Recollections of the past , visions of the present

She had walked and walked, almost without thinking, just allowing her feet to take her where they wished, away from that place and him. Finally stopping and looking around, she found herself somewhere she vaguely recognised .... a smile began to cross her face. She hadn't been here for years - at least, not as an adult - the foreshore.

Sitting down on a dilapidated bench, she looked around her, out towards the water of the harbour. In front of her, there was a group of children playing at the waters edge: throwing stones into it, trying to make them bounce across its surface; running up and down the jetties , laughing and giggling; splashing around, trying to make each other wet. She started to smile to herself again ... and slowly, in her mind's eye, another picture formed ... that of a little girl, shoe-less and slightly muddy, scrambling along amongst the shingle and rocks looking for shells and crabs, calling out to her Mum and Gran sitting on the grass bank above her, under the shelter of those huge old trees. Blinking, that vision started to fade away, and the present reappeared .... the trees disappeared, no longer there , the grass bank was now just a piece of unkempt waste ground, and the little girl was just a flashback in her mind from a simpler time ... but she was no longer so little, and life was no longer that simple.

Sitting there, just looking and contemplating the view, other thoughts and recollections crept into her mind. Much had changed around here, but much had appeared to have stayed the same. The castle across the harbour was still there, guarding that shoreline as it had been for millennia - but now it was partly hidden from view by rusting unwanted warships. Above this the hill still stood, looking protectively down over the whole area, its flanks curving down to and around the harbour like two protective arms, the surface of its cut chalk face gleaming in the spring sunshine. This was a welcome and comforting sight to her, for when she saw that special, familiar vista of green and white while travelling along the motorway, it was always a sign she was almost home. Adjusting her gaze, she noticed other things. The pub along the shore road was still there too, but where before it backed onto unused MOD land, now new apartments and expensive looking new homes stood there. It was as if a whole new town, admittedly a tiny one, had sprung up from nowhere. The skyline elsewhere around the harbour edge had changed also - other flats, houses, buildings now rose into the blue where formerly there was nothing but green hill or white clouds - and of course, near the harbour mouth, there was now the tower . The tower was new, very new and very large - you could not really miss it wherever you were in the town. The view of it here was a little different though to elsewhere - she had not seen it like this before. Despite its size, it did not seem out of place ... mimicking the masts and rigging of the yachts of the marina around its base ( if on a much, much bigger scale ), it seemed to fit in ... a modern sentinel to watch over that end of the harbour, much as the castle and hill has done at the opposite end .... old and new in some sort of balance.

Balance ... if only she could find some in her life ... her thoughts came full circle back to the present, her present. It was growing cooler, the sun had disappeared behind the gathering clouds ... time to move. She got up from the bench and took one final look at the harbour and its surroundings. It had evolved, it had changed , but it was still basically the same. The same could be said about her .... and, now she realised, about him too. Time to go home now .... and with that, she turned her back on the foreshore and slowly walked away.