Part 1
It was wonderful that Anne introduced me to Bruce McMaster, a gentle bower human from Kandos.
Anne and I arrived at McMaster’s shop around midday and meandered around the hundreds of pot plants in search of Bruce and the miniature horses which I couldn’t resist calling ponies.
To my delight we found them as they were huddling around in the shed all slopped with mud post rain, their little hooves all muddy and their manes drooping over their eyes. Bruce appeared from the doorway of the colossal industrial shed, backlit by green corrugated plastic, ‘industrial stained glass’ as Ann pointed out. Bruce and I chatted and discovered we are akin not only in our love for cats but we are also Mc Masters (well I am from my grandmother’s side).
We pondered the human geography of the Macmasters in NSW for a while, and I felt the warmth of the winter sun on my back. We all soaked up lots of sun, watched the cats frolic and I took these photographs.
Part 2: Alex Wiser took me on a tour to ‘the scorched earth site’ which is a subsiding piece of land on the side of a mountain. From a distance it floats in the landscape as a dead shape. From beneath the rock and soil there is a coal seam burning, subsiding as the smoke rises.
Alex and I got tempted to walk further and further out beyond the fence all the while telling each other to be careful, each time feeling the earth sink and slide under our feet. If sink holes are your nightmare then this would have been a little day terror that smiled like soot.
