It was quiet out in the forest today, especially once you get far from Bracknell, but not too close to Bagshot. There's this sweet spot just far enough in that you don't see anyone else. It's bliss. The weather was cool today, and it was actually sunny, such that in the sunshine you felt warm.
The forest is, obviously, a place apart, a not-quite-wild space that is much more wild than a city park. There are areas that feel like pristine wilderness, and other areas that feel like industrial factories for wood-extraction.
We can wander among all of it at will in Bracknell Forest, and my wandering takes the form of a low intensity run lately, training now for Race to the Stones 4-5 July 2020. But what am I observing today about humanity that I hadn't seen before?
There are a lot of dogs, and a lot of families, and I think one thing the forest offers is a place away from other eyes, from television, from watching, from being watched. I could think of a dystopian scenario in which the forest had eyes so that we could be under 24/7 surveillance but as far as I know there's no CCTV in Bracknell Forest.
What about a dystopian fantasy where the forest comes alive and trees start eating people? Sentient plants has been done before. You could do much worse in these times than read Wyndham's Day of the Triffids or The Midwich Cuckoos.
Overall I see people acting very rationally, in the sense that they are doing what they need to do to take care of themselves. Gazes are occasionally, in glimpses, aggressive, a kind of 'keep back' glare that erupts now and then. I've seen spats on the motorways, but then I've so those before too.
The driver of a car stopped me mid-run yesterday close to the Mill Pond McDonald's and asked me where all the shops were. I pointed vaguely and said you could only get there by walking (Wildridings Shops), which technically isn't true: it's just what I do.
Our gazes give a lot away, but we can also refine them by taking time to let things sink in. The hearing too gives way in a new found silence to contemplation. I see jumbo jets lazily turning in the sky because they have so much room to move now, and there's barely any sound of traffic, just the occasional Ambulance siren.
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