The Long Village (Villages and tribes)

JOURNAL ENTRY

16^th October, Wednesday

“October drips onwards.

The towpath washed with mud
And brushed silvers
Wet with fallen leaf
And windfall twigs
Greets me with
A familiar squelch.”

[MUSIC]

WELCOME

Tonight, the clouds are piling from the west. Over the Atlantic a low is deepening and tracking northwards. Stormy weather lies ahead of us tonight. Just now the rain has started. Light and sporadic and then a rush of water that makes the alder and reed blades hiss so loudly that I can hear them in here.

This is the narrowboat Erica narrowcasting into the darkness of a stormy October night to you, wherever you are. 

Thank you so much for coming, I am really glad that you could make it. Shake off your wet coat and boots and come inside where it is warm and dry. The kettle is singing on the hob, the biscuit barrel is to hand, the barometer needle is plummeting. The night is set to be wild and wonderful. Come inside and welcome aboard.   

[MUSIC]

NEWS FROM THE MOORINGS  

   A few days ago, the Hunter’s Moon reached its fill, ushering in, according to the Anglo-Saxons, winter weather – the month of Winterfylleth. Miles Hadfield’s An English Almanac records that “October, as often as not, is the wettest month of the year.” It will be interesting to see how this year's weather statistics read on this. While it is true that we have had a fair amount of rain – extremely heavy at times – this year, October has some serious competitors for that title in the UK.

Hadfield goes on to remark that it is now that “we are forcibly reminded that it is now time to adapt ourselves and make ready for winter with its colds and overcoats.” As he later goes on to add, because of the shortening of the day light hours, “the sun now quite loses its mastery and surrenders to the moon without more ado.”

And I think that sums up this October for me. The evenings have gotten dark so quickly and so early. Do I say this every year? Perhaps, I do, but like just yesterday, I couldn’t quite believe how dark it was by six o’clock in the evening. A lowering sky of heavy cloud probably exacerbated this effect, but it was quite striking.

The other characteristic of the last couple of weeks have been a seesawing of temperatures and shifts between stormy winds and flat calm. The other day, we were joking along the moorings that spring had at last come. The day before, a biting northerly wind had raked down the hill and threw rain drops like gravel against our stern doors, and we huddled inside next to our stoves. Now, it is, again, really too warm to keep the stove lit. In my head there has always been something tumultuous about the month of October (witches and highway men, besom brooms made from birch twigs, bonfire and crow song) and this year our climate – with its wildly swinging jet-stream – is certainly living up to that tumult.   

I love Hadfield’s observation that it is during October that is the time of the burning of the leaves swept up from gardens and towns and that: “The scent of the month is in their smoke.” While smokeless zones have probably meant that this activity is largely now a thing of the past – there is something slightly smoky about the month. Perhaps it is the mist that softens and smudges the countryside, wrapping the recently denuded branches and twigs of the canal-side trees in wispy veils, as if to help acclimatise them to the harshness of light and air. It’s often the month when I stop, sniff the air, and say to no one in particular, ‘Ah! It smells just like bonfire night!’

The great writer, poet and naturalist, Edward Thomas, surely hits the nail on the head with his poem ‘Digging’ – a poem that has added poignancy in that it was the first poem Thomas wrote after his enlistment into the army in 1915 and just before he finished his initial training for his placement in the trenches from which he was not to return.

‘Digging’

[READING]  

[MUSIC]

CABIN CHAT

[MUSIC]

THE LONG VILLAGE (VILLAGES AND TRIBES)

From time to time, boat-life on the canals and rivers of the UK to has been likened to being a part of one long linear village. I am not sure who first developed this image, but it is a good one and apt. There is a strange sense of camaraderie that you get living here. It’s a friendship of strangers knit together by a range of differing but shared experiences and worldviews. It’s often short-lived, a chat waiting at the water point swapping local knowledge, or on some towpath at the close of day commenting on the weather or just commiserating about the general state of things, talking of future – or even past – plans while propped against the lock beam as the water slowly rises. More often than not, it is just a cheery wave or a shout of greeting. I suppose that it is not for everyone, these types of relationships often last for just a few hours or perhaps a short season when you share a winter together. In those cases, there is a pang of loss when partings are made – and there is a silent nothing where there once was the warmth of another’s personality. But these types of friendships (and perhaps friendships is a term too loaded with other meanings) – these types of friendliness and community can weather storms like these. And you pass a boat and one of the boaters sweeping leaves off the cabin roof, they look up and smile as you pass, and there is something in that smile that hints at ‘I know something of your life and world, for I am there too’; and you are reminded again that you are a part of a long village, a long, linear, village. And, heaven forefend, something goes wrong, there are people who will do their best to help you – if only to assure you that you are not quite so on your own as you thought.   

It feels like there is some indefinable common thread that links us together and acts as a tentative bond: The retired professional seeking a way out of stress and a new sense of purpose, the recluse for whom the modern world has shown its sharp edges, the young couples navigating new and exciting worlds, the hobbyist, the enthusiast, the holiday maker, those looking for peace, those looking for adventure, the seasoned, the novice, the practical and pragmatic, the engineer and mechanic, the artist, the crafter, the writer, the dreamer, the naturalist, the spotter, the urban historian, the industrial archaeologist, the astrologer and herbalist, the nomad, the settled, the felon, the sainted, the schemer, the grifter, the loser, the winner, the virtuous, the gentle, the hurting, the healed, the hopeless, the restless, the lonely and uncherished, the favoured and relished, the introvert, the extrovert, the rich and the poor, the lost, the found, the wearied and worried, the happy and content, the boisterous, the silent. All held together by narrow strips of still water that begin to seep into and flow through our veins – if only temporarily.   

The sense of community is one of the most attractive features of life-aboard – and I am one that speaks as a person who finds social interactions awkward. It can often be a reason why someone choses this kind of life. It is fairly unique – mobility allows these brief moments of communality that makes strangers allies and friends. Comparable ways of living either necessitate living within a fairly-fixed commune or living in isolation.

Personally, I am glad of the social distance that this type of life offers. People respect your space – after all, most have ended up here because they seek quietness, space, not to feel too fenced in socially. Most encounters occur outside the boats – even among established friends. You do not set foot on another’s boat without asking for permission before hand. Unlike houses, where you’d knock on the door and then there was the natural expectation of being asked in, that is not the case with boats. Normally, the only time you find yourself of another person’s boat is if you were helping them with a job fixing something that was broken or installing something.

If you need space, you can hunker down somewhere quiet, and people are fine with it – many understand for they too have been to those places.

I was reminded of all this by a couple of things that I came across online recently. One was a video that Wayne created for his vlog Narrowboat Spudley. In this video ‘Keeping Heads above Water – Just’ Wayne featured a great new charity, The Forces Veterans Afloat, who are gifted abandoned boats cruisers and narrowboats. They then renovate where needed and refurbish them and offer them free to veterans of the military services who are struggling to make their way or who are homeless for 12 to 18 months. As a society, it has always struck me, that we have a curious relationship with those who serve in the military. Whatever you may feel about the things they get sent to do – and those on the ground have no say in that, it is clear that they can be treated appallingly badly when they come out of the service – and it is often that those who have been traumatised or hurt by their experiences the most that can be treated the worst. The point was made on the video about the sense of community that there is on the canals and it is often exactly the kind of community that is needed by those at a vulnerable place in their lives. Supportive, but also not smothering and allowing space. Watching it, I was reminded of so many boaters I have come across who are ex-military. This does seem to be a lifestyle that can seems to be ideal to those with so many practical skills and who are seeking space to navigate their lives through new waters. I will put the link to this video and to the charity in this episode’s programme notes – Wayne, by the way, you are an absolutely natural interviewer. You did a great job. If you can, please watch the video – and please watch to the end. I am not too familiar with how YouTube do things, but apparently it counts towards viewing figures and Wayne has pledged that any revenue that he gets from the video will go directly to the charity. 

Having said all this, I am also aware that within any community there are inevitable tensions. The tendency to tribalism and create factions seems to be a very human trait. Scratch below the surface, and that village can easily shatter and divide into enclaves and cliques – each suspicious of the others. Very early on, before we even moved aboard the Erica we were introduced to the terminology. ‘Were we going to be true boaters – or just floaters’ – in other words tied to a marina or a residential mooring and not moving away. The inference was that ‘floaters’ weren’t somehow one of us ‘genuine’ boaters.

In all honesty, I am not sure what actually constitutes a genuine boater. I have heard one group of continuous cruisers complain that another group of continuous cruisers were not genuine boaters because they were only here because they couldn’t afford a house and not because they loved the canals and life upon it.

Sociologists and also ethologists (those that study animal behaviour) show how factionalism and conflict generally arise within a group when resources are scarce. Unfortunately, the current situation on the canals is that the resources (water points, waste sites, designated mooring spaces, - although even the possible normal bankside mooring spots, and even usable stretches of the canal are getting harder to find in places). Resentments can fester. The village breaks down into ghettos – continuous cruisers, marina-based live-aboards, residential house-boat dwellers, time-share owners who get a few weeks a year to live a different kind of life, weekenders, holiday makers. Culturally we are also experiencing a shift in attitude to how we view each other. The danger of community fragmentation isn’t so much the forging of hyper-individualism, but the forming of small group identities that view themselves as being threatened by the others around. It is so easy to characterise and then demonise those in other groups. I was saddened to hear Heidi’s comments on one of her recent vlogs about how much continuous are getting it in the neck in some of the social media narrowboat groups. However, I wasn’t surprised. I had to withdraw from them shortly after we moved onto the Erica. A possible source of information and support quickly became a source of stress and antagonism. I dreaded meeting other boaters on the canal if this is the way they behave. Of course, they don’t behave like that on the canal at all – or at least, the majority don’t. It just that something seems to happen when we get behind a keyboard. The lovely family who are on holiday with whom you shared a lock and watched the dragonflies dance, or the elderly couple who have been holidaying on the canals for the last 30 years and who held your centre-line when a shallow patch made mooring difficult become faceless hire-boaters who know nothing, are disrespectful to other users, and will cruise far too fast. The ageless man with a shock of unkempt hair and whose face is mapped with the lines of his life and whose dog you petted as you chatted for over an hour about all the different frogs and newts he’s seen while living aboard and whose cabin roof is laden with a ton of drying branches becomes one more continuous cruiser who thinks they have a right to the moor anywhere they like and who probably hasn’t got a license or insurance for the boat in the first place. That recently retired couple, all smiles as they proudly show the canal-ware pots and kettles they have recently painted after attending a summer course, find themselves transformed into yet one more example of newbies in a shiny new boat who think they know everything and act as experts on all things canal. And so, it goes on.     

The CRT hasn’t helped the situation by also pitting different groups of canal users against each other concerning who should pay the highest increases in license fee. They would no doubt strongly argue that this was not their intention, but it has proved to be an effective way to deflect anger and worry about the increases away from their door. Especially when the narrative presented is that those who are not continuous cruisers voted (or expressed the opinion) that continuous cruisers should pay more as they use the canal facilities more. Intentional or not, the consultation/voting questionnaire was a masterclass on how to divide a community.

Of course, we need to be careful with the language we use. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with tribes, their existence or even being a part of one. After all, it is really just another name for a small community that lives among many. The problems come from the disposition for tribalism – casting ourselves within one faction and others in opposing ones.

That is why, I was particularly heartened by a Facebook post by Rich on by bike & Boat (narrowboats Bluebell and the butty Stowaway) and was the second reason that got me thinking again about the specialness of the canal community.

I did try to contact Rich for permission to read it out, but haven’t been particularly successful. By the way, Rich’s social media posts are beautiful and always worth looking at and reading – links in programme notes. So, I hope you don’t mind Rich, and working on the premise that ‘it is better to ask forgiveness than permission’ here it is. I think it is wonderful and these fracturing times needs to be read over and over again:

“What makes a boater?”

The waterways have a magical way of bringing people together—people from different walks of life, different corners of the world, all united by the shared love of being on the water.

Owning or hiring a boat becomes a great leveller, opening your world to faces and stories you might never have had the blessing to encounter otherwise.

Take the year-round liveaboard, for instance, travelling the waterways month after month, season after season.

These are the boaters who live through the crisp autumn air, the silence of a frozen canal in winter, the awakening of spring, and the warmth of summer.

Each journey is a testament to their commitment to the slow, rhythmic life of the canals and rivers.

Then, there are those tethered to their moorings, forming little floating communities along the waterways.

These boaters find their sense of place, creating bonds with neighbours, sharing stories, and finding their own pace within the water-bound world.

Their lives are shaped by a different kind of rhythm—the gentle rise and fall of their boat and the conversations that drift across the towpath.

And, of course, there are the adventurers—the ones who keep their boats for when life insists they need an escape, a reminder that there is more to life than the hum of daily routines.

They slip away on their boats, answering the call for adventure when the need arises, letting the waterways reset their minds and hearts.

Finally, we have the hire boaters—those who immerse themselves in the world we all love, albeit for shorter bursts of time.

They embrace the simplicity, the slower pace, and the unique beauty of canal life, often leaving with stories and memories that linger long after they've returned to land.

Yet a boater is a boater. Regardless of how often we venture out, where we come from, or what we do off the water, we each add to the vibrant, colourful tapestry of the boating community.

It’s a community where social status, profession, and background melt away, replaced by a shared passion for simplicity, nature, and the gentle ebb and flow of the water.

Some of my fondest memories come from this sense of belonging, like that night in Banbury when we lay on the towpath, sipping wine with another crew from a hireboat, watching a meteor shower until the early hours of the morning.

Or the countless evenings gathered around the firepit, surrounded by boaters—teachers, anthropologists, bankers, doctors, and people from so many walks of life, all made equal by our love for this life.

Boating is the great leveller, and it’s in these moments that we realize how truly fortunate we are.

Much love and blessings...

Rich and the Bluebells x”

Facebook 14^th Sept 2024

SIGNING OFF

This is the narrowboat Erica signing off for the night and wishing you a very restful and peaceful night. Good night.

WEATHER LOG