Walking the seven sisters

We walked all day through meadows of silver
Over the cliffs where the white gulls play
And we rolled down the hill to the inn at the end of the day
(You and John Peel)

 When I stayed with my grandparents in Eastbourne in the 1970s, I walked many of the paths across the downs around Alfriston and Wilmington. But for some reason, every time I set off with my grandfather we took the bus into the town centre and changed onto the bus that ran up to Beachy Head.

Heading west we would leave behind the crowds and trace the vertiginous path along the clifftops and down to Birling Gap, where if time was on our side we would scramble down the cliff to the beach while fulmars hung in the air above us. Back on the cliff path the grass glowed silver in the morning light and stonechats stood sentry on the gorse bushes.

I always associated my grandparents with walking. My very first memory is of walking out of Rochdale with my grandmother who had come to care for me while my mother was giving birth to my sister. They had already stayed for my own birth; when my mother went into labour, my grandfather had been walking Kinder Scout with my father, celebrating the mass trespass some 20 years earlier. My early childhood holidays were punctuated by walks across Wilshire downs. And once my grandparents moved from Enfield to Hampshire following my grandfather's retirement, we would walk up to Hambledon to watch cricket on the pitch that had been central to the game's development in the 18th century.

Beyond Birling Gap we would continue up and down the dry valleys that separate the sisters. Michael Dean leads up to Bailey's Hill, and Flathill Bottom up to Flat Hill. On sunny days the views west along the coast were breathtaking. On a foggy day we would stray further inland through the sheep folds, and my grandfather, already into his seventies, would lie on the damp grass and roll under the wire fences.

Beyond Flagstaff Point I invariably began to doubt the number of sisters, and indeed have never quite believed there are just seven of them. And with equal regularity, as the walking rhythm led to gentle conversation, my grandfather (a Telegraph reader, 'for the cricket reports') would ask whether I shared his belief that one day socialism would come.

The sisters end at Cuckmere Haven, and from there we would walk inland to Exceat to meet my grandmother in the pub for lunch before taking another bus back to Eastbourne.

Many years later I wrote ‘You and John Peel’  in recognition of the role that both my grandfather and John Peel played in helping me to survive my teenage years. Once I had completed the song, I realised that it was almost entirely about my grandfather, and was on the point of changing the title. But in one of those strange coincidences that seem to follow my songwriting around, in the afternoon before I planned to play the song in public for the first time I bumped into a friend who told me that John Peel had just died. I could hardly leave him out in such circumstances.

You and John Peel

We walked all day through meadows of silver
Over the cliffs where the white gulls play
And we rolled down the hill to the inn at the end of the day
Long summer days echoed with leather on willow
My childhood days could never end
Through my teenage torments you were still my best friend
You gave me hope
When others were dragging me down
And I was alone – you and John Peel

We talked all day about cricket and politics
You said that socialism would come one day
And I dreamed a world that was fashioned your way
On the old people’s ward you said you would never come home
And honesty ploughed up your honest brow
Half a lifetime on I miss you now
You kept me sane when I was close to the edge
And I was lost – you and John Peel

You never lost your temper or your cool
But I learnt more from you than I learnt at school
And you gave me the shoes for my journey through life
And I never thanked you half enough
Now I spend my days far from meadows of silver
Far from the cliffs where the white gulls mew
Further still from the days I spent with you

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