6.
So at dusk my walk led across the seven
football pitches of Chingford Plain, un-
trodden save by a disorientated dog which
had followed the goal lines in orderly
fashion, but with the embellishment every
30 yards or so of a long narrow loop to
starboard for no discernible purpose.
The scrub leading to Ranger's Road
included dense hawthorn, the roost for 1000s
of commuter Sparrows, preferring this
nightly habitat to the Victorian eaves of
London E. Latecomers were still adding to
the decibels of high pitched sound, while
over all presided monumentally, a Magpie
balanced upon an over-reaching twig. Over-
head the Black Headed Gulls flapped easily
from their day in the field to night on the
reservoir, jinking lightheartedly now and
then from side to side while a great, if not
greater, Black Back loftily cut them down to
size.
At the steeper slope approaching the
Epping New Road, the last tobogganists
sought to churn one final glissade out of
the over exploited snow, and beyond, up to
the old road, the woods were already nearly
benighted but for their own pale lamp of
snow. The cricket ground on the crest was
backed by the sodium lights along the road,
and the evening welcome of the Roebuck inn.
For just a hundred minutes I had been
able to capture the forest scene in its
transient winter make-up, knowing well that
tomorrow could so easily find it returned to
more sombre beauties, erosional warts and all.
ERIC HOOPER