Writer Alice Elgie opens the pages of her 2014 narrowboat diary…
From my narrowboat living room on this early evening of early autumn, I look out through my open door to a sky that merges seamlessly from cobalt blue at the top through to lighter blues, pale creams, yellows, oranges and finally deep red just above the darkened tree line. Geese fly in formation across the scene, their honking therapeutic in the otherwise still, drawing in of night. The long narrow strip of water stretches out ahead of the bow and its quiet inky ripples reflect on my ceiling… wavering, wandering lights.
autumn on the water – alice elgie
I wonder how many more evenings there will be like this, how much longer before we descend into the full darkness of winter. Already as I walk along the towpath to collect drinking water I catch the occasional drift of a wood-burner coughing and spluttering its way out of hibernation, forming streams of grey black smoke across the canal. There is something comforting about this departure from those afternoons spent lounging on the roof of the boat as we drifted along the cut during the long hazy summer. Perhaps it is the realisation that we can now begin to retreat inside — without question or explanation — to rest and recharge our jittery souls.
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And yet there is too, a sense of melancholy in the air.
Some days I catch my heart as it mourns sorrowfully for the beginning of summer when we wandered along untouched towpaths where wild flowers and grasses grew in abundance, where we were able to crouch down within them and become better acquainted, ‘why, pleased to meet you Meadowsweet and Timothy’…
riverside cottage – tanya barrow
Times where we would rest in the cool shade of dappled woodlands listening to woodpeckers, feeling spongy moss beneath our fingertips and feet.
I think of the ‘Country Wines’ boat, their hedgerow creations crowding the deck, the chat we shared, the wine we bought – and then drank on a peaceful still evening as swallows swooped ahead, back when my heart wavered with joy knowing they were only just arriving.
This evening I watch them swoop low to the water and somehow my heart sinks with the knowledge that soon they will leave.
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RSPB bird watching – jonny gios
Yet on another autumnal day I stare out of my writing room window and am immediately buoyed by this new season. Reeds shoot up ahead of me, swaying in the fresh breeze, interlaced with the ever-disappearing pink blooms of Great Willowherb. Tufts of grasses offer a brown hue and the first orange-tinged leaves are twirling gently toward the water’s surface like ballerinas pirouetting.
Suddenly I feel overcome with joy and wish I could bottle it: this feeling, this appreciation, this ‘in the moment’ of life, and I realise I am thankful that in this wandering floating home there are so many windows and (still) open doors that I am unable to ignore the ever-changing nature that spills in and — albeit sometimes reluctantly — brings me joyfully into the heart of each season.
Alice Elgie is a wandering writer with an appreciation for time spent in nature. You can read/listen to more of her words at aliceelgie.com or perhaps enjoy a real hold-in-the-hand letter: aliceelgiewrites.etsy.com
Photo credits: House on the river Tanya Barrow on Unsplash Bird watching RSPB UK Jonny Gios on Unsplash
