I can see that the oaks, once part of ancient hedgerows — wavy lines of hawthorn, oak and dog rose — have been set adrift again, floating islands on a furrowed sea.
Spending time in nature is good for our mental health and wellbeing. This might seem obvious, but it’s an idea now supported by reams of evidence-based research. I need to be in the green, but I also need culture and cities and grime and bustle. Is it possible to have both?
‘When we moved to the village, to our funny house, with all its quirks and corners, steps and riddles, it was the garden that got me.’
‘Yesterday blue fought through the cloud and the sun came out. In the walled garden, the birds sang, a hundred tiny voices making a chorus of good news.’
‘In the last week of March the blackthorn flowered. Rosettes as white as snowburied fields burst from stems black with witchcraft, from between the thorns of fairy tale and folklore; thorns whose vicious stab cast Sleeping Beauty into a hundred year sleep.’
“It was brutal, but wasn’t that what nature was, what we were, made brutal by our drive to survive?”
‘One day Theo handed me a roll of electric fencing. “Hold this for a second, Nels,” he said. “You won’t connect it, will you?” I ask. “Nah, course not,” he says.’
Learning to embrace imperfection in life and writing
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