Becoming Wurzel Gummidge.

I was due to have my hair cut during the week when lockdown was announced, so the day before the appointment the hairdresser rang to cancel. It’s now becoming uncomfortably long. Long hair doesn’t suit people who are thinning unevenly on the top, and I imagine one day there will be a couple walking up the lane while I’m taking the sun and watching the butterflies.

‘Why does that man have a scarecrow sitting in a chair at the top his lawn?’ one will ask the other.

‘Because he’s very strange,’ the companion will answer. ‘Rumour has it that he voted Labour at the last election. If only we could prove it we could justifiably chase him to the burning mill with pitchforks, but we can’t. That’s the trouble with secret ballots.’

And then the scarecrow will wave to them.