Hello and welcome to five minutes in nature with me Liz Scott down beside the River Exeter Quay and the river is very still.
Just watching a family of ducks.
They're almost hidden on the river,
They're a dark brown colour and I can see the trail,
The wake of the ripples as they swim upstream and there's a seagull perched on the edge of the quay here just with an eagle eye watching out for any scavenging opportunities that might arise and it's very peaceful.
It's early in the morning,
This is before the quay comes to life and I'm just about to head up towards the city of Exeter to get my morning cup of coffee and as you know I've been here before and you'll probably hear cyclists or dogs or people walking as they go by.
It's a very popular route to come beside the river.
Today as I was walking alongside the river,
I walk along beside the river for about a mile,
There's a track,
A concrete track that goes beside the edge of the riverbank and over the years this concrete edge has been built up so the riverbank has got almost like a tiered wall which is probably about 10-15 foot beside it which acts as a flood prevention barrier.
There was a time probably 50,
60,
70,
80 years ago,
I'm not sure entirely,
When the river rose very high and it broke its banks and it flooded the area of Exeter around the river and as a result of that the river has been contained in a way that keeps it safe from flooding but to my eye it's like it's been tamed,
It's domesticated,
It's been caged and I was wondering as I was walking along the banks today,
I was wondering what the river would have looked like and what course it would have taken in the years gone by before we'd built it up with concrete and bricks and blocks to keep it contained within its banks and I've had a wonderful little reverie of curiosity as I've walked today.
You see it's one of the things I would love to do is to be able to have a keyhole into a different time or era and just see what it looked like.
I'd love to see what the river looked like before man was actually involved with this part of the world.
I would love to see what the river looked like when it was a thriving port and the ships could come upstream all the way up to Exeter Quay.
I'd love to see the river just a hundred years ago when there were different bridges that crossed it.
I just love this idea of the river being a constant and yet the changes around it have been quite vast.
It has me feel a little bit like the river is a metaphor for me in so much as there I am in my spirit and my sense of who I truly am flowing through the world and yet I am contained.
I listen to the messages that I pick up from family and friends and society and my culture.
You've got to excuse the noise there it's the the bins are being emptied down here on the the quayside.
I listen to those messages about who I should be and how I should turn up and respond and then I interpret those messages and I take on beliefs and attitudes and act accordingly and I just wonder what would it be like if I didn't do that and I hadn't done that.
What would it be like if I flowed with the intensity of who I was supposed to be in the world and I wasn't contained and I wasn't held in.
What if I could rage and flood when I needed to and and then just trickle in a beautiful calm way down to the sea when that was required as well.
So today is just a little reflection really and I find it quite hard to unpick my way through the beliefs I've picked up and worn over the years because they almost feel part of me but there is a running energy and spirit within all of us and I guess my curiosity and my request is your curious too is what is that running energy what is that energy and spirit that runs through you?
