Figure in a Landscape

figure
Originally uploaded by tamaranth.

When I see a path, I wonder who walks it, where it goes, how unthinkingly familiar it is to somebody.

In the desert, signs of life are sparse but persistent: that path I eyed, curving around the corner of an outcrop, might last have been walked a century ago. (Though chances are that anything close to the road is in use.)

The narrow twisting paths, punctuated with stacked stones from field-clearing, were very different to the hollow tracks of the Downs: I suppose the soft chalk and the relative wetness of Sussex makes erosion more rapid.

Anatomy Question

Twice, lately, I've fallen over and gashed my knees. I don't get any bruising at all around the gashed / painful area (unlike ladymoonray, who gets quite spectacular bruising in similar cases): instead, I get a small round patch of bruise about a third of the way down my calf, on the inside.

Why?