Sound

One of my favourite parts of the day is just after I water the greenhouse and close up the henhouse for the day. I take myself for a little walk up to the top of the garden, where our attempt to tame wilderness, blends into the woods behind. Beyond is our route to the woodland walk.

The path to the woods has become much busier. Families from the village are enjoying it, as part of their once a day exercise. From the drifts of conversation, I accidentally catch, it seems that some are discovering it for the first time. I like that. Nature on their doorstep that they are enjoying.

If they look up at our fence, they often see Hero peering over. He loves when they spot him, but he is puzzled by their lack of a dog sometimes. In his head, it is a dog walk.

Other than this new source of sound and the usual extra chatter of the birds in spring, I cannot tell you how quiet it has become. We live in a hamlet, just outside the village. A cluster of a few houses. Yet I barely hear the other houses, even though I know they are home.

We’re under the Bristol airport flight path, but planes are few and far between, at the moment. When we hear an aircraft now, I almost want to jump up and rush outside to see it. A connection to somewhere else.

There is far less traffic in our little lane. More pedestrians than cars, which is a turn around. The main road, about a mile away, is quieter too. The steady rumble of lorries heading to and fro from stores is heard, if the wind is in the right direction.

Only noise to break the quiet is when our three children go out and play badminton. Or when they garden with me. Seems that they cannot dig without chattering away. Not that I’m complaining. I like to hear them. I also like that they dug and planted three crops of potatoes too. This does make me a tad biased, I guess. I paid them in mini chocolate eggs, so a complete win-win for all.

(an aside: just so you know. Saying that “a family that digs together, survives together,” and any other similar, well-intended, inspirational combinations, does not go down well. Spades were downed and mutiny threats ensued. Sigh. My humour is lost on them.)

We are rolling up to the end of the Easter holidays. Back to school on Monday, albeit by not leaving the house. Three weeks into lockdown and at least another three weeks to go. I’m not surprised with the announcement last night. It is too soon.

The bluebells in our woods are just starting to open. I love the hazy blue they make en masse. They are mixed in with the white of the wood anemones. I prised the children away from their screens and took them for a walk, this week. The scent is sweet and floral.

I tried to make Easter weekend different from the rest of the days. Gone is the time when we would craft around the holiday theme, but I kept to our family traditions. Easter Sunday breakfast. Boiled eggs with faces drawn on them, followed by chocolate. There was also an Easter egg hunt around the garden. In the evening, we had roast lamb, followed by a film. Full tummies and lots of soul sustaining family time.

We also joined in a family Skype tea with my parents and my sister’s family. Lovely to see them.

Unlike the children, us adults have not been on holiday. After the manic of work, from the last few weeks, it is slowly returning to normal levels. Companies are looking for ways to cut costs, so they can ride through the lockdown and come out the other end. Fortunately we can still help them. I suspect lots of people had holiday booked over the Easter period, as the phone has not been ringing off the hook, as before. Some people have been furloughed, but not as many as you’d think.

I can see at the end of all this, people will be working smarter. It will look different.

Never to miss an opportunity, I have grabbed more time to potter around the garden. It’s at the stage before everything goes crazy and big. My greenhouse and windowsills are full of trays of seedlings. Almost ready to plant out. Looks like the spaghetti squash in the photo above will be the next to make the leap.

To give you some idea of the scale of my gardening this year, there are eleven of these squash plants and that is just one type of squash I am planting. Let alone the beans and sweetcorn, to complete my three sister planting.

I will partly gloss over the fact that Hero the hound took it into his head this morning to de head a tray of beans. I have no idea what got into him. Fortunately, the munching sound alerted me before too much harm was done. We don’t do guinea pig testing here. More like deerhound testing. Apparently, the beans come up to muster.

The one other new sound, took me by surprise the first time, even though I was expecting it. I’d just lost track of time. Back to my evening jaunts around the garden each evening. I was stood watching a bullfinch in the wild apple tree, with Hero by my side, when out of the blue, a canon was fired. And then again. Followed by dog barking, cheers and clapping. Saucepan bashing and whistling, coming across the fields. We may be out in the sticks, but when Somerset claps for the NHS and carers, you can hear it in all quarters. Hero sat down on his haunches, bemused. The bullfinch held its ground, or perch, and I joined in.

I hope the sound travelled far and wide.

Word of the Week linky

14 comments

  1. Those bluebells in the woods are so pretty. How lovely to have such a beautiful place to walk right on your doorstep. We don’t have any bluebell woods within walking distance (or at least not any that I’ve managed to find!) and I’m missing them this year. I can imagine it must be a little confusing for Hero to see lots of new walkers without dogs. Glad that you were able to make Easter weekend a little different. How lovely that Somerset is joining in so enthusiastically with the clap for carers. Sounds like you have had a productive week on the gardening front and so nice that the children have been joining in too. #WotW

    1. I hope you find a bluebell area near you. There must be one. Ye, I think Hero is always confused when people walk without a dog.

  2. You are very lucky to have such a beautiful wood near your home. I heard lots of clapping last night too, seems to be increasing in numbers and volume. We all joined in. I have some veg and herbs growing, more than I did last year but only have a small greenhouse thing, every little helps though. Your aside about the gardening mutiny made me laugh!

    1. Hope your garden grows well. And, yes, every bit helps. I might give up on my motivational phrases. What am I saying? Of course I won’t 😆

  3. Your nature photography is just gorgeous! Every week, I look forward to seeing your photos. The place where you live sounds beautiful.

    I used to pay my children in candy for helping me garden too. That lasted until my mother started paying them what we called “grandma wages”. It was just an excuse to slip them an extra $20! Then, working for chocolate was not so appealing anymore.

    1. Ha! I can see how the $20 would be more enticing. Not reached that point yet, but I’m sure it will happen one way or another.

  4. All the sounds sound so different at the moment. I am liking it.
    The lane at the back of our house has became busier with people going for their daily exercise. It is such a nice spot for a walk. The roads have become quieter here too apart from everyone who seem to have taken up jogging. lol
    Your Easter breakfast looks fab!

    1. There are so many more joggers. Our lane is usually so quiet. Just the regulars normally. Looks like we will be a fitter nation at this rate.

  5. Naughty Hero and the beans! I love how your posts always sound so calm and serene despite everything you manage to fit in. I guess that must come from living out in the sticks. I’m glad you heard the clapping though. I don’t go out the front to join in and see the neighbours. I do stand at my back door though. The bluebells are beautiful, one of my earliest members are visiting the bluebell woods with my Dad. I’ve taken my kids, but the last time I didn’t get very far and they didn’t want to leave me to explore, so it wasn’t so much fun. Still pretty though.

  6. ha ha that made me laugh, dogs are so cheeky, Alf has started visiting the neighbours garden this last week as if its his right ! I love how they have their own minds. It sounds very similar here to where you live, its so quiet, we did have a problem with crowds initialy however that seems to have settled down now thank goodness as it was overwhelming although the footfall is definitley increased, but I am enjoying the home time with my family x

Comments are closed.