I said I would not mention the weather again unless it changed. Well, today, it has changed. A cloudy sky and what I think weather forecasters call “scattered showers” had veiled the sun and cooled the air to 17°C (63°F).

Grey sky and raindrops

Actually, for people who are not keen on the heat, it was quite pleasant. The rain was not heavy enough to tempt us to open our umbrellas, and we went for a good walk as usual.

Some windows blanked

At the risk of boring you, here is another example of blanked out windows. A couple of things intrigue me here. Firstly, unlike most other cases I have seen, while three windows in a vertical row have been blanked, one has not. (It’s usually all or nothing.) Secondly, notice the colour of the bricks: the upper story has been added, or perhaps rebuilt after bomb damage, and its window has been bricked up with the same bricks, i.e. at the same time that that floor was built. That argues for a definite decision to have the window blank.

(As I said before, once you notice details like this, you begin to see more and more of them and to become ever more intrigued by them!)

Leafy path to flats

Near Percy Circus stands an estate of apartment blocks. This pleasant leafy path is one of the pedestrian entrances to the estate. How nice it is to find so much greenery among the streets and buildings.

Poppies

Nearby was this patch enclosed with wire inside which were dozens of bright red poppies. They were fluttering in the breeze as though waving for attention. And so I gave them my attention!

Poppy

Here is a close-up of one of these simple but beautiful flowers. They seem so fragile that you would think the breeze might blow their petals away but, no, they just flutter like butterflies.

Percy Circus

Percy Circus is a broad crossroads with five roads leading off it and a circular central garden which also seems to be called Percy Circus. Two of its branches belong to Great Percy Street, which, as I mentioned previously, was named after Robert Percy Smith, a director of the New River Company.

Percy Circus and its houses were developed between 1841 and 1853. This long development time is explained by the site being rather challenging for architects and builders as it lies on a steepish hill.

The garden seems quite popular and there were people enjoying it today despite the weather. I amused myself trying to imagine the changing fashions – and comportment – of the generations who have visited the garden during the 170 years or so of its existence. Are we any happier or wiser than they were? I think not.

The rain became a little heavier (though still not enough to warrant breaking out the umbrellas) and we cut through Prideaux Place (see my previous post) and from there to Myddelton’s to pick up our coffee before heading for home.

I have sometimes wondered what it must be like living on a small island and seeing much the same views day by day. By keeping us close to home, the pandemic has caused us to live in a virtual “small island” and so I have my answer.

When you can range far and wide, you tend to see the larger features of the scenery. When you are confined to a relatively limited area, your gaze focuses successively on smaller and smaller details and changes in the environment. You switch, as it were, from an elephant’s eye view to a mouse’s eye view. Smaller things grow in importance and significance, proving that we can learn something from all situations in which we find ourselves.