I've taken to climbing trees. I know; it's a bit childish, and maybe irresponsible, but I'll come back to that in a minute.
When I told my Mum, she was startled - not because I might fall out - but just because she didn't know I could climb trees at all.
"What about the pear tree?" I asked, "The one in the back garden; we used to climb that all the time, and then clamber out onto the garage roof!"
"Did you indeed?" she said. I imagined a raised eyebrow, but it's hard to tell on the phone. I hadn't computed that she didn't know that.
Anyway, I reassured her that I'd be quite safe. Though of course, my own safety isn't really the best reason not to climb trees at the moment - probably more that we should all be doing everything we can to stay out of hospital, and climbing trees could easily be one branch-snap away from a sprained ankle. But I reasoned that the little twinges of joy outweighed the risk, and I was very careful. I'm never more than five-feet from the ground, and it's all felt comfortable so far.
So far. Today I scrambled up a new one and sat nestled in the branches. The sun twinkled through the green leaves, the wind rustled, and birds sang through the wood. I was snuggled, with the angles meaning I had my knees up and my feet wedged into a nook. And so there I stayed for ages: texting, listening, thinking, composing a long reply about something not very interesting, playing games on my phone. It was all very pleasant until I realised I couldn't feel my feet.
Pins and needles. I've got poor circulation anyway, but the angle I was squashed into the tree had sent my legs and my feet to sleep. I was unable to move at all, let alone clamber out of the tree the way I came.
"What would Bear Grylls do?" I asked myself, not for the first (and it won't be the last) time. What would he do if he got pins and needles up a tree and couldn't get down?
Now normally, you'd stretch out your legs to get the circulation flowing. I was conscious that that might mean upsetting my centre of gravity and I could have tumbled out like a coconut. One thing I do know is that Bear wouldn't have panicked. If you're in a safe situation that might become dangerous, you at least have a little time to make a plan. I felt sure that was the kind of thing he'd say - stay where you are, don't get in a flap, make a plan.
So I stayed where I was for a while, hunched up in the branches, making a plan. I could call someone who lives down the road and tell them I've got ‘pins and needles and can't get out of a tree’. Hmm.
I could call my Mum. Well she'd probably tell me off for climbing trees when I didn't have much practice or experience. We've been over this, Mum. Or, I could just let gravity take its course and try artfully scrambling with two dead legs.
In the end, I gripped a branch very tightly and did some (remarkably) graceful stretching - one leg horizontal at a time - arabesque style. If the Cirque du Soleil people had been watching, they'd have signed me up there and then. It was elegant, to the say the least! A few moments later, with toes wiggling inside my trainers and the blood spindling through my calf-muscles, I switched my clumpy, lifeless feet onto a low, twisty branch and managed to lower myself back on to the terra firma, the dry mulch that so often surrounds trees in copses.
It felt a bit like I’d imagined storm-battered sailors to feel when their tattered ship reaches the harbour. Dry land! Soft mulch! Freedom! Made it!
I walked home. Maybe it is a little irresponsible to climb trees at the moment.
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