She was one of the hill people from over where the lanes end up the steps and in the dark with port town lights on the low horizon.
By Figgy Ormerod’s farm, satellites lead you into a training facility with close-cut grass and roving cameras.
Now Figgy wanders through the lanes, takes clippings and blocks stiles. The tops are secured for miles and miles. The lower ground has plants in every store
ready to pass messages up the chain. Eyes on you in every feed station, ford, lock-up, lay-by and loading bay. Just one of the hill people, you say.
With all that brickwork, a shed ablaze and also, through intersecting lines, the sky at the far horizon, there’s a gift for the burning bush observed through rain-smudged glass, in writings on negotiated walls or in the voices of students on their way to class.
I once overheard you and Iain Sinclair among porticoes on London Road. It was something about the architecture of hospitals. Do places retain a memory of pain? In building anew, what do we remove? Your eyes roam through famous and common land, find what makes a town distinct
on the margins: gasometers, factories, an odd inland gull, people on unique trajectories, made new or strange by weather, politics, light catching off glass by the Oracle offices as though fire radiates across the valley from a business park and cobbled together nature reserve or gesture by Sonning.
Then the pause, the interregnum: thoughts of Liverpool and stations in-between, a life transplanted and re-planted as a now quite utterly unique breed in a Thames Valley influenced by the Far East seen through a lens of past industry with modern trade on credit seen for what it is
and mainstream media interests less significant than the cracks on the road, geese proliferating by Kennetside road ends, salvaging moments against the currents of memory in fleeting cloud glimpses and aphorisms converging in time and halting, as you said, but only for now, in the grounds of abbey ruins.
From the embankment of the Thames by wind-ruffled waters and still Mildmay oaks we’d watch and wait, alert to the newness of the day, for cousins’ single-mindedness and strength in boats
to emerge from a mid morning heat haze from a stream off the Brocas, before a hopeful search through indescribable scents in charity shop doorways for Ben Shermans and deleted Pulp albums
incongruously nestled by Sir Christopher Wren, suit jackets and glasses that looked like Graham Coxon’s. I can still hear you through the dictaphone breathing stories Jarvis could have taken on
and, before Shazam, ‘I think last night…’ was lost in broken fragments, endlessly reconstructed before Steve Lamacq played ‘Your Ghost’ on the evening session and we could piece it all together on Maidenhead Road.
On your dad’s bookshelves, seventies brown and mid-orange framed the bearded head of the ‘forgotten Spurgeon.’ We were doubled up unaccountably, or perhaps because the book was also forgotten
soon to be unforgotten, reforgotten and unreforgotten.
Now we have our sad allotted nights in our own configurations of time and light taking form in the mind’s private dark rooms to imagine you on stage again in Camden,
on the deserted streets around Caledonian Road or after trademark fried chicken in Highbury Fields. Saying prayers on the streets of North London, it was the individual he loved and not the group.
To a zealot’s ‘Community goes deeper than friendship’: ‘So you’re not a great friend, then.’
And he’d take the foolish things to shame the wise as with baffling knowledge of Pokemon tour dates became proxy wars in village halls as Gareth’s base stats and anti-metagame
switched advantage to the weak or despised. And he’d remember the praise, but he’d remember the slights through long Essex days and deep Penzance quiet. Hurt and joy combined in the eyes but for all that wonder, he’d forgive every time.
This darkness charts solo missions each orbit: by Saturn, by Dogger, by rural churchyards in hemispheres of local time. And space travel is what older citizens are veterans of – set their watches by. Only moving in the Milky Way yields stardust at the temples. This darkness is a field of constellations, red shift, grey matter greying in transit liked the neutron turned positive inside the Crab Nebula.
The globe provided a live weather report to boldly interrupt the thoughts of an 8-year-old science lover with news of constant Colorado storms and scattered showers when you zoom into Sonning.
That contraption, with its right proportions, torque and granular mountain relief was the height of technology: didn’t stop speaking.
It collapsed imagination to hotel and seaside idylls projected on a screen and snapshots of eternal sun over low desert lodges.
This world gives us so much but where is its charging cable and can we explore the Free State without bluetooth?
The original world was more of a sketch; great continents fused then left. It was the work of an impressionist, with an extra light that held deep space projected into dots and shapes while you’re dreaming.
That model gave us space, and, as you said, this other world is still plugged in; this other world is lit up from within.
Wind-ruffled oaks in common grasses; a castle that stands in swathes of time. Do we need these places so we feel small and free disappearing ripples on a constant sea?
Venture across soft grass and concomitant nettles, interloper on royal grounds, taught to show reverence.
A Quaker would never bow, except to divine energy, cumulonimbi piling up over a sequoia treeline seen from a town centre car-park top.
Lost in the National Trust’s gold and green insipid Crown Estate heraldry, you forgive great men foibles, would rather they were private.
Isolated villages, Great Park council properties; You’re a child with inferiority signposted daily in ancient stone, drawbridges, Range Rovers.
A prince marries in a Christian church, hears a standard gospel message: the family smirks.
These ancient oaks, Mildmay plantings, are so much less derisive. Yes, lose yourself, your ego, self-importance, conceited dreams of greatness: lose it in great rivers, unknown nebulae, at just a glimpse of someone who stands apart through learning or instinct; lose yourself before a farmer who humbly read the weather, a taxi driver who baffled with all the London streets, a player who created time when others snatched.
Never lose yourself to fortifications, a curated garden, some farcical sage green punt at prestige, falsely weathered wood or new authentic signage, those people who filter the Holy Land through Instagram: ‘Here’s a picture of me wading through the Jordan, beyond the profane; here’s one by the holy sepulchre, hope I got the lighting right and you see me in Jesus’ footsteps. I’m wearing a hoodie & a cowboy hat as per the megachurch uniform so young people can relate to me. Hope you can ignore the salary, but look at the followers, the reach,
and who I’ve saved from hellfire – hope you’ll forgive me.’
From the first Berkshire Youth Development League game (throwback here: https://wilderspoolcauseway.com/2015/09/12/woodleyzebras11we2/) where there was a ‘raw blend of hairstyles, philosophies and haircuts on the Wokingham side’ to the last, today at Prospect Park, there have been huge changes to the profile of the team – with only Evan and Connor remaining from that first game – but not so much to its identity. They still obdurately play the ball out from the back, along the floor. This has led to too many perilous defensive situations to recount, as time and time again the full backs find themselves under huge pressure when receiving the ball – but, unsurprisingly, they have therefore learned to deal with the ball under pressure. Other teams may launch the ball through the air, but have players who remain uncomfortable with the ball on the ground, which isn’t ideal when the game is called ‘football.’ As Brian Clough said: ‘If God had wanted us to play football in the clouds, he’d have put grass up there.’
Wokingham also still prioritise skill and quality of play over the final score. They therefore adhere to the current F.A. guidance that players should be encouraged to take risks, make mistakes, be creative and have time on the ball. This is because historically there was/is a cultural problem in the U.K. which means that individual expression is automatically deemed selfish – in the 80’s if you had the ball at your feet for more than two seconds you would be screamed at by teammates and supporters alike to ‘get rid of it’. In my own case, the parents were best described as resembling the cast of Only Fools and Horses: one of them was even a T.V. racing pundit – so much like Boycie it was unbelievable – who would run across the pitch with his long coat and big cigar to shout at the manager or ref at any moment he needed some emotional release – the others would just shout random stuff like ‘Oi!’ and ‘Are you listening to me?’ and ‘Get Out!’ (We played a high line – so high that the defence were screamed at if they weren’t on the halfway line at all times). If you don’t have the ball, though, you can’t become very good at the game, obviously, and that is ultimately why so many other countries with similar populations have far, far surpassed England; they don’t attach any stigma to the football – they see the ball itself as a good thing and treat it accordingly.
It’s only in recent years that the F.A. have woken up to this and changed their official policies to value creativity. They’ve seen that allowing a bullying culture means that a load of thugs make it as professionals, but they then can’t deal with other national teams who are much larger part footballer and much lesser part thug. This new culture only permeates grass roots football though, if managers – i.e. parents who grew up playing in the 70’s and 80’s when you were just supposed to launch the ball anywhere and mainly fight physical rather than footballing battles – can have the vision to drop their egos, take a long term view and not worry about the scores of individual games.
This is easier said the done, but Evan’s team have been blessed with brilliant coaches, Pete Mulvaney being the constant presence over 6 years; he shows unbelievable attention to detail – but they are not the details that most people typically value. If you ask him the final score at the end of the game or who we were playing against (or even, to be honest, where we are) he will genuinely have to rack his brains to remember and will invariably get it slightly wrong – he just doesn’t remember those details. If you ask him about a particular player, though, it’s a completely different story – he will be able to give a nuanced and detailed account of how they played, picking up on all kinds of subtleties the other viewers would not have seen. He will also then project forward as to exactly how he sees that player developing, and the positions they will be taking up in 6 months, a year or even 2 or 3 years later. Despite being a prolific goalscorer himself, he doesn’t especially privilege the scoring of a goal over any other skill, and at the end of the game might give a goal the same billing as a run someone made, a position taken up, a thoughtful pass or even an intention gone awry.
To be fair to the manager, it can be quite tricky to get a grip on the identity of opponents in this league. There are 10 teams in the division, and many are named after recognisable places such as Calcot or Pangbourne, but some have names which are harder to grasp like ‘Centre Skills’ – this one is confusing; does it mean they practise skills at a centre? If so, where is the centre? Or are the skills performed in the centre of the pitch? What are the skills? The name kind of functions in an abstract way like North West Pangs of Conscience FC or Adjacent Tendonitis-on-Loddon. And Whitenights, surely, is an Estate Agents – would their supporters arrive in suits between Saturday morning viewings to see how their little leaflet droppers were doing?
They train, predictably, at the Whiteknights campus of The University of Reading – but where do they come from? What’s the vibe? Regardless of the total mystery surrounding them, they played in quite a straightforward style – well organised, nothing too flashy and lots of prodding and probing down the flanks for little reward until their centre forward managed a fantastic lob from outside the box just before half time. Wokingham generally had more of the ball but were a bit too impulsive; they needed to calm down, lift their heads up and adopt a different perspective on life, but they did come back into the game well in the second half, culminating in Connor scoring an excellent left-footed volley from a corner to win the game after he and Evan entered the fray having taking their turns on the bench in the first half. Evan took a while to settle, but then found his customary range of passing and particularly helped in quick transitions from defence to attack. This was a good game and a fitting end to the BYDL era with Connor scoring the final goal after Evan scored the first, 6 years ago. The team also secured 3rd place and now probably face dispiriting trips to places like Colnbrook for 11-a-side games next season.
Wilderspool Causeway 