and mind – tortured soles and souls – that pays scant heed to the chronological order of the universe. Weeks fly, days pass, hours and minutes drag: just me, my violin and my shadow slowly crossing the landscape with Laurie. ‘The days,’ he wrote, ‘merged into a continuous movement of sun and shadow, hunger and thirst, fatigue and sleep, all fused and welded into one coloured mass by the violent heat of that Spanish summer.’ This is just one day of my life. But every day to come will depend fractionally on what I do today. I must live it as vividly as I can bear to do. (An extract from my new book, ‘My Midsummer Morning’. Available for sale now – link in my bio. Thank you / Gracias!) #MyMidsummerMorning... also liked:
The book Laurie Lee wrote – As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning – is my favourite travel book of all time.
The river Kaveri is one of the 5 great holy rivers of India, revered by pilgrims for centuries. From its source amongst the coffee and cardamon plantations in the cool hills of the Western Ghats, the river flows 500 miles across southern India towards the hot plains of Tamil Nadu and the Bay of Bengal.
A 16-foot canoe loaded with food, 500 miles of wilderness ahead of us, camping on islands under the stars: paddling down the Yukon River remains one of my favourite adventures.