THE SENTINEL

AWAY WITH WORDS 

By Tessa Harvey

    Polly Stanton leaned back against the wide oak tree and closed her eyes for a few moments, feeling exhausted. The young lad at the bus stop when she queried where the school was sited had smiled down at her. "Nowt but a lar walk," he had said.

    She remembered the lovely Cumbrian accent and how it had cheered her all those years ago returning from London on the overnight bus. Just a wee walk then. 

    So she had set off walking the narrow lane which had meandered and curved. Imagining herself again a student, the time had seemed to fly by. Then her years had caught up with her. Old age, she thought, remembering how an older woman had once said "never get old, dearie!" Polly had thought that funny. "Move ominously," another person had said, "life is a......" - which it could be, she thought, ruefully.

    Sinking down among the slowly falling leaves, she wondered at the impuise to seek out her former student. "Daft, that's what I am. Real daft!"

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