This is a small meditation upon the fragility & fleeting nature of life and an encouragement, from one who is becoming old, to fix your gaze upon what you can be & never to stop.

I found a couple of houses on my last survey that appeared to be abandoned. The one above was particularly poignant because of it’s 2nd floor portico; I could imagine the owners and their guests in days past, standing with cool drinks on hot, balmy summer evenings, gazing across the vista of the fields of Marshall Hill as it fell away below them (Marshall Hill is one of the taller hills in Nottingham, and the houses that now cloak the hill are worth many millions of £ GBP). Today, the house is unloved & ill-kept, hedges, bushes and trees growing to the skies and hiding the house from view most of the time.

So how does such a fine house end up alone & unloved? I know nothing of this house, but did discover the story of a large area of Brownfield land near Porchester Road. It was prime development land, but the person that owned it was now without family & ensconced within a Residential Home for those with dementia. My father had vascular dementia following a heart attack so I know that well. The typical lifetime for someone resident within a Home is 2 years, but it also may be 2 decades. In the meantime, if they have no-one else their property rots. It seems to be a common issue, if my experience across the last 5 months is anything to go by.

I’m sorry that this turns out a touch morbid, but it does seem that in mapping all human life is there.