Lucky in Lockdown: On Home and Healing

“I am really, very lucky”. This thought had come unbidden to me, swimming amongst the goals and the deadlines and the uncertainty and the small pools of anxiety floating around my head at any given time during this strange period of lockdown. “I am really, very lucky”.

carclaze bridge

I was on my one allotted period of exercise for the day, something that could have become monotonous and even depressing by now without being able to drive anywhere.

I had become used to jumping into my car whenever I wanted. It was a game of sorts, finding an adventure in little hidden pockets of Cornwall that I had never visited before. I would sometimes plan where I wanted to go, but more often than not I would drive around for a while until I found somewhere that looked interesting. I became so used to doing this, always looking for somewhere new, travelling further and further afield, that I had forgotten just how lovely my local area could be.

par beach

I love Cornwall. I have always loved Cornwall, but I haven’t always loved my hometown of St. Austell. I am no more than a 4 mile walk away from an array of incredible beaches including Par sands and Porthpean, numerous fields and of course, the otherworldly and culturally significant clay trails. I am really, very lucky to live here but it did not always feel that way to me.

a view of Porthpean beach

When I was growing up, there seemed to be this underlying and toxic negativity surrounding St Austell, as if it wasn’t “cool” to be from here. I felt a bit trapped, this was my home and yet I could not wait to go to university and escape it. There was a narrative fed to us growing up in Cornwall, and I’m not sure who was doing the feeding, that you have to leave to be successful. I suppose it is the same sort of feeling shared by many young people in rural areas. That’s quite sad, really, isn’t it?

I certainly do not remember my parents telling me that, I do not remember anyone in particular telling me that and yet that pernicious thought loomed over me and my friends like an unwelcome weight. I am one of the last amongst my close friends to still be living in Cornwall. I moved back upon graduating and even when I was away from Cornwall, the tug of hireth pulled my heart back. It has become a real privilege over the last 4 years to rediscover my love for Cornwall and to embark on a journey of loving my hometown and the surrounding hamlets, villages and areas.

Treverbyn skytip

But I always did love the “clay trails”, those footpaths and bridleways weaving their way around disused china clay land like an adventure map. The iconic Treverbyn Skytip always made me feel at home and without being able to ever explain why it filled me with a sense of pride. Well, how could St Austell be so bad if we had something like this? Something unique? There was a reason this part of Mid Cornwall was once known as The Cornish Alps after all...I will neither confirm nor deny having climbed to the top of the old china clay waste tip growing up. Perhaps even numerous times…or perhaps not. Wherever you are in ”Snozzel”, it seems to be visible, commanding respect and admiration.

Treverbyn skytip and gorse

I didn’t really know anything about china clay then. I had visited Wheal Martyn before, I knew that family including my great grandfather had worked in the industry. But it did not really have any significance in my life, or so I thought. I was wrong, of course, St Austell and ‘’the clay country’’ is wed to the China Clay industry in many different ways. It is an important part of our heritage here, whether we realise it or not. How many of us have family members employed in the industry or live on old China clay land?

‘’I am really, very lucky”. There it was, clear as the sky above me (and doesn’t the sky look a little clearer now?). I waswalking along the Carclaze clay trails, on that once lunar, otherworldly landscape that now boasts the triumphant yellow and green of the gorse sprouting wherever it is possible to sprout. ‘’I am really, very lucky’’.

The gorse

I love clay country, I love the white paths and the vibrant, peculiar blue that fill the old clay pits. I love the defined, contoured landscape with its “hills” and “lakes” and the palpable sense of a story intrinsically linked to every part of it. The story of the china clay industry as a whole and each individual works in a smaller sense. There were many. There still are some.

I won’t regale you with the whole history of the industry here, you’ll have to come and visit Wheal Martyn Clay Works when this is all over and it is once again safe to so do. I’ve yet to mention that I work there now, and it’s an honour to do so, and has given me much to admire from Victorian workings to current working China clay pits. The landscape of the Clay Country has changed considerably over the last two hundred years and the China clay industry is the reason why. This used to be a popular filming location for science fiction dramas such as Doctor Who because it was pure white, unlike anything else you could imagine. It had a spooky quality, real and tangible but not of this world and especially not of Cornwall with our green fields, ancient standing stones and miles of sandy beaches.

littlejohns pit

I do not remember this alien world. By the time I was born in the mid-1990s the environmental efforts of Imerys, the largest china clay company in the world, were far past fruition. The wildlife and the flora of the area is largely down to these efforts. It seems fitting that an industry that has often been controversial, especially to environmentalists and fans of a more natural landscape, should also seek to heal that landscape and bring new life to it. But nature only needs so much input from us, before she takes the reins and finishes the job herself.

View of the surrounding landscape from Wheal Martyn

So, I will leave you with is this passing thought…

The land that we live upon can heal itself from any damage. Another perfect example that I can give you in Cornwall is the little ruined medieval church in the hamlet of Merther, which when seen from the outside looks like a gigantic sprawling tree, but is a testament to the quiet domination that nature can have upon the things that we leave well alone.

the church in merther

So much like the clay trails, and much like that lovely little church ruin, we can heal from this pandemic. There will be scars, there will be memories and there will be a story to tell about this period of history and all of our individual lives within that period. But we can heal…and we will.

Siân