Park of the week

115. Dalmeny Park

Dalmeny Park, in Tufnell Park, is a small, secluded park behind Victorian housing, originally reserved ‘for use by children and the elderly.’ It contains containing a playground, sandpit, grass and trees and benches. 
In the 1870s building was beginning to cover the area, which had been rural before that. By the 1890s much of the surrounding housing had been completed although land to the south of the park remained unbuilt on until the early Twentieth Century. The park was for the private use of the residents of the surrounding houses, but it’s now public, owned by the local authority. It’s a conservation area.

I saw it listed on a website among other Islington parks, without any details. I sometimes manage to see what’s in a park using the images available on Google Maps, but not this time. I took the chance that it’d have the sort of swing Jack likes, and it did.

It’s known locally as ‘the secret park’, and I’m not surprised. The entrance is between two houses, and because of my usual rotten sense of direction, I couldn’t find it. We walked up and down the round a few times until, with the help of the satnav, I noticed it. 

It’s a quiet, peaceful place. When we first arrived, we were the only people there and I sat while Jack went on the big swing, without anyone staring or commenting. Since my birthday last week. I’ve been wondering when ‘elderly’ begins. Ten years ago, the first of my series of (fourteen and counting) stories about an elderly couple was published, and I’m now older than my characters were at the start. I think, perhaps, it’s a matter of attitude as much as the physical side of it. Jack and I, a child, and an elderly person, both pedalled the roundabout shown below.

When we went, it was easy to find a distraction from my own problems and to relax into the space. I wish it were that easy now.

Judith Field

Dalmeny Park, 13-14 Dalmeny Road, London N7 0HH