I was in a positive mood because I was going to a five star hotel to try out for a baking job. The gates to the hotel began on the busy main road and through the gates the private road to the hotel wound through acres of trees, lots of old trees; massive redwoods, twisty cherry trees, limes and oaks, all in their autumnal splendour, constantly drizzling leaves into the wind.
Even though I was eager to go and hang out in the opulent hotel, I stopped to look at the birds bouncing on the winds between the trees. I went into a clearing where the ground was spongy beneath one of the redwoods. I thought there might be some goldcrests. They like conifers.
Cars were driving past on the hotel road. They were big and new and had blacked out windows, and were driven by massive men in suits. I began to imagine I was in a dark moneyed Murakami underworld and if I stood by the side of the road peering about through binoculars, I might be stopped and asked to move on, but I did it anyway.
I saw some long-tailed tits. Even without binoculars I could tell it was them. Their silhouette looks like a ping-pong ball on the end of a trailing ribbon or something. The tail is longer than the body, which is round and fluffy. I’d never seen one before. Ever since I saw the picture shown above, I wanted to see one.
The day after, I heard some goldcrests at the hotel. Strangely they sound like goldfinches. There’s a similar type of twilpy blib, like a Radiophonic Workshop drip, but the goldcrest’s call is higher and more whistly. I wasn’t in a positive mood anymore though, so I didn’t get my binoculars out.
No comments:
Post a Comment