could we be magic?

Today was a magnificent day.

Anabel, Lily and I took ourselves off up to the Mount with a picnic this morning.  How brightly the light danced over the smooth, round hillside.  Clouds of high-piled whipped cream raced each other across the blue.  Our hair jumped and tugged about our faces.

Smiling faces they were; so glad were we to be out and heading up into freedom.  Through the low woods, out onto the open slopes, panting on up past the bleating sheep - we stretched our legs and relaxed our minds.

We'd forgotten, all of us with husbands and sons, how good it is to be in the company of women.  We wondered if three was enough to form a circle.  No matter which angle you viewed it from, three, we reluctantly decided, made a triangle.  Then we agreed that triangles did not deserve their bad press.  Triangles were not all bad.  Triangles could be a powerful force for good.

Then Lily said it.  And Anabel and I each caught something in the other's eye.  We both looked at Lily, almost holding our breath.

"We could form a coven," she had said.

 A three-way grin formed.  Triangular glee. 

"Great idea," I said.

"What would we do?" asked Anabel.

"Make things happen," said Lily, eyes sparking, "in the village."

"What kind of things?" asked Anabel.

"Good things," I said quickly, "like protecting the ancient trees that the developer wants to chop down."

"Ah, right," said Anabel.  "And like wishing up a windfall for Mrs Charlton so she doesn't have to shut the post office."

"Well, yes," said Lily.  "But I was also thinking along the lines of some excitement.  You know, like some interesting strangers moving in.  Like some events that would get all the tongues wagging.  Some fabulous parties.  That sort of thing."

Anabel and I were staring at Lily again.  We had thought we were past parties.  But now that she conjured the image up, we realised we weren't.  We wanted parties.   We wanted to dress up and make up and paint nails and wonder who would be there.  Out here in the wild wind, away from men and boys, we could feel like girls and dare to imagine parties again.

Reminiscences about parties past got us all the way to the peak.  We stood leaning into the wind, surveying the patchwork fields, brown and green, fading into blue, all around, for miles.

Then we tucked ourselves under the earth bank that circles the Mount, ancient fortifications from thousands of years ago.  We wondered what it would have been like to live up here in the wind, while we chomped on sandwiches and crisps and then Anabel's yummy cupcakes. 

Laughter peppered our stomp down the hill.  We thought of hundreds of spells we would like to cast, all the good we could do in the world with our magic.  It was so liberating to be free, for one day, from any thoughts of "that's not possible". 

We agreed to meet in a fortnight to put the world to rights again.  I'm so looking forward to it.  Coven or no, we worked magic today.

.

into the blue

Today was a great day.

I packed water and munchies and headed out onto the spur, all gritty wind and sun-bleached rocks. It's slow going sometimes, picking your way, but well worth the effort. The scattered little plants leaned low, away from the wind, pastel flowers nodding. My boots kicked their heads, they didn't care.

As the spur narrowed, I became surrounded by blue. Blue sea, slowly swelling, with myriad diamonds playing peek-a-boo. Blue sky, huge, just a few wisps of white, strewn and torn. Hundreds of seagulls wheeling high, appearing lost in the vastness. Their cries thin, mewling. Blown.

At the tip, I sat on a rock, contemplating the swell, the surf. And munching. I could feel my cheeks browning. I imagined my eyes becoming bluer, drinking in the blue of the sea, the sky. The air itself tasted blue.

Without warning, a smooth dark head rose from the water no more than twenty feet away. Huge dark eyes gazed at me, gently curious. Then the seal lay on its back, little back flippers held up to the sun. Sunbathing seal. Contemplating me, contemplating it. Slow-mo bobbing.

What a thrill. A connection. Eye to eye with a creature living a life so different to mine, yet we both need to breathe, eat, sleep. Play, contemplate. And sunbathe.

You want a moment like that to last. I accepted it wouldn't, fully appreciated the transience of the thrill. The seal hung around for a long time anyway. It was truly lovely and I'll never forget it. Magic.

I blinked. It was no longer there. I felt high all the way back across the rocks.