25th The Larches, Wrentham, 20th August 1980
A day trip to Lowestoft, the most easterly town in England. We parked ourselves on the sea-washed sand. The behaviour of people on beaches is fascinating.
Within the limits set by the size of the beach, the unwillingness to walk far and getting the proper social distance from their neighbours, families stake out their little territory. Nobody bothers them – the accidental intrusion of balls and bodies across the invisible boundary is usually accepted with good grace. Those who had staked their claims early were very patient and a breach of the rules by intruding groups was met by only raised eyebrows and resigned smiles. Very British. In France we saw cordons of pine cones claiming beach space.
Around us the sense of modesty, or beach propriety, varied. On one side a mother breast fed a toddler of about two. Her aged parents, she in top coat and knotted hat, he in jacket, waistcoat and flat cap, looked out to sea in silence from their deck chairs, pretending not to notice. What were they thinking? Perhaps for them it was just something else in a changing world they no longer understood. On the other side a group of six teenagers, locals from their strong Norfolk accents, went through contortions with towels and windbreaks to hide themselves while they changed. Later, by the Punch and Judy, someone forgot that windbreaks screen you from only one side