Liberation day

Whilst I retired, officially, on 30 April, as I don’t usually work on Thursday or Friday today was the first day when I am “at large” when I would otherwise be working. I won’t lie – it has been tremendous.

The day started a bit rainy, but Lyra and I had a lovely long walk. I was wearing my quite excellent new wellies and feeling fairly indestructible, so we explored the little wood rather than skirting it. It was a chaotic jumble of mouldering trees, ferns and wild strawberries, brambles and raspberries, navigable only by deer and rabbit track . The smell, in the light rain, was the sharp green of new growth. It reminded me a lot of the waterside where I grew up, where I, and most of the other local children, ran more or less feral all summer. There were dens and a rope swing, the river to platch in and plenty of roseships for itchy coos. Nowadays it has been tidied and paths laid and it is much more accessible to dog walkers and strollers, which is great, but also a little sad as we kids had it all to ourselves when it was a wilderness.

Throughout our walk Lyra was very tolerant of my photographic endeavours and I was reasonably tolerant of her mission to explore Keith Kerr’s garden (as was Keith who had to come down off his roof (he is a slater) to help entice her back – NB for anyone who is confused, my husband is also a Keith, as is our architect and one of the local joiners – you will just have to keep up).

Since then I have given a motivational lecture to the seeds in the greenhouse, finished sewing a batch of facemarks – latest colour is very Handmaid’s Tale – listened to three James O’ Brien podcast interviews (which I heartily recommend) and done a bit of painting.

Seriously, what is not to like.