Learning to live again

Sunday 13th September, 2020

I impressed myself today by letting the two chickens out in to their run at 6.43am. I was particularly delighted as I was able to see the sun rise over the horizon. It is a majestic inspiring sight. One is so dependent on such events and so ignorant of how they happen. One presumes on nature. That presumption can be arrogance. I walked this morning at 8.30am up the long drive to put out the blue dustbin for tomorrow's collection. Again a presumption that it will be collected, that our systems still function, that someone will remove and deal with my detritus.

The presumption re nature working was a little tarnished as I picked up a bag full of discarded rubbish. Even here in the midst of the countryside but on a canal I found 6 plastic bottles, a Tesco bag of thrown away picnic waste, two McDonald's coffee mugs, some sweet wrappings, four tissues and a few other bits and bobs. These I put in the dustbin to be collected but why, I wondered, are people just dropping them and not taking them to the appropriate place to throw away? We must husband, nurture, work with nature...and each other. Society has rules, laws for its better working so does nature.

I picked more blackberries. My attempt at crab apple and blackberry jelly yesterday had not set. So I emptied all the juice back in to a saucepan, re boiled and then decanted back in to the jars....I am now the proud owner of five jars of solid, tasty, colourful and well scented jelly. Sadly I had to find tops for my jars...I stole them from a pickle and from a mint sauce jar...those I have covered in foil.

At the same time I put my 2 lbs of damsons, my 3lbs of crab apples and my 1lb of blackberries in to a saucepan and boiled them and then drained the juice. I have not sufficient sugar nor sufficient numbers of jars to turn that juice in to jelly. Perhaps I will find discarded jars on the canal tow path!

The sun has been glorious. The tortoise has been out again munching dandelions, I have sunbathed a little, many canal barges have passed, the sheep have munched their way through the day....sadly I did shew off the fourteen wild duck which waited for the hen feed. My hostess had warned that we could not feed the whole canal flock of duck. She also said they bullied the chickens so I am protecting my own!

The dog ate her breakfast  and lunch. She can be fussy and temperamental. I am about to walk her again after the second feed of the chickens. I have to watch over them again as they produce an egg each per day. My lunch was two fresh, delicious boiled eggs.

I have read a little...and am engrossed by Yeats but also by the book ' When breath becomes air' by Paul Kalanithi. The latter is the autobiography of a very young brilliant neurosurgeon who died from cancer. It chronicles his last few months.

I end this with a quotation of Michel de Montaigne which Kalanithi puts at the start of his second chapter: " If I were a writer, I would compile a register, with a comment, of the various deaths of men: he who should teach men to die would at the same time teach them to live".

Some say the earth and its nature are dying, others say man is heading for apocalypse, yet others point to the virus and pandemic and warn of unfathomable challenges. Have we learned to live? Is this our opportunity not only as individuals but as a species?