Driving through Okehampton, Devon, just passed Sticklepath and Belstone, a maze of country lanes awaits you, flowing every which way through the heart of this idyllic place.
Turning right into another lane you stop the car, stunned by the world you can see through the windscreen, and the world you cannot.
You turn the key to hush the mechanical engine and click the seatbelt button releasing your body from the sudden confinement of the hot metal car.
You step outside. Grey chips of stone crunch and crumble under your heavy black boots, this morning the sound reminds you of thick ice which knots as you stand.
You think; this light grey cobbled country lane leads to an unknown destination, the lane’s end is blocked by a curtain of mist. This unfamiliar route concealed by a white grey cloud.
Eyes closed. You inhale and taste the smells with your nostrils, letting nature’s air fill your lungs as well as your mind; moist, damp, maturing.
Eyes open. Scattered trees define the lane’s edges. They are as bare as are naked, skeletons of their former summery selves with no leaves or blossom to clothe them. Instead, they look dark, almost black with sharp crispy looking ends which seem to point defensively at each other.
Behind the trees line, an old fence comes into view. Dark soaking wet wooden posts are spaced about a meter apart, connected by three individual strands of wire evenly placed on the posts.
Remaining still, as not to disturb nature’s grace, you move only your head to study your surroundings. To the left and to the right of you, portions of fields are visible to your eyes, the remaining green is not yet for you to see. Held and kept safe, covered by its foggy clouds.
Instantly you know you must see more, more of ‘nature’ in its finest hour. You want to touch and smell this new world you have stumbled upon.
As if egging you on or encouraging you with their glorious good morning songs, the invisible birds call and whistle to you.
Your feet move before you do. The crunching you create makes you aware of your own steps which are making their way to the fence. Your feet and hands take control and climb the barrier on your behalf as your brain contemplates the consequences of possible trespassing. Your feet seem not so worried, your hands only aware of the danger the wire could cause, nothing else is relevant.
Once over, your feet touch down on different ground, soggy dull grass replaces crunchy grey stone, a mass of mud instead of crumbling bits.
Nature’s raw elements surround you in a damp mist. Your feet feel it first; the coldness seems to seep through the constructed leather of your black boots, chilling your toes right to their very tips.
This thick fog now touches and settles on your face as you stare into the never ending mist.
Your feet, once more, work for you. Carry you. Left then right, left then right, away from the fence. The wet dewy smell intensifies and touches all of your senses. Grey in sight, woody in scent, moist to touch, thick air to taste and silence as sound.
You feel alone, really alone. You feel so alone it heightens your senses and chills your bones. The skeleton trees in the distance threaten you with pointy daggers, the birds are no longer singing their sweet songs. The ground beneath your feet no longer wants to hold your heavy weight and pulls its self from under you.
You fall. Bare hands and knobbly knees are all at one once dipped into the cold wet slime which sits under the few blades of grass. A bit flicks up and hits your nose. Brown frozen dirt.
You no longer want to see this new world and what it’s willing to give. It’s too wet, too slippery. Too cold and unnerving.
You stand. Your eyes look down at your awful dirty self and then up again to the idyllic scene, perfect as a picture; Country Lane on a Foggy Misty Morning. For some reason this landscape will not tolerate you. You, your heavy black boots and your hard metal car.
You walk back to the fence controlling your own feet this time and cautiously climb back over, not wanting to slip.
You crunch your way back to the car which now embodies a safe place for you. Here, you feel most at ease.
Comfortable.
Natural.
You steal another glace, make it your last and step back inside the car. You click the seatbelt on and turn the key once more.
Only now you realise this isn’t an unknown hidden route, you pass down this lane more than once a week, you just hadn’t seen it in this light before.
(Larna Bobby Lou)
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