I'd dreamt of getting away this weekend, perhaps even abroad. It didn't work out. There was too much to do, even if I could have made arrangements for a teenager and cat. But on Saturday sunshine arrived and by afternoon I was filled with a restless desire to walk - away from the house and the shops and towards the river.
I wasn't the only one. Walkers ambled, runners jogged and cyclists overtook both. Dogs were alert to every movement or tired and eager to reach home. Canoeists were checking their boats. A fisherman flicked his rod in the air - there was a slim shimmer of silver so lovely that I found it hard to remember that, for the fish, this elegant movement was death and pain.
Passing the lock, I reached the point where the canal meets the river. A cacophony of birds greeted me. I know few bird calls but recognized the sound of Canada geese - out of sight but very near, hidden by the tangle of scrawny winter undergrowth. For all the sunshine there was little sign of Spring.
I followed the path, always looking toward the river with its moorings for launches and narrow boats. I caught sight of a familiar black bird. As I watched, it dived beneath the water. The surface of the water shivered for ages and I followed the movement till the bird surfaced again, half hidden by branches. Some kind of cormorant, I thought, or a shag. It looked like those I'd seen on the Northumberland coast or out on the Farne Islands. I watched it for a while and took a photo but the bird was a blur. I wasn't even sure I'd captured the right bird.
I tried to notice everything so that I would remember it: the shine of the water, the delicate screen of parallel twigs, the sense of being free and not quite certain where I was. But already much of it has vanished. There are photos as prompts - and I haven't forgotten the hunched and sulky heron, by the stump of a leafless tree in the water, glaring at an insouciant white gull that perched on a nearby branch.
Eventually my walk led to the nature centre and cafe. I bought postcards, tea and a slice of Dundee cake and rested till the centre closed. The staff were tired - no-one had expected a busy day in February but the lure of sun and water was too strong. As I left, I saw my first snowdrops of the year - a small clump of raggedy flowers that had pushed its way through dust and twigs and survived the recent frost. After that first clump, I saw more until, suddenly, on a tended lawn by the church, there was a carpet of snowdrops and pale mauve crocuses. Still February, but almost Spring.
A rustle of wings distracted me. I looked up and watched as the heron shrugged its way awkwardly across the sky.
It was years since I'd walked through the Nature Reserve. I remembered it well: the narrow paths, the overgrowth and most of all the mud. That, I suppose, is what mothers remember. I recall the pushchair and the worry lest a lively toddler would get free and run towards the Trent. Our walks would often pause in the garden of the Marina cafe, where they cater for the narrow-boat trade and mud isn't a major cause of worry.
Sometimes, in the last couple of years, I've strolled as far as the Marina. But today I was failing to work at home. Everything distracted me, from the radio to my daughter and her boyfriend who are strenuously renovating her room. Perhaps, I thought, I would concentrate better if I cycled off, with my work in by bike basket. I could make a first visit to the Reserve's cafe and see if a change of scenery would help me concentrate better.
Joe the cat thought a cycle ride was a wonderful idea so I took a while to get going. My daughter held Joe firmly as I set off. I wasn't quite sure of the route so, from time to time as I got nearer, I stopped and checked I was on the right path. Polite schoolchildren, tired dog-handlers, energetic walkers all tried to help. By Attenborough church an elderly couple were uncertain but knew the general direction. As I turned the bike and cycled off, one called out after me, "Parry. Riposte."
I'd forgotten I was wearing my fencing hoodie with the name of my club blazoned across the back. I stopped and looked at them. "You're fencers?"
"Not any more."
But no-one really stops being a fencer and it was a delight to meet this couple, with their enthusiasm (best of all!) for epee. I stayed with them for a little while as we needed help finding the way past Ireton House and the church where Ireton married Oliver Cromwell's daughter.
In the residential streets, the air smelt of well-tended gardens and heavy lilac. But as I cycled onto the reserve the scent changed to the damp green smell I link to cow-parsley, grass, nettles, dock leaves and hawthorn. Soon I saw ducks (with ducklings), swans and geese in and around the deep pools.
It's not a natural space, apart from the bank of the Trent. The Reserve is built around flooded gravel pits. The work of gravel extraction continues. But lately much of the Reserve has been left to nature and nature is doing its best. There's something calming about water, trees and grazing birds - something that can help people focus on a task. I settled down at a cafe table, pulled out a pile of papers and reached for my reading glasses ... and reached again. I'd left them at home.
Cycling back on the pale paths of the reserve - quite without mud - I looked at the rippling water of the Trent, the green leaves and blue sky and thought it would make a perfect picture. And then I knew that no picture would conjure up the moment. I cycled on without reaching for my camera.
Does anyone know what this bird is, by the way? I got as far as goose - and then I began to wonder if that was wrong.
