The solar system

We get off the train and meet Philip and Sharon halfway up the stairs on our way out of the station, and as we exchange a series of hugs I think that it’s ages since we saw them last, even though it feels like only yesterday. We drive to their new house taking what Philip calls “the scenic route”. Leaving the dual carriageway behind, we pass through a tunnel of trees and everything is green and fresh, the sun making fascinating patterns through the leaves. “This is where it gets beautiful” Philip says, and as usual he’s right; roundabouts and roadside Harvesters give way to fields full of lavender, tiny farms glimpsed from above as the car makes its way round the gently bending route towards the valley.

We all catch up in the car and fighting his way through the banter and interjections Philip takes us through the itinerary for our stay. It largely involves food, drink and mooching around, which sounds pretty perfect to me from where I’m sitting. “Of course, we can change any bit of it if you don’t like it” says Sharon from the driver’s seat, and I’m momentarily sad because I know how much thought she’ll have put into everything and I wish she had a little more faith. But that’s rich, coming from me. “Oh! And we can show you the solar system!” says Philip as, at the end of the journey, the car pulls into their road. It’s such a surreal, cosmic sentence, rich with baffling ambiguity, that I half hope the moment will pass and nobody will ask him to elaborate on it.

After lunch and a leisurely stroll, we reach the middle of Otford and the full meaning of Philip’s words becomes clear - it boasts a scale model of the solar system, with all the planets represented by plinths scattered throughout the village. Later on, for instance, we discover Neptune on Philip and Sharon’s road. Somebody has placed a bottle of Sprite on top of it, showing little respect for astronomy; at least we assume it’s Sprite, because although the bottle is full it doesn’t look much like the original contents. Most of the planets, though, are close to the village hall, somewhere on the flat green space where a game of cricket is playing out. As contests go it seems half-hearted but cricket always has done to me, so I have no way of telling how seriously they are taking it. It doesn’t matter anyway; this is what weekends in England are supposed to be like.

As we stand idly by the boundary taking things in, the ball clicks off a bat and pelts towards us, larger and heavier than I remember from school. Philip deftly stops it with his foot and picks it up as a fielder walks over to fetch it, in no hurry at all.

“Be careful, or they’ll ask you to join the team.” says Sharon, as he lobs the ball underarm to the man in white.

“Not with a throw like that.” I say. This too is rich coming from me.

“So where are these legendary planets then?” I ask Philip. I know the whole thing is likely to be underwhelming, but my curiosity has been piqued now. This has always got me in trouble, if you show me a ludicrous tourist attraction I’ve always found it difficult to resist. After all, a scale model of the solar system isn’t something you see every day, even if there is a reason for that.

“Can you see that white pillar over there just past the boundary on the far side?”

“What, the thing that looks like a bin?”

Philip chuckles.

“The thing that looks like a bin. Yes, that’s exactly it.”

The moment they chose to capture the positions of the planets was midnight on the first of January, 2000 and the first planet we see turns out to be Jupiter. I was expecting it to be further away so I am surprised to find it here, like a random stranger you weren’t expecting in a photograph full of people you know. But of course it’s not really a planet, it’s just a squat white pillar with a flat steel top, JUPITER engraved on it in handsome, neutral letters. It is brilliantly nothingy, and somehow affecting in its modesty. I can’t tell you how disappointed I would be if it had turned out to be flashy.

Walking towards the middle of the solar system we notice a cluster of white pillars, close together, and looking down we realise that the paths of the orbits have somehow been mown into the grass. We cross the dark circles and make our way to Earth. It looks no more habitable than any of its siblings, though there’s no real reason why it should. I take a close look at the top of the pillar, wondering why the moment doesn’t feel more thought-provoking or significant. I also fight, successfully I’m pleased to say, the urge to break into a rendition of Planet Earth by Duran Duran.

The information board is a treasure trove of facts few people need or want. I take some photographs of Philip, Sharon and Kelly staring at it and looking perplexed, and then I take a closer look myself once they have moved on. The model, like so many white elephants, was built to celebrate the Millennium and the blurb on the board was written by someone who is very proud of the project, which is how it should be. This model is the only one of its kind on this planet. We don’t yet know about other planets! it says, before adding solemnly It is intended that this model will be here for the next millennium. I find that faith sweet and reassuring – in nine hundred and ninety years the world will have run out of food and countries will have been drowned by the melted ice caps, but the Otford Solar System will still be there to remind us of the bigger picture. Who’s to say that that is such a terrible idea?

Will anything survive of me in ninety years’ time, let alone nine hundred and ninety?

My favourite quote is at the bottom of the information board: It is said that if you wipe a pillar top with a soft tissue, it brings good luck. I didn’t know there was space in the world for new traditions and superstitions. I suppose they were all new once, that there was a first person who carried a four leaf clover or refused to walk under ladders and risked looking stupid, but I’ve never actually witnessed an attempt to fabricate one before. That an old wives’ tale like this sits mere paragraphs after facts like the diameter of Saturn and the size of Jupiter’s red spot is oddly touching in a way I can’t explain.

I love the Otford Solar System. It’s a folly, pure and simple, and I have a massive soft spot for follies. I try to imagine the meeting of the Parish Council where this grand scheme was agreed, and decide that I’d love to have been a fly on the wall. It strikes me that any village in the country could have done this but that only this village did. It also strikes me that any village that can attempt something so deranged can’t be entirely bad. I think that in Philip and Sharon it may have found two perfect residents, and that perhaps in Kelly and me it has found two suitable visitors.

Last of all, we are drawn to the sun. Unlike the others which are flat, this pillar is topped with a gleaming chrome hemisphere. The four of us approach it and look at the fisheye reflections on its shimmering surface. I get out my camera again and try to take a picture which captures us all, standing around it like some kind of prog album cover. There are many changes of position, soundtracked by chatter and laughter, as I attempt to fit everybody in, before I decide I am satisfied and give the others permission to disperse. I look at the photos I’ve taken. In them, we look tiny and yet I know we’re not, even though the point of this is to help us to realise how small we really are. It is the only thing about the whole project that doesn’t quite work: standing there, united by our emerging friendship, the cricket going on next to us and all manner of life beyond, it still somehow feels like we are at the heart of everything.