Two weeks after Rigby Woods, and I'll be honest, transcribing this entry now: the handwriting is calmer. A find like the Rigby trainer puts a charge through the register and then the register settles back to its work, and this boot were the settling. Right boot, tan, on the bridleway above Scammonden Water. Laces missing, heel worn right down to the welt — a boot that had been walked hard and then been out in the weather a good while on top of that. Been there some time, is the honest dating, and I'll not pretend to better than that.
Breezy up top, as it generally is at Scammonden, with the motorway going below. You never quite stop hearing the M62 up there but you learn to set it aside, the way you set aside a clock ticking. The notebook makes the same observation and I see I've been making it for years, so happen it's less learned than I claim.
Flask conditions good. Six photographs taken, and two of them came out grainy even by my standards, which the notebook admits with what I'd call professional candour. I've kept all six. The grainy ones suit the subject, as I've always said, and a worn-out tan boot above a reservoir might suit grain better than owt else I've photographed. Sat a short while on the stool, more for the water than the boot, then packed up and home for tea. A sound, unremarkable entry, and after the August I'd had, unremarkable were welcome.
Written up August 2026, from the notebook.