Wishbone Soup Cures Everything

Today was a pop of spring in between rain warnings- the ground and air damp, the sky blue and white, the sun imbuing warmth- like a rainbow, it held promise. I walked awhile and noted where branches had snapped, where floods had swept stones and mud across roads, where spring bulbs and stems ne’ertheless pushed up through winter’s mulch.

The sky is all shade, no colour. It looks flat unless I stare, then I see evidence, no more than smudges: here was a cloud, gone now, rained out. The sky is ghosts. But the horizon is alive with stark beauty: winter trees, the silhouette of a lone crow. 

This morning we managed to finish the latest line of deadhedging on our land, the one that will catch the icy flow of air as it sneaks down into our tree corral, that will be excellent cover for the frogs we hope will soon find our first mini pond. At home snowdrops drift up banks- ants carry their seeds, they are gardeners too. Daffodil hordes begin to raise their colours, heralded by bold crocus. Evenings are light for longer, bit by bit, and though the weather wearies of surprising us, doubling back to storms, we are heartened, we are sturdy in the whirl and lash of winter’s middle month.

Homewards, I drive. Fog makes heavy work of driving, makes you concentrate to find the road. It gathers like a paste in the valleys, dissipates on peaks. As I guide my car up onto Bodmin Moor the view expands beyond the expected. A bridge of startling light all across the night sky, a bridge between worlds! The Aurora Borealis has me questioning my sanity until I'm home and everyone else can see it too. Even monochromatic it swells with magic: through a camera lens all the colours that a human eye can't catch are there.  We pull on boots and warm coats and walk into the middle of a field to see the whole sky open- and then clouds close the show, and cold pinches our skin. But we are satiated, happy to return to the cosy hearth, hearts full of wonder. 

It’s a misty commute. In several spots visibility dims to fog levels (less than 1000 metres if you are curious about the definition of fog) but there’s morning sun so it’s a bright obstruction. In fact here and there the air clears and sunlight is the cause of extreme squinting.  Last night’s journey was hazy like some weirdness was erasing the landscape- perhaps I would arrive home to find nothing there? I was intrigued. In the obscured I feel wrapped up rather than separated. I am in my hermit era. I am a soul happily cackling in the mist, on my own path.  But!  Every now and then I connect with outside life and a question sneaks out- What does lie ahead, beyond the fug of modern uncertainty?  And the answers bounce back like this:  the only place we can influence the future from (or the past) is the present: the best place to begin is here; the best time is now.  Small stuff adds up.  What seems set in stone forever is swept away by weather; certain...

Mr and me sit on our two piece sofa, one either side and each with a damp dog huddled beside. It has been healthy chaos here. Muddy prints spiral from the front door, soggy chew-toys are draped over carpet and tile.  Mr has been bundled up, fighting off a cold with rest and home remedies, while I have pottered through a rare day off: hid upstairs and remade a lightshade, boxed away some Xmas clothes, daydreamed. Downstairs, remade the fire, served up leftovers for lunch, walked the happy houseguests.  Mr drops into sleep, rumbling snores. The dogs begin their dream twitches.  If the clock worked I'd be listening to its tick. It does not work so we have set it at midnight to summon moon magic. So, in a way, the clock is functioning perfectly.