Town Buildings

The river Thames flows deep in its current quietness, skirting the centre of the small town where I live. It somehow feeds life to the streets of Abingdon when my morning cycle ride takes me through the town for my morning exercise. Of course, it's still much quieter than five months ago, and I like that, but one thing I truly prize is seeing old and young alike striving against the tendency to couch-watch to 'keep up with the world' whilst snacking and such. The combination of not snacking and exercising for many is less a lifestyle happening whereas I think it is extremely important and without it I fear I would be most unwell.

Currently, I have never seen the town so alive with exercise since I moved here. I might say exercise seems to have increased a hundredfold within the last five months. Walkers, runners, cyclists and more now jog, cycle, walk and run at pace. I include myself in there somewhere. My cycling for a good hour is 10% of my daily self-control where I drive myself to get my heart pumping. This has become an essential and non-negotiable activity for me. A time of reflection and thoughtfulness, planning and objectivity go with the territory. I just designed a floorlamp from start to finish including the joinery and the size of stock while riding my bike. This is what I love about my life!

I wanted to show off the town a little because it does have some lovely spots; the scenes are seasonally nice and combined with my ramblings and forays into nature I feel at home here. I always stop to look down into the Thames where I see small fish teeming below and then a shoal of big guys as big as my forearm including my hand float nonchalantly through. With the only natural predator being men with sticks and strings of filament they just go on growing unchallenged in the cleanest river in Europe. I watch fishermen from the opposite bank lift smaller fish in their landing nets quite frequently. People are indeed filling in the gaps with sporting and hobbies. My life of woodworking is what I do every day, but these other sports are important to everyone in their different spheres.