woods – Page 2 – Louisa Parry

After the chicken run, stepping stone, repeating, evening walk, giveaway smell

1. I sneak back into bed and facing each other, we hold hands inbetween our chests. The dog snuggles her nose into the inverted v-shaped space between our arms.

2. I half open my eyes when I feel the cat step off me. I see her use the sleeping dog as a stepping stone to get to her dad. After she’s settled down on the other side of the bed, Lily finally reacts, looking first at the cat then at me. “Yes, I saw it,” I whisper.

3. I finally meet one of our neighbours for the first time. We chat chickens and growing things. A dog bark in the distance calls me away but just before I go, I think to introduce myself. As I walk away, I hear him repeating my name to himself as a memory aid.

4. We – Lily, John & I – take an evening walk in Thackley Woods. The world is still, the only sounds bird call & distant whinnying and over Baildon’s hills, the sunset is a hazy red.

5. The cat has been sleeping in the washing again. When she jumps on my knee, she smells line-fresh.

One about a dog & one about a lost cat, real/virtual

7/8/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

1. Jake the German Shepherd’s ears are marvellous: when he’s intrigued by something, they not only lift up but bend together to form one giant attentive ear.

2. I say her name and she meows. A few steps then we repeat it again and again. A barrier of nettles, brambles and a steep drop barely navigable in the bare winter keeps me from her so I have to walk back to the garden, down and right around but all the while, I say her name and she meows. This is how we find each other then I carry her home.

3. After an afternoon in the garden, tending to the veg beds & the chickens, I spend the evening playing Harvest Moon DS Cute – tending to my virtual veg beds & virtual chickens.

Refreshing, so glad he asked, greetings

4/8/2010 / louisa / 1 Comment

1. After suffering salesmen, it’s a relief to see their slumped rugby socks and hear their no-nonsense advice.

2. We repeat the walk Lily & I took on Saturday – a more direct route though, and no getting lost in the middle. I take John to all the things I found he marvels as I had done. While we’re up near the derelict buildings, we meet a couple of random dog walkers for the second time and after exchanging “hello agains”, John asks if they know anything about the buildings. Coincidentally, one of the women trained to teach woodland management and had to learn the history of the local woods. She confirms rumours we’d already heard – of exploding fireworks factories and Italian POWs. She tells us that “all the Calverley girls” loved the Italians, because they “just had that way about them”, and we tell her about John’s Italian heritage and laugh.

3. Lily & Carla visit each of the boys in turn to say hello.

Walk, watermelon, grooming time

31/7/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

1. To walk further into the woods than we’d gone before and find exciting things.

2. The newly exposed seeds glisten as I walk down the garden. Russet heads peck at the garish pink flesh.

3. The rhythm of combing sends us both into a meditative state. The Simpsons run unwatched in the background.

Office humour, passing over, step by step

23/7/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

1. Sometimes our banter is so perfectly timed that it sounds almost scripted (in a good way).

2. A flash of red reflected in the stream as John steps from bank to bank.

3. The design evolves step by step until it’s just right.

Spotted, nearly kisses, hen friends, up there with laughter

6/7/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

1. I find a polka dotted feather on the ground in the woods – black with white spots. I show the boys then keep it tucked in my hand, to take it home and add it to my collection.

2. “Well, that was nearly embarrassing,” I tell one of my colleagues over IM, “the cat just stood on the “x” key and nearly sent you a row of kisses.” He laughs.

3. The chicken, the one with the black flecked neck, eats the corn from my hand – a first for Team Peach. Later, they all eat from John’s hand and the black flecked one jumps then flies up to sit on my head. I think they’re starting to like us.

4. She’s on me now, rubbing and writhing around on my wrists as I’m trying to type. Now she’s sat on the arm of the chair, looking at me, purring with her paws tucked under at the front. I reach over to tickle her head but she pushes her chin forward instead, telling me to stroke under there instead. My hands are dry & tender – swollen joint hangover from the work I did yesterday & from an assortment of nettle strings today – but the pain is temporarily relieved when I touch her smooth and refreshingly cool fur.

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