Nighttime on Still Waters

Send us Fan Mail This week we explore and reflect upon a wonderful poem by narrowboater Steve May (NB Blue Phoenix), ‘The Magnificent Heron’. There is a growing appreciation of genuine encounters with animals and birds and, with the help of Martin Buber and Jacques Derrida, we reflect upon changing attitudes and understanding about how we relate to the non-human world.   Journal entry : “9th July,...

Send us Fan Mail Did you know that each evening we experience THREE twilights? Each one with distinctive features and that during this period we respond in physiological ways. Similarly, our ancestors appeared to have taken advantage of these liminal periods of transition in ways that we might do well to remember. We finish the episode with a lovely passage from Tom Rolt’s Narrow Boat and there is...

Send us Fan Mail The hot weather has broken with rain and slab-like grey/white skies. While we wait for the sun’s return, it’s probably a good time to remember those lazy sunny days of long ago (and not so long ago). In this week’s episode we explore the sounds of canals in summer from bees to lock sluices and enjoy the words of John Betjeman and E Temple Thurston.  We also discover the meaning of...

Send us Fan Mail The hold of early summer along the canal-side grows firmer each day. However, sometimes the changes and shifts in the season can affect us in surprising and sometimes disconcerting ways. This episode reflects on the birth of the idea that would eventually become the Nighttime on Still Waters podcast, and a reflection on radio and encounters in the night-time.     Please note that...

Send us Fan Mail The world is filled with new life, fledglings of all kinds. It is noisy, messing, sometimes cruel, and so full of vitality and life. It’s an boisterous energy that cannot be contained or ignored. From vetch, to rabbits and birds and even humans, fledglings fill this world with a fragile, exuberant colour.   In this episode we also discover some of your ‘first poems.’ Journal entry...

Send us Fan Mail What was the first poem that you ever learnt? This week marks the fourth anniversary of my mother’s death and, for some reason, it has brought to mind poems that she loved and that I shared with her as a child. There is something strangely powerful, evocative, perhaps even reassuring, about rhythm and rhymes. Sometimes, it might be, that the rhymes become the reason.  Journal entr...

Send us Fan Mail What is ‘dead sleep’ and ‘morning sleep’? Why are 'duck hatches' invaluable? What should we do with the feral ducks? In this far ranging episode. we explore the night-time of history and discover that, perhaps, the importance of the night for our well-being might not be purely as a time for sleep. We also talk about what scenarios we employed for choosing the right boat...

Send us Fan Mail What is it about the heron that makes it such a frequent subject for social media posts featuring canal and riverside birds? There is something about it that is strange, singular almost. Spotting one is often felt to be a significant event that should be recorded and remembered. This week we look at the heron in the company of Dylan Thomas, John Moriarty, and Wendell Berry, and ex...

Send us Fan Mail This week the rains swept in pushed by great fronts of ocean air – moisture from places with magical names that I hear on the shipping forecast and can only imagine. Life around progressed without a murmur and the ground drank heavily.  In this episode we listen to the rain and to Thomas Merton. We also thinking about casting clouts and what that might mean.   Journal entry : “7th...

Send us Fan Mail A lifetime ago, almost to the day, it turned cooler after an uncustomary warm and dry couple of weeks. Synoptic charts show high pressure moving up the country dragging with it frontal systems. No doubt, on that day, some looked at the clouds and grumbled. And life carried on as it had the days before. Engines shunted in sidings. People waited at bus stops. Shop tills rang out. Do...

Send us Fan Mail Back where we belong. Under an old ash tree and a full April moon. After nearly five months of restricted movements, we’re back home, out on the canal! Join us as we stop over at one of our most favourite places to tie up for the night. The sun is warm, the air is soft, and the moon is big.  Journal entry : “23rd April, Thursday. Sitting up here on the roof of Erica  I am surround...

Send us Fan Mail At the beginning of the week we were waking up to snow and each nights the temperatures have been slipping below zero. However, the days are filled with sunshine and warmth, and a vibrancy fills the word. Spring has arrived.  A few years ago, I discovered something wonderful that the isophenes of Spring tell us about the the progress of the season.    We also join the poet, writer...

Send us Fan Mail Boat blacking is when the hull of a boat is painted or sprayed with a protective – usually bitumen-based – paint to help minimise corrosion of the steel hull. For painted blacking, it is a process that occurs every 2 to 3 years. This week it was NB Erica’s turn for blacking, a time of convergence between ‘canal time’ and ‘land time.’   Journal entry : “10th April, Saturday. I’ll s...

Send us Fan Mail A listener has asked, "After we left the boat and went to live in a house, did canals continue to play much of a part in my life?" After the boat, we moved to Kings Langley, Hertfordshire. It was there I grew up and found my place within the world. At the time it was still a fairly small village. The main industry was the Ovaltine factory that bordered the Grand Union Ca...

Send us Fan Mail The journey from winter into spring is often messy and ill-defined. Sometimes it feels as if we are making progress and at others the cold and damp of winter days returns. As we are also contemplating moving from lockdown it is not surprising that we can feel a bit of kilter. Reflecting on an encounter in WH Hudson’s book A Shepherd’s Life , there are times when we feel like a sma...

Send us Fan Mail These are the days of swan nests and duck eggs, but the call of a lone swan circling overhead, perhaps captures more precisely the tensions we feel moving through the seasons.  The seasonal shifts in the activity of the swans and ducks are becoming increasingly visible reflecting the wider patterns of movement. Boats leaving and others moving in. Everything is in a state of transi...

Send us Fan Mail The fascination of boots and canals. Boots have always been one of the most essential pieces of equipment for canals and canal-life.  In this episode we re-join impresario, journalist and social reformer, James Hollingshead on his journey up what would later be known as the Grand Union in the late 1850s. We will discover his fascination with the footwear of those working on the ca...

Send us Fan Mail Everywhere the world is filled with the whispered spring. The first of this year’s lambs scamper and nuzzle in the field above us and skylarks sing high from under a bowl of Wedgewood blue. A softer, warmer wind blows, and the sun is strong. Humans and non-humans alike emerge to drink in the sunlight and warmth. It’s a spring that the poet John Clare knew well and understood its s...

Send us Fan Mail Stormy nights like this, when then wind howls among the reeds under a hunted moon, are perfect for curling up with a ghost story or two. In this episode we hear about two ghost stories set in locations close to where NB 506812 is currently moored and explore what do these stories tell us about the worlds that produced them and us today.  Journal entry : “18th February, Thursday. E...

Send us Fan Mail Tonight, the NB Erica is locked in ice. There’s a wolfish southeaster blowing and the night is filled with rasping creaks and groans. There are times when the ice sings. Acoustic lightning flashes that dart across the frozen water surface.  Journal entry : “9th February, Tuesday. Last night’s snow low uneasily on the ground, like a miser’s blanket, threadbare and uneven.  But it’s...

Send us Fan Mail One of the first things you will experience when you cast off onto the waterways is, what is sometimes referred to as, ‘canal time.’ What is canal time and how is it different to land time? Canal time functions not so much as a marker for time passing as a recognition of the many streams of timelines of things and lives that fall outside the sphere of human control. However, there...

Send us Fan Mail This week the first proper snow of the winter fell. For a while, our world was transformed. If you love snow, a boat is the perfect place to enjoy it. If you hate snow, a boat is the perfect place to escape it! Journal entry : “29th January Friday. The last couple of mornings have smelt fresh.   The trees bordering the canal sharp with bird song,        not just the aural darts of...

Send us Fan Mail Another January storm has passed over us. But, tonight we have a stock of gingernut biscuits and the knowledge that each day the daylight gets longer and the spring is coming. In this episode, with its usual sprinkling weather lore, we answer some more questions about the canals – principally – how deep are they? It is a subject that I have first-hand knowledge about! Journal entr...

Send us Fan Mail January 18th (2021) is 'Blue Monday'. The third Monday in January is considered by many to be the most depressing day in the calendar. As we enter the dark days of January, this episode considers the importance of the hope of spring and how the calendar and weatherlore enabled our ancestors to deal with the uncertainties they faced.  Journal entry : “16th January Saturda...

Send us Fan Mail What is it like to be on a narrowboat in the grip of a winter’s cold spell? How do you keep warm on a boat?   Living and working on the canal systems in winter has been notoriously difficult and hard. In this episode we reflect on what it entails to live on the canals in winter today. We also hear a piece of Victorian reportage by a journalist travelling on the Grand Union Junctio...