Lockup likes
June 22, 2021 Leave a comment
With the end date for Covid19 discussed and easing of some restrictions it is time for some refection. My thoughts focus on boxes, faces and places.
In the first phase of lockdown I realised that school could take over and the screen rule my life. Teams was forced upon on us and those basic rules of teaching thrown out; without consideration, suddenly, we were filming children!
I needed balance, time away from screen; an escape Pod. My shed became a man [outdoorsman] cave. My breaks consisted of brewing up outdoors and I was lighting fires in the garden!
The outdoors became a haven. Apps were culled, facebook thinned but groups increased in importance.
I resurrected a few older group, trees, gates and made new friends, with common interests, on Messenger. One group piqued a real interest. There was something about the red postboxes and enough engineering and recent monarchical history to drive a new interest. I joined the LBSG, learnt how to collate the relative data and now survey them too.
The interest, of course was simply a stripped-down exploration. Adventure without an event. I maximised the local boxes, explored further afield and can now spot a special at 100 yards.
Between lockdowns life returned. The additional of a pop up loo meant I was self contained with tent and food box. I explored pubs outside, headed to the moor and slept in friends fields.
A pseudo normality returned, not of deep adventure but of light exploration. Rules were to be upheld but subvented.
With half term included SilvaBeck entered my life and she inspired river adventures under sail and pole too; new adventures.
The second lockdown bought a new normality. Blended learning insisted on masked face to face alongside filmed and recorded teaching. A nightmare in planning. Set the bar low and exceed daily.
A new preoccupation blossomed. Fingerposts. I got involved in the cast signs of Somerset and Dorset [I am close to the border] and the theft of a Cornish sign led to me petitioning local dignitaries. Again, this was a momentary obsession. A means to step out, explore, eventure.
Half term in the Trinity term was a run to Lancashire and the Lakes; new friends, old friend, rediscovered faces. My grey became a badge of rediscovery; things had changed but genuine relationships are indeed face to face.
Film locations, ghyll scrambles, board games, old pubs, days in the canyon with my son; all became the new and rediscovered currency.
The adventure had shifted centre stage again. The journey no longer driven by boxes and posts. Duke of Edinburgh up on the Moor, SUPping on the canal, sailing up to float down the river. Activity ruled again, and the cut back, trimmed down social media disappeared behind the curtain.
And so what of proper post lockdown? Wales and Lakes and Woodland edging are all planned. Nuttalls will re-emerge and Dartmoor Pints and pubs. SUPping the leats of the moor? Scrambling on Leather Tor and then the long promise of snow.
Solstice has come and gone but a wet one swelled the rivers, a promise of a watery wander.
Alicemark 