faversham

AWE-TUMN

| sophiekemsley

I often hear people say that of all the seasons, autumn is their least favourite.

It’s cold. It’s dark. It rains.

None of those attributes would win first prize in a beauty contest, and eating ice-cream is nowhere near as thrilling (though it doesn’t prevent one from trying to find out).

But I am going to take a brief moment to defend autumn, and push it a little further up the perch.

I spend a lot of time walking around my hometown each evening as a way to get the steps in when working from home. There is something beautiful about this place during any season; the biting clarity of a winter sky adding fine outlines to chimney-tops, bonfires burning by the duckpond on balmy spring evenings, and bright red sunsets at 9pm in summer.

Come autumn, the walks invariably take place in the dark, I return with wet feet, and the town is very quiet.

And it can sometimes take a little longer to spot the scenes of brilliance, but they’re still there: golden reflections dancing off the water below, and Victorian lamp-posts illuminating the paths ahead. Deep-fried fish and vinegar floating through the air, and televisions lighting up living rooms like discotheques.

The glow of anticipation for impending festivities, and watching people chitter-chatter through restaurant windows. Cat-shaped silhouettes sprinting along the tops of fences, and smoke lingering in the air from bursts of colourful fire. The dazzle from the fairground as it visits for the weekend.

There are a lot of awesome things about autumn.

Everything has its place.

Song of the Day: Philip E Morris – The Polka

Spotify recommended this song to me. Philip E Morris is a Swedish composer who specialises in fusing electro beats with traditional, older songs. I can’t admit to knowing quite what’s going on in this piece but I like it, and it jazzed up a recent supermarket visit to listen to it. So there we go.

JANUARY ON THE MARSH

| sophiekemsley

It was early January and it was grey, cold and wet.
Extremely wet.
Rain ricocheting off the kerb and into your already sodden boots wet.
“Why on earth did I venture out in this muck when I could have stayed home and watched ‘A Place in the Sun’?” wet.
“I need a new cagoule and a waterproof bag” wet.

And don’t get me started on the cold.
It was very cold.
Knuckles rattling round pockets like Maltesers being shook in the box cold.
“I could be on the sofa with my hot water bottle and duvet” cold.
“Should have brought along some soup” cold.

And we may as well discuss the grey.
Murky, dirty, shirty grey.
Doom and gloom, CHRISTMAS IS OVER, back-to-reality, grey.
“I could be in a restaurant having a colourful lunch” grey.
“Definitely didn’t need my sunnies today!” grey

And I wondered why I was out doing this lengthy trudge. Through puddles, past roadkill, and wading through sludge.
But I didn’t need to wonder for long…

Seasalter Beach, Graveney Marshes & Faversham Creek

Song of the Day: Moondog – Do Your Thing

How on earth has it taken me until now to come across Moondog? A blind composer and poet who was known for standing silently on New York pavements for hours at a time in the 1950’s and 60’s, and died in Germany in 1999.
This song was written in 1978, but is still completely on point.

Going Sno-where

| sophiekemsley

There’s something so rare about heavy snowfall that each time it happens, you recall vivid memories of the few occasions you’ve experienced it before:

  • A canal-side walk with my older brother one late Sunday afternoon in the early 1990’s, and watching him pound away at the ice with his heavy black Doc Martens to show me how easily it could crack.
  • Careering down the steepest verge of a snowy hill on a sledge circa 2000 – in an awful effort to impress some boys – and whacking straight into a tree, before limply falling out of the side of the flimsy plastic transportation and groaning on the ground for ten minutes whilst said boys crowded around in an embarrassing concern.
  • Meeting a friend at her house during a lunch-break from my temp-ing job – and her revision-break for her Law exams – and making a snowman with blueberries for eyes, in 2009.
  • Sliding down the grassy verges of the Dane John Gardens with some friends one Friday evening in January 2018, after several beers in a cosey pub

The older you get, the more wary you become of snow. It’s dangerous to drive in. It’s perilous to walk on. It wreaks havoc with public transport and it makes everything wet. At thirty five, the thought of heavy rain washing all of the snow away fills me with some relief when as a child it could make me cry. That’s exactly what happened this week; a Winter Wonderland flushed away overnight, the snowman over the street now a beheaded ball of black ice alone on a bright green lawn, and no more fretting about the need to walk anywhere.

But, my word, did it look beautiful during its short stay, making the town look like a Christmas cake with Viennetta footpaths and glacier mint waterways. At a time when we’re tethered to our homes, the snow was a welcome distraction from the reasons behind that, which have dominated our lives for the past year.

The snow was a reminder of a few things, really. How an alluring appearance can sometimes conceal danger. How different things can suddenly look after a few conditions collide, and then how quickly the things we like can melt away.

The Pandemic Snowfall 2021. One which won’t be forgotten in a hurry…