High up to my right, I can see the oak on One Tree Hill, its shape unbalanced by the constant battering of the south-westerlies that curve across the Downs and pick up speed as they race inland. At this time of year, with animals in their winter quarters and walkers in their towns and cities, the tree is once again the solitary occupant of the hill. Despite its name, it is not so much a hill as a ridge or a barrow; lying between Lime End and Comphurst Farms, it runs parallel to the footpath behind Strawberry Field and shadows me as I make my way through the first hard morning frost of the winter. I have never seen it up close, but the tree has become a comfort to me; I feel its benevolence and protection whenever I pass and it has my admiration whether skeletal in winter or showing off the full bloom of its crown in high summer.
As the footpath rises, I can see beyond the hill to Flowers Green and the row of cottages behind the nursery’s now empty pumpkin field. Three summers ago, I worked in the garden of the house at the far end of the terrace, clearing nettles and brambles and cutting back hazel so that the owner could regain the view. Whether he felt the same pull of the lonely oak, I never had the chance to ask. He was rarely at home and was a late payer; I sensed that he was dissatisfied with my work as I was not engaged the following summer. His garden only stands out in my memory because a friend surprised me there one day: walking home, he had seen my vehicle outside and wandered in; we sat under the apple trees and shared my lunch.
Having, as usual, become disorientated on the Levels – the tributaries and irrigation channels continually diverting me from my objective – I abandon my plan to walk to the coast and turn and head for home by another route. At one point, the path is blocked by a tree freshly fallen in the week’s storms and I have to head across open fields. From a different perspective, the oak on One Tree Hill looks even more majestic and, when I approach it from a track that I am sure is not public (the spirit of Kinder Scout lives on), it is much larger than I imagined. Despite the sun now being as high as it will manage all day, the cattle trough in its shade is still topped with a sheet of ice and it feels a degree of two cooler up here than it did on the lower ground; the reality of its exposed position gives me a new respect for my sentinel tree.
