July 23rd, 2008
One Moon
We have just spent a week at Selsey Bill, which is on a peninsular on the South coast of England. The house we rented sat at the water’s edge (literally) and the spray from the sea made the windows misty white with deposited salt. In the water directly ahead of us was a post to mark the end of the groynes that have been built into the sea to stop the coastline eroding and each morning a lone cormorant perched on the post, displayed its wings and then settled down for a rest. I felt quite sad for this magnificent bird until I realized that each post, standing a few hundred yards apart, hosted a cormorant. What a privilege to watch.
In the evening around nine o’clock, the sun dipped leaving a splash of reddish gold and then the moon lay its silver strands across the sea in a wide beam. As I stood and watched the moon I took a moment to think of all those people I love who were far away and wondered if any of them were looking out of their windows watching the moon. It felt like the moon was bringing all of my family who were on holiday with me, together with everyone else I cared about who was not; as if we were all under one roof lit by the moon.
I probably had this idea because I read James Herbert’s “Moon” some years ago, although Herbert’s book is one of horror and terror and my thoughts were the opposite. Anyway what holidays do give us is time to have special moments, which perhaps we are too busy to notice when we are at home working.
