Days of Our Lives

It’s a peaceful sort of a day. The sun feels hot on my back as I sit, cross-legged, filling pots with compost, taking pleasure in the feeling of the soil under my nails, resisting the urge (but only just) to make mud-pies. There’s a certain joy in potting up the window boxes and hanging baskets, marking the distances between the tiny plants to give them room to grow. The rhythmic crack of the polystyrene as I pop each plant out of its tray. The hole burrowed by hand into the damp compost. The springy feel of the earth as I firm each plant in to its new home. Then the pouring of water and the start of impatience – it seems like an age to wait for the plants to take hold and grow, sprouting flowers and trailing down the sides of the baskets. In truth, it will probably happen sooner than I think. One morning I will look out of the window and be taken by surprise by the myriad colours; the proof of life.

There’s a robin in my garden. He’s a cheeky sort of a chap, never far away when the garden fork appears, hoping for a fat, juicy worm or two. Strangely, the cat doesn’t seem interested in him. Maybe he’s just too small to be worth bothering with, but she continues to sun herself at my side, stretching onto her back, rubbing dust into her head and then giving me a quick sideways glance to check that I’m still watching her performance. Suddenly her attention is grabbed by something undetectable to human eye and she leaps into action, streaking up the walnut tree. Halfway up the tree she stops for a moment, hanging precariously, planning her route maybe; then she snakes her way up to the top, faster than greased lightning. Maybe she was in search of a sunnier spot, or maybe she just wanted to show me that she could do it. She sits, like the Cheshire Cat, waiting for Alice in the topmost branches.

(Originally published April 2006)

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