7th November from the West Cliff Green, Bournemouth
A riotous, raucous wind. little dribbles of rain from time to time. The green waves heaving and collapsing onto themselves. A day like a delegate to a temperance conference at the BIC coming home across the green in the dark early hours. Meanwhile, the Boss of the Clifftop, the Crow, makes no effort to fly from his post where he is keeping on eye on things. He just spreads his wings and lets the wind carry him up and away. Bright yellow splashes in the long brown stalks are flowers of evening primrose and charlock.
From 7th November 2019
One of the reasons the Autumn is so pleasurable is the long, luxurious dawn when it is possible to stand and look and listen without the normal chatter and distractions of the world. Yet, all is not still. The scurrying breeze carries with it the rich mixture of scents from wet leaves, gorse and the tang of salt. Even in the course of a walk the light changes minute by minute from enveloping dark to bright daylight. Bands of purple clouds line the horizon. They are sculptural in their majesty, yet they too, fold and change. Gulls and crows wheel and call before settling on the clifftop grass as their venue of choice for breakfast. And beneath it all, the restless splendour of the sea.
From 7th November 2015
This is the sort of day that reminds me of those sort of childhood mornings when you couldn't wait to get outside and shout at the wind. I don't particularly believe in Ruskin's pathetic fallacy but there is a definite emotional charge, an uplift, in being in the midst of this weather. Everything is in motion, every blade of grass, every bush and tree is rocking and swaying. In the pine groves there is a deep hollow mournful moaning while the holm oak stands echo in a crisp susurration. The sea has given up any pretence of organisation and the waves are marching up the beach in a ragged rabble of foam. The rain and spray is stinging my face when I spot a pair of black eyes watching me from the leaf litter at the base of a bush. It is a wren, no bigger than a fifty pence piece. I marvel that something so tiny should be here in the presence of all this tumult. She stares at me in wonder that any sensible being should be out here at all. So we both turn away to find our breakfasts.
From 7th November 2012
From just outside my window I can see the whole of Poole Bay from Old Harry with the grey shoulder of the Purbeck Hills beyond to Hengistbury Head. The sea is that peculiar colour somewhere between steel and bottle green. 7 - no 9 small boats dot the water. One of them,hauling its lines, is cloaked with a mob of gulls. On the far horizon a container ship bulky and ugly passes. Just then the sun spills down a brilliant splash of platinum light against the grey cast by what weather watchers call the Eyes of God.
From 7th November 2009
The night is like a giant bowl of Rice Krispies
