Early Morning Ramblings

Not sure what time this blog will say I posted, but it`s currently half past five in the morning. Been up a peedie while. Outside, it`s still dark, and the promised Force 10 gale hasn`t yet arrived, the calm before the storm holds sway and there`s an eerie hush over the island that won`t last, of course.
Well, hushed, aside from the early morning news on the tv, all dour and gloom due to the recession and the banking crisis. Sigh.
Well, at half past seven, I`ll turn on the radio and listen to radio Orkney. It always has at least a touch of a sense of humour, no matter how down the day`s news gets.
The fella slumbers on, sleeping peacefully after a day out in town yesterday. The son also sleeps, so here I am, just me, the eternal insomniac, looking once more out the window towards the distant lights of neighbouring Stronsay and seeing the occasional star glimmer above.
And what is in store for today?
Well, hopefully, a short trip to Backaskaill tea room for coffee and scones with Frans, maybe the Post Office to ship out some sheepskins to the US, home for lunch then work, both of us sanding and combing out finished hides.
Much depends on how fierce the winds get today, if the promised gale turns up or if it stays calm, in which case, I might decide to get in the car and skive off work a peedie while (yes, shocking, I know....) and visit Elsness beach, nearby Quoyness Chambered Tomb, looking out over the sea towards the other isles.
A few yards along the coast from Quoyness, itself only partially excavated, lies a crumbling, decaying similar tomb structure, slowly disappearing into the sea with each winter storm. "No money," say the Council, to fund a dig to preserve it and I guess now, they are right. Sad thing it is though, to watch so many thousand years of heritage vanish beneath the waves, taking the lingering remnants of real peoples lives with it.

When winter approaches, I get the nesting instinct. Wanting to gather practical things around me, food and comforting, fluffed blankets and a stock of firewood....plans for Yule already rise in quiet moments, though this year, as it will only be the son and me, it`ll be a strange and quiet time, bereft of other family members and the laughter of children.
But I`ll order in a real Fir tree.....how I do miss trees on this rock in the North Sea! And wreaths of holly and twine ivy among them, drape them over the mantelpiece and around the doors.....lay in a huge stock of fat church candles to soften the winter gloom....find goodies to wrap in pretty, shiny paper and place beneath the tree like always.
Here, already, they advertise Christmas 2009 on tv! It`s getting rather silly. Halloween hasn`t even happened yet but already shops on mainland Orkney are ready to stock both Halloween decorations AND Christmas ones...so like last year, orange pumpkins (foreigners to Orkney, for sure!) and black cardboard witches complete with broom and cat, will sit alongside glitter and tinsel and coloured fairy lights.
Sometimes, the world seems out of sync with the actual seasons. Mad....

A wild goose has joined my tame flock. She`s injured, her wing hangs `wrong` but I can`t get close enough to her to check her out. However, it isn`t a severe thing though I can tell she`ll not fly again.
Deserted by her own wild flock, she sneaks through the fencing into the garden where my own geese, much larger and very much fatter, live now. Dwarfed by them, she shares in their morning grain feed and drinks from their water trough. Then she leaves the geese again and joins the ducks for a second feed! After which she may saunter off into the farmers field or hunker down with the ducks, a larger `lump`, beak tucked beneath wing, one wary eye open for intruding humans, though at least now that she grows used to us she doesn`t try to flap her injured wing and run at takeoff speed in an effort to escape, just walks away, `nose` in the air as if to say, `I can see you but I choose to ignore you, being a superior beast, of course....`
in time, she`ll settle down. The other geese don`t mind her at all and nor do the ducks. I might even get to have a look at that wing, though won`t be able to do anything to fix it so she flies again. So long as it isn`t giving her a deal of trouble, for now I`ll leave her be, not wanting to stress her out by catching her.

Well, still dark outside. Evenings draw in too, and the hours of daylight this far north grow scanter. It`s cosy, early dark nights, though in the depths of winter with only three or four daylight hours, and often those, twilit because of the chancy weather, it can become a little gloomy. Those are days when the lamps stay lit all day, and the fires are banked high for warmth, talisman against the darkest days.

In a wee while, the son will see to the animals, I will make breakfast for my man and watch, with a smile, sleepiness leave him gradually, and begin the day.