Birdwatching

I forfeit my usual trip up the mountain in favour of heading north from the top of the lake.

Up the green sloping hillside between giant oaks into high hill woods.

Into an old Victorian walled garden, where volunteers have refurbished at least some of the beds.

I start at the bottom and scrutinise every inch, including the potting shed.

It’s overgrown in a lot of places but here and there, there are successes. Some big fat peas. Blackcurrants.

It’s another high-up secret garden a bit like mine. Deserted and lonely, where the onslaught of weeds is relentless and outstrips the ability of the well-meaning to keep on top of them.

I’ve come on holiday by mistake.

Once a year, I try and get away to my favourite place. The same campsite. The same pub. The same table. The same mountain. I am such a crushing bore. Why don’t you try somewhere different?

I came because I suddenly got sick of gardening. Weary to the bone of the abject aloneness of it all. I should be jumping with joy and celebrating. I saw it all coming over 30 years ago and prepared accordingly. What would you do if you knew that they would take away everything? Food, water, fuel, health, livelihoods.

People said ‘It’s a waste of time trying to grow food round here when you can just get if from the supermarket?’

I said nothing but thought ‘which particular part don’t you see yet?’

That was then and now is now and here it is in precise detail exactly how I said it would be.

Yet I am suddenly exhausted by it all. Out of kilter. Unable to solve the disconnect between growing the food and getting it out there. I’m good at a lot of stuff but not everything.

Out of the garden and up up up. It’s almost as steep as the mountain. Heavy ancient woodland. I hear a chainsaw in the distance but apart from that, it’s just me and the trees.

The reward at the top is the stunning view of the tarn. Created by rich Victorians to improve their view, from a time when it was fashionable for them to create giant pastoral landscapes.

It lashes with rain and my descent into the village – about two and a half miles – is swift.

It’s not the same this year. There’s a sign outside my favourite pub saying ‘card only’. I go in anyway and pretend I haven’t seen it. I remonstrate politely with the landlord. He explains that they shut the bank last year, so it’s an hour’s drive to the nearest big town. It’s too wet to sit outside at my favourite table. I have one pint and say goodbye. I don’t go back. There are other pubs. The other thing that they’ve done is put locks on the public toilets, with swipe cards that steal 50p when you go in. Need a shit? That will be 50p and will be recorded electronically. Fuck off.

The campsite is quieter than I’ve ever seen it and again it’s not the same. Normally there are a few of us – me and my lads, but it’s just me this time. My usual chariot for the last 10 years has been my old VW split screen van – perfection itself for gentlemanly camping. The van became like the garden – just too much to keep on top of. It needed vast amounts of welding and lots of restoration. Again, I couldn’t do it all on my own, so I traded it (packed with years worth of collected spares) for a shiny modern one. ‘Don’t sell it’. they said. ‘We’ll help you’. They said.

The new one is nice and is the result of years of research. It’s smooth, comfortable, nippy, economical. In the back it’s a blank canvas to develop as an all-purpose vehicle. I went to the camping shop and bought a luxury self-inflating mattress and a new sleeping bag. Still it’s not the same. I’m sad, and I don’t sleep. All the demons creep out in the night. Everything is changing.

I’m back home in two hours and straight up to the ranch. It’s more overgrown than ever. Just picking the raspberries – they’ve spread exponentially –  takes 2 hours.

I read a thing by a Hopi chief about the spirituality of everything and get comfort from it. More and more I’m exploring that side of things. The cycles of the moon and tides and so on. Women living in nature naturally synchronise their periods to the cycles of the moon.

I gave the plants sales a good go and they were successful in their own small way. Nevertheless it’s a vast amount of work for miniscule profit. Again, I can’t do it all on my own. I tried a social media advert and that was partially successful, but people didn’t turn up when they said they would and I was uncomfortable.

I do what I always do in times of doubt and go onto automatic pilot and remember the bigger picture. I empty the horseshit – ten barrowloads. Water the main allotment. Harvest the first potatoes (they’re scrawny and the ground is rock hard bone dry). Plant out beetroot and Florence fennel. Prepare an area for concreting.

I’m in disconnect – missing a jigsaw piece. There’s something in the collective psyche that senses what’s coming. Cheer up grumpy.

Mog comes and helps pick raspberries. We check on the greenhouse and compare a nearly-ripe gnarly tomato to a baboon’s arse. We’ve already commented on the firmness of the developing nuts on the hazel trees.

I’m literally a bow and arrow shot from where Shameless was written.

My mum and dad were ordinary.

I served an old-fashioned engineering apprenticeship then became a doctor.

I walk along Parliament street past the heavy drinkers outside the offie. I pass a couple with a baby. The girl is pushing the pram and the lad has a can in one hand and a spliff in the other.

I’m not being judgemental. The point I’m making is that it’s not possible for someone like me to be a conspiracy loon. I’m entrenched in ultra-pragmatism. The punchline of my book is Above all be kind but I just can’t help my irascible true nature.

My storytelling naturally continued from he book into these posts. The arrival of the pandemic was coincidental.

I tried to steer the middle ground and present the facts one by one, backed up by my two science degrees and my experience of working through the pandemic as a senior Emergency Medicine consultant. I might as well talk to myself. The awake are already awake and nothing will convince the hypnotised.

I told them who Pfizer were and what they’d done in the past.

I told them about mRNA technology and how it was brand new in humans meaning NO LONG-TERM SAFETY DATA WHATSOEVER and therefore no informed consent.

I told them about immune escape.

I told them about Antibody Dependent Enhancement.

I told them about the unexplained excess deaths.

I told them about the horrific, largely unreported, adverse events and deaths.

I told them that giving an unlicensed immune-modifying medication to children who had no risk from the illness was a serious crime. Their immune systems are in development.

I told them how the spike protein knocked off a crucial part of the ‘fight it off at the door’ immune system.

Inevitably, the latest variant strafes the vaccinated preferentially and still people don’t see it. Sadly this is just the tip of the iceberg. Two years is nothing in medical science.

I wanted so much to be wrong.

Rock and Roll

Our  Rock and Roll is spiky and difficult – just the way it’s meant to be. It’s a sunny Saturday. We’re rehearsing our Notsensibles set for Beatherder next week, then off up to the ranch with refreshments. We’re playing at Trash Manor on Saturday at 1pm – the first version of the album back to back. It’s been a slow start with the usual tomfoolery associated with anything to do with Notsensibles, but now it’s sounding neat.

Through the walls of noise coming from our house over the years, our next door neighbours’ kids formed a band.

My friend Gill is a head teacher and she brings some lads to the ranch. ‘You must behave yourselves’ she sternly tells them when they arrive. ‘Nonsense,’ I say. ‘It’s anarchy up here.’ I slip into hereditary teacher mode and they absolutely love it.

The other teacher turns out to be our old next door neighbour – singer in that band.

I revisit them and his voice is exquisite: The slendour of the taxis and the takeaways.

Gill invited me back to the school. I went yesterday. I took my scythe, a pair of shears, my 60s Voix de son maitre record player, my Gretsch and my 5 watt amp. Again, I have nothing prepared. Gill and Gary show me the vast area at the top of the school – a beautiful big airy modern building. They also have a big polytunnel and a big garden and the potential is vast – the whole area could almost be a small school in its own right.

We do a bit of scything with the boys and I show them the record player and the amp. Superficially, they are nonchalant and disinterested. I ask them what their least favourite subjects are. ‘Science and maths’. I try and explain that everything that we’re doing – the gardening, the record player, the electric guitar are all based on science and maths. Something about these sweet boys struggling with tough lives makes my heart bleed and I realise what a huge part the school plays in giving them support. They like looking after the three chickens that live in the garden. The birds have their own protected big mesh house. They sleep in the polytunnel at night – safe from the foxes.