Thursday 16 July
It’s a beautiful morning and I can do anything I want. A few days into the summer holiday and school already feels like a fuzzy memory. Nothing to think about except the here and now.
I’ve woken early naturally, probably because of the excitement that was welling inside me before I went to bed last night. I packed my school bag with a pretty tatty I-Spy book of Birds and a pencil with a rubber on the end. I also had a bunch of pages, torn from the back of a half-used reporters notepad. I’m not sure if was Mum or Dad’s. They’re stapled three times at the top. The curly, white shreds above create and oddly appealing fringe.
Downstairs, me and my sister make really jammy sandwiches on white sliced bread, naturally. Mum and Dad are still in bed. Our low fibre, high carb snack is intended for lunch but isn’t going to last past mid-morning. We empty the rest of the bread into the bread bin and put them in the now empty plastic bag. These join the pre-packed items in my school bag. I don’t remember us packing a drink.
Then we make our way quietly out to the back garden and get on our bikes to go on our birdwatching expedition. I couldn’t say where we went, I wouldn’t be able to retrace my tracks but I do remember the scenery around us.
We set up our lookout beneath some low branches of trees at the edge of a golden field of long grass. By late July meadows have gone over. The dry stems, heavy with seed, have folded. The majority of wildflowers have also gone to seed and to ground. It is sunny, warm (I’m wearing a t-shirt and some very roomy jeans).
The only ticks that are in my I-Spy book when we leave the field to return home are in pen. Robin, blackbird and wren, identified before this outing. The bag is a little lighter as we head back, our sandwiches have gone. I remember eating the jammy parts and throwing the crusts from our lookout under the trees. A very real, albeit hopeful, attempt at attracting an owl or kestrel to land in front of us. Pencil and pad at the ready.
We are back in-doors well before midday, and playing with friends in our cul-de-sac that afternoon. Despite our expedition yielding zero sightings, I count that as the first time I sat and purposefully watched for birds. Forty-odd year’s on, and one morning this summer break, I’m going to pack a jammy sandwich, get on my bike and have another go.
The Bald Birder 