The roof above the roses

An original literary non-fiction-style account of watching a thatcher at work on a cottage roof.

From the lane, the roof seemed to have grown over the cottage. Its edge dipped above the windows, and a thick ridge lay along the top like a carefully combed back. Roses reached towards it from below. I had stopped to photograph what I thought was an old, finished thing.

Then a bundle of straw appeared above the hedge. A woman on the roof took it from someone I could not see. She placed it beside her and separated a portion with both hands. From where I stood, her movements looked small against the roof's width. Each one left a slight alteration in the surface, visible for a moment before it became part of the whole.

On the ground, short pieces lay in the wheelbarrow and along the path. The cottage's neat outline depended on this temporary disorder. An open flask stood on a folded jacket. When the woman came down for a drink, she brushed loose strands from her sleeves but left one caught behind her ear. She looked back at the roof while answering my greeting.

I asked how she knew when a section was finished. She said she looked at it from several places, then asked whether I would mind moving a little to the left. From my new position, a shallow unevenness became visible near the edge. I had been admiring the entire roof without seeing it.

I put the camera away. Before leaving, I walked back down the lane and looked once more. The roof still seemed to belong to the cottage as naturally as the roses. Now I could also see the ladder, the wheelbarrow and the hands which had made that appearance possible.

How does the writer present the work of thatching in this passage?