Cold Mountain

Ada left the porch and walked down past the barn into the pasture. The sun was long gone below the ridgelines, the light falling fast. The mountains stood grey in the dusk, as pale and insubstantial as breath blown on grass. The place seemed inhabited by a force of great loneliness. Even the old timers talked of the weight that bearsdown on a person alone in the mountains at that time of day, worse even than full dark on a moonless night, for it is at twilight that the threat of dark makes itself felt most strongly.

I´ve woken up to there being fog surrounding the house. I wonder if this means it will clear into a sunny day? Can´t really trust this to be like British weather though. Last night there was a full moon that rose enormous and yellow over the hillside. The country then becomes this eerie shadowy landscape. The mountains most of all become big hulking black things cast by the moonlight behind them. There´s a window in my room that´s circular and facing South so the full moon passes directly through it. Lovely as this is, I´m always bad at sleeping with a light on. It was so bright I could see the shadow of my hand on the bed. Apparently the hunt started yesterday with a pack of dogs at 6 o´clock, but I did not wake up. I can imagine this would be a spooky site on the hillside first thing in the morning just as the sun is about to rise. Equally because I´m reading a bit of Sherlock Holmes in Spanish (an odd thing it is too) for atmosphere.

Last night was very, very windy. This shouldn´t be surprising on an island called Fuerteventura, but it was so strong that a window I thought I had closed blew open again, and I had to stuff a pillow up against another window to stop the draft because it wouldn´t fully close. On a warm night it lets in a nice breeze. Last night I tried to close it but it just made howls of various pitches, one of which was an uncanny owl impression. I think beach may be off today, as of yesterday because of the wind. Wind is this country´s rain. Yesterday, what for me would´ve passed as a great beach day in England was turned down as not pleasant enough. Apparently when asked what their favourite weather is, people here say rain. 

Reading Cold Mountain by Charles Fraser makes a nice change from the aridness outside. It´s full of cool air and mountain farms. In some ways it reminds me of the books by Laura Ingells Wilder about her life in Wisconsin and then on the Prairies, because it details so atmospherically the little processes of life. But with a grand narrative of two people trying to get back to the same place. Ada, the protagonist, has taken on a girl-hand called Ruby who actually knows what to do with the neglected farm and turns it into a fully working biscuit and cider and tobacco producing plantation that they live of more than adequately during the Civil War. In the other half of the story Inman is, by contrast, making his way back to Ada eating little but stolen cornmeal and catfish found on neglected farms that won´t know he´s deserted. I haven´t finished this yet but I can already recommend it, especially if by chance you find a fireside to sit by in the winter for atmospheric enhancement.