PHOTO STORY 'THE PERMANENT WAY'
CO-DIRECTION / PHOTOGRAPHY / PERFORMER

The Permanent Way was photographed on an old train line in the Cotswolds on November 10, 2018. It features Alice Williamson as Agatha, Emma Lister as Phyllis and Sakari Mannisto as Clyde; three characters pursuing an unknown destination along a railway track.

1. If we keep following the tracks they’ll always lead us somewhere.

2. Clyde looked ahead to where their endless metal trail pulled into the horizon.

3. One thing was certain, they were running out of sandwiches. Phyllis sipped her tea.

4. Agatha glanced back at the dark sky that chased them but said nothing to the other two.

5. Clyde said: ‘We’re almost there’, even though each rotting sleeper looked the same as the last. 

7. So they walked—spurred on by the promise of a now distant idea. Or was it a memory? The sound of long ago waves heard in a seashell.

8. The rain was everlasting. They waited so long in the dark that time seemed to recede back into the tunnel with them.

9.  Weeds and flowers grew from the gravel and rusted tracks. ‘Even in the dark nature left a trail for us to follow…’ thought Agatha.

10. Finally a break in the clouds. Emerging from the tunnel at last they were met by the sun.

11.  The new sky seemed like a destination of sorts…’Have we arrived?’ asked Phyllis.

12.  If we keep following the tracks they’ll always lead us somewhere.


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