An outing to the Farm.

(Darts Farm, that is.)

I fall so far behind with you that I hardly know how to restart. So, a few glimpses of today--some from before and some from after the fried squid and chips:

This last one is something of a triumph: now that there's a footbridge over the Clyst, the river that runs in the pasture behind my house, it's possible to stop and take pictures without having to fear for one's life. I thought I was taking a picture of the light on the river at dusk (i.e., 4:40 p.m.). But when I got home and put these on the computer, I discovered that there was a heron there the whole time as well.

I read so much, but it's never enough--and I say that not as self-deprecation but as an exclamation that there's simply so much to learn. And just when I think I know what I'm looking at, it turns out that a heron is standing there, too.

One step forward, forty steps in twenty directions.

Last week, one of my charges ended up in the hospital, stricken by an illness that had steadily worsened until it became imperative to hook her up to an IV and put lots of things into her that way. I got a good three days' worth of experiencing how much repeated trips into a hospital can make everything else feel secondary or negligible. This afternoon, responding to my report that this student is now faring much better (and is back out of hospital), someone from home wrote that now I can get back to focusing on all the other things I have to do--and when I bristled at that, I realized, once again, how thin my skin became during this student's sickness and our collective adventure with a foreign country's health system, and how distracted I've felt. 

This weekend, though, those of us who were not in hospital piled onto yet another train and headed eastward once again, this time to Cambridge, where some 38% of my heart seems still to reside. Saturday was all about seeing a play at the Arts Theatre, a big part of my year in 07-08, and then wandering around the Backs (espying the King's College cows), drinking at an establishment that didn't exist when I was last there, listening to an organ recital, seeing some Bonfire Night fireworks, and then eating and drinking with various students for many more hours, realizing what an excellent group of people they are. Sunday was for touching bases: a morning trip to Ely, replete with AMT cappuccino on the train up; studying the Lady Chapel through my camera; prowling at the bookstore in Ely, one of my favorites anywhere; and then bustling back to Cambridge so as to maximize the time I could spend at Kettle's Yard before it closed. Two students tagged along with me throughout the day, so we explored together and then brought up the rear of our whole group in catching the evening train back.

I find that after traveling weekends, I'm not good for much on Monday, which is a bit of a shame as there's always a good amount to be done after a couple of days away.

I also find that I seem to lose the plot on a fairly regular basis now and then spend days trying to find it again. Right about the time I do, it's time to go somewhere else and lose it all over again. Perhaps this means I should stop thinking that there's a plot and start following the days themselves.

The guys.

The first weekend my students were here, I took a walk down to Darts Farm, the local emporium of all things local and/or awesome, and prowled around making eyes at the cows. The funny thing about cows is that if you stand near their fence, they'll come over and stare at you pretty soon. It looks like curiosity in their faces, but I don't know whether that's really what they experience when they stand and look so stolidly.

These are the cows I can see grazing in the field visible from my bedroom and living room. They amble about, sometimes all day long. Two days ago, though, they were in another part of their realm, and all the Canada geese were hanging out in their field instead. Two swans flew in and menaced one of the geese until it flew away, with the two swans flying in hot pursuit. But the funny thing is that soon they had circled back, and there was a third swan, and the goose seemed to be flying right along with them, no problems.

The sea, the sea.

The water was this color all around what's known as "the Island" at Tintagel--the rocky outcropping on which buildings stood from at least the "Dark Ages" onward. And it wasn't even because the sun was out; it wasn't, so much, and certainly not at the time I took this picture. The water is just this incredible, roiling range of blue-green.