The Ned Wood Archive

Sam  

Sam isn’t asleep.  He hasn’t been asleep for an hour or so.  Just snoozing.  He looks at his alarm clock again to see whether he can get up yet.  Yes he can.  Well, he could have got up earlier, but what would be the point?  He’s gonna have to get up before 6 the next day so this is his last chance for a lie in.  For Sam, a lie in is anything after 6:30.  At his age the body clock doesn’t really know lie ins.  You always wake up at the same time every morning and you can never get back to sleep.

He got down on the Monday, so he’s already had one morning of lying waiting for the clock to catch up with him.  Waiting for the clock to get near enough to seven so he can get up.  It’s about getting the balance right.  You need the sleep.  You want to stay up late and enjoy yourself.  You need to get up early for your shifts.  At his age, there’s only so much candle you can burn and there is only one end you can burn it at.

Many of the crew get here on the Sunday and treat it as a nice long holiday with a bit of work in the middle.  Four days of work in the middle of ten or more days break.  A free campsite, plenty of entertainment, and just a few hours earning your keep.  Sam’s got four shifts starting at 7am on the Thursday.  He’s like most of them – working in the middle.  There are a few that have already started work.  And some that don’t start till the Monday after the festival.

When he can’t lie in his bag any longer, he gets up and emerges from his tent.  He rolls round to the shower block and has a long, luxurious shower.  When the festival is in full swing and the majority of the recycling crew have their shifts, the shower block is fairly busy.  This morning there are only a couple of other people there.  He takes his time getting dressed.  It’s drizzling, so there’s no rush.  He takes his time over breakfast, too.  Another perk of working on the crew: a massive mess tent with hot meals provided morning, noon, and night.  And they’re free, twice a day, when he’s got shifts.

It’s still pretty early when he heads out of the campsite.  The crew campsite is right up at the top of the site, beyond the Pyramid Field, next to the farm.  Inside the fence, but out of bounds for ordinary mortals.  Sam goes through the gate next to Worthy FM at the top of Pyramid Field and into the festival proper. He sees it all stretched out in front of him.  His eyes scan the crest of Pennard Hill across the valley where he can make out the tents of Worthy View between the parade of trees lining the top of the hill.  A bit to the right is the world famous sign, put there to remove any confusion in the minds of anyone who thought they might be at Reading or Leeds and were wondering why there were people here over fifteen.  Far off to the right, in the distance, a giant’s hop from the end of the ridge, is the Tor itself, patiently waiting to star in a thousand iconic photos.  And between him and Pennard Hill is the burgeoning town itself.  The brightly coloured venue tents and stages stand out between the trees across the valley floor.  Immediately in front of him the camping grounds facing the Pyramid stage are almost empty.  There’s the lock up tent and the food stall to his left surrounded by the tents of the folk who’re gonna work there.  There’s the campsite wardens’ encampment down the hill in front of him.  Apart from that, it’s mostly empty.  But not for long.  To the left of his track are the vast lush green spaces of Big Ground and Kidney Mead just waiting to be filled.  

He walks down the hill, under the pylons, towards the stage.  He’d spent much of the Tuesday walking around the site, watching the various crews getting their various constructions ready.  To walk round Glastonbury when the festival isn’t on is a rare delight; whether it’s during the build or during the break; whether it’s when the crowds have gone or have not yet appeared.  You’ll have hares smile nervously at you from the hedgerows and birds broadcast blithely for you from the boughs. Outside the festival dates, the land is yours. Yours alone. And yet, at the same time, the festival is ever present.  It’s always there: the songs and the voices, the joy and the laughter, linger on, echoing from the trees and the fields. Relics of festivals past and promises of festivals yet to come.  

This morning he’s going to watch the punters arrive.  By the time he gets to the iconic tree that faces the Pyramid stage, there are already groups of campers springing up out of the ground to grab a prime pitch.  Looking back, he sees the gradually growing flow of humans leaking from the dirt track through the gaps in the hedge behind to his left.  Still a trickle at this time in the morning.  Though he isn’t sure what the time is.  Is it 8 yet?  Maybe the gates are open and these are the first folk coming through.  Maybe these are folk from the crew taking advantage of being inside the fence to grab a prime site for their mates.  

He walks down to the bottom of the field, down the track that passes along to the left of the big stage itself and from there left through the markets.  There are signs telling him that this stretch of track will be a one way system when the crowds are out and about later in the week.  That’s a new thing this year.  The formality of it.  Previously it’s been a bit ad hoc.  Sam tells himself he needs to memorise this one way thing so he can get around the site quickly when he needs to.  He’s wondering how it’ll all work out when this is packed with the masses.  Without the crowds, he can get from one end of the site to the other in half an hour.  Normally, he has his own routes to bypass the bottle necks when it’s busy.  Like going across to the Circus and Theatre Fields to miss the crushes closer to the Pyramid.  Is this new one way system going to scupper that?  We’ll see.  Today, however, it’s just him and the odd worker in their high viz down here.  

He goes through the town centre and comes out by the Glade crossroads.  He sees the bright green expanse of Pennard Hill Ground in front.  Another empty campsite.  As with Big Ground just three or four groups have managed to get this far.  Sam’s aiming to get up to the sign before it gets too busy with punters.  The legendary Glastonbury sign, way up Pennard Hill in front of him, past the rest of the camping, where he’s gonna watch the invasion as it really gets going.