‘The city skyline spiked by spires, 

The silence ripped by siren choirs, 

Riding the Marches, walking the Mat,

Walking forward, walking back’

( An extract from ‘Exercising Ghosts’, from ‘Back Wynd of the Mind’ , (Malfranteaux Concepts 2011)

Its probably a bit extravagant , maybe even pretentious to quote from your own poem, but I will, as I think it fits in with this piece,as it describes an imaginary walk I had envisaged years ago, which took in some historical sites throughout Aberdeen, and as I saw it , invoking famous people who had trod these steps before me.

I took a walk across the other side of Aberdeen today, a sort of walk down Memory Lane so to speak , an urban wander, a lockdown ramble, my destination , the other side of the Old Bridge of Dee, at the foot of Kincorth, I haven’t been across that way for years on foot, and today was the day for it, a beautiful sunny day in the middle of June, almost Midsummer.

I lived in Kincorth for most of my primary school years , moving to the area in which I now live in the early 70s, but  I still have some happy memories and good friendships from those times which endure to this day.

I have fond memories of sitting on the Dee’s banks in the hot summer sun during the school holidays in the early 70s, with my brothers, my Mum and grandparents, maybe drinking a bottle of Coke or Cresta, or eating an ice-cream  bought from the ‘Fine Fare Superstore’, the site of which is now occupied by Asda.

I passed Asda on my way down Anderson Drive and the small shop which was the ‘Dee Chocolate Cabin’ in the 1970s’, and is still a shop of some sort , but one closed due to the pandemic and displays a faded poster inside advertising a circus coming to town.

As I approach what we call the Old Bridge of Dee , built in 1527, I am met by a murder of crows flapping and cawing all over the place, maybe that’s a bad omen.

I think a lot on a solitary walk, ideas and thoughts for stories, poems and stuff often come to me in these times.

I suppose I find inspiration in walking, like many folk do.

Anyway, were the summers brighter when I was young, or is this just a rose tinted memory?.

Perhaps its a bit of both.

Maybe we just had more time on our hands , as we were children with little to worry or think about.

Of course the 70s were a  long time ago, and the area is almost unrecognisable except for the odd landmark, my old family home, and the football pitches down by the River Dee , both the bridges are still more or less as I recall them.

I am reminded of the quote from the author L.P. Hartley , that the past is a foreign country.

Provost Watt Drive still looks as steep, though thirty years on I don’t think I could run up it as I once did in my days as a marathon runner, my overall impression is how verdant the area is now, trees everywhere, sylvan glades and  shady groves all over, up the hills and down by the river, adding to the skyline as you shift your gaze towards the city.

As I walk along Great Southern Road, I notice that some of the grass verges are freshly shorn,  that’s a perhaps a good sign that the Lockdown is easing.

I thoroughly enjoyed my walk on such a lovely day, and looking around at the amount of vehicles on the roads, you could be forgiven for thinking that there is no pandemic going on, its just when you see the people observing social distancing and that there are few folk going about that you realise that is still out there.

Its during this time of Lockdown that I have taken time to reflect on dwelling on the past and looking back on the last three months, in all aspects of life, that I have found that dwelling on the past is not really the best thing to be doing.

The World has been turned upside down by the global pandemic and things won’t be as they once were , back in the day, that well worn cliché , which in the words of one of my schoolfriends from the 70’s has been ‘over the hills and back again on crutches’.

‘Back in the day’ is no longer valid, moving forward is really a lot more important, and making the best of the ‘New Normal’.

If I have learned anything during the Lockdown, that is it, and perhaps more positively, I have submitted more writing to websites during the last three months than I have ever done, so something positive has come out of this for me.