50 Pegs


Capturing the moment when the boys go to meet a friend
and the Dads are left to sort the bikes out! 


Yesterday morning, after a lazy run in hot mist, but before the shower is free, I am waiting for the 99p store to open: I need a new glasses case. I hope to come back to the car with this solo item. I have huge sunglasses on, there's no case big enough for these. Also one giant t-shirt, ripped leggings, flip-flops: technically I'm still in the queue for the shower. Across the car park I see a lad sporting a grey suit; it looks new. He tucks his trousers into motorbike boots. A Massey Ferguson tractor pulls up, it has a trailer and two shiny trail bikes behind it. Squeals from the road, and the bob of balloons: an open topped bus full of frocked up girls rolls by. Ah! It's the Leavers' Day Parade! Aged 16, after 11 years of schooling, a rite of passage and celebration, quick: before the weariness of adulthood can grab them! The suits and the dresses and the modes of transport shimmer in the sun and everything is possible in those launching minds. 
May their energies carry them far and happy, land them somewhere where the view is as colourful as this.
I have a new case for my glasses now, and 50 wooden pegs.
Two loads of washing dry on the line: after my shower, sit by the blow of bold cotton, under the blue sky, hot sun: cool grass sticks to my legs. I write notes for stories.



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