The beech has begun to rust. An odd snowberry glows in the hedgerow between occasional bleeds of haw and rosehips. Dead cow parsley creaks, bone-like. The tortoiseshell butterflies have begun their annual migration from our garden into our house to hibernate, and often die on the low, black beams. The memory of the autumnal equinox is fading.
Leaves sound brittle in the south-westerly, and this, along with the pok of a calling blackbird, provides my dusk soundtrack as I walk. It’s almost sunset – a time that I, like almost every woman walking alone, am mindful of. Like most men, when the clocks go back this weekend, we will set out earlier. Unlike most men – as has been discussed on these pages – we don’t have the same freedom to navigate the darker hours alone (or, indeed, any hours).
