Murk

By Maxim Griffin.

Weather came in with the tide and isn’t shifting – a fret, a fog – the sky has fallen on our heads – you could cut it with an axe – premium murk – there are no landmarks other than the mud beneath the boots – slippery grease muck that’ll send you skidding with the next wrong step – not that these conditions are necessarily a bad thing – there’s a great pleasure to be had being a ghost in the fog – everything becomes enigmatic, the territory presents itself as a mystery to be explored.

Fog steals any sense of direction – the indication is that the path crosses a large field – the wooden sign with the little walking man points forlornly into a wall of grey – visibility down to 20 metres – a Rothko come to life in the dead of Lincolnshire – divisions of mizzle stacked – walk forward with caution – the path is barely used – no fresh prints – the mud is thick – ankle-breaking furrows – hmm, double back to the hedge – trudge the long way round – keep the hedge to your right and follow it round.

The hedge is wide, spiky, diverse – probably hundreds of years old – blackthorn on the brink of budding – snowdrops – the odd daffodil – these tiny signs of life a reassurance, spring will arrive in triumph soon – you must stop to wipe the mist from your spectacles – you try to remember the Japanese word for fog but it’s not there – nothing is here, it’s rather nice – murk devours sound, blunts the edges – a bunch of jackdaws in chorus elsewhere could well be a recording – one of those BBC Special Effects tapes – there’s no way to gauge how far away they are – distance is meaningless – keep going – hedge to the right – the spectre of an oak – bare, brown – old, small, grown weird due to exposure – must be the parish boundary – some poor sod probably swung from there.

Keep going – something caught in the hedge flutters – plastic bag – carried by weather from elsewhere – faded, ripped – but still legible – K W I K S A V E – blimey – they went bust 20 years ago – a Kwik Save bag in the fog, ripped – that’s 2026 right there – ordinary intolerable weirdness, kind of sublime – you find all sorts of ancient junk along the hedges of high places – 40-year-old cola tin with a mouse skeleton inside, a photograph of the tenor saxophonist Ben Webster, an industrial-sized sack of macaroni – today there is nothing else of note, but it’s important to keep one’s eyes open – eyes open in the grey.

Taking cover
The sun is up there somewhere but the fog is telling lies about it – you haven’t cast a shadow since last year – you keep topped up on vitamin D supplements but nothing can replace the full force of our star – even the grass looks light-starved – keep that hedge to your right – a gap – tractor wide – a couple of sizeable lumps of flint – another field of murk – keep the hedge to your right – it’s the long way round but better than a broken ankle – you stop for a second – Boom – the natural reaction is duck for cover – Boom – that was loud – someone out popping caps at the pheasants? – Boom – count – one, two, three – Boom – count – one, two, three – Boom – must be a crow scarer – you can still hear that cassette of jackdaws chuntering away – they don’t sound bothered at all.

The crow scarer has declared a ceasefire and the hedge remains on the right hand side – murk remains – the view should be excellent – the entire western edge of the county – Lincoln to the Trent and beyond – on especially clear days the Peak District will be visible – you squint in the direction of Sheffield and see only fog – you wipe your spectacles – you were expecting to have reached Walesby by now – you trudge on – another sound – voices – young voices.

The fog does its best to conceal them – they grow louder – a bald man in the lead – waterproof swishing in the damp – your presence is a surprise to him – a dozen children follow him – you clock his neckwear – a badge, a woggle – Scouts – now thens are exchanged and brief comments on the conditions – alright mate, real pea souper isn’t it? – yes mate, proper thick one – his troop are giddy, wet – walking the Viking Way – took the hedge round the ploughed field – good luck lads – off they trudge vanishing into the murk the way you came – kiddo at the end of the line shouts forward – how much longer is it? Scout leader shouts back – six miles, maybe seven – a groan follows.

The dog leg of the hedge approaches – turn left – a stand of trees appears – jackdaws present – a telegraph pole with no wire – Boom – louder – Boom very close – the crow scarer has no effect on the birds – there it is – a crude looking device of metals tubes and a cannister of compressed air – it resembles a flamethrower – you wait for the next bang – the cannister hisses – three, two, one – Boom – you stick your fingers in your ears and brace as though you were manning the artillery – BOOM – the jackdaws scatter in a confusion of wings and hollers in the direction of the middle of the field – black birds into grey.

Going the distance
Onwards – finally, you rejoin the path – a sign points another little walking man across the field in the general direction of the way you came – Walesby can’t be too far now – a mile maybe – on the other side of the trees is a lane – you cross the lane – another sign, another field – still foggy – perhaps not as thick – you stop to wipe your spectacles – another tract of leg turning mud, another field to navigate, another hedge to keep on your right hand side.

Head down, collar up – get the distance done – you can stop at the Ramblers church up at Walesby – Boom – that crow scarer behind you, those jackdaws too – there’s a trace of brighter blue coming through the murk, looks as though it might even be starting to clear up, you might even cast a shadow.

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