The Equinox - Darkness and Light

Today is the equinox, the only twenty four hours in the year when the whole world has equal day and night, light and darkness. A hinge, a tipping point.

Last Sunday we walked a circular route around Brassington - a few hours along almost deserted lanes and paths.There weren't many people or cars about and so I'm tempted to write that it was quiet and calm but actually it was full of energy and noise. There was a palpable sense of tension and anticipation - as if the whole world was pushing at the door that opens between winter and spring.  The weather matched the mood, beginning with snow - ice-green grass, sugar-dust roofs - but then the sun came out, the snow was gone and as we set off up Hillside Lane daffodils were opening in the sunshine.

Half way up the hill behind the village Him Outdoors begins to sweat and swear - too many layers: shirt, fleece, jacket - god I'm hot, it's bloody warm, that sun - so some of the energy and tension as we set off is generated by him and me exchanging views about whether it's too cold or too hot, and whether coats should be taken off or on. Sadly we fit the stereotypical couple profile in the temperature department - I'm rarely too hot whereas a bit of sweating for him is a nightmare that cannot be tolerated. So he has to stop and remove a layer which involves removing other layers and unpacking and re-packing the rucksack. I'm of the 'can't be bothered'  school of outdoor clothing. I put a lot on and leave it on. I might undo the odd zip occasionally but all that layering and packing and unpacking rucksack business seems like an unnecessary faff to me.

We walk down the bridle path between small fields full of heavily pregnant sheep, many of which have given up trying to find grass and are having a lie-down, not surprising with big, ready-to-be-born lambs churning about in their bellies. The grass has only just started growing and tractors have been carrying hay bales to the fields for weeks, the hungry sheep baa-ing loudly whenever they spot one. As most of my knowledge about farming comes from listening to the Archers and watching Springwatch, I'm extremely sketchy about how it all works. I guess the sheep are gathered together so the shepherds can keep an eye on them as they give birth and although it's a benign scene, I imagine there must be a lot of anxiety amongst the farmers right now - snow, grass-growth, viruses. But the sheep are calm, patiently waiting.

 As we carry on down the lane to Balidon, black clouds roll over the hills from the north. Two  horses, looking bizarrely like one eight-legged horse silhouetted against the sky, walk slowly along the brow of the hill.  The sun disappears and it's winter again. No snow, but cold, really cold. Even the horses have blankets on. I zip up. He gets his coat out of the rucksack again, I stand and wait and watch and we have the same exchange of views . . . about weather and coats and me having to hang around waiting . . . that we've been having for thirty odd years. The horses watch us for a while then disappear over the hill.

After a mile or two more, the sun comes out and we're hungry, so this time when he takes off his coat, it's to give me something soft and warm to sit on. He may be a faffer but he's a kind faffer. We hunker down in the lee of an old stone wall to eat our ham sandwiches and drink our coffee under a wide sky the fields and hills laid out before us like a gift. Another spring and here we still are after thirty odd years, together, alive, walking the hills, sitting in sunlight.

On the route back, in the road next to the Tarmac factory, the corpse of a dead hare, most of the flesh of its body eaten, the eyes pecked out, beetles and flies crawling in and out of its skin-stretched ribs, only the long ears still intact.

More fields full of fat ewes, crowded in, close to farmhouses and barns. But then, just as we climb up to join the High Peak Trail, I spot them, far over the other side of a field, near to the hedge. Five lambs. The first this year. March 18th.  



Back in Brassington, the lane leading up to our house, we walk under high trees with rooks hopping about the branches building nests, stealing twigs from each other's nests and caw-cawing loudly. Even birds bicker.