Mist hung across the width of the vale, grey and clammy. A stiff breeze drove a thick veil up the Ridgeway scarp to envelop the high ground in a cloak of mystery. Even at mid-day I could see but a couple of hundred yards: or, as ancestors might have termed such a distance, a bow-shot. That was it: more than a stone's throw but not far enough to have been safe from ambush. Fortunately the Dark Ages are banished today - if lurking fearfully close in this world of raw ambition unguided by moral purpose. The mist hides an enclave: my exile for an afternoon.
The trail melted away into a clinging grey shroud. Few people were abroad on such a day, and that just added to the depth of atmosphere. Mystery filled this ancient landscape, the more so as I drew away from the parking area and road noise dwindled to nothing. The absence of a view into the distance cast attention on senses other than sight. The few noises - a bird taking off with a flapping of wings; the wind whistling through skeletal trees; the heavy patter of Brena's hooves on dank ground - assumed disproportionate significance. I felt how Brena walked: when her footing was good and the occasions when her hooves sought purchase on edges of ruts. There was nearly no smell beyond scant product of gently decaying vegetation. Brena was under no illusion as to how good the grass tasted: any grass whatever the season or weather.
Lines of hedges and thorn bushes slipped away from my little world and into another. For here the world shrank to a couple of acres. All beyond is mystery, everything that appears is a surprise. So I write because of the wonderful fresh feeling engendered by this new perspective on a familiar place. In truth I know this place well. Each rise and fall of the trail, each twist and turn is familiar. Only the experience is different, like a pleasant surprise given by an old friend who possesses a little skill at acting.
There I go again, dreaming of wilderness. Unconsciously that strand of thought creeps out only to be spotted. Smoke from the chimney will be visible. The wider unconscious is centuries in the making. My spiritual ancestors might have been the monks who sought wild places. They may have included the sailors who loved the open sea and the men who farmed and shepherded silent tracts. Perhaps all of these: individuals each and none of them cast in the common mould. That little bit of collective unconscious is mine, and finally I am beginning to grasp how rare, precious and fragile it is. This path of mine, it exists by a favour granted by the mass: yet they know not of a gift unknowingly given. Nor would they understand it should their dull senses begin to perceive. Yet once in a while a slumberer awakens and sees for the first time through newly opened eyes and mind rare beauty and wonder along the solitary way.
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