Trevorthelockeeper’s Weblog

I used to be able to go for long periods without sleep. There was a time when I was young, I was in London, and sleep was for those who couldn’t let a youngster put one and a half lumps of sugar in their tea without mentioning the war. To cut a long story short, but without a war, I got older, and reasons for a lengthy spell in bed became more to do with sleep and the flu. The month was October, the swollen river stood testament to the atrocious weather we’d been having.

Megan the pup (still only a few months old) decided to go exploring one evening. An hour went by but I was completely unconcerned by her absence. She was first generation working stock and I’d already decided not to get too attached to her. Sixty two minutes went by and I was frantic with worry. In my mind she’d got completely lost and was lying in bits on a railway line, on the A4174, in the swollen river, a hundred and two different scenarios, with me playing the villain in them all. The weather was deteriorating again as I donned my waterproofs and wellies. I searched everywhere, all night, in the pouring rain. By ten to eight in the morning I returned home for the final time, and completely exhausted I de-donned the waterproofs and went to bed. Ten minutes later Megan ‘yippety yipped’ to be let in. I nonchalantly tore down the stairs as I prepared my best ‘where the flippin’ hell have you been’ force five expression. It didn’t make it past the door frame as a perfectly dry and mystified puppy got pummelled, bounced, kissed and subjected to lots of baby talk. I had a few things to do, all achievable on ‘slow ahead’, promising myself a bit of shut eye later on.

A few hours later the great storm of October 2000 hit. It continued all evening and most of the night. A friend in the Environmental Agency phoned. He told me the storm was a monster. I said I knew as I was standing in it. As my friend was in a nice cosy response centre with wall to wall computer screens, coffee machines and the comforting thought of lots of compensation should anyone break a nail, would I keep them updated? Could he pass on my number to every one of his four hundred colleagues who were manning the emergency help desk? I was desperate for sleep but agreed. I also had some planning of my own to do. The river was not only breaking records it was having designs on my CD collection. I watched the river rise some more.

The phone rang. What were the water levels doing? I told them. The phone rang again. I was informed as to what the river levels were doing. The phone rang. What was the river going to do and when? I made a suggestion. The phone rang. I was informed as to what the river was going to do and when. Oh for goodness sake. I think if I’d started a rumour about a three legged Shire horse called Dobbin rescuing stranded boaters and was desperately in need of refreshment  the phone would have run minutes later and I would have been asked to boil up some barley. The phone calls went on every hour for the next forty eight hours, during which time my knackered little phone and its two rechargeable batteries had had it’s fill of water levels, flooded cottages, fire brigades, ship abandonment’s, rescue helicopter priority lists, three legged horses (ok, I was tired and finally weakened), drowning sheep and the falling share price of  Amalgamated Guinean Mushrooms Inc. (somebody on the EA help desk wasn’t pulling their weight). The fourth day without sleep found me and two friends out and about in my dinghy cutting, retying, strapping, baling, ferrying, whilst dodging  whole islands of debris the size of a small housing estates, which in fact some of them later turned out to be.

After everything that could be done had been done, as well as a few things that were too much fun not to do, I retired to bed. It was an exciting few days that I wouldn’t have missed for the world. That should have been the end of the story  regarding my fatigue. Blow me down if Joe (the then ten year old) didn’t get gastric flu and came in to remind Mrs Lockeeper and me every hour for the next three nights. I’m feeling sleepy just remembering it all. 

My stretch of the Bristol Avon starts at Hanham Lock and twists and winds it way for eleven lovely miles, rising about twenty feet through six locks, to Bath. Three of the locks, (Keynsham, Saltford and Weston) I can drive to very easily. Kelston Lock requires a bit of ‘off roading’ through farmland and Hanham Lock is so close I’ve had to learn to dampen the enthusiasm when getting out of bed. Then there’s Swineford Lock. A visit to Swineford requires more thought than the rest of them put together. First of all I have to drive through a sewage farm. This is heavily guarded by an electric sliding gate that simply oozes attitude and is so formidable it was probably bought second hand from a South American drug baron who’d been paranoid since birth as well as having had more than his fair share of door to door double glazing salesmen. The gate has since been ordered to stop being so threatening and snappy, presumably under threat of being lowered to the ground and condemned forever to the gate hell of being used as a cattle grid. This is just as well, because before this happened you had to pull up to a white line and wait. You then felt the chilling stare from a particularly malicious  electronic eye. So chilling you could hear the question it was asking itself. Was this white truck carrying a band of fearless and particularly inarticulate American Marines who would, once released, ‘Hut hut hut’ their way to spraying some rather lewd graffiti about the natural processes of the residents of Bath on the pump house wall? I mostly  passed the test as the gate usually opened, slowly, malevolently and with an air of something impregnable that knew it had complete control over your possible exit. Just inside the gate there was a string of abandoned vehicles. I never dared looked inside any of them in case I found a skeleton. On one occasion I was placidly going for the increasing gap that was just wide enough for me to pass through, (for placid, read ‘foot hard down, screaming engine, first gear selected, drop clutch’) when the gate suddenly chose to nurture its feminine side. I was halfway through and the gate changed it’s mind. This type of situation was not totally alien to me what with me being married to Mrs Lockeeper, but at least under those circumstances I didn’t have to explain viscous sky blue paint deposits down either side of the works van. After negotiating the sewage farm version of the front door belonging to the father of a particularly cherished daughter, the drive past all the filter beds accompanied by an aroma that levels paupers and peerage alike, is relatively restful.

On the other side of the sewage farm there’s another gate. This leads into a field across which I must drive to Swineford Lock. This field is part of a large and top secret farm that’s a sanctuary for animals that would, if ever their existence were publicised, send an animal behavioural psychologist blubbering to the offices of the nearest evolutional theorist. In this field there is a herd of heifers that are so intelligent I’ve taken to proffering the kids home work every time I can’t answer one of their questions. By the time I get there they’ve already been semaphored of my imminent arrival. They crowd against the double gates which open inwards. I undo the padlock and drive the truck slowly into the gates forcing them open. Now completely surrounded by a heaving mass of black and white Mensa graduates (Bovine Division) and with gates getting sky blue paint deposited on them, I wind down the window and suddenly give them the finale of the 1812 Overture at full volume. They dash off, pretending to be startled, for enough of a distance minus one metre for me to get through, out of the van in time to close the gates and get back in the van. They dash back. After about three attempts, I win. This is because I’ve put on a size thirty four over coat, and like a demented Dracula, flapped my way towards them, buying myself time and distance before dashing back to the van. I then have to get across the field. The van is buffeted, licked, nearly overturned and accelerated until I then reach another gate where I have to do it all again.

 The tricks they play never cease to amaze me and I wish I had more time to tell, but I think the reader might get the message. If the reader has, please now read this offering backwards because I have to go through it all again in reverse in order to get out again.