At first I couldn’t make out what it was – a cat maybe or a dog. The morning had not quite lifted and that gorgeous blue was still hovering on the horizon. (It had been too overcast for me to see the blood moon, or indeed the eclipse, at 4.20am, though I had remembered.) But then I saw the sharp, pointed ears, the brush tail. It was a fox. It was standing on the corner of Queen’s Road and staring at me. I stopped walking and spoke to it in soft tones. It didn’t run off but continued to stare for at least, well maybe ten seconds. It was a beauty (male or female, I couldn’t tell), small but alert, curious. It moved on then, not running but walking. And as I turned the corner and looked back I could see it still, sniffing around some litter by the old court rooms. It looked at me too, one more time. I felt blessed by the encounter. Truly.
She usually sits with either her friend the fire alarm fixer or her fiancé (who she told us yesterday she’s known since she was eighteen) but neither were there so she sat at the table next to ours. He talked (well listened) to her while I drew. For all her initial reticence when we usually first greet her, we found after spending more concentrated time in her company that she actually shares her opinions rather liberally such as about Putin (‘he’s like Hitler, someone should shoot him’), or Welsh Rugby, or the Town Council (‘I didn’t vote, the town’s in a shocking state’) or the people who’ve taken over P.D.’s Diner on the Prom (‘the burgers were just warm, who wants warm burgers, and the coffee’s shocking, the bikers aren’t going any more’). She cleans other peoples’ houses and holiday lets and says she loves it. She was off to do two that afternoon, ‘after I’ve done my bits’, she said. Before she left, she said, ‘I love to see her draw’. And there’s me thinking she hadn’t noticed.
The giant poppies are out in the front garden of the house along Llanbadarn Road. They are lush, vermillion petals like a Schiaparelli dress and that deep black centre. Another source of joy as I walk.
