Autumn Cheer

Today is Michaelmas Day, and therefore a good day for getting rid of gremlins and bugbears and thorns in the flesh. (For those of you who don’t know such things, or haven’t got an Almanac handy on the shelf beside your computer, the Archangel Michael fought against Satan and his evil angels and cast them out of Paradise; hence my decision to cast out  Dark Days  and return to the brighter side of life.

I must also say how moved I was by the many kind and helpful replies I had, when I threw my weeping head on your collective bosom and nourishing crumbs of comfort promptly came my way. Thank you, dear all, your wise words have helped tremendously. Bless you.

It’s been a glorious day, the sun was at his most cheerful, bathing the hills around me in happy autumn tints. I’ll share a few of my discoveries with you by way of thanks and a general feeling of pleasure. I came across a man and his two collies, who has lived in Valley’s End for almost a year now. When I asked him if he liked it still, he said “Of course I do. Who wouldn’t.”

Can you see why he said that?

 I found a small clump of cyclamen in a hedge. Perhaps a bird dropped a seed 

and survival did the rest.

Seedheads are putting on a spectacular show at the moment.

There is beauty in nature at any time of the year’s cycle.

Smoke bush and willowherb form the most intricate patterns

and sunlight turns the tracery into spun gold.

The autumn garden isn’t half bad either.

Colours seem to be at their most intense just before dying.

(I know the physical reasons for this phenomenon,

just indulge my fancy and let me see something extraordinary

in the most ordinary course of the natural process.)

Somehow, today is special.