Kevin Parr

White-tail

I was 8 years old when I saw my first eagle. We were holidaying on Arran and it rained every day for a fortnight. But it didn’t matter that Scotland was wet, I had gone with a firm belief that I would find gold in the mountains and despite the conditions, serendipity soared over usContinue reading “White-tail”

The Shortest Month

I once worked with a Sci-Fi nut who took pride in seeing everything, knowing everything and being first to everything. With a brand-new Star Wars film on the horizon he was saving pennies and beginning to bubble. And in order to ensure he saw it before anyone else he knew, he bought plane tickets toContinue reading “The Shortest Month”

Catkins

Hazel catkins hang like lanolin lanterns. Little lamb’s tails that shine against the chocolate brown of the ploughed field beyond. The leaves remain tucked up, but the season is shifting. Spring is coming but winter has yet to bite. There is a different kind of cold out there though. Clouds casting shadows where even theContinue reading “Catkins”

Slipping

It can be difficult to roll with nature’s fluctuations. Man has, after all, gone to extraordinary lengths to avoid them for himself. There is much to admire in what we have achieved as a species – science, welfare and medicine have created a world (certainly in the West) which, though far from equal, does offerContinue reading “Slipping”

Institutionalisation

I spent some time in a secure unit when I was 20. Actually, ‘secure unit’ is being generous – it was a Mental Hospital, dating back to the First World War and since bulldozed and developed (for housing, obviously – nobody gets mentally ill anymore). ‘It’s nothing like One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,’ theyContinue reading “Institutionalisation”

Stranger Things

Despite the recent heatwave, the blistering temperatures and sweaty, sleepless nights, it still feels as though we are waiting for summer. Not a settled period of pleasant warmth and sunshine, but more the essence of the season. A sense of stopping and feeling, a pause of worry and an ease of workload. An expectationContinue reading “Stranger Things”

Cuckoo

I miscounted this morning and thought this was our 8th spring in Dorset when it is in fact our 9th, but the difference is slight, and the sentiment all the more significant as a result. I heard a cuckoo – the first I have heard here. It was far-off, and came through the thick ofContinue reading “Cuckoo”

Curled up

January. A thick head and heavy limbs. Uncomfortably numb. Comfort comes in sleep. A gentle drift into dreams. They aren’t always pleasant, and many are bizarre and untouchable, but my subconscious is kinder to me now than my conscious. No guilt for not doing, for spending too long in bed. For not being gratefulContinue reading “Curled up”

Autumn winds

I made an unexpected return to the Wye valley a week or two back. A celebration for Nick’s 50th to which I was generously invited. I only fished for the final couple of days but missed very little earlier in the week. On the Monday, Nick and Tony had arrived to find a river inContinue reading “Autumn winds”

Butterfly Summer

Water drips from the gutter edges and streams down the bulge of the waterbutt. The ridge beyond the field just a vague blur behind a screen of rain. Its welcome, to some degree, although perhaps not in such instant quantity. The woods where I walked last evening were dusty and bare, a few withered chanterellesContinue reading “Butterfly Summer”