Country diary: the edgelands, early on a teen-free morning

‘Youthful voices shout in lurid colours along its dark brick walls, a golden daubed heart is badged with the slogan “Live ya life!”.’ Photograph: Derek Niemann

Generations of young people have crossed the tracks here for an out-of-town experience. They are drawn to the edgelands, those places that often smack of dereliction and abandonment, the adult-free margins that become briefly central to their lives.

Beyond the pavements, the street lights and houses with disapproving windows, the railway bridge is a conduit to the countryside. Youthful voices shout in lurid colours along its dark brick walls, a golden daubed heart is badged with the slogan “Live ya life!”

‘… the paths reduced in places to gloopy threads …’ Photograph: Derek Niemann

There is light woodland on the other side of the bridge. Tree canopies lock branches in pretty arches over a road into the country, which curves ahead and sweeps out of sight. It once went by the innocent and knowing name of Lovers’ Lane.

Tyres of cars for which it seems no road is ever wide enough have muddied the margins, grinding out milled edges. Narrower wheels with lighter treads have veered off to the side, running along broad paths into what the locals call the Sand Hills. Historically, builders from the town dug deep for sand, leaving a mass of hillocks and hollows that in time scrubbed over with trees and bushes. In the centre, a flat expanse of partly grassed sand the size of a cricket pitch hosts the town’s annual firework display.

Over the rise behind this public arena, the trees and bushes grow denser, the paths reduced in places to gloopy threads, the uneven ground and fallen branches thickly coated with moss, the sunken hollows now ponds full of silty water. Town teenagers have marked their presence within this dank hinterland in a scatter of drinks bottles and tin cans.

‘On a fallen tree trunk at the water’s edge someone has balanced a half-full beer can.’ Photograph: Derek Niemann

The wood runs out at the largest pond whose far side is fringed with reeds, a curtain to the farm fields beyond. On a fallen tree trunk at the water’s edge someone has balanced a half-full beer can.

I pour out the contents and fill my bag with a dozen or so more cans and bottles on my way back – clearing up after the kids. It is probably OK to be here early in the teen-free mornings. Later, I would be invading their space. Live ya life!