nature writing – Kirsteen Bell

Yellow and bronze oak leaves, still with green chlorophyll in their midribs and veins.

The green hills are singeing into copper and bronze. All around us trees are drifting too into the autumn spectrum. From the yellow birch to the still green oak, with rowan, alder and hazel at varying stages between, the trees and bracken are calling back their chlorophyll.

Chlorophyll is the green pigment that allows the tree to absorb light needed for photosynthesis. It is green to the human eye because the tree absorbs red and blue light but reflects the green. Autumn leaves may be a sign of decay, of the trees shedding what is no longer needed, but it is when the trees are at their most energetic that we see most of their waste – green is the colour of light that the tree throws back.

Each tree reaches a point though where they have stored enough sugar under their bark and in their roots, where they cannot store any more. Or, if they haven’t reached that point, they are forced anyway to withdraw their liquids deep within to protect themselves from the threat of coming frosts. Unless you are a pine tree of course, then you effectively have anti-freeze in your needles and a thick layer of wax that allows you to keep your greenery all year round. Deciduous trees however begin to prepare for their winter rest. Their chlorophyl is broken down; the carotene and anthocyanin pigments that remain in the leaves now have their chance to shine. The sycamores near us are the first to leaf in the spring, and so seem to be of the first to turn; their five-pointed leaves appear like golden stars in a deep green sky.

The Woodland Trust suggest that the depth of the yellows, oranges, and reds we see each year depends on weather conditions. Cold and dry weather that stays above freezing affects the pigment, giving the leaves a redder hue, as does longer spells of Autumn sunshine. There is another theory that the vibrancy of the leaves shouts a warning. The brighter the colour the stronger the tree – the stronger the caution to insects. These tiny creatures may find a sheltered home for the colder months, but when spring comes this glowing tree will be capable of defence, so they’d better find another, paler, weaker, home.

Warning issued, energy reserves pulled back into the trunk and roots, the tree will seal off its branches. Leaves will be released and fall to the ground under their own weight or in the first wind. From hereon in the wind will whistle through bare wood; without their leafy sail to catch the air the trees will be safer from storm damage, the colours of spring stored safe within.

First published in the Lochaber Times, Issue 8536, Thursday 5 November 2020.

In a monotone world, snow disappearing into still water, there appears a tight swell of movement, full of languid force. Indistinct dark splashes are more often than not a far-off cormorant diving repeatedly for food, but, as the streak loops and circles, my confidence grows that maybe this time it is an otter.

The hills on the other side of the loch fade as the drift of falling snow deepens. Perspective drifts with it, small or far away becoming blurred so that the twisting shape could be two otters – until it lifts its head and upper body out of the water in a periscope motion, returning a sense of scale. Eventually it submerges fully and I walk in the direction given by its wake, my boots scraping too noisily on stonechips, stilling steps and body in a pantomime freeze each time the otter emerges closer to the shore.

I make it onto the strip of tide-swept grass, free of snow and soft enough to quieten my feet. The grass leads towards an outcrop of basalt which tumbles into a handful of boulders, dark and proud of the pale loch. I am a cold statue as the otter swims towards them, silhouetted oh-so briefly on the surface, before vanishing into the rocks.

Two, three, slow steps. Two, three, more. Every cell alert and leaning towards the creature I imagine to be on the other side of the stone. Another two steps. Poised in expectant motion. Then

Low rumble of a male voice. I hesitate briefly, then step up onto the rock. Through the curtain of snow and branches I can just see two hooded bodies standing at the bank of the wee bay beyond. As I teeter with decision a car alarm goes off – not mine, must be theirs. I give the otter up for lost and turn back, crunching heavily along the shore back to my own car.

I am always on at my children to share nicely, to think of others, to be kind. It is not until I am driving away that it occurs to me that I could have continued to walk towards the people by the loch, whoever they were. Our pincer approach combined with the car alarm may have sent the otter melting away into the water, but what would we have gained – or given – by talking to each other about it?

My experience of nature as it relates to writing is, on the whole, a solitary affair: the ‘lone enraptured male’ so prevalent in nature writing setting a tone for much that followed. While new voices and narratives have emerged in recent years, the form is still predominantly of a single author relaying their own experiences, observations, or understanding of the living world. Some write from the clear self of first-person, others in the quietly human third, while Kathleen Jamie’s use of second-person in Surfacing goes someway to counter this solitude, her ‘you’ reaching out to bring the reader along with her and opening her words outwards. However, no matter the twists and turns of technique, the process of writing tends towards the innate perspective of the author. Or, so I thought.

Then there was Foundle, created by Tanya Shadrick, Jo Sweeting and Louisa Thomsen Brits. I had watched a little of the project’s development via Instagram, slight glimpses into the experience of the growing friendship of three women and its creative flow, in which ‘chance, skill, and intent triangulate to form art’. The emotive strength of their three-fold depiction lies in the balance and attention that each gives to the other and their work: ‘A triangle of women, the strongest shape, the weight of our attention evenly spread. Touching, listening, conjuring collective purpose.’ The idea of new bonds and collaboration was beautiful to see, and to me seemed so very brave. If I imagined myself taking part in such an endeavour, I became petrified, a stony fear creeping out from my centre until my limbs were stilled.

It was that same stone that turned me away from the couple on the shore. It is likely that they saw the otter too, rumbled their car to a stop and crept slowly towards the lochside, cameras poised, hoping to capture the moment, to make it theirs. I had wanted that moment too, senses alive to light and movement in the hope of etching its lines onto my memories, to be reformed in words at some unknown later date. I had not wanted to share.

But, there is something else here now. A testing of the stone. The possibility of a new way of carving words. I am no longer wondering about the missed opportunity of seeing the otter up close; instead, I wonder at the missed opportunity to become ‘we’.

With thanks to Tanya Shadrick, Jo Sweeting and Louisa Thomsen Brits: https://www.littletoller.co.uk/the-clearing/foundle-by-tanya-shadrick-jo-sweeting-and-louisa-thomsen-brits/