Postcard - No 7
23 March 2023 - on saving wild things…
Dearest friends, readers and writers and curious passers by, it’s wonderful to know you’re here sharing your time with mine again… how was your week?
Gentle, I hope?
A very welcome - too warm for March - spring sunshine has bewitched the hill this week. I say bewitched because it is, as it is so often, a false start. Temperatures have risen above 20c only to plummet again in a wicked Siberian wind. I could cry at the thought of all the tiny mirabelle blossom just setting fruit, the sloes too - another summer without clafoutis and winter without sloe gin - insert sad faced emoji of your choice - I am growling at Mother Nature’s sense of humour once again as I wrap my fur coat more tightly around my bikini… can she possibly be more fickle!
Probably…
Saving the wild things…
Skulduggery on the hill; snares have been placed over the entrances to one of the three badger setts. They are meticulously set, tiny forked twigs so gently holding the murderous slip wire open, the other end of which is tied to a log ten times the size of even the biggest brock. Zero chance of escape - the work of only one person… a furious flurry of very unladylike expletives follow - possibly loud enough to echo around the valley though I fervently hope not because I unset the snares on two separate evenings. I don’t risk a third despite the temptation.
He knows I know and I know he knows I know - checkmate - this does not sit well, my mood is dismal but not resigned.
Skulduggery is not exclusive.
Lizards are venturing out, I hear them rustling in dead leaves decaying on now warming earth in their mute search for just that perfectly heated spot. They are gone before I get close enough to even glimpse a departing tail, binocular vision their asset, not mine. Back at the house two others are trapped in a zinc bucket, fooled by the warmth of recently emptied hot cinders I scoop them up in my hands, warm enough to not cause shock and release them to continue their spring shenanigans. Do I imagine their look of gratitude as they disappear in their jerky zigzagging way?
At school there is a commotion. A dozen children are gathered around a huge plastic bag - about the size of one of those compost/leaf bags people with snooker table smooth lawns have - filled with footballs they are forbidden to use, in part due to constant disputes, in part due to all of them being flat anyway. On peering in and asking what they are doing, a cacophony of young voices all shout at once,
‘I’ll y a un bébé oiseau attrapé dedans’ There’s a baby bird trapped inside.
‘Il faut lui sauver Susie, il a peur…’ You must save it Susie, he is frightened!
And, as I peer in, from deep within the bag the open mouth of a young starling, its wide yellow outlined beak is almost hissing its voice so high and fearful. I reach in to gently ease terrified feathered shrieks out from between a ball with faded Barbie pink printing and several others too battered to decipher cartoon characters but as soon as I move a ball dislodges - wings stretch, ruffled feathers glint in the sun as it lifts and flaps, lifts and flaps. It is free amidst the cheers of happy Friday afternoon recreation.
“It’s a grand thing, to get leave to live”
― Nan Shepherd
I read an extraordinary and hauntingly beautiful essay by Jonathan Foster earlier this week, I truly recommend you do too…
Also, a gentle book circle is beginning, Luisa Skinner not only writes around the edges but reads around the seasons also. The first book chosen is Ruth Allen’s most recent book ‘Weathering’, a book about ‘How the earth’s deep wisdom can help us endure life’s storms’ do click below for all the delicious details.
With love to all,
Hi Susie. Here I am still, in large part thanks to your early encouragement :-) I was just this week starting a new piece which hinges around saving some wild things and a bucket! I like those strange coincidences when miles apart and unknown to one another we are word-wrestling to capture the same strange ambiguities.
Oh that poor bird, but also, I'm glad it is free.