John Muir Country Park, 12 May

I was up late last night, watching the news, and then a bit earlier than planned this morning, absorbing the news… and my brain is tired today. I’m too tired to write, while acknowledging a need to simply sit and write for a bit before disappearing from a small screen. My eyestrain is too pronounced to focus on photo edits or chunks of small text, and, as I type this through blurred vision, I’m also probably not going to write too much here. So this is (mostly) a post for photos.

And it’s also a post that I wasn’t sure about sharing as it’s a rewind back to May, which feels a little odd in November, as we feel the glow of autumn gently giving way to the darker winter days ahead. I have a few posts to share from late April and May and have hesitated with these. One has the title the day after, and, if you know us from Instagram, you’ll understand the relevance of that title. All these posts are from the ‘in-between’ days, the days when we were two, and I haven’t felt ready to draw together my thoughts from this time.

But today I simply wanted to share these scenes of calm, and this gentle light of spring - as an antidote to my busy mind, if nothing else. The light shifted throughout this walk, from the cooler tones of the first three photos as we arrived at Hedderwick Sands, passing the four entwined trees that lean together, clinging into the edge where land meets shore, to the warmer glow as we looped back to this same spot later in the walk, as the sunlight pushed through the cloud cover.

The view across Hedderwick Sands at John Muir Country Park.

Our walks here over the months before this had been slow. We walked at Bracken’s pace, always encouraging him onwards, and now, as two, we were striding out, gathering speed back into our legs while feeling the distinct absence, as if we’d left someone behind. Even this simple act of walking together with speed felt strange, alien, as did the new quietness. On our walks, I’d always speak to Harris and Bracken - I say ‘to’ but I mean ‘with’ as they responded, albeit without words, and so even this lack of interaction felt jarring.

If I could drive, I’d have headed here this afternoon to walk below these pines and to pause at this spot, gazing out over Hedderwick Sands, absorbing this quiet, with nothing but birdsong hanging in the air. But I can’t, so I’m simply sharing these photos, these moments, instead. Acknowledging the complex emotions of this walk, of this time back in early May, while also reflecting on spring.

Autumn can feel like a season of retreat as the daylight hours slowly (or not so slowly) slip away, while winter is a season of survival - the cold, the dark, the gloom, and I say this is as someone who enjoys the bracing chill of winter walks. Summer can be too warm, too bright, too busy; a season of hayfever and people and noise. A different type of survival. But spring arrives with new life and light and the promise of longer days, and this hope-filled season will return.