Random reminder

Press, 28 August 1979, Page 25

Random reminder

BOTTLED WATER

To cycle alongside the Avon River is to observe human activity beside which the Rhine is merely a chemical outfall, the Thames no more than a trout hatchery, the Mersey simply a latter-day Styx upon which ferries ply, and the Waimakariri itself just a shingel grinder. All human life is here — cm, and in, and under, and around the Avon River. The person who is tired of the Avon River is. tired of life. The noblest prospect a suburbanite sees is the high road that leads him to the Avon. And so on ... to the limit of the attacking power of a well-equipped Dictionary of Quotations. To cycle alongside the Avon is to share the give-and-take of day-to-day comradeship “Oi. Pimpleface.” she shouted. “Leave off dumping your grass clippings. On the opposite bank, a suburbanite whose noblest prospect had been the high road which led him to etcetera, shovelled all the faster, after adjusting the sack over the number plate. “I’ll tell on you.” she shouted. Crash tinkle. Empties. Splash. A dead dog. The man paused before driving off. A word ... A smile ... A gesture. To cycle alongside the Avon is to be close to the raw reality of life. Serious me n , wet-suited, face-masked, schnorkelled, searched systematically. She ran down to the Baking Powder Bandsand landing. “Are you looking

for a gun? Has there been a murder, a robbery?” One man straightened. “No.” he said. “We are looking for antique bottles.

A family party with — what? An upright vacuuum cleaner? A porridge bowl on a walking stick? A very small, silent grass trimmer? Beep, it went. Quack, went the ducks. Dig, dig, dig, went the ycfung man with the kneeling mat and the trowel. Is that a mine detector? What have you found? The lady showed her. Chocolate, the metal foil therefrom. Pure geld as allegdly smoked by the Queen, the metallic packages thereof. ■Bottles, the metallic closures therto. One cent. And a threepenny bit. Look, mum, said the digger. An aluminium identity disc, home made, engraved Illegible on one side and Christs College on the other. Once, he said, replacing the turf, once we found a First World War medal and I got $32 for it.

To cycle alongside the Avon is to see children at play, if to wade waist deep in winter water, poking at the ooze with sticks is “play.” “Are you looking for antique bottles?” she called from her bridge. “Stolen bicycles? Sunken boats?

“Nah,” said the children. “We are the Sweeney, and we are looking for the gun. We are looking for bits of bodies, all chopped up. There has been an’ Orrible Murder, and you’re next, so watch it.”