Hand grab

Fiddling, between the new engine and the port-side engine bay wall, I'm interested to discover that there is a certain pattern of pressure on the palm of the right hand that creates a visceral panic reaction. Conscious control returns in a second; I know that the engine isn't bolted to anything and my hand cannot possibly be trapped, but what an instinct. In what murky past did one of my ancestors survive only by having this built in fear?

The cold of it

The Forest’s puddle frost lay unquiet this morning. No planar crystal panes showing clear undershores, but a twisted crazing of partial melts and freezes forming gentle lozenges or sharp shards like creamy guttered candle runnels or inundated torn tissue papers.

I crouched to feel the surfaces, their curled micro-ridges like reflected finger whorls, slicked by light human touch. Cropped grass blades cut the surface in spattered ink patterns; green lances pointed at the sky, rimed with hoar.


Where transient pools sit over porous ground, the thin ice caps get left behind, looped round stranded branches, propped on drained leaf litter. Ghost pools on the forest floor.

Kenwood spatula

It has come to my notice that, over the years, I have had an antipathy towards the humble kitchen tool which first became an object of (general) desire with the Kenwood mixer: the Kenwood kitchen spatula.

This stems, I'm sure, from my childhood, when the spatula and its attendant mixer first came into my life.

My Mum used to make excellent cakes. Rarely anything fancy; just simple fruit or cherry cakes and a Victoria sponge flavoured with chocolate or coffee. These were hand-mixed in a traditional stoneware bowl using a wooden spoon and this same tool was employed with a butter knife to scrape the mix into a baking tin. As a child I would then have the pleasure of scraping the bowl as close to cleanliness as I could using a teaspoon while the cooking process raised expectations of the finished item.

I clearly recall the arrival of the first Kenwood mixer in the house because it disturbed my cosy routine. Firstly, the mixing process was now consigned entirely to the kitchen; secondly, this mixing process was now accompanied by an excruciating noise that precluded conversation and usually caused me to visit distant parts of the house in the search for some peace - in addition the mixer in operation smelled of electrical appliance, an odour I was willing to countenance in the garage with my train set, but felt unsuited to a place of food preparation; thirdly, the pairing of bowl and spatula resulted in there not being sufficient residue to make the scraping of the bowl worthwhile.

What I was perhaps less aware of at the time was that although the frequency of cakes may have risen somewhat with the arrival of mechanical assistance, the flavour and texture took something of a dive. Now I can only compare the before and after with a deal of dubious introspection, but I'm sure that it is the case.

All of these detrimental changes in my life I have attached to this humble kitchen tool. I despise it.

Cloud framed

Wintered twigs open,
Light to littered woodland floor.
Basket woven sky.

Awareness of carpet

I sit awhile, most days, at my computer desk. Predominantly I sit here with bare feet, keyboard on my knee. Why today am I suddenly aware of the feel of the carpet? It's been the same carpet for 23 years.

Half past summer?

The rain, earlier just an optical aberration under a sky the colour of dusty sheets, graduated to falling mist and now, hisses on the conservatory roof, washes the leaves of the tired apple trees.

Birds have skulked to cover. Before 7am I was greeted by a fresh robin, dipping and chirping from the garden furniture on the lawn grazed by nervous, slow pigeons. Blue and great-tits searched crevices for insects and arachnids; blackbirds and jackdaws holed the unripe apples, spoiling them for all but the alcoholic wasps.

Dawn is still 5am by planetary motion, 6 by the clock, but summer is dissolving. This year's infants are entering adolescence. The cruel irradiating sun is filtered and the persistent blocking-high has welcomed Atlantic fronts at last.

There was some drought

Happy faces raised,
to accept the rain's blessing.
We run for cover.