temporary stop by katharine eastman
I was going to start with an apology for this music - it surely can't appeal to anyone except me (and I certainly haven't given it the full 55-minute experience ...... currently 3 mins and counting) - but then of course you have come here to be challenged, and I feel that this is quite a gentle challenge .... 3 and a half minutes now, and I'm still finding it okay ....
Anyway, after years and a decade or two of never going, I have now been to Lepe Beach twice in four days - Saturday and yesterday. Saturday with a friend for a gentle stroll - what a beautiful breeze-less cloudless day, the sea so flat and solid I believed I could walk on it, but didn't put it to the test - quite a lot of people around, mainly orienteers running around trying to find some clicker thing attached to a post. And yesterday, on my own, cloudier, breezier, hardly anyone around - how I love weekdays best of all.
Yesterday, walking between what I call The Boathouse but what the map and everyone nowadays calls the LookOut, and the mouth of the Exbury River there was absolutely no one on that stretch of beach, and I soon realised why. The tide was high and rising. Halfway along there are signs telling you that you run the risk of being trapped by a rising tide - the beach narrows down to nothing, the sea on your left, and a solid wall of groynes on your right beneath a stocky little cliff.
That narrow beach (about two feet wide) totally disappeared and I was walking through the waves with little idea how much further I had to go - I was too stubborn to turn back to definite safety. I was quickly having to wade up to my knees. The worst thing was that when the waves hit the groyne-wall they splashed merrily back and rose high in the sky and soaked me.
Even though I am a coward and never do anything daring or exciting or dangerous, it is odd how from time to time I find myself in situations where I'm worried for my safety. I knew there was no chance of me drowning, mainly because I am a mega talented musician who hasn't yet achieved her potential and therefore god must allow me to live until I have created at least one great album.
I survived. I was thrilled. I walked on to Exbury and then to Blackfield Crossroads where I caught the next bus to town and we waited hours on the bypass for the roadworks and I was still soaking, my bum making the seat wet, I probably smelt, but the salt had done something wonderful to my skin and my face looked twenty years younger and people greeted me with a kindness I've not experienced in ages and ages, I'm so glad I still do these stupid things.
recorded this morning, photo Lepe on Saturday
