Relative time

After walking from Merthyr to Cardiff (27 miles) for Made in Spring and then traversing back by means of powered diesel railed sleigh (a train) home. As I sat in the carriage I was struck by the thought of time. Time is indeed relative, walking time is a different time to train time. A train is very ordered, very precise, it must be for trains to function. A result of this is your time upon a train is very definite, the time it will reach a stop is known, your journey time is accountable, you feel you must fill it, use it, prepare it, for the moment that follows, it’s a waiting time. Walking time is different, it’s more non useful, slow, and is really no time at all. Time passes on a walk but it's not noticeable, it happens but without the importance of noticeable points, there is no real need for it. Walking time is just walking time, it happens during the walk and whist the train counts the minuets, hours, seconds. The walk counts sunrises and sunsets, minutes and hours are something else, they belong someplace else.

On the second day we started at Taffs Wells train station and as we waited for the time of departure, trains came and went in accordance to their pre-designed time tables. Organised down to the minute of arrival to departure, as certain as the ticking clock and as we waited the train time counted down the second until our time of departure. 10:30 come and we started to walk and as we walked the predestined and ordered set of time began to slip and fade away with ever step we took until away from the train station we had left all that behind and was now walking in our own time, the time of just the walk. Upon the trail it ticked away someplace else, hours come and went, appointment and schedules were heeded too but for us all that belonged someplace else. We followed the course of the river down to Cardiff, through nature and land we strolled, watching the natural ways of life, horses in a field, ducks and birds upon the river bank, plants and animals going about their business and concerns ordered by impulse rather than scheduled. As we grew nearer to the city we began to notice more of appointment time appearing, runners and bikers passed and said hello to us on the path. These keep fit fellows tracking to the pace of their own personal bests. Onwards we walked until the city towers could be sighted above the tree line and then entering our final destination of Roath we marched, through the street’s passing and growing more and more into the city’s time. Coffee shop costumers waited for their beverages and bus riders advanced upon their progress. We then became drawn more and more into their time, the waiting for clear stretch of traffic to cross the roads, the apologising and moving out of the way of the city shoppers who mostly greeted us with an expression of mild curiosity as their busy city shopping time was suddenly interrupted by a line of red flag carrying slow time walkers. Then finally we reached Roath and Made in Spring and as we crossed the finish line into the excitement and thrills of the closed road, under the May King and Queen gaze did we finally leave and give back all points of walking time and re-entered city, scheduled, arranged, ordered time once again.
 

 In some ways that’s the importance of the Red Route march, the reclaiming of this time. The arts and cultural sectors are currently experiencing more cuts than a frantic, impulses, hyper child cutting away at some paper with no real clue as to what they are doing. In society too, zero hour contracts, unliveable shift patterns and lowing advancement prospects for a large majority of society the opportunity to enjoy the arts, just to find the time to visit a gallery or to just have a day to enjoy a walk is slipping from slow time into the ordered and necessity of the train time. Soon time to enjoy and be in slow time will be a privilege available to the few when the arts and this slow time need to be available to all. The Red Route march was an act to reclaim this slow time that is slipping away. I hope I’ll be able to hold the time to partake again next year. 

Red Route March eve

Less than 12 hours until the Red Route March through the South Wales Valleys to Roath in Cardiff, a distance of 25 miles, the second year Made in Roath has organised this cultural stroll for Made in Spring.

I made the journey last year along the Taff Trail. I also grew up in the valleys and  one of the proudest things I can say is that I am a valleys boy, I grew up alongside the Taff Trail too. I played on it as a kid, stumbled home upon it as a teenager and frequently made excuses not to walk upon it as an adult. It’s easier to do this as an adult, there is an abundance of reasons and excuses you can find not do something, especially if it's a cultural or leisure activity. There are so many excuses to choose from ranging from "I'm working" to “I'm far too busy with other projects", or the simple excuse of having a "quiet day". Its fairy easy to find an excuse not to walk along the Taff Trail by telling yourself “I’m going to have a quiet day and do it tomorrow”. We say these things to ourselves all the time and when the months and years have gone by we often realise that we possible have had too many “quiet days”. Quiet days have a nasty habit of adding up to a quiet life.

Another excuse I’ve told myself is the “well its not really my thing” when in truth I haven’t tried to find out if it is my kinda thing. I’ve quite often discovered that my kind of thing is actually pretty wide and encompasess quite a lot of actives that I first thought was “ definitely not my kinda thing”. Performance art for example, I strongly felt through out art college that performance art was not my kinda thing only to discover when I eventually attended a performance I rather enjoyed it and I now hold performance art as “one of my things”, joining the ranks of silent movies, American literature, ballet, radio 4, philosophy and Dolly Parton to name but a few things, which I now regard as “one of my things”.

That’s really what the Red Route March is about. It’s not simply about walking from one place to another, its about finding the time to enjoy our culture and heritage. My main memory from last year was the reminders of our heritage, you don’t occasionally see the odd historical item in the Valleys, history in the Valleys isn’t so much here and there but more under every foot step you take, as you walk, history walks with you. It doesn’t wait upon blue plaques on random street’s to occasionally catch your eye and mention a person or event but more warmly, welcomely beckons and invites you down strange alley ways and then hits you over the head with a big stick of history, then you wake up dazed and amazed, three days later on a boat to Murmansk not really sure how you got there but finding you quite enjoyed the ride. You don’t walk past history in the valleys, there’s so much of it you’re confronted by it at every step.

 Merthyr alone can clam the first Red flag being raised there and the start of the first train in 1804 which ended in Abercynon. Abercynon can clam one of eight German master spies caught there in WW1 and the Glamorgan canal home. Pontypridd had the longest train station in the world, the authors of the Welsh National anthem which began life as a poem defining the land of our fathers.

Not to mention the secret history of course. The unofficial history which ever valleys town boasts, the history that may not be strictly true but is still pretty entertaining, for examples Pontypridd has a street named Broadway, according to local legend a great actor is reportedly to of requested that his ashes be scattered on Broadway, unfortunately they thought he meant Broadway New York and ended up there but he really mean’t Broadway Ponty.  It’s of course probably not true but still an amusing urban myth that I told on last years walk. In return I remember hearing the tale of the man from Merthyr with a man shaped hole in his kitchen wall. Apparently the local police were in persuit of a person of a criminal nature, who they chased into this gentleman's home, the chase was so intense that the pursued failed to notice the quite noticeable feature in the man’s home of his kitchen wall and ran straight at and through  it, which of course slowed the man and allowed the lads in blue to apprehend there pray. The man now being left with a man size hole in his kitchen decided to keep it as it allowed quicker access to the kitchen and the house still has, to this day a man sized hole leading into his kitchen. This is the kind of local, personal, unofficial history you only hear on activities like the Red Route March, it’s the kind of history that you’ll never find in the official history books, or a documentary but lives and exists with the local people and personal word of an area. Another tale is the Granddad with the drift mine in his garden shed. It appears a Grandson had the somber task of pulling down his Grandfathers home made garden shed after his death. The shed was at the end of his garden and was placed up against the side of the valley.  When removing a back wooden wall panel he made a surprising discovery, the quite startling find of a small dark well constructed tunnel leading into the valley mountain side. Confused with this discovery he asked his Grandmother who informed him that during the miner’s strike of the 80s his Grandfather and his mates, to make some extra cash and get some fuel, dug and built a small drift mine leading into the coal stream of the mountain from his back garden shed. This he and his friends operated as a small mine until the strike ended. Which is pretty resourceful to be fair.

It’s these tales that stay with us about a place, unfortunately there is another side to the valleys that we should discuss but that's a better tale for after tomorrows march. In the mean time I walk tomorrow remembering this culture and these stories and look forward to being entertained by more tales and experiences on the march. So for now I shall wish you a good night/Nos da and hopefully see you tomorrow on the Taff Tail or in Made in Spring. 

 Best wishes Dai