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HERE COMES THE SUN

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  'Peace doves' installation: Lincoln Cathedral: Peter Walker The drive from Grantham towards Lincoln is just an extended memory lane. My pilgrim’s route has already taken me on foot through most of these villages. As I motor on, what stays with me is no replay of aching muscles or pinched toes. Rather, I feel a golden-hued nostalgia for the beauty and kindness I met. Every day was filled with sunshine, or so it seems. But then, as previously observed, I’m a glass-half-empty person, and a fair-weather rambler. At Waddington I take a few moments to see what St. Michael’s looks like when there’s no jumble sale in the offing. It’s spiritually comfy: there are echoes of my own childhood religion in the surroundings – 20 th century modernist architecture, an infant-friendly depiction of God’s care for his creation, the bones of Christian theology laid out in front of the congregation – but I’m remembering a different era and a different denomination.   So then, not ‘change and dec...
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DECK OF CARDS

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  I negotiate refuse trucks and nervous drivers and then find a safe place to park in Coleby’s narrow streets. It’s said there can be distant views of the Boston Stump if you go to the village junction with the A607, but though the pollution cloud of the last few days has cleared and the morning is bright, there’s still too much haze to see that far. The path is flat today along the top of the ‘Cliff’s’ little escarpment, so I’m taking it easy in Merrells. Across the green I pass an enormous disconnected arch at the back entrance to Coleby Hall. Does it celebrate some battle triumph of an erstwhile owner? Maybe they saw action at Waterloo or Cr รจ cy, or would have liked to. The stones which support its span are huge, robbed out from some grand long-gone building. I head north, fields to my right and a secluded tennis court to my left.   The crops are mown to stubble now, and there’s been no rush to plough them in. In the end, after all the dampness earlier in the summer, the...
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UP ON THE ROOF

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  Beyond Wellingore’s Memorial Hall, there’s a field. Then, beyond the field and its hedge the view opens out to show the walker where she/he’s about to go along the semi-circular edge of Lincolnshire’s ‘Cliff’. My destination today is Coleby’s spire, on what appears to be the highest point, although if that’s not an illusion, it must be only by the odd metre or so - the ‘Cliff’ maintains a fairly even height. The ‘Jurassic Way’ long distance path from Banbury to Stamford was designed to celebrate the limestone ridge which runs roughly south-west to north-east through Oxfordshire and Northamptonshire. The ‘Cliff’ is the eventual continuation of that ridge, but never more beautifully displayed. The height above the valley is only about a hundred and fifty feet here, but any balcony walk carries a certain thrill and elation, simply because you can look down on things.   And what does that say about human nature – or maybe just my human nature?   This is not what you woul...
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THAT DON'T IMPRESS ME MUCH

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  Roadside planting, but it could be Chelsea '24 Shania Twain’s on the stereo as I drive north to Leadenham and the beginning of today’s walk. Deep into the second week of campaigning for the forthcoming General Election, a row has broken out about Sunak’s claim that the Labour party will increase everyone’s taxes by £2000, the timescale on which this will happen, and how this estimate was obtained. Starmer says Sunak lied. Sunak says he didn’t.   Sue and I are due to take worship at Morcott this Sunday. The first reading set in the lectionary is from the book of Samuel.   To be frank, old man Samuel has become rather boring to the Children of Israel. They don’t appreciate his advice and they don’t like or trust his sons, so they demand a king, because everyone else has one. Samuel does a ‘be careful what you wish for’ . He tells the people a king will very likely become a tyrant, and rig the affairs of the nation to suit himself at their expense. Are they sure this is ...
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THE GREEN, GREEN GRASS OF HOME

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  Green I’m not a painter. Far from it – a teacher at my Primary school once delivered her termly verdict on my ‘art’ with the devastating/amusing put-down ‘messy but improving’ . If I were to try my hand at painting today, I guess the same would be said, undoubtedly with the coda: ‘but not a lot’ . Nevertheless, I like watching Sky TV’s annual ‘Landscape Artist of the Year’. A group of contestants is often asked to grapple with a scene that’s mostly green, and it’s always interesting. Because, of course there isn’t a single green, as my six-year old self might have naively thought, but an astonishing range of colours with a family resemblance such that we’re able to refer to them by the same adjective.   And in this spring, right now, the whole Dulux colour chart of green-ness is on display, fresh, enlivening, calming in equal degrees. Today I’m glad of the green, because my mood is sombre. Sue’s Nana, Hilda Woods, would have been 125 today, and in this county of airfields...
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LOVE IS EMBARRASSING

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  Honington St. Nicholas The drive up beyond Grantham this morning in the company of Nicky Campbell and his Radio   5 phone-in guests is depressing. Two subjects are aired. The much-heralded ‘Co-op Live’ mega-arena, due to open in Manchester a fortnight ago, has been cancelling gigs because the venue isn’t ready. In the course of Nicky’s morning conversations, it becomes apparent how much has been invested by the potential punters at Olivia Rodrigo’s scheduled performances, now no more. Heartbreak has been visited on families, and considerable money lost (some of it beyond the scope of re-imbursement). One family has been using the diarising of such events as a key part of the strategy for curing a thirteen year old’s anorexia.   A lone dissenting voice texts to say something to the effect of ‘Get over it. This is such a first-world problem…’. Campbell seems angered. ‘Have you no heart, man?’ he hollers at the unidentified contributor. Is the anger real or manufactured ...
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