This week’s challenge took some thought. I loved the concept, and wanted my destructive method to have relevance to my quest. Something with a connection to Clifton, which also provided a story idea.
I thought about dropping the cards from the top of Cabot Tower. Rubbing them against the side of the Victoria monument. The logistics and legality of these plans were foggy. Everything in my flat was too pedestrian, with no link to the local area. Sleep dropped away after three days of planning.
Then I thought back to my encounter on the Lookout Lectern. How there was still something to clear up. Something that may provide help.
A plaque at Sarah Guppy’s former residence marks her achievements. I must have walked past the house a thousand times without noticing. I would notice this time.
You can stand on the pavement outside the house, and think. If you choose to wear a tweed suit when doing so, then all the better. But not for too long. The current residents do not need a stranger standing outside with his eyes closed But in that short space of time I ruminated about the Suspension Bridge. What it meant to those who had designed and built that connection between the two cliffs.
The pressure built in the air again. Perhaps a roar echoed down the street. And instead of Victorian engineers, I recalled heading to the Downs in 2004, when Concorde undertook it’s last ever flight.
There is a famous image of the jet shooting over the Bridge, two pieces of local engineering in perfect hamorny. But I remember the crowds heading up like some kind of coronation, smushed together on the streets. The mixture of disposables, SLRs and early camera phones capturing the event. None as perfect as that one photograph.
And here lied the key to creation from destruction.
I dashed home. Formed a series of mini paper (or rather card) aeroplanes from this month’s selection, and threw them around the room. My technique was sloppy, and the flights lasted a few feet at best. But the seeds of a story germinated with every crash and clatter onto the floor.
Their backs are broken, and the noses are trashed. You can see from this month’s photo my cards are on the way to oblivion. And my flash fiction idea arrived on time like an exeprienced commuter.
Clifton continues to provide me with an ocean of information, history and culture to sift through, and slot together. But the year is running out. Perhaps I would have discovered more sooner if it wasn’t for the lockdown. There is every chance we will be trapped inside again.
I need to dive deeper to find the truth, and need to dive soon.
Story follows next week.
