Another Wet Wednesday
A festive wreath is waiting to be hung by the front door, but these winter days it is dark as I leave the house and dusk by the time I get home, so any outside tasks will have to wait until the weekend. The early gloom does make me extra sleepy, too. It’s frustrating, and I find by mid-week I’m longing to see my home in daylight, to spend a morning in a kitchen filled with watery winter sunlight. A chilly stroll to the post box with the seasonal greetings cards, returning with an armful of foraged ivy. A cup of tea on the doorstep with the cat. Leaving a small package of festive treats - a jar of candied walnuts or chocolate covered roasted hazelnuts on my neighbour’s porch. To sweep the floors and the hearth, dust the mantle and dresser shelves, catch up on laundry, and hoover out the crumbs under the sofa cushions - all without putting the big lights on!
Then, when the early evening arrives, tired but excited like a school worn child, crowing around for attention at 4.30pm, I would feel ready to sit down with it, to curl up on that sofa in its arms and enjoy its closeness. It is the rain to blame for my mood, I suppose: bright glistening days balance out the gloom, but through November we had just five dry days. I clutched them like a handful of jewels, rattling in my pocket as I clambered out of layers of waterproofs that pooled around my feet on the kitchen flagstones.
The hedge along the side of the garden, sits dense and scruffy edges; purple from the stems of hornbeam and dogwood, evergreens of yew and holly adding to its bulk. Small birds dart in and out along its length, hard to make out in the grey rain. as the evening clears and dries up for a spell just before dusk, a performance starts. A Song Thrush has chosen and emergent branch of yew as a theater, the rise of woods behind he sound board, the low finger of weak watery sun his spotlight. His pale breast is uplit against the rain darkened surroundings, vibrating with the force of his dropped notes.
