By: Blonde Two
The older you get, the more you realise that life has a rhythm and a beat to it. We walk along (some run, some stagger), all in the same direction and we pass the same things, experience the same events and feel the same feelings over and over again. Things come and they go away, we all know that, but how often do we ponder on the fact that the gone-away-things usually come back again?
Everything, even a Blonde blog falls into a pattern. At Christmas we tell you about dark Blonde evenings at the Dartmoor Christmas Tree, in May we share our nail biting wait at Okehampton Camp as our youngsters to complete the Ten Tors Challenge and in June and July we describe the experiences of our DofE expeditioners as they achieve their goals.
Although it is inevitable that one day (definitely not any day soon) this pattern will change, it won’t go away altogether. Elements will stay, you just have to look into Blonde pasts to see that there were echoes of the present. Blonde One trained my son (Six-Foot-Blonde) for Ten Tors long before we became friends. I honed my camping and walking skills as a Scout leader whilst family Blonde Two were growing up.
You might also (if you could) look into the future, and see further generations of Blondes striding Dartmoor with trails of youngsters behind them. You might also see some of our current Young Leaders sitting at Okehampton Camp waiting for their own teams to return. Where will we be then? Who knows but you can be very sure that, in the Blonde future, there will be a multitude of echoes of Blonde seasons past.
I saw a chap the other day sitting at the edge of the Haytor car park looking as happy as a man can. He was there for a long time, just gazing up at Haytor and watching the walkers up and down the hill. A time to Bimble and a time to watch others Bimble maybe?
Recurrences are strange; not quite the same thing as your cyclical happenings, more a matter of chance or coincidence. I sometimes muse at the times I have revisited somewhere that I thought I would never visit again. In 2008 I walked Land’s End to Johno’Groats and saw no likelihood of walking the north Cornish coast path again, but five years later I became interested in The Marilyns and last April found myself on a pleasurable ascent of White Downs which I had walked past on the LEJOG. There have been quite a number of other instances and many where previous routes cross each other.
I am setting off again on 26th or 27th April on a very ambitious plan considering the state of my knees which would extend for two months. If I do manage to survive I would find myself crossing my LEJOG path again towards the end of the venture at a point not far distant from your part of the world. If you were of like mind I would welcome the idea of a rendezvous at Fox Tor Café. It goes without saying your privacy would be respected and you could even turn up wearing brunette wigs, heavy sunglasses and whatever other form of disguise you may consider. My email address is on my blog.
We definitely need to hear more of your plans – Blonde interest is engaged. I’ll drop you a Blonde email about a rendezvous. If we are free at the right time, we would love to meet and have a variety of wigs, coloured contact lenses and fake moustaches available for such occasions.
You are going to have to email us first, I couldn’t make your address work. blondestwo@ymail.com