Exodus of the Emmets

Yesterday afternoon, about 5 o'clock, I was walking along the Wharf and it totally bounced down with rain, like you could see the raindrops, not drops really more like knitting needles of rain, hitting the cobbles and ricocheting like the spears in that film Zulu off Michael Caine's tin hat. It was hitting the awnings above the shops along the Wharf with a tearing noise as if it was going to go through, and then sluicing off the edges right on top of the emmets sheltering underneath as if somebody was pouring buckets of water on them. Ha ha.

What with the rain and all the cars you had to be careful, you had a choice between getting rained on, having a load of dirty water sloshed up your legs by a car, or just getting run over. Yes, at 5 o'clock last night the Exodus of the Emmets was well under way, and like to think this rain was St Ives' way of waving them off. There was a near biblical line of cars all the way from Back Road West, down to the Sloop and almost as far back as the Alba, as all the emmets queued in the one way system to get out of town and begin the long back to wherever they come from, because today a load of the up-country schools go back and they were all those who'd left it till the last minute before going back home in the middle of the week.