Viz. You have a lot of perception and great sense of the world around you. The village I wrote about is called Dunster and is on the edge of Exmoor National Park, the location/setting for the novel , Lorna Doone. I've added a couple of links for you.
http://www.britainexpress.com/villages/dunster.htm
http://www.dunster-exmoor.co.uk/villtour.html
I wrote a short piece recently about English rural/village life, so I've taken the liberty of adding it here.
THE VILLAGE AND MY ROOTS
I was in the car park of the supermarket and some guy's car exhaust was blowing some crazy smoke out and it really stank. Obnoxious isn't the word. I was expecting to see Geronimo and a bunch of his warriors racing thru the retail park. The ailing car though limped its way out onto the road on its way to oblivion.
The light spring breeze cleared the air and that was it. All was over and done with.
But then I thought about the smells that I do like. Farmyard smells and the earthy sweat of ridden horses. Two giant English Shire horses standing quietly whilst their saddles and bridle are stripped from their bodies. Steam perhaps rising from their backs after their morning gallop. Then there is that sound, as you hold out an apple in the palm of your hand. The horse envelopes the fruit with its huge mouth and the sound of sharp teeth crunching on the apple in destructive satisfaction, contrasts with the gentle, tickling sensation of it's whiskers and the outer softness of it's mouth. The horses have a good drink from the trough and their nosebags filled with fresh oats are ready waiting. The stables have been mucked out and fresh straw has been installed. The earthly mixture of countryside and animal smells, some subtle, some pungent mingle and invade our senses. As the horses eat and have their coats brushed down, two or three dogs, border collies perhaps, are heading home. Their fur is sodden and streaked with mud, after a big adventure, over the fields and far away. Breakfasting rabbits have been chased hither and thither. Wood pigeons and crows have been put to noisy flight. The dogs have stuck their noses into a hole on a bank of earth and scratched at it. Excavating, in the vain hope of finding new playmates. They are alert to everything that moves or makes a sound. Eyes are flitting and ears twitching. Their tongues are hanging out and dribbling saliva. A soppy grin of enjoyment emanates from their faces. These dogs are wise creatures; they have secrets and skills that humans never learn. Now the dogs run anxiously, expectantly and then suddenly they spring forward as they near home. They've caught the smell of food, heard the banging of a fork against metal bowls and come bounding into the stable yard. The food is wolfed down, bowls cleaned to perfection. Copious amounts of water are drunk and an hour or so of sleep embraces them but even so, they are still privy to all that moves.
For us it is also time for that morning ritual of breakfast. We are alerted, by the resonant sound of a hefty bell and the hollered words - "BREAKFAST IS READY" - The call is answered. A baker's dozen of people, hurry round to the far side of the stables, towards the food. Drawn closer by the heady kitchen smells of a cooked breakfast wafting from the rambling stone hewn farm house that stands proudly in all it's historic grandeur. It is at one and the same time, home and business center. It's seen pleasure and pain. Heard joy and anger. Raised babies to adulthood and then witnessed death. On this spring morning though, it's all hustle and bustle. The day began some hours earlier, with cows being milked, eggs gathered in and a million other tasks squared away. The rush of the hungry, empty, bellies of the farm's troops and us its paying guests is witnessed by a family of ducks. They wait eagerly with much quacking and padding of feet, for the crumbs of bread lying dormant next to the breadboard.
The troops take up their places at the large kitchen table, waiting expectantly, with industrial cutlery at the ready. The farmer's wife and her daughter serve large plates, stacked with bacon and eggs, sausage and chipped potatoes, mushrooms and tomatoes, thick slices of home baked, fresh crusty bread, along with fresh churned butter. A fitting meal for a ravenous army, washed down with huge mugs of strong tea. Such a meal is eaten and enjoyed on a daily basis throughout the year by the farm workers. Long days in all weathers, through four seasons, builds an appetite in the most weathered body and sturdy spirit.
With the meal finished, mind, belly and soul are sated and satisfied. It is time you and I said thank you to our hosts and made our way down to the village.
Leaving through the kitchen door, we are replaced by the arrival of two large honking geese, demanding the scraps remaining from the breakfast table. These waddling waste disposal units are in no mood to be denied. They crane their necks and stretch their wings whilst vocalising their demands. Mrs Farmer tells them that the food is on its way and with the arrival of the bounty sanity settles in the birds brains as they devour their table scraps.
Beyond the stables, the fields are busy with numerous sheep. A flock of four legged lawn mowers that devours grass almost non-stop, day in, day out. Their fur coats are thick and matted from the wet and muck of winter. Any day now the shearers will arrive and lighten every sheep's load and so make them all look clean and tidy. Respectable even. Then it will be lambing season. The newborn will quickly find their feet and gambol and frolic back and forth across their field and in the process lose their mother. Panic will set in and fearful bleating will fill the air until the mother and child reunion is made complete. The lambs will draw many oohs and aahs as they are fattened up ready for market.
Beyond the sheep and in the shadow of the wooded hills nearby is a large area of pastureland, home to a herd of very large dairy cows. They look up from their munching of grass as you stroll amongst then. With large eyes hovering above their large churning jaws, they take little more than a casual interest in their human intruders. They have other things of greater import too ruminate over.
These fields and others nearby are home for many wild creatures. Not only rabbits but also moles, for example, who've left their mounds of dug earth for all to see. The moles for now are safely tucked up in their underground network.
One side of this pastureland is bounded by a dry stonewall. A mature farming structure built by craftsmen with great skill. The hands that built it have now long gone, retreating further and further into local history. Half way along the wall is a gate for the cattle. Humans have the chance of improving their gymnastic skills by making use of a stile. This next field is home for many pigs, busily filling their stomachs. Many sows are heavy with a great many unborn squealers. Here you walk round the perimeter at one end of the field, far away from the porkers. Angry pigs do not make good playmates. Thankfully the big old boar and his apprentice live elsewhere, their anger and bullishness isolated.
As the morning lengthens and the sun warms the air, the wild flowers such as bluebells, forget-me-nots, common catsear, ragwort and thistles, with their range of colors, shapes and scents show proudly above the grass. Pointing skyward in all their glory.
The hedgerows are alive with birds a chirpin', insects a buzzin' and little ground creatures snufflin'. Survival for all concerned in this wild and woolly landscape is and always will be a matter of luck. The squeal of death is alive with pain in this killing field, interrupting and mingling with the broad range of living sounds.
And so we walk and talk with abandoned hearts and light steps, taking in all the beauty that surrounds us. A small plane lends a different instrument to the countryside symphony orchestra. It emits a steady drone as it passes overhead; on it's way to here, there or nowhere in particular.
At the far side of the field and built into the dry stonewall, stands another stile, with which to climb and so depart from the porkers' park.
Now we are on a narrow, much used footpath. It is lined on one side with sharp thorny blackberry bushes, several feet high. Soon they will show their blossom. Followed by small green berries, which with the right combination of sun and rain will ripen and give a huge harvest of fruit for both human bi-peds and the avarian hoards.
Different sounds begin to reach our ears. A small brook runs out from under the hedgerow of brambles and runs alongside us, babbling over a bed of rounded stones that was first made hundreds, probably thousands of years ago. Ahead of us is something of a much newer vintage. A car drives past, along the narrow road that leads from the main road into the village. The village church bells suddenly ring out. It's 11am. The village parishioners will be filing into the wonderful, ancient church. How many pairs of feet have crossed its well-worn flagstone entrance in its 800 years of witness. This piece of historical architecture has known every human emotion. How many generations of valiant human fortitude lay within its grounds. A great many are now beyond any living memory. Disguised beneath the weathered and unreadable headstones of ancient monument.
How many future generations will it usher into the village and hopefully the world beyond.
Coming out of the footpath and onto the narrow road you see the church spire rising above a copse of elderly trees. A row of stone cottages with their thatch roofs and built at a time when men were of lesser inches and when a tallow lit the way to bed, leads us into the village square. For many people in past generations,
it was the center of the world. When a man might ride down from his farmhouse in his horse and trap to the village pub. Enjoy the banter and local gossip with his friends over a pipe full of baccy. Hear the news about what had happened in far away places. Perhaps he'd have 2 or 3 or maybe 4 pints of ale or cider. And all the time his faithful old dog would lie at his feet. Then when the farmer was good and ready he'd say his fond farewells, clamber with awkward slowness, one way or another, into his trap, fall asleep and the horse would take man and dog back home in perfect safety.
Now the roads are hardly big enough to cope with the local cars and the village bus, never mind the tourists. Gridlock and road rage have moved in alongside peace and quiet. Half a century ago you would hear the sound of The Rattler huffing and puffing its way down the hill to the railway station a mile or so away. The railway, like an umbilical cord, that led the village to the outside world. It vanished years ago, to be replaced by a multi lane highway with its sleek motorcars, SUVs, highly strung motorcycles and huge tourist busses. But the tourists spend money in the community just as you and I would do. In the village square, the post office will sell me a newspaper and a pack of cigarettes along with the stamps and postcards. Old Mrs. Hamm has spent her entire 70 years in the village. Here she was born, schooled, married the blacksmith, mothered 6 babes and has never been ill once and never been abroad either. A woman who till her husband died a few years ago, had been as happy as the day was long. These days she merely keeps her chin up.
A cluster of other shops helps form the square. The butchers, bakers, grocers, petrol station, hotel, two pubs, and a gift shop all help keep the village vibrant. Dancing, festivals, anniversaries, parties and matters of the church lend a social whirl to village life for the locals. And overlooking all of this English life is the Norman Castle, whose shadow moves across the higgledy-piggledy construction of community, life and a few hundred living and breathing souls. They, like you and I each cling to our own mortal coil, breathing the fresh air, spinning a yarn, raising a family in their homes, be they humble, be they grand.
In the middle of the square stands the Yarn Market. A round structure, the size of a small shop and built of local stone with half open sides and a conical roof.
This 16th century construction is now a historical monument to its former trade, the sale of yarn, the produce of farmers from our former heritage. It also serves as a shelter for those waiting for the bus that will take them into the nearby town with the big shops, supermarkets and all the extra and newer social and leisure amenities we now desire.
Homemade entertainment has given way to satellite TV. The piano has become a wide screen digital TV. Handcrafted skills now come in flatpack boxes, cut to size and shape.
If life and our world must change and change it will, not everything need become obsolescent. Many things will surely stand the test of time.
Across the square on the far side the road leads to more cottages and the old but rebuilt watermill that once again is grinding flour and making money. First though we would have to pass the church and its attendant village school and then the driveway, the approach to the castle. This massive mediaeval structure has provided employment, protection and justice for its subordinates throughout the centuries. Now the castle is protected by charitable hands and by tourists' money.
There is a stone built cottage opposite the road from the church, a cottage I know well. It was the home of my mother and her family way back before WW1. Its thick stonewalls, flagstone floors, heavy oak doors offer testimony too its 300 years of life. Modern utilities and equipment have been built into the cottage. Candles, bathwater boiled up on the huge kitchen range, coal fires are a thing of the past but the past remains, seeped into those old and ancient stones. It was a summer home for me as a child. A wonderful safe place with a certain tranquillity that I've never found anywhere else. But as much as I love the village and the wildness of the neighbouring countryside, I couldn't live here. It's to remote, to quiet.
I'm a big city person and always will be. So now please take me home.
LE FIN
