Right now there are no children or young people at Pilsdon which is something of a shame. Having kids around tends to cause more noise, more mess, more questions, more tantrums, and generally more fun. There have been children at Pilsdon in the past, and in fact any day now we are going to have a brand new child burst onto the scene. Laura and James* are having their first baby and today is Laura’s due date, which of course means everybody is bubbling over with excitement and anticipation. Laura herself has been calm enough to teach me the basics of Mahjong this evening.
When the little bundle of fun does arrive, James will take a couple of weeks paternity leave and will be handing over his duties to others during that period. I’ve somehow been chosen as the one to take on responsibility for the wood-fired heating and hot water system. This is an extraordinary piece of engineering which was installed last year at Pilsdon to service the renovated “East Wing” block. It has three large sturdy units that manage to combine high technology (digitised temperature readouts, intelligent switching of heat sources to maximise energy efficiency) with the primeval technique of chucking a few logs together and setting fire to them. Once the mantle of chief-wood-burner falls upon my shoulders, I will be required to enter the boiler room each evening, check the temperature of the super-insulated water tank above me (not by dipping my elbow in apparently) and if below 50 degrees C then I literally have to make a fire within the main unit using bits of wood and paper, and a match. Once it is burning merrily away, I shut the unit and leave it; over the next few hours it will reach its peak and then die away to nothing, hopefully having heated the stored water sufficiently for everyone’s showers the next morning.
Another of James’ regular tasks that he is handing to me, in this case more permanently, is that of cleaning Pilsdon’s reservoir filter. All of our water comes from a spring-fed reservoir in the hill above us which we share with a couple of our neighbouring farms. Rather than the beautiful lake that may have been conjured up in your mind’s eye by the word “reservoir” this is a purely functional concrete storage tank with a corrugated iron cover, above which is a brick-built filter system with a complicated set of chambers, some of which are filled with gravel. Due to the accumulation of silt this gravel needs a good clean every two weeks with a shovel and buckets of water. Although this may sound like a tedious and tiring job it is easily compensated by the stunning vista of Marshwood Vale laid out below and out to the sea in the distance. It is such a steep hill that coming back down from the reservoir we found ourselves actually above, and close to, a hovering kestrel on the look out for prey.
Water from the hills, energy from the trees. It takes some effort to make use of these local natural resources but such an approach is being tried by more and more communities of all sizes in this age of increasing insecurity. The Transition Town Initiative (www.transitionnetwork.org) is a great example of this in the UK, do check it out if you haven’t already.
*I’ve changed people’s names for confidentiality reasons.
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