Six days at Haughtongreen bothy for a work party. We’ve been looking after the bothy officially for maybe 2 years now, and our work has been confined to keeping the paintwork up on exterior surfaces, and a bit of light work replacing roofing slates — but the bothy was in sore need of love, especially after someone stole pretty much every part of the stove that wasn’t bolted down, and at least one part that was.

The work party itself was weeks and weeks in the planning — most of it undertaken by Sam, who moved basically the whole firmament to make sure that everything needed was in place when the first volunteers arrived.

I feel a little bit out of place when we get started: I hadn’t been much involved in the planning due to a frustratingly difficult last few months at work, and I find myself now among folks I don’t know well, out in the middle of nowhere, in a steady drizzle. Morale is low to start with, but as soon as the tools come out and the work gets started it makes a leap forward, buoyed by intermittent sun across the crags.

We spend the next six days ferrying tools and equipment back and forth across the half mile of moor to the forest track, cleaning windows and painting walls, adjusting stone flooring, strimming a year’s worth of nettle growth, and building a couple of new sleeping platforms. Over that period, 10 people (including Ghyll, a bona fide person) get their hands on work around the bothy. By the end, the building is unrecognisable for its former grime and smoke: bright and tidy inside, a brilliant spot for a brew or a kip.

I feel as though I’ve been transported by the time spent out of doors. I don’t check my phone for days at a time; I am present with the people and the work around me. I no longer feel much of a difference between the inside and the outside. I think this is partially a function of falling into the rhythm of this life (bedtime at sunset, 8:30pm) and partially a function of the nice weather. I don’t want to leave.

On the drive home, I almost feel culture shock rejoining the highway, tooling around between terraced houses and corner shops. This will all pass, I know, but I think there’s some core of meaning right at the centre of things, here, which I’m struggling to hold on to, days later. Maybe an extension of what I was saying about friction; maybe less friction so much as a narrowing of options. Sylvia Plath’s fig tree comes to mind here — I know that I’m privileged to be sitting in the tree — but I think that, right now, I wouldn’t mind so much if maybe the world wasn’t so wide open.