Overly Exuberant

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Another shot of our visit to Scotney Castle. Loved this scene of the old castle. 

This morning I was in the presence of what I can only describe as an overly exuberant person. Being more on the introverted side of things, encounters like these test my patience. I can’t join in because of my sense of incongruence, and a deadened response to it is just plain bad manners. So I find myself, at times, in these rather uncomfortable and in-between places. Fortunately, over the years, I’ve mastered a subtle and measured form of enthusiasm, which I reserve specifically for these encounters. I applied it in this case and it served me well.

From my Sketchbook

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In the English landscape, you often see a single, sizable and old tree standing in a flat and expansive landscape. Although it has the look of loneliness about it, it’s locational rootedness is a positive affirmation of its presence and its right to be there. It makes no apologies for its presence.

Whenever I see such a tree, it affirms in me “my right to be here”  and I live and move through this beautiful world without any apology for my presence.

Daffodils

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Yesterday, in the soft rain, I walked over to where we park our car. The sky and everything else seemed so grey – all a bit depressing. Then I saw them, pressed up against the trunk of a tree, a glorious clump of Daffodils. As I looked at them I was ushered into my day with a new sense of joy and vigour, and my mind turned to one of my favourite poets:

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;

 

From my Sketchbook

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This scene of a section of the village a little way from ours, is one I pass regularly on my morning walks. Today, I decided to quickly sketch it. Not much sign of Spring yet, just one tree in full blossom.

Ruins

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There’s something wonderful about ruins. They speak of age, memory and past lives, and stand as a living protest against time’s destruction. There’s a dignity about them, even in their decaying and worn-out appearance.

These ruins are part of the old Scotney Castle in Kent. Loved our visit there. Took this shot with my iPhone.

To Be Amazed

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Passed this lichen on my walk yesterday.

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I’ve always been a great admirer of the poetry and writings of Mary Oliver. The other day I was going through some notes of mine and came across these words of hers – deeply touching. Sadly, she died in January 2019.

“When it’s over, I want to say: all my life I was a bride married to amazement. I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.”

She lived these words.

Champing The Grasses

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This morning I stopped alongside a fence and listened to a horse grazing in the field. It was a beautiful sound, breathy and hollow with an echoing kind of chomp, punctuated now and then by the slight sound of the grinding of teeth. It was a lovely moment and I was transported back to some of the words of a favourite poem of mine, “The Listeners” by Walter de La Mare:

Is there anybody there? said the Traveller,   
   Knocking on the moonlit door;
And his horse in the silence champed the grasses   
   Of the forest’s ferny floor:
I loved, and still love, the phrase – “The forest’s ferny floor” –  I can go on saying it forever – “The forest’s ferny floor” – and I can hear his horse in the silence champing away at the grasses.