Miss Whalley's Field

Shocking behaviour from me this month. After being rubbish at walking because of my 'injury', I've just had a full week off to try to rest up properly and get my back better – it worked a bit, but not totally. But also, I have had two blog posts sitting here unwritten since last week. How awful is that?! A whole week in which I could've added some words to the photos for your delectation, and instead I sat on my sizeable butt and read books and ate too much. Shocking behaviour.

Anyway, I'm here now. Back for the foreseeable future, very keen to do one walk every day, just like I was doing right back at the beginning. This is now doctor-mandated exercise – I have to keep it up to strengthen my back so I can avoid any more of these silly episodes. So I'm sorry, but you're stuck with my daily witterings from now until I die. 

One day last week – I forget which one and it doesn't really matter – I was still in lots of pain, but I was going a bit bonkers in the house and without any work to distract me, so I went for a little drive and thought I'd seek out some new walking places. I found a lovely short one up top o' town. As you see, I went to Miss Whalley's Field, which I never knew was called Miss Whalley's Field until I decided to get out of the car and have a look at it the other day. 

I've driven past this spot, ooh, hundreds of times probably – anyone who lives in Lancaster and drives has probably driven past it hundreds of times. It's just a little field, lying between the Ridge and a couple of other residential estates that I don't know the names of. I figured it couldn't really lead anywhere secret or terribly exciting because all it does is fill a space between a few streets. But the little field itself turned out to have some magic anyway, just because it exists. You can read about why it's called Miss Whalley's Field here, if you like. Have a look at the trust deed for the field – it's rather a cool thing.

How gorgeous are those flowers? Rather stunning, if you ask me. And I'm a big fan of the dog-walking paths that have been cut into the parks and fields over the lockdown – I think we should keep those. They're so pretty and green!

My new trainers were also grateful for the dog-walking path because they're still shiny and clean, and it had been raining and they didn't want to get grubby just yet. So I toddled off along the path, taking in the air and the space and the prettiness, smiling at the long grass just because I really like long grass. It's a peculiar little field because it's in the middle of a built-up area (well, near the outskirts, really), and you can hear traffic and children and dogs and all of that noisy town stuff, but it's also quiet. There's a beautiful stillness in just this couple of acres (the trust deed told me that – I don't know what an acre looks like off the top of my head).

At the end of the path, I found a bench, which was wonderful because I was still very limpy last week and already needed a sit. The bench was mostly wet, but I wasn't bothered at all. I had the little flask of tea with me and no reason to worry about a soggy bottom. So I sat and drank hot tea and looked out over Lancaster, and Morecambe, and Heysham, and Grange, and Barrow, and the whole of the Lake District. I could almost see my own house, but there's a very small hill in the way. Did I ever tell you about the flying lesson that I once had, when I flew a tiny plane from Blackpool to my house and back again? That was one of the coolest things I've ever done. The instructor took over when we got to my house so that I could look down on it. Thomas was in the plane with me (and his dad – alright, fine, he can have a mention!), and he was only two and a half. 

Oh, my house is just over there, look – just past the ugly blue train bridge.

That's about the best view you can get of Lancaster Castle – well, from a distance, I mean. You get a great view if you stand right next to it, of course! I've always fancied living in a castle. Do you ever have that feeling, when you're in a stately home or somewhere royal, that you were accidentally born in the wrong place or time and that you were supposed to have lived in tremendous luxury, with paintings of kings and queens on your walls and everything gilded and brocaded? I do.

I daydreamed about what my life might have been like if I'd been the queen's granddaughter for a while, but I lost interest when I realised that I'd've been related to Prince Andrew. Instead, I had a look at my closer surroundings, such as the higgeldy-piggledy houses over on the street to my left. Ooh, I thought, now then, they look interesting – perhaps I could stretch my legs just a bit more. So I did.

It turned out that there was another dog-walking path that led to a proper path that in turn led down into town, so I took that. There were some builders working on a house just next to this path, and they were singing and being generally happy, so I waved and smiled and they waved and smiled back because sometimes people are just nice like that.

I found myself on streets that I know well enough and which I could find if you asked me to, but whose names I forget. Here's the corner of Borrowdale and Ullswater – I'll forget their names again in a couple of days. I say I know them well enough, but I really don't know them at all because I've never known anyone who's lived on them. I've never been in any of these houses.

Nope, I tell a lie. I've just remembered that I once went to a party in one of these houses and the owner showed us the cannabis plants he was growing in his loft. That's it. That's the entire story.

Anyway, what I was going to say about this area is that, because I don't know it very well, I found it completely fascinating on my walk last week. The weather was perfect – not too hot or too cold, and not windy, as it often is around these parts – so I just ambled up and down these streets, looking in people's front windows not at all surreptitiously, admiring the differences between all of the houses. Where I live, the houses all look the same. There are slight variations, obviously, but mostly they just look the same. Not so up top o' town. These houses are quite a lot older than mine, built when architects were drunk all the time. You see a lot of that in Lancaster.

Look at this one. Isn't it wonderful? As you know, I don't usually take pictures of individual houses because it feels like a bit of an invasion of privacy; but I took lots today because I just thought they were brilliant.

Look at these, with their four storeys! Amazing. I live on the wrong side of the river. I've thought this for quite some years, but no one wants to buy my house in its current state, so I have to stay where I am for a while. If anyone wants to nominate me for DIY SOS, I won't be offended at all. Or Ground Force – is that still a thing?

This is someone's front wall. What's that all about, eh? The builder here, I feel, shared my imaginings about being robbed of a life in a castle. If you can't live in a castle, you can at least put some crenellations on your front wall. See those biggest stones in the wall? Here's another story for you. When I was about eight, I was playing in the ginnel behind our house and a stone that size fell on my foot ... and didn't break it! Strong bones, me. My foot was very badly bruised, of course – I'm not superhuman. The nurse who bandaged my foot at the hospital asked me if I wanted crutches, but I was too shy to say yes so I said no – one of the biggest regrets of my life, seriously. Now that was a limp!

What else I like about the streets up top o' town are the pavements. I know they're a bit dangerous for old people and such because they're very uneven, but they remind me of my childhood because all of our pavements used to look like this, with those big old concrete slabs with moss in the cracks and huge kerbstones (I think – that could be a false memory). (I just had to Google 'kerb' because I didn't know if it should be 'curb', and the first thing I came across was a blog post from my very own work – I work for Proofed, in case you didn't know.)

Here was a house – actually two, because they're semi-detached – that looked different from the rest of the street. I liked it because of this outside wall. Don't you think it's lovely? I'd like an outside wall just like that.

This next one is unusual because that's the front door you can see just there, tacked onto what is normally the side of such a house. It's sort of the front door – you go in just to the side of that tiny porch. This house and garden looked very well cared for. So clean!

Man alive, I was limping like a professional limper by the time I got to the top of this street. I turned back to get a photo of it and to gaze in a 'hmmm, I wish I lived on an interesting street like this' sort of way. I will live on a more interesting street one day, when I move up to the northeast. Won't that be exciting for you to read about?!

That was pretty much it for that day's walk. Here is Derwent Road, which is where I'd parked the car and where I found Miss Whalley's Field. Derwent is another very nice road with higgledy-piggledy houses. My dad's decorated a few houses up here. I think he has. I remember him telling me about at least one, but maybe he worked on it for a long time so it seemed like a few. Either way, I know he said they were nice houses up here.

I shall bring Matthew here one evening when we only have time for a short walk. I think he'll like it.

Until tomorrow, my patient possums,

WQ