When the rain stops and we find a world transformed

The recurrent showers of recent weeks has had us crouching under bushes for shelter.

Sweeping in from the Atlantic, they catch us on cliff tops where there’s often no more than a wind-bent sceac for protection. “Carry an umbrella!” I hear my reader say.

But an umbrella is somehow incompatible with cliff-walking. It’s also impractical, turned inside out by the wind as soon as it’s opened or snatched from the hand by a gust. As for a walking aid, a piece of a sceac itself is more appropriate.