Mark went off to work this morning, and the Peppers were having a special, compulsory-holiday, empty-guest-house lie in.
It was the most glorious morning, so I took the dogs off up the fell by myself.
The day was magnificent. Watery winter sunshine streamed from an ice-blue sky where the ghost of last night’s moon still hung.
We tramped off under the trees, through the mud and off up the rough tracks to the top of the fell.
We had the nicest time. It is lovely to have company to walk, but walking alone and in silence is a different sort of happiness.
Of course it was not silent. I could hear sheep in the distance, and the twittering of the birds who, like us, had not been able to muster the resources to flap off to Africa for some winter sun. Little streams bubbled down the hillside, and the cool morning air smelled of dry bracken and fallen leaves. Brambles tangled with hawthorn, and rowan trees drooped their still-laden branches of scarlet berries over the path.
I had half forgotten that just breathing could be a simple pleasure.
I stood still beside the little tarn and breathed, and breathed and breathed. I could smell fallen trees, and sheep, and acid mud, and grass.
The whole thing was such a joy that it became useless for exercise, because I was having such a lovely time that I did not want it to end. I strolled, slowly and contentedly, feeling the warm sun on my back and the chill air from the beck on my face.
Roger Poopy found a squirrel and chased it. It ran up a tree, which he discovered, after several unsuccessful attempts, he could not climb. He had, however, bounded through a ditch of brambles and up to the top of a mossy wall to reach it, where he discovered that he was stranded.
I picked my way through the brambles to lift him down, and discovered to my irritation that he had been rolling in badger poo, presumably to impress Pepper later on with the idea that he was an edgy and rascally sort of chap. Sometimes breathing is not a pleasure at all, and I hauled him down crossly.
Both he and my coat had to be washed later.
I collected a pocket full of pine cones to make the house look quaintly rural for Christmas, and put them on top of the stove to dry out and open. I will have to remember to move them before they burst into flames later.
When I got back I looked on the mighty Internet for knitting patterns whilst I had my cup of tea. I have remembered that I have got some wool and thought I might knit some Christmas presents for anybody who does not want curtains. I like knitting, and have now sufficiently recovered from the failed tea cosy, which regular readers might recall from a couple of years ago, to give it another go.
It was dark long before Mark got home. We took the dogs for a last stroll around the park with half of the Peppers before we went to bed, and thought that we might have a bonfire of some of the scrap bits of wood at the farm one evening if the weather stays dry.
We thought it might be sensible to take the camper van over and sit by the fire with a glass of wine, after which we could just go to sleep without needing to try and go home or anything difficult. The Peppers can’t do anything much with their van at the moment, because the clutch has jammed into solid immobility. This happens when you do not move something for a while, and their camper van had been sitting on the previous owner’s driveway for years, where the clutch has gone rusty.
It was a nuisance, because they needed to move it to the front of their house so that they could do some repairs to it.
Mark volunteered to move it there and then, since he had not been drinking, and knows what you are supposed to do to shift rusty clutches. A couple of minutes later he and the van kangarooed off down the road, obscured from view by a dense cloud of black smoke.
It was a good job that it was late at night in the middle of lockdown in the middle of winter, because it made an awful racket and bounced about like a rabbit at a rock concert. In the end he reappeared, by which time the clutch had given way and the van was chugging along in a normal, if smoky, sort of way. We trotted after him, and he eased it into the only-just-big-enough parking space in front of their house.
They are going to put the bathroom back together and maybe they will come and help.
We can tidy up the wood store and drink some socially distanced wine together.
