Story Time

I have not been to this familiar place before. It is the first time I have been beckoned by these rows of summer trees, telling me to walk between them to Faygate and not stray from the firm path beneath my feet. If a tree were to fall with no one present, (and lost in the green light with the baby asleep, I feel like we are not) would it make a sound? If a clock were to tick, would time pass? The birds are singing and insects are buzzing but time is not passing.

This countryside I know so well is new to me. Here is Beau Peep House: red door, four windows, chimney, symmetry; here is a leafy den: smoothed ground, a plank for a bench and a tree for climbing; here is a lane sickly sweet with elderflower and venomous with nettles. This is England's countryside in summer. I am sharing childhood memories with my baby in a place I have never been. I wonder if, one day far away, in a dustier, drier land, my son will know, as I once knew in India, that there was once also this place.

For a moment, trees part and allow us to see a cottage: green gables, a pond with a duck, a swing hung from a tree and I know what the time is. I have suddenly walked to childhood, to the settings of story-time. I have visited before. Indeed, I have lived here for many stories.