There were voices too, chatting in a muffled way that made the words indistinguishable. They sounded young though.
It turned out to be scythers. They were cutting the grass on the hill in a way that suddenly seemed both completely old-fashioned but also, entirely necessary. Scythes, I need hardly point out, are long curved blades on wooden poles, and were, for thousands of years, the only tool there was for cutting long grass or reaping crops at harvest time.
“Alright?” said one of them.
“Hello,” I said back. We had a conversation about scything and strimmimg and lawn-mowing. All the while though, I was deeply wondering whether there might be something prophetic in it - about using old tools in difficult places. I didn’t dwell. It was already time to move to the next place in this city.
When you think of Bath, you probably picture the Circus and the Royal Crescent. After the baths themselves, it seems the most natural symbol of the city. I decided to walk down the hill, back through studentville, pick my way across, and wind up in Victoria Park, opposite the famous row of Georgian houses.
It’s rather grand. Built by John Wood the younger, it looks out over the park and the western side of Bath, a curved parade of affluent town houses, cradling an area of perfect green (residents only) and a cobbled path for horse and carriage and every other period drama. Nowadays of course, the road is neatly stacked with Aston Martins and other such fancy vehicles. I sat in the park, trying to write a poem about it...
Royal Crescent
An elegant moon
Of Georgian pride
With windows tall,
And crescent wide
Its delicate style
Of light and shade
Still sweeps its
Stylish stone parade,
Where names of gold
On polished doors
Would open in
To polished floors,
And men of old
Would warm inside:
Their crescent moon
And great divide
That eloquent row
Of wealth and class
Still curves the hill
Like moments past
With curtains draped,
And windows high,
It beams beneath
The western sky:
That Georgian age
That Wood once knew
Still captured by
The wealthy few.
And there the moon
Is curving wide
So lights the crescent’s
Great divide
-
From there I wandered back into town, stopping in at the Georgian Garden. If you’re ever there, it’s the back of No.4 The Circus, and it’s been recreated almost exactly as a classic Eighteenth Century garden would have looked. I was there alone, and I loved it.
I think it’s those tiny hidden treasures I enjoy the most. A pub that’s emerged out of the mist like Brigadoon, a park with a view you weren’t expecting, a pad curry at the Thai Balcony with exquisite and indescribable flavour...
I said indescribable. It was ginger and whisky and something else that felt like the absolute fine-tuning of ingredients and balanced spices. Who knew that food could taste like that?
Tiny hidden treasures. That’s what it feels like Bath offers: unexpected little shops, vintage boutiques and eateries in side streets and alleys. I think when I was here, I learned how to find those things in the people too - the little things that make us tick, whether we’re quirky physics students, CU prayer warriors, or MBA guys in golf attire who drink lager because it’s the 90s and they’re going to be CEOs one day.
But you know, to find those things you have to explore a bit. I couldn’t help think about the scythers on the hill, switching back and forth through the grass. They’d volunteered to do that out there in the hot sun. There was a simplicity about it - a job that needed to be done, and a vintage joy in finding a clean, sharp way to do it. What tiny little treasure had they found in the process!
I’ve been thinking about that a lot.
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